Category: better call saul

Here’s something I didn’t expect to say before this show premiered: Better Call Saul has an incredible sweetness at its core.

Remember, now, that this is a spinoff of Breaking Bad, where sweetness was not unknown but where it inevitably led to tragedy. What’s more, Better Call Saul is focusing on a character who was, in so many ways, an open facilitator of that tragedy. We met him in an Albuquerque of cynicism and despair, and he was at home there.

Seeing him at work in “Alpine Shepherd Boy,” we are in a whole other world. A world in which shiftiness and misdirection are necessary, but also a world in which there can be joy. In which there can be happiness. A world in which underhanded methods can be employed in aid of making things better.

This is the conflict at the heart of Jimmy McGill, and I think it’s one that’s been there even when we knew him as Saul Goodman. In Breaking Bad, Saul was the one who expanded Walter’s reach, his empire, and, ultimately, his capacity for destruction. While he was never directly involved with what were probably Walt’s darkest actions, he kept the plates spinning in the background. What’s more: he was happy to do so.

And yet, nobody disliked the guy. As frustrated as we got with Walt, as frightened as we got of Gus, as worried as we got for Jesse, Saul was always just there. He didn’t inspire the same kind of severe audience reaction, because he was somehow separate from the events unfolding around him. He was of them, and not of them. From the moment he entered that world — in a satirical, comic bubble — he felt safe.

Whatever happened, Saul was going to be okay. And we were perfectly happy with that. In spite of the fact that he was doing Very Bad Things, we needed to trust that he was going to be fine…even when we could trust in nothing else. There’s a reason, after all, that his kind of character is referred to as comic “relief.”

In Better Call Saul, Jimmy’s been up to some fishy business, but we love him. And “Alpine Shepherd Boy” shows us why: he can be a good person. He has the potential in him, somewhere, to be an excellent human being. He won’t become one through hard work and initiative, of course…he’ll become one (if he ever does) through dodges and deception. But that’s what makes him such a great character; he operates in an intrinsically hateable way, but never becomes hateable himself.

“Alpine Shepherd Boy” seems to offer a thematic bookend to a great sequence in “Mijo.” Whereas that episode carved for us a representative cross-section of what Jimmy McGill’s life would look like as a public defender, this one shows us what his life would look like if he embraced semi-legitimacy. In short, he goes from representing those who need a lawyer and can’t afford one, to representing those who don’t need a lawyer but can afford to throw their money away on one.

It’s a fantastic series of scenes, showing our unhateable shyster meeting with a fanatical secessionist, the inventor of a sex toilet, and, most lucratively, an old woman relaying complicated plans for the posthumous distribution of her porcelain figurines. Across each of these we learn a little more about Jimmy, but what really stands out is how strong Bob Odenkirk is as an actor.

I know Odenkirk very well from many things, not the least of which is Mr. Show. Mr. Show was a sketch comedy program that ran for four seasons on HBO. It’s also one of the very few sketch-based examples I point to (along with Monty Python’s Flying Circus and The League of Gentlemen) when I argue that good acting elevates good comedy.

In Mr. Show, the sketches didn’t wear out their welcome. They flitted and evolved and darted across the screen. At no point did the show technically need Bob Odenkirk and David Cross to deliver legitimately impressive performances…but the two of them did anyway. And that’s, I honestly