I Miss These Guys

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— Saul Goodman ⚖ (@itsSaulGoodman) April 21, 2024

Lalo, Gus, Mike, and Howard. They're all gone now.  Lalo murdered Howard.  Gus killed Lalo.  Mike buried Howard and Lalo, and then Walt bombed Gus and shot Mike.

Dad Rock

Or, in my case, Grandpa Rock.  Walter White rhapsodizing on the virtues of Steely Dan.  He may have been a meth kingpin and killer but what great taste in music!  Extra bonus points for mentioning Boz Scaggs who, in 2012, toured with Dan co-founder Donald Fagen and frequent Dan background singer Michael McDonald; here they are performing Boz's big hit Lowdown.

Never A Story Of More Woe

In the prologue Shakespeare ensured we learn that Romeo and Juliet have died.  Seeing how they arrive at that fate makes for tragedy.  Tonight is episode 3 in Season 5 of Better Call Saul.  Having watched Breaking Bad we know the fate that awaits Jimmy McGill (aka Saul Goodman, aka Gene Takavic) and Mike Ehrmantraut but the knowing enhances the sense of tragedy surrounding the series.  It's entirely fitting that in a recent article Michael Brendan Dougherty concludes, "Vince Gilligan's Breaking Bad prequel is the most heartbreaking drama ever to appear on TV."

This is the penultimate season of the show.  We've seen Mike (Jonathan Banks), a corrupt Philadelphia cop seek redemption for the death of his son by moving to Albuquerque and supporting his daughter in law and granddaughter but in doing so he's become deeply emeshed in criminal and increasingly violent activities at the direction of fast-food chicken franchise owner and meth kingpin Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito), also a lead character in Breaking Bad.

Meanwhile small-time con man Jimmy has tried going straight, or as straight as he can, as a lawyer though being thwarted at every turn by his own stray instincts and his brother Chuck (brilliantly played by Michael McKean - David St Hubbins in Spinal Tap) a highly respected lawyer in one of the largest local firms.

While we know the fate of Mike and Jimmy, we don't know Jimmy's final fate as know from a series of flash-forward's to Jimmy's post Breaking Bad life as Gene Takavic, assistant manager of a Cinnabon in a Omaha mall, fearing every moment that someone will discover his real identity.

What we don't know are the fates of two new characters that we've grown to care deeply about.  Nacho Varga (Michael Mando) involved in the meth trade is an associate of Mike's and Gus Fring.  Yet he dislikes the business and is desperately trying to protect his father, who condemns what his son does but has been placed in danger because of it.  Nacho has an air of sadness and fatality about him.  And he does not appear in Breaking Bad.

Nor does Kim Wexler (the great Rhea Seehorn), Jimmy's fellow lawyer, friend, roommate, and kind of girlfriend.  She's the one person whose approval Jimmy values, at least at times.  She is also from the same kind of hardscrabble background but is more dedicated to the pursuit of the law and following the rules.  Every follower of the series prays nothing bad happens to Kim but we all know something happens to prevent her from appearing in Breaking Bad.  Daughtery tells us, "Showrunners report getting agonized letters and messages from fans pleading with them not to hurt her or bring her to an awful end".

The pace of Better Call Saul is slower and more methodical than Breaking Bad.  It takes it's time getting where it is going because the accumulation of detail is so important.  It's also because:

Vince Gilligan, the creator of the televisual worlds of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, has an unusual talent: he is brilliant at showing us work. What does it feel like to test fast-food sauce recipes, to push a mail cart around an office, to make a cement walkway, or to highlight relevant items in a laborious legal discovery process? What does it look like to cook up meth? In his hands, the work of men and women becomes weirdly gripping.

The law plays an important role in Better Come Saul.  For both Chuck McGill and Kim Wexler it provides structure and rules for lives that might have otherwise become chaotic.  In contrast, Jimmy McGill finds himself unable to abide by those constraints.  Tragedy lies ahead.

"I've Had A Great Life"

Actor Robert Forster died last Friday at the age of 78.  The recent interviews below show an upbeat man of grace and gratitude.  After some initial success in movies and TV during the late 1960s and early 70s, Forster fell into two decades of obscurity, taking any roles he could find to get by.

His career was resurrected in 1997 when Quentin Tarantino cast him as bail bondsman Max Cherry in Jackie Brown, based on Elmore Leonard's book Rum Punch, a role which saw Forster receive an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor.  For the past two decades Forster has worked steadily and achieved acclaim in numerous roles.  Those of us immersed in the Breaking Bad universe know him in the role of Ed The Disappearer in BB which he reprised for its sequel, El Camino, which opened the day Forster died.

The Better Call Saul Wrap

Better Call Saul just finished its second satisfying season.  The sort of prequel to Breaking Bad it features two of the subsidiary characters from that series, Saul Goodman, originally Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) and Mike Ehrmantraut (Jonathan Banks).  Since we already know the ultimate disposition of both, Better Call Saul is about how they got to be the characters we met in Breaking Bad.  As it turns out, Better Call Saul is good enough to stand on its own and has now introduced us to new and interesting characters.

In an article in Slate, Julia Turner makes the case that, as the title says Better Call Saul Is Better Than Breaking Bad.  While THC will not yet go that far, she makes some interesting observations (no spoilers regarding either show):

Better Call Saul takes the style that made Breaking Bad distinctive—the astonishing cinematography, dark comedy, and brashly confident pacing—and elevates it by applying it with more beauty, subtlety, and moral sophistication.

