Better Call Saul

xxpost - kinder, my comment at the time was basically complaining about “all the annoying BB fanservice”. O_o
idk wtf my problem was, obv i am a better person now than i was 3 years ago lol

<3 Nacho <3

This might be my favorite TV show right now but it still feels like two different shows to me, a gripping one about Jimmy that tells stories I've never seen on television before, and a much more contention crime one about Mike.

The problem was actually worse in S3 with the addition of Gus and all those other BB characters, who were often quite literally retelling stories we've already seen in BB. Like, learning about the Los Pollos and Madigral drug fronts are not as exciting the second time around because... we've literally seen them explained on the previous show.

also (SPOILER) the season three finale closes the door on everything I found most interesting about the show (the Chuck/Jimmy relationship, the law firm intrigue, the class action suit, Jimmy's relationship with elderly clients). The show had to move on, but I'm gonna miss all that stuff

xp that kind of redundancy could never bother me in a show so beautifully realised - the standard complaint against prequels is that foregone conclusions aren't interesting but a) that's wrong, cf all tragedy and b) those conclusions are not exactly unforegone in the original

Sincerely, a fwwm stan

The thing I love is the way show lives in the grey areas of morality & behaviour. It’s pretty rare to find shows that are confident enough to do that.

And the Jimmy/Chuck story is on some kind modern-day Greek tragedy arc that I cannot get enough of. I think about it all the time, and how even though its obv heightened for tv, so much of the emotion & motivation of both characters is SO relatable, sibling-wise
Esp if you have ever experienced the fuckup/not-fuckup dynamic

Chuck is only slightly below Walter White on the hatefulness scale imo, he just happens to also be mentally ill and technically "right" on some incidental points - this is a v smart choice on the writers' part

wins relentlessly otm

yeah, BB was very black and white in its conviction that bad actions have bad consequences; that show was obsessed with collateral damage. But Chuck is roughly as culpable in his downfall as Jimmy was (well, maybe not, depending on how you view his mental illness, but that's the beauty of grey areas).

interesting parallel in the season finales: In S2, Jimmy does the right thing by coming clean to Chuck. But he still doesn't follow through and take responsibility for his actions. In S3, Jimmy rights his wrong and clears the old lady's name, at great and permanent personal sacrifice. His path to villain hood is a lot less linear than Walter White's

chuck seems to believe that doing what is legally right equates to showing love. but he’s incapable of actually expressing which leaves him with nothing other than the law to back him up.
jimmy so far (s3 e5) is still capable of expressing love but he often uses love to justify making really bad decisions. he’ll choose what feels morally right/satisying over what is legally right, but the kindness he shows people in life generates a reserve of good will that can keep him afloat when he fucks up.

and that’s what chuck can’t understand.

it’s not that chuck is bad and jimmy is good, or vice versa, it’s that they just both have really jacked up ways of showing love lol

s3 episode 9

welp

i guess it’s officially goodbye caring Jimmy, hello proto-Saul :/
i wanna crawl through the tv & shake him! this shit he’s pulling on poor sweet Irene makes me want to cry ;_;

this is the best show, but a disconnected battery is not a current source.

oh god i’ve been bawling non-stop through episode 10

chuck’s breakdown is so hard to watch.

Yeah. S3 is really intense. I can’t wait for the next one. It’s my favorite ongoing show, I think

oh god that ending

why did u make me watch this show i hate you all

poor chuck. he’s a motherfucker but oh god that destroyed me

;_;

i reread the thread & i’m surprised at the few underwhelmed comments re season 3 and/or the final ep. i thought it really shaded the greys so beautifully. and i love that it doesn’t put a bow on every plotline, but unravels or tangles one with another... it feels like a lived-in world where “plots” ie ppls lives ebb & flow or mistakes just repeat/repeat/repeat til they break and form new patterns.

dramatically, it’s so studied and beautiful that it looks boring bcz it mirrors so much of life irl; and yet still heightens it to make it watchable & interesting. that’s why it’s SO good.

sorry for shitposting - one last thing

Francesca, Kim & Jimmy’s receptionist?
She’s Saul’s receptionist in BB. <3
She’s the one he says “How bout I follow you home?” which is even more O_o now that we’ve met her etc

So when Jimmy mentions Chuck's condition to the malpractice insurance representative, grinning mischievously, he did have any real plan or was he just being vindictive?

