Jump to content
DVDVR Message Board

Better Call Saul


Niners Fan in CT

Recommended Posts

On 8/3/2022 at 9:25 PM, NoFistsJustFlips said:

See the Saul is broke take doesn't make sense to me. In his keepsake shoe box he has a bunch of diamonds. He obviously converted a portion of his wealth into diamonds to make it easier to transport. Why does he need to scheme it up to get 20k when he's probably got a million in diamonds in that box? I don't think he needs the money. I think the money is irrelevant to the end game.

I'll tell you what doesn't make sense to me the more I think about it. Why a Cinnabon manager in Omaha?

Ed was able to stow Walt in Bumfuck, NH. He drops Jesse in East Nowhere, AK despite a ton of heat. The guy's a consumate pro by all appearances. So why does he stick a nationally wanted fugitive into a public service job in a city? As NoFists has pointed out, it's not like Ed's bill cleaned Saul out and he needed to work. Creating false IDs is part of Ed's job. He couldn't have planted the rest of Saul's money in an account, then stuck Saul in a 55-and-over community somewhere in the suburbs as a retiree?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Look at how Walt cracked in isolation. Certain personality types crave interaction. Jimmy is one of him. Ed could have set him up on a remote farm if that's what Jimmy wanted. But what he wanted was a low risk suburban area. Remember he said "best case scenario" before he threw out the Cinnabon line. Meaning that's kinda what he was hoping for / aiming for. So I'm sure it was requested that way.

That part i don't have too much of an issue with. Jimmy would crack just like Walt did wasting away in irrelevance and isolation. He needed somewhere he could have some kind of human interaction. Even if it's just boring workplace stuff in Nebraska.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Like I've repeatedly said in here... a happy ending is not this writing team's style. Ain't gonna be no happy ending here brother.

The Kim stuff was riveting and soul crushingly mundane at the same time. I very much did not expect them to go there with her coming clean. Howard's wife was still wearing her wedding ring. It's been 6 or 8 years and it's still haunting her. Just sad and tragic all around. Just like Kim's new hairstyle lol.

Nice nod to Jesse and Emilo. Wonder if current day Kim realizes she met the infamous Jesse that was a partner of Saul's after the fact now. Good scene.

I still hate the black and white and feel like I would be more griped by the finishing stretch if this was in color like the rest of the series. But no sense complaining. It is what it is. Bring on the final episode and the final Walt flashback.
 

Edited by NoFistsJustFlips
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

And now, after all of these years, I'm firmly in the "FUCK Saul" camp. Spineless, gutless turd of a human being. Kim has long been my favorite character in the entire BB universe and last night was soul crushing to watch. That was one of those cries where it's so intense that you almost feel like you're going to throw up. I wish Saul never contacted Kim. And that is firm, firm, firm proof that whatever was left of Jimmy inside Saul is long dead. I hope Saul dies too.

Fuck around and find out.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, Log said:

I love how Kim also escaped into a character like Jimmy did.

Kim's stuff was so sad knowing what a brilliant person she is. Seeing her have to play dumb was heartbreaking.

Easy. She's doing work that's a little similar to what I'm doing now. It may not be as difficult as being a lawyer, but it's still a challenge at times even if there's nothing that is insurmountable. I think the rest of Kim is pretty much Kim though, like her having friends and dating down in Florida. That didn't feel like it was her being someone she's not. It felt more like someone she grew into after a traumatic event and a divorce and that person she grew into at least looked happy with what she was doing and looked happy with the people she was friends with. For her, it probably felt a lot like the family of people she worked around in the county city building in ABQ, except without any of the risk. I liked the juxtaposition of her working environment in Florida and then going back to ABQ and almost moving through that building like a ghost.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't think Kim is enjoying her life in Florida at all. She's punishing herself over Howard's death. She doesn't act like the Kim we know in any of the Florida scenes. It's not until the conversation with Jimmy, and the return to Albuquerque, that we see a glimpse of the real Kim. And finally she has that beautifully cathartic moment on the bus where she bursts into tears. I definitely think Kim's life in Florida is meant to parallel Gene's life in Nebraska, and we're supposed to remember her line about the reason she stayed with Jimmy was because she was having too much fun. If Kim had been happy in Florida, I'm not sure she would have returned to Albuquerque to hand in her affidavit. 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Craig H said:

Easy. She's doing work that's a little similar to what I'm doing now. It may not be as difficult as being a lawyer, but it's still a challenge at times even if there's nothing that is insurmountable. I think the rest of Kim is pretty much Kim though, like her having friends and dating down in Florida. That didn't feel like it was her being someone she's not. It felt more like someone she grew into after a traumatic event and a divorce and that person she grew into at least looked happy with what she was doing and looked happy with the people she was friends with. For her, it probably felt a lot like the family of people she worked around in the county city building in ABQ, except without any of the risk. I liked the juxtaposition of her working environment in Florida and then going back to ABQ and almost moving through that building like a ghost.

I didn't mean her job was dumb. I meant her inane conversations about Miracle Whip and the talk about crack and pacifiers, etc. I mean, she would have been the one representing the poor kid who gets the cops called on him for buying a pacifier.

Agree with @ohtani's jacketthat she did not seem happy at all. In fact, I'd say they went out of their way to show how unhappy and mundane her life in Florida was. If she's happy, there's no way she's confessing to the stuff with Howard.

