Better Call Saul

taxi driver freaked me OUT
he looked like William Forsythe & I was so sure something bad was going to happen (mainly bcz I was so convinced it really WAS Forsythe)

The guy with the baseball cards (three episodes into Season--not sure if he'll be back): he seems to have based his performance on William Macy in Fargo, but he was great.

he looked like a nerdy Rob Cordry

My most bingiest binge since Mad Men: Season 2 on Friday, Season 3 on Saturday. No repeat of the Season 4 debut today, before the second episode tomorrow--I probably missed a bunch of them all week--so I'll have to wait on the new season.

I liked the first two seasons a lot, found the third wandered. The performances by the new actors are great (i.e., those not in Breaking Bad--I'll call them by their character's name): Kim, Chuck, Nacho, lesser roles like Ernesto and the baseball card guy. There were two things that lost me a bit in the third season. (Specifics ahead.) Mike's surveillance as he tried to figure out what was going on with Hector's crew--the gas caps and all that--seemed to go on and on. They could have scaled that back a lot. Also, as great as Michael McKean is, I thought his story should have more or less ended with his courtroom meltdown and the subsequent shot of him cowering behind his door. With everything that happened after that, I'd had enough of him. All I really learned that hadn't already been made clear was that the director and writers have seen The Conversation.

Loved "Sugar Town" to start Season 3.

Mike's surveillance as he tried to figure out what was going on with Hector's crew--the gas caps and all that--seemed to go on and on. They could have scaled that back a lot.

get out

lol otm

Mike might be the most meticulous character on television

almost to the extent I’m convinced that if every character he advised did exactly what he said, nothing would ever go wrong

if that happened we wouldn’t get his glaring and exasperated looks, though. and those are truly rewarding

I get that it was totally in character with Mike; I already knew that. As a viewer, for me, it just dragged on.

Actually, the post before is part of why I was getting impatient: I love Mike's interactions with other characters so much--his words, those looks--having him out there in the desert on his own isn't as interesting.

Mike Doing Stuff whether laying concrete or inspecting a warehouse is one of the joys of this series - not just him, tho, it’s full of long scenes of intelligent ppl meticulously doing shit (often but not always schemes). Very here for the ambient heist movie vibe in general, this was one of the few tv shows I thought of when watching the new twin peaks - particularly the pre-reveal dr jacoby scenes where he carefully painted shovels for several minutes

I really liked him setting up the playground, especially the subtle flirtation with Anita. If they launch another spin-off, I would absolutely watch Mike Saying Stuff. Mike Doing Stuff, maybe.

I’m still laughing at “oh the soaker hosea you were making!”

mike itemizes his tax deductions to absolute perfection, saving over $1400 compared to the standard deduction: season 4

mike is one of the best all time tv characters

SPOILERS for last night's episode to follow.

I don't understand how Gus knows about Nacho scheming to kill Hector with the fake pills. Or, for that matter, how he's so sure that Nacho had anything at all to do with Hector's stroke. All we're shown, as far as I remember, is Gus looking intently at Nacho handing off the pills to the EMT. How does Gus infer anything at all from that?

Something to do with the report he was staring at in this episode confirmed his suspicion maybe?

Oh yeah, that could be it. But in that case the report would have to have clearly indicated that Hector hadn't been taking his medication. There's no reason to think Gus would be able to infer that on his own from the results of a brain scan--he's a chemist by training, not a doctor.

I'm worried that we're just supposed to accept that Gus figured it out because he's really really smart. Kind of like how we were meant to accept that Walt found a way to poison Brock near the end of Breaking Bad, even though it's never shown or explained and Vince Gilligan has admitted that he doesn't have a specific idea of how it was done.

I guess that's a pitfall of having shows based around brilliant, hyper-meticulous characters. "Whenever you notice something like that... a genius did it."

Come to think of it, I feel similarly about this business with the doctor from Johns Hopkins. Gus "got a grant to come through", got everything cleared with both hospitals, and got a specialist to come from Baltimore to Albuquerque all in what, a few days? I don't know about that.

$$$$

Sure, but you'd still have to make all the bribery and threats look legit on paper. It can't just be "hello, I'm a wealthy businessman from New Mexico. I want one of your doctors immediately. Here's a zillion bucks. We'll tell everyone it's a grant" and it's a done deal inside of a weekend.

We are supposed to accept it cause in this world everyone who isn’t an idiot is a genius. Gus was portrayed as virtually omnipotent in bb!

I never got the complaint about the brock thing either. We’ve seen Walter pull off so many outlandish stunts by that point that it’s not exactly difficult to swallow that he managed to put some berries in a dumb kid’s food or something. I’m sure that writers’ room would have come up with something if they intended to show it to us, but that would have ruined the reveal. At its heart breaking bad is genre fiction and it thrives on unlikely convolutions, but it takes way fewer short cuts than most shows of this type

I mean a guy who left work as a professional scientist and was working as a high school teacher was able to jump into meth cooking and within a short period somehow come up with product that was better than what an established cartel was working on

I'm perfectly fine with unlikely convolutions--in fact, I demand them--as long as they're depicted in an exciting and understandable way. Nacho's scheme with the pills was unlikely, but it was riveting to see how he pulled it off.

On the other hand, it's no fun at all for the show to say, in effect, "we've shown you that this character can do all kinds of devious things, just give us this one". The whole reason it's fun is because we get to see how they do it. It's better to be shown than told.

(And it wouldn't have ruined the reveal for Brock's poisoning to be explained after the fact.)