Perversely, Better Call Saul aims higher than its progenitor by lowering the stakes. Through its first two seasons, the show has concerned itself not with murderers and kingpins but with the mundane dilemmas of Jimmy McGill, a silver-tongued man with a gift for conning people who is trying not to use it. The show’s emotional core lies in his relationship with his older brother, Chuck, a brilliant lawyer who doesn’t believe that no-good Jimmy can play it straight for long. Jimmy aspires to please Chuck and go legit even though his talents offer tempting shortcuts.

This is clear in Saul’s understated, methodical, and deliberate plotting, and the suspense the show creates with each subtle turn. Why is Mike Ehrmantraut, the beloved Breaking Bad heavy, drilling holes in a garden hose with his granddaughter? Why does Nacho, a savvy drug-world apparatchik, pause to check out the leather seats in that Hummer? Why does Kim Wexler (Jimmy’s friend, colleague, advocate, and love) rip a business card with his name on it in half? Every modest moment in the show builds to a fascinating payoff. It’s also notable that the characters the show has introduced—including meticulous Nacho (Michael Mando), loyal and ambitious Kim (Rhea Seehorn), and conniving Chuck (Michael McKean, who like Odenkirk is a comic actor giving an authoritative dramatic turn)—are as compelling as the two we’ve watched for years.

If you haven't watched it, check it out. 

(Spoilers included below)

Better Call Saul

The second season of Better Call Saul starts on February 15.  THC is generally wary of spin offs and this was a spin off of Breaking Bad, his favorite series, but they pulled it off and it's quite good.   So, to get ready here's some of Saul's best lines from Breaking Bad, and Mike Ehmantraut's (Jonathan Banks, who also stars in Saul) chilling speech from the series. Unfortunately, Mike's speech has been overdubbed with a music track that was not in the original.

 

Better Call Saul

Since devoted readers are aware of THC's obsession with Breaking Bad, it should come as no surprise that he is eagerly awaiting the premiere of Better Call Saul on AMC this Sunday evening.  That's struggling lawyer Saul Goodman (played by Bob Odenkirk) on the right above.  Actually, Saul's real name is Jimmy McGill but he changed it for business reasons. It's a prequel, set several years before the time of Breaking Bad so there'll be no Walter White or Jesse Pinkman.  However, there is the marvelous Mike Ehrmantraut (left, above) played by Jonathan Banks who you may also remember from his many 1980s appearances in film and TV, including Beverly Hills Cop.

THC was a little dubious about the prospects for this spinoff but is encouraged by this review at Grantland.

Hey, That's My Shirt!

Faithful readers know that THC was a big fan of Breaking Bad (see Baby Blue) and is a proud owner of a Los Pollos Hermanos T-shirt.  Well, according to The Smoking Gun, so is Daniel Kowalski, the young owner of a meth lab busted by the police.

Los Pollos Hermanos is the fast-food chain owned by Gus, Walter White's most formidable nemesis.

Baby Blue

The closing song from the last episode of Breaking Bad; a perfect choice since it was Walter White's blue meth that paved his rise.  The Ozymandias episode was the emotional peak for the series with the last two episodes, Granite State and the finale Felina (title from the lyrics of the Marty Robbins' song El Paso), calmer, at least by BB standards (except for the one mass killing), and focused on tying up of the story lines.  Everyone got what they deserved though Stevia sales may take a hit.

Badfinger was a British band signed to Apple Records by Paul McCartney (who also wrote their first hit, Come and Get It).  They had four consecutive Top 10 hits in the UK and US in the early 1970s with Baby Blue being the last.  Here they are performing on some TV show and introduced by, yes, Kenny Rogers!

Breaking Bad

Tonight the final eight episodes of Breaking Bad begin on AMC.  If you haven't seen the show before DO NOT watch.  Instead, go and watch the prior 53 episodes first.  Breaking Bad may be the finest of the cable drama series, even surpassing The Sopranos (something THC didn't think could be done).

Walter White (Bryan Cranston), quiet, highly intelligent, who missed his one chance to get rich and be recognized for his achievements, now teaches the chemistry he loves to bored high school students when he is diagnosed with terminal cancer.  The choices he makes in response take him down a path of criminal enterprise, manufacturing methamphetamine in order to, as he tells himself, provide for his family when he's gone.  There is a lot of drugs and crime in the series but that's not really what it is about.  It is what happens when personal inner demons that have been suppressed finally hatch and the havoc it wreaks on Walt and everyone in his path.  As Andy Greenwald at Grantland wrote: 

"Breaking Bad, to its enormous credit, isn't about everything. It's about one thing and always has been: Walter White's calamitous path not from Mr. Chips to Scarface but from homeroom to the gates of hell."

In The Sopranos all the characters were the same from start to finish; we just learned more about them as the series progressed.  In Breaking Bad, all the major characters, not just Walt, change, as does our perception of them.  It has a more intimate feel which makes the intensity almost unbearable at times.  A memorable show but it is time for it to end and for Walt to get what he deserves.
(Walter, Season 1)
(Walter, Season 5)

And, don't forget - if you're in trouble, "Better Call Saul"