Her life in Florida is like a distorted mirror of Jimmy's in Omaha. Where his is grey skies and snow, her's is sunshine and palm trees. However, there's this sadness in both lives. Neither one is what they want to be doing at all.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I see it more as Kim being a natural chameleon and being able to blend in and change wherever she goes. The reason I say she was fine or happy or content in Florida was one, she never changed her name or felt a need to do so, and two, it took Jimmy/Saul calling her to absolutely shake her to her core, enough to travel back to ABQ and submit her witness testimony for what actually happened to Howard.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

See my read on that was the Jimmy call didn't shake her to her core. It finally gave her confirmation she wasn't in danger anymore if she told the truth. Jimmy told her Lalo & Mike & Gus were all dead. Jimmy himself is alive but on the run and making jokes about the FBI not being able to find him. This was a moment she was dreading but also begging for this whole time. She never told the truth because she was worried the cartel would kill her, or Gus would kill her, or worse someone would kill Jimmy in retaliation. At her core Kim knows what happened was wrong and went too far. She was just too scared for her life & Jimmy's life to a lesser extent to do the right thing.

So now that the fear of being killed is gone... now that Jimmy is off and away from ABQ and (at least at that point) not likely to be impacted by her coming clean... it was finally time to do the right thing. That burst of crying was her finally allowing herself to feel the emotions and gravity of the situation. She was finally able to breathe and let it all out after 7 or 8 years of holding it all in. Jimmy didn't shake her to the core. Jimmy telling her all that finally took the death grip of her throat and let her breathe for the first time in years.

At least that's how I interpreted it. She was basically doing her own fake "Gene" for 8 years in Florida. Now she can finally be Kim again. Even if that means she has to face consequences for their actions.

Edited by NoFistsJustFlips
  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 minutes ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

See my read on that was the Jimmy call didn't shake her to her core. It finally gave her confirmation she wasn't in danger anymore if she told the truth. Jimmy told her Lalo & Mike & Gus were all dead. Jimmy himself is alive but on the run and making jokes about the FBI not being able to find him. This was a moment she was dreading but also begging for this whole time. She never told the truth because she was worried the cartel would kill her, or Gus would kill her, or worse someone would kill Jimmy in retaliation. At her core Kim knows what happened was wrong and went too far. She was just too scared for her life & Jimmy's life to a lesser extent to do the right thing.

So now that the fear of being killed is gone... now that Jimmy is off and away from ABQ and (at least at that point) not likely to be impacted by her coming clean... it was finally time to do the right thing. That burst of crying was her finally allowing herself to feel the emotions and gravity of the situation. She was finally able to breathe and let it all out after 7 or 8 years of holding it all in. Jimmy didn't shake her to the core. Jimmy telling her all that finally took the death grip of her throat and let her breathe for the first time in years.

At least that's how I interpreted it. She was basically doing her own fake "Gene" for 8 years in Florida. Now she can finally be Kim again. Even if that means she has to face consequences for their actions.

God. That's some heavy shit. Heavier than I already thought it was. That changes how I viewed all of that stuff now. I didn't even think about the stuff with the cartel or Mike or whatever.

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

There was a lot going on during the telephone call scene, as well as the scene where they signed the divorce papers. Gene clearly wants to reunite with Kim, but Gene, or Saul, if you will, is a gross caricature of the man she loves. She tries to appeal to him as Jimmy, not Gene, Saul or Viktor, which causes him to flip out and begin attacking her. He goads her into confessing, and somewhere between the telephone call and her arrival in Albuquerque, she decides to do just that. I thought it was brilliant the way she switched back to being Kim when she returned to Albuquerque. As a former lawyer, she knew the affidavit wasn't enough to get her charged for any crimes, so she went a step further and confessed to Cheryl. When Cheryl threatened to take everything that Kim has, it was clear that for Kim, her "Miracle Whip" life in Florida didn't amount to much. When she told Gene that he can't be living much of a life and that he should turn himself in, she might as well have been talking about herself. That said, she deliberately chose that life in Florida so that she wouldn't hurt anyone anymore. She probably would have continued with her mundane routines if Gene hadn't called her, and may indeed return to it. The call was the catalyst for Gene going off the rails in Nebraska, and whatever his final outcome is, and Kim finally confessing, and was the crossroads moment we saw in the previous episode. Kim's confession also implicates Jimmy in the crimes (if that's the correct verb), but I don't think she cares by this point as the Jimmy she loved is gone. I suppose she has to feel some guilt over that as it was her decision to leave Jimmy that pushed him over the edge. but their relationship was already strained by their opposite reactions to Howard's death. It's interesting that she protected Jimmy at Howard's memorial, but is now making an effort to have even more charges laid against him. 

Edited by ohtani's jacket
  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I just want to add that the writing on this show is so brilliant. Like the way Gene used the pseudonym from when they used to pull scams together. He's so confident at the beginning of the call after hearing that Kim asked about him. I'm 99% convinced that he thinks they can get back together. 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

These last few posts speak to something else I love about this show. The creators don't feel the need to hit us over the head with everything. Some things are left to us to fill in or figure out. I love it when shows trust their audience.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, RandomAct said:

I did find it interesting that it was teased twice that Gene would do physical harm to someone, considering that he has never shown any inclination towards that ever.

That really made me sad and made me think about Jimmy and Kim mainly engaging in a few harmless scams when they were living comfortably together. He's sunk really low.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, Craig H said:

That really made me sad and made me think about Jimmy and Kim mainly engaging in a few harmless scams when they were living comfortably together. He's sunk really low.

At least he snapped out of it when Marion said she trusted him. For a moment, I thought he was going to top her. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, Technico Support said:

If anyone missed the preview for next week, there's what looks like a car wreck and you hear Jimmy frantically trying to say vacuum cleaner part numbers. 

The images and the soundtrack usually don't match on these trailers. They love messing with us like last week's preview with the cop car. That's Jimmy's old car that they pushed off the cliff in the desert in Season 5. Jimmy didn't discover about Best Quality Vacuum until Season 6, so I'm not convinced that the image and the soundbite match. The image is in color, which would indicate a flashback. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...