Summary: Many months have passed. Kim and Jimmy have grown apart as Kim settles in at Schweikart and Cokely as Jimmy continues to sell burner phones. Hector has woken up with his mind intact, so Gus halts his treatment to prevent him from getting better. Mike's worker crew continues building the superlab but an accident sets them back. Huell knocks out an undercover cop who was arguing with Jimmy, not knowing he was a cop. Huell is told he will get 2.5 years of prison so Jimmy goes to Kim for help. Kim reluctantly agrees to help Jimmy with Huell and gets to work, but she refuses to do it his way.
The Good: This was another really well-executed episode. It has been a quiet season for "Better Call Saul", but the way the show has been put together continues to amaze me. This episode was entirely set-up, but the storytelling was incredible and the episode had me engaged with an almost melancholy tension which was ever-present throughout the episode. The opening montage at the beginning was outstanding, quite possibly the show's best montage. I usually tend to be indifferent towards timeskips because they very rarely satisfy me, but this is a rare case of a timeskip being executed perfectly. Instead of skipping all of the development which characters undergo throughout a timeskip, this episode began with a montage which showed us the complete story of Kim and Jimmy's relationship across those several months in a very impactful way. Their relationship has gone cold ever since they branched out in the last episode, and the montage was a heartbreaking show of how rarely they interact with each other as they go through with their normal life. I love the added touch of a black bar in between both Kim and Jimmy throughout the entire montage which highlighted how split they have become. The ending moment was particularly poignant for me as both Kim and Jimmy sleep facing away from each other, not even speaking to each other. Then in what I think was a beautiful piece of foreshadowing, Kim fades into the darkness as Jimmy opens his eyes in total silence. This was just tremendously well done. The episode didn't stop there though and immediately followed up with another beautiful sequence as Jimmy welcomes somebody into a building which he is thinking about renting, showing the person around with his normal high energy. At first I thought it was Kim, but it became clear after there were no responses that it wasn't her. For a moment I even thought it was Jimmy alone trying to possibly recite what he would say to Kim to try to win her back for Wexler-McGill. But instead it was revealed to be Huell, who delivered some funny lines about being a lawyer. It was a good reveal, but more importantly it made me understand how much Jimmy and Kim's relationship fell apart. Ordinarily Jimmy would be showing this location to Kim, and yet he likely didn't even tell her about it as he chose to show Huell around instead. Furthermore, it seems that Jimmy doesn't even really consider getting Kim back, having resigned himself to the fact that Kim is practicing elsewhere. Surprisingly though, Jimmy compares his new office to Kim's in a small moment, almost as if he is trying to find a place better than hers. Perhaps a small part of him is still hopeful that Kim will work with him, and that's really sad to see. The central conflict introduced in this episode was really good too. The tense confrontation between Jimmy and the cop was pretty tense, but it was resolved in hilarious fashion as Huell just stumbles by and knocks him out. But a terrible set of conveniences leaves Huell incriminated with a potential 2 and a half years of jail time. This is a really logical story to tell and it's a good way to put a highlight on the deterioration of Kim and Jimmy's relationship as they are now forced to interact and in no way do they come off as lovers anymore. A far cry from how they were together in the early parts of the season. As an aside, I love that this slow deterioration was hinted at last season where Kim and Jimmy did appear to be drifting apart before the harsh reality of Kim's accident put them back on the right path. Their conversation in Kim's office was great and I really appreciated Rhea Seehorn's acting as she learns about what Jimmy has really been doing and asks him about him, only for him to ignore her and for her to simply brush it off. She doesn't even seem to care anymore as the two have them have essentially been living apart for the last few months anyways. I enjoyed Kim and Jimmy pursuing the case together. Kim had a terrific scene as she argued with a prosecutor about the Huell case and she unexpectedly and to take a look at who Jimmy has really become. She's evidently bothered by it and I'm interested to what she will do about it. Kim hasn't changed on her morals and I cab I especially loved her refusing to tear down another upstanding man. Regarding Jimmy's plot though, it seems eerily similar to his ploy which he used to take down Chuck, which highlights another great dimension to his character: he hates upstanding law enforcers because they remind him too much of his brother, which is an excellent motive to make his transformation into Saul more believable. Speaking of Saul, this episode was the first where I noticed that Jimmy's behaviour was more like Saul than it was like Jimmy, showing how far along the road to Saul he has gone. I really enjoyed the short Gus scene in this episode. The episode gave us a crucial piece of information about his feud with Hector as we learn that Hector could have potentially made a full recovery but Gus is keeping him in the chair. Giancarlo Esposito was terrific again as he subtly showed his joy that Hector was fully conscious in his current form, and he was chilling as he left Hector in such a disabled form, quite possibly the cruelest thing we have seen him do thus far. This works really well as it also makes me look back more fondly at his speech int he previous episode which sets up this decision which Gus makes. There were a few other scenes I really liked in this episode. I loved the sequence where we were shown how the workers get transported to the superlab. I was wondering how they would be transported and it was good to get some confirmation. Additionally, I loved the scenes with Jimmy at Schweikart and Cokely as he started off as the charming Jimmy that Kim grew to love, but he soon lets his hatred of the place that took Kim away from him come to fruition as he badgers Schweikart about more expensive vacation trips than the ones being planned. The Bad: The Mike story just doesn't interest me very much. The storytelling is fine, but there is nothing that really makes me care and we aren't learning anything new about Mike's character. Perhaps this is leading to a big moment where Mike finally decides against ever using half measures, but as of now, it doesn't do very much for me. I'm disappointed that Nacho was absent again. He was such an important part of the first four episodes, so it feels weird that he has just been absent for three successive episodes. It's especially disappointing for him to not be seen in such an important episode which sped through time. I would be interested in seeing what he has been up to, but sadly it appears to have been skipped unless we get another montage, or something of the sort next week. The Unknown: What are Kim's plans to get Huell away from jail? Why did she pick up all of those art supplies at the end of the episode? Best Moment: So many moments were well done, but I'll pick the opening montage because of the sheer skill that was used to put it together. Character of the Episode: Kim. Conclusion: This was a great set-up episode, and it seems like a normal thing to get at least one exceptional set-up episode per season with this show. The exploration of the sad state of Kim and Jimmy's relationship in this episode was terrific and carried this to becoming one of the season's best episodes. Score: 71
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Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
March 2024
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