Better Call Saul

oooh maybe!

Kim is super smart and seehorn plays that so well. You could see her putting things together well before she found the cup

I feel like she is going to survive the series. given we know how vindictive and motivated by revenge we know Saul is it would be pretty odd if all the BB stuff happens without any mention of the cartel having murdered his wife. also, I can't imagine they'd take care of her without offing Saul as well. of course she could die in a different way but I don't think they'll do it.

still I think Lalo is my favorite character, maybe one of the best TV villains I've ever seen. he's got Gus's intellect and intuition, Tuco's impulsiveness & ruthlessness, and Saul's charm, plus a supernatural ability to jump long spaces (??). you really never know what he's going to do at any point in time and he's way more fun to watch than Gus is.

Possible Gene/Kim encounter in final series?

idk if he’s more fun to watch than gus. it’s definitely a more outward-facing performance but gus’s rectitude and fastidiousness can be fascinating, like in the climactic scene from the “salud” breaking bad ep or just a couple weeks ago when he was comforting the german executive.

Maybe Gus is killed in BCS and Kim becomes him in a mask and voice lessons

Yeah, Lalo has turned out to be a fantastic character--I say turned out because at first, maybe only for an episode, he seemed to me to be a little too show-offy or something. His control throughout the whole last scene--great acting often involves watching someone think--was scary.

yeah, at first Lalo drove me nuts as I thought he was going to be a temporary heavy that wound up getting smacked down by Eladio and his underboss for his recklessness, but his calculated menace, the absence of limits in his code makes him a great foil for Fring. Fring isn't above killing wives and children, but even he generally only crosses that bridge where necessary. he showed too much mercy to Walt.

Lalo will kill a random travel agency guy, no matter how unlikely that this guy would go to the feds, because fuck it, why not, I have nothing to do this afternoon, and it eliminates a loose end.

do have one question - was he grilling Jimmy about his inconsistent story because he wanted to be aware of a possible threat to him when he went back to Mexico? is he purely angry that Jimmy lied to him and couldn't be trusted, even though that lie means he actually went through much more to protect Lalo's money? i assumed he wants to make sure he isn't about to get whacked.

kinda glad Fring isn't the most interesting baddie this time around. he was wonderful in BB because he came out of nowhere and you only gradually learned of what a truly ruthless boss he was. you already knew that coming in with BCS so it's nice to see him still have a role but not quite as central.

also jfc did we have to see Jimmy drinking pee

🤮

I have some of those same questions about his interrogation of Jimmy, but didn't ask them because...I had even more basic questions at one point and was a little embarrassed. At first I was even wondering why Jimmy didn't simply say he was ambushed, and then it occurred to me, duh, that that raises the question of how he escaped, which leads to Mike, etc., etc. But what exactly Lalo was after, I'm not 100% sure; best guess is that he knows something's going on and is trying to piece together what exactly that is, but getting his $7 million was enough that he'll postpone any immediate action.

it felt something like game recognize game, but not that exactly ; Lalo’s like, ok if your gambit is like THIS & you’re this committed to faking me out then i’ll just tap out & see where this goes

like jimmy & kim may now have sent him on a whole new path

Hasnt lalo been the one asking who Mike is for some time? Was he trying to root out Mikes involvement?

He can't let it lie when something feels off. C.f. trying to find out what "completing the south wall" was, driving him mad

Anyone would be asking those questions in lalo’s position. He may not even suspect mike’s (& therefore fring’s) involvement, though he probably does, but he can see that a) armed criminals made a play for his money b) jimmy somehow survived c) he is lying about it. That’s all suspicious as hell, why wouldn’t he go back for the real story? It doesn’t take a chessmaster

I loved the jump onto the car

I really thought Lalo was going to punch the fish tank.

The fish tank! Even that was tense.

if I recall correctly the creators mentioned something about Season 6 featuring episodes that would be set during the events of Breaking Bad. that clearly seems to me like they're gonna fill in what happened to Kim. I can't imagine what else they'd do.

She's in the hotel with Huell

If Lalo just wanted the story, and indeed suspected Saul of something fishy (!), then he could have just made Saul show him his cell phone call history

Wasn't his phone dead out in the desert? Maybe you mean earlier calls, but I thought Jimmy uses burners by this point.

I dunno, where would he get them from?

lol

Tonight's the closer. There's gotta be somebody who doesn't make it to S6.

