We received the exciting news that Bryan Cranston would be reprising his role as Breaking Bad's Walter White in the sixth and final season of Better Call Saul. Although Cranston briefly returned to his iconic role for a cameo appearance in the 2019 epilogue film El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie, it will be interesting to see how Walt is incorporated in the prequel story. Cranston’s performance is often hailed as one of the best in television history, and it's not the only iconic TV character he’s embodied. Cranston has also been awarded for his roles as Hal on Malcolm in the Middle and Michael Desiato in Your Honor.

However, Cranston has been popping up in films since the 1980s. Although he only played smaller roles, Cranston has appeared in such classics as Apollo 13, Saving Private Ryan, Detachment, That Thing You Do!, Little Miss Sunshine, and The Lincoln Lawyer, just to name a few! It’s always been impressive how Cranston has been able to turn in respectable performances, regardless of a film’s quality.

While it's hard for any actor to distinguish themselves after playing a character as iconic as Walter White, hopefully Cranston will continue to get larger roles with his upcoming slate of films. Here are his nine greatest film performances so far.

RELATED: Bryan Cranston's 'Your Honor' Renewed for Season 2 on Showtime

Shannon in Drive (2011)

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Image via FilmDistrict

Drive distinguished itself from other neo-noir thrillers with Nicholas Winding Refn’s combination of slick stylized editing and a realistic depiction of the criminal underworld. Refn cast many established actors against type; it's the comedy icon Albert Brooks who plays the ruthless gangster Bernie Rose, and Cranston as the cowardly mechanic shop owner Shannon. Shannon plays an important role in getting the Driver (Ryan Gosling) to return to his former criminal ways. He unwittingly puts the Driver’s love interest Irene (Carey Mulligan) in danger before he suffers his gruesome fate.

Lyle Haggerty in Contagion (2011)

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Image via Warner Bros.

It’s hard to keep track of all the great actors that appear in Steven Soderbergh’s prophetic masterpiece Contagion. Nonetheless, Cranston plays one of the most important characters in the film. Rear Admiral Lyle Haggerty leads the government response to the virus, which screenwriter Scott Z. Burns researched extensively. Cranston has admitted in subsequent interviews that the coordinated efforts that the United States takes in the film gave him “false confidence” ahead of the COVID-19 crisis.

Jack O'Donnell in Argo (2012)

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Similar to Contagion, Argo features many great actors like Cranston as the various Hollywood and government figures, who all worked together to rescue the American hostages trapped in Tehran during the Iranian Revolution. Cranston co-starred as Tony Mendez’s (Ben Affleck) CIA supervisor, who hastily agrees to the plan to stage a fake movie production. Argo does a great job at satirizing Hollywood, but Cranston adds some humor to the military scenes. “This is the best bad idea we have,” he quips at one point.

Joe Brody in Godzilla (2014)

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The entire Monsterverse has struggled to create compelling human characters to give the epic kaiju brawls actual emotional stakes. Although 2014’s Godzilla isn’t well-written overall, the opening sequence where Joe Brody (Cranston) loses his wife Sandra (Juliette Binoche) during a research mission is gripping. It gave Brody an interesting character arc, as he grows paranoid by his obsessive research. The brief scenes in which he gets to bond with his son Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) are the rare emotional moments in the entire franchise.

Dalton Trumbo in Trumbo (2015)

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Image via Bleecker Street

After years of being awarded by the television industry, Cranston finally broke through and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for his performance as Dalton Trumbo. Trumbo is a classic example of a mediocre film that’s elevated by a dynamic lead actor. Cranston shows the hardships that the Spartacus screenwriter went through after he was blacklisted from Hollywood for his Socialist views. Cranston perfectly captures the eloquent, creative nature of an artist whose work is as important as his politics.

Robert Mazur in The Infiltrator (2016)

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One of the best things about Cranston’s work on Breaking Bad was how he added a realistic familial dynamic to the crime story. He brought out a similar sense of empathy in the underrated crime thriller The Infiltrator. Based on a true story, the film follows the U.S. secret agent Robert Mazur, who goes undercover in the Mexican drug cartel to infiltrate Pablo Escobar’s money-laundering scheme. Pretending to be a violent criminal strains Mazur’s relationship with his wife and family.

Ned Fleming in Why Him? (2016)

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Image via Fox

After playing one of the most beloved sitcom dads ever, Cranston returned to the comedy world to play another awkward father in the comedy Why Him? You could easily mistake Ned Fleming for The Simpsons’ Ned Flanders; he’s a perpetually nervous, traditional family man who is caught in over his head when he’s faced with drugs, language, and sex. Ned grows uncomfortable when his daughter Stephanie (Zoey Deutch) announces her engagement to the exotic tech billionaire Laird Mayhew (James Franco). Ned struggles to support his daughter’s decision when the Flemings spend a rambunctious weekend at Laird’s mansion.

Sal Nealon in Last Flag Flying (2017)

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Image via Amazon Studios

Cranston certainly had big shoes to fit into when he was cast in Richard Linklater’s Last Flag Flying; the film was conceived as a “semi-sequel” to Hal Ashby’s 1973 classic The Last Detail, with Cranston as Linklater’s equivalent to Jack Nicholson. Cranston’s Sal Nealon joins his old companions from the Vietnam War. Al and Robert Mueller (Laurence Fishburne) learn that their younger friend Doc Shepard’s (Steve Carrell) son was killed in the Iraq War, and travel with him to the funeral. Sal provides the same comedic relief that Nicholson did, but is faced with reality that his sacrifices have been forgotten.

Chief in Isle of Dogs (2017)

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Image via Fox Searchlight

Although he’s given many great vocal over performances throughout his career, Cranston’s best animated work to date was his role as the dog Chief in Wes Anderson’s stop-motion comedy Isle of Dogs. Chief is the leader of a pack of stray dogs trapped on a “Trash Island” outside Japan. Chief is a gruff, no-nonsense leader, but he takes sympathy on the young boy Atari Kobayashi (Koyu Rankin), who searches the island for his lost dog Spots (Liev Schreiber). Chief recognizes the boy’s devotion, and allows him to join the pack as they search for the lost dog.