I get that he was reeling from his own financial losses, but in hindsight the spitefulness of that act (which set in motion the events that killed Chuck) seemed out of character. He'd already defeated/humiliated Chuck, and generally he was only willing to harm his brother when it was to protect his own interests; he rarely plotted against Chuck out of pure spite

I think he was just in a dark-ass mood at that point. Wasn't that just after his seething monologue at the bar?

considering watching all of this again

Just kind of an interesting choice narratively. In the end it's not any of Jimmy's scheming, conniving, or half-rationalized attempts to do something good that brings about the show's great tragedy. It was an uncharacteristic act of malice.

it felt spontaneous. jimmy had just learned about his own insurance increasing 150%. I read it to be a large part of what he regrets in his last talk with chuck. I don't know that jimmmy expected it to lead to chuck's forced retirement. just good at tearing things down.

yeah i think he felt that chuck had ruined him & in that moment decided fuck it, why should i be the only one suffering, i’ll ruin him right back etc

all good points. it's yet another incremental step towards the total amorality that would lead him to suggest that Walt and Jesse kill Badger in S2 of BB.

sucks so hard that s4 got delayed till the fall

agree

I don't think it's been delayed at all? They started shooting this year and haven't even announced an airdate yet

Sorta delayed, the first two seasons both premiered in April, season 3 in June. This one won't be until August or September (as I read in that Odenkirk interview w/ yo la tengo), so just a longer wait than previously.

i started listening to the podcast bcz i’m
a saddo & quick sidebar (same sidebar i had with the breaking bad podcast):

kelley YOUR QUESTIONS ARE TOO LONG. it takes you five minutes to ask anyone anything or you include all the stuff they’re waiting to say in your question or you talk over them aaagghhh

i mean love the convos but girl, my god, you gotta chill

...just a longer wait than previously

or exactly the same wait as last year!

I've listened to the podcast a little, I can't imagine being able to follow it unless you're listening 100% week by week. although they often get super-confused themselves bcz they don't record it week by week.

or exactly the same wait as last year!

ha, yeah, true. just feels longer this time i guess.

Renewed for Season 5, back on Monday August 6th.

:D

Finished Breaking Bad over the winter, just about to stat the last season of The Wire; Saul is next up (so I'll have to catch the upcoming season on rerun).

"start"--Freudian slip brought on by the stat-crazed higher-ups on The Wire.

s4 now on Netflix!

Not in America, the first episode only aired tonight, and that one wasn't even on the AMC app for hours afterward. Guess the next 9 weeks' ratings'll plummet if we can torrent the entire season tomorrow.

It's not dropping all at once anywhere, AFAICT.

aw man. The email from Netflix literally says 'season 4 now on Netflix' but I guess it's only ep1. Never mind, I quite like watching this week to week.

I'd happily re-watch the whole series if I had the time

got lost during s3 and didn't manage to work out where i was

I'm seven episodes into the first season. I've liked everything so far, except maybe the episode with the billboard. Loved how they used Tuco as a link in the first episode.

got lost during s3 and didn't manage to work out where i was

Albuquerqe iirc

i accidentally ran across this analysis of chuck and jimmy recently and think it's worth sharing. spoilers abound, even in the title, so here's the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ddHGpQm9oE

like a lot of you, i haven't watched in quite a while and kind of forgot what was going on, so it also serves as a decent refresher of where at least one of the storylines currently sits

NO!! i thought my formatting would just make it a link instead of embedding the video. welp, sorry about that. chuck goes through some shit in this show, spoilers

v excited about this

this show is really outstanding. I probably prefer it to Breaking Bad, probably because I find the characters more likable and somehow what we already know about the characters who carry over from BB doesn't cheapen their appearances but deepens them. And whether or not a prequel was the plan initially (I sincerely doubt it), the writers seem to have left enough room, left enough unsaid, and planted enough clues throughout BB to allow for that richness. I'm particularly fond of the single mention of Nacho in BB turning into a completely outstanding character here, and what I imagine will be a lot of filling in of the gaps around Mike's comment protesting Walter and Jesse sparing Lydia (something akin to "you don't know what she's capable of" or whatever.) And surprisingly the Gus backstory has a lot of room to grow as well.

it is def better than Breaking Bad

also I've never seen Rhea Seehorn in anything before but she is *incredible*

it's not as exciting or as intense as breaking bad but it's deeper and more fulfilling.