I started binge-watching BCS for the second time around before *gesticulates listlessly* all this happened and it's been sort of keeping me going, something I really enjoy. I know how pathetic that sounds. But after tomorrow I won't have it any more!

Season 6 probably won’t be filmed for a while and if I’d have to guess it’ll probably be like two mini seasons

Don't read this till you're caught up...Great last shot (even though Lalo's escape is a tad Stallone/Schwarzenegger-like). I'm sure I'm not alone in remembering very little about Sandpiper--does that go back two or three seasons?

Sandpiper goes all the way back to the first season. The things I can't remember are (a) why Jimmy still has so much hostility for Howard and (b) why Kim has any grudge against Howard at all.

This long Rolling Stone piece provides a credible explanation for Kim's motivations. I had to laugh tonight when a perplexed Jimmy asked Mike why he had to lie to Lalo about being ambushed--exactly the same question I mentioned with embarrassment above. I think the person watching is supposed to have a broader understanding of what's going on than a character in the middle of everything.

http://www.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-recaps/better-call-saul-season-5-finale-recap-something-unforgivable-984335/

In the interview accompanying that piece, Gould notes that Gilligan is returning to write on the final season.

Eladio's amusement over Nacho not wanting to have to look over his shoulder anymore was funny: "You might be in the wrong business."

disintegration of the sound of Lalo's footsteps on the gravel into his angry heartbeat was very effective I thought.
Frustrating cliffhanger in that it set up more questions than it answered but i guess that's why they call it a cliffhanger.

FRUNK

Professor Frunk (also almost a play on Fring...).

Can't find a still for the sake of comparison, but Lalo limping away at the end reminded me so much of Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men, I thought it might have been an intentional allusion.

https://media.giphy.com/media/iDyF9dOL6nG4uS2S1z/giphy.gif

it makes perfect sense that eladio would be delighted by lalo, since it falls on his right-hand bolsa to clean up all the messages. eladio can just enjoy his charmingly sleazy antics like the viewer at home.

We were supposed to think it was a setup, right, for a moment there, when Nacho comes out at 2.55am and sees Lalo sitting waiting by the back gate?
Then I remembered Mike knew about it. The moment Mike assured Jimmy it was happening, I knew it wasn't happening.

Also did Don Eladio always look like a cross between David Hasselhoff and Lionel Blair? Maybe all those yellow filters were flattering idk.

We were supposed to think it was a setup, right, for a moment there, when Nacho comes out at 2.55am and sees Lalo sitting waiting by the back gate?

Without thinking about Mike or anything else, that's exactly what I thought, that Lalo was onto everything. (I did find it a little bit of a stretch that he wasn't suspicious of Nacho's 3:00 a.m. wanderings.)

I still think that he thinks of Nacho as a tracking device: maybe he'll go the "good" way, maybe not, but anyway useful. Still, Lalo had to go check out that kitchen thing (how did Nacho know this was just like what those morons used to do, use a burner as a lighter, then forget to turn it off)
So did Eladio order the hit on the guys who ambushed Jimmy, did he order the hit on Lalo? Trying both times to help Fring?

lol @ that Lalo gif

yeah grabbing that for future memes

was so pleased to find it on giphy as soon as I finished watching

I haven't thought about hair-removal product Nair in at least a decade, then this afternoon my son's school exercise involved made-up words from the teacher, including 'nair'. Then Jimmy talked about it! NAIR

Eladio looks older on this show than he did on BB

one of two Scarface alum on the show

favorite moment in this ep (maybe all season): Howard narcing on Jimmy’s antics in “this is v serious tone” & Kim just stands there expressionless for a beat & then busts out laughing

god love her

Rhea Seehorn seemingly at the Alison Janney god-level of being able to laugh genuinely on command

Nacho didn't use the burner as a lighter -- he was rigging a grease smoke and possibly grease fire (callback to the Los Pollos Hermanos grease fire) in an attempt to cause a distraction, but it turns out Lalo interpreted that as his lackey using the burner as a lighter.

Kim just stands there expressionless for a beat & then busts out laughing

Once again, I was fooled. My first thought was the laughter was a show for Howard, and that she'd then go home and confront Jimmy, especially over the hookers. But I'm finally clear-eyed on Kim (cf. that Rolling Stone piece): she's just as, if not more, devious than Jimmy.

Her destructive streak is just better concealed

(I mean devious-clever, not devious-evil; it's Howard we're talking about.)