I mean a guy who left work as a professional scientist and was working as a high school teacher was able to jump into meth cooking and within a short period somehow come up with product that was better than what an established cartel was working on

Well sure, but that's just the conceit of the show. Some people are extremely brilliant in a way that their station in life doesn't reflect. I don't need a scientific explanation of Walt's chemistry genius any more than I need a neurological explanation of how Jimmy is such a good con artist. But once the conceit is established, I want the plot to make sense, or so help me god, I'll post mildly-worded complaints online.

Don't forget: one of Gus's guys was watching Nacho when he chucked the pills into the river. I don't know what he saw exactly, but he was presumably keeping an eye on him for a reason.

(Sorry, though: Brock thing still bugs me to this day. It's like marveling at the intricacy of a Goldberg machine and noticing a box haphazardly stuck in the middle with 'JUST TRUST ME ON THIS PART' scrawled on its side.)

I barely remember who Brock is

Can we talk about Jimmy’s job interview... I nearly stood up and clapped I was so in love with how that played out.

Also characterwise an awesome illustration of the push & pull within him

yeah, it was a fantastic demonstration of the crossroads he's at now. use his skills for good? or bad, or neutral? use them at all without the chance for personal aggrandisement? support and be in service to Kim, or tear her down through jealousy / incidentally via his own hubris? he WANTS to do the "right" thing for her, and freed from the burden of his care for / anger at Chuck, there's the chance to dedicate himself to somebody who actually returns his love, but he has never learnt how to do that, and always always always wants recognition for his cleverness. when he was doing the elder law, getting the genuine positive feedback from his clients was neeearly enough to fill that need... but selling a machine to businesses isn't going to cut it.

also, of course, it was a parallel to Mike: going into a business and telling them how they're fucking up. but Mike can cast that as a + for both parties, and for Jimmy it brings contempt for both. I'm in no hurry to see Saul come into being*, but it was nice to have that little setup for their narratives coming back together next week.


*bcz there's no way that can bode well for Kim

It just made me feel sad because they were completely average people who don’t need to harden their lives for scammers

I mean, everyone is a target of scamming but their stakes here were low, and it’s evidence of him turning his eye for seeing vulnerability into a complete disdain for human weakness. His scheme he is calling Mike about is stealing their collectibles off the shelf! If Mike even opts in, he’s going to be rolling his eyes.

i loved Kim’s scene with Howard too, he looked like he was gonna pee himself by the time she walked outta there!!

I'm hoping the Hummels just inspired some other scheme in Jimmy's mind, wld hate it if he's just doing job interviews to case places

yeah me too

Scene with Kim going Dark Phoenix on Howard was AMAZING.

(And it wouldn't have ruined the reveal for Brock's poisoning to be explained after the fact.)

The lily-of-the-valley reveal is literally the final shot of season 4! When is this apparently necessary ex post facto here’s-how-he-did-it scene meant to take place, at the beginning of the next season? Who cares at that point?

would this show be understandable if you never watched breaking bad?

With a bare minimum amount of intro, I'd say yeah.

Yes, absolutely. There are moments where the context of what's to come adds some texture to what's taking place but I don't think it's anything insurmountable. There are scant flash-forward scenes of Saul post-Breaking Bad that might get a little lost in translation (it might help a touch to know how he wound up where he is in the present day), but there's very little in those scenes that directly references the previous show.

Like, "Here's the story of how a guy named Jimmy McGill became a guy named Saul Goodman. Have at it." And that's just because the show isn't called Better Call Jimmy. xp to self

Wrt the present-day scenes, if you know that he's been a lawyer in the past and that he's now working at a Cinnabon under a fake name, you may be able to piece together the whys and wherefores on your own based on the character's progression on BCS.

The lily-of-the-valley reveal is literally the final shot of season 4! When is this apparently necessary ex post facto here’s-how-he-did-it scene meant to take place, at the beginning of the next season? Who cares at that point?

I don't know, man. I'm just saying it could have been explained without "spoiling the reveal" because it could have been explained after the reveal. I'm sure some other changes would have to have been made to accommodate this idea in an elegant way. But I would have preferred it, I think, because I like to know how all the schemes are done.

I think, if anything, the existence of BCS makes me more exasperated about the Brock handwaving. Saul was directly involved in the poisoning of a child. I need more than 'this happened...somehow!' I mean, I know I'll never get it, and that's okay, but still.

(To expand on that thought: after having spent half a decade focusing on Jimmy/Saul as a fully fleshed-out human being, the idea of Saul's casual involvement in something like that bothers me even more when we have basically no idea of how it actually went down/how aware he was of what he was doing/etc.)

going to SB anyone who says "Brock" in this thread now

It's basically like someone on Mork & Mindy casually mentioning that Fonzie gutted a shopkeeper.

basically exactly

lol ok sorry you guys had to use your imagination that once, I think the mechanism of how a child was tricked into eating some berries is the least important part of that plot point

Saul is a slimy coward in bb and his small part in the scheme was explained, a scene explaining how Walt delivered the poison wouldn’t change any questions about how to square jimmy with Saul what even is this goalpost shifting

Brock

BRB, I'm going to propose a Brock spin-off to Gilligan. I'll let y'all know the premiere date ASAP.

(In all seriousness, I have a heightened sensitivity to the plight of kids even in a fictional context, and I will admit to having fretted more than a few times about what became of Brock after what happened to his mother.)

With a bare minimum amount of intro, I'd say yeah.

I don't think you need any intro at all. You might even be better off without it.

Any extended Brock discussion needs to go to the Breaking Bad thread ASAP

why bcz this digression is now a) pretty off-topic and b) boring the fuck out of me

mainly bcz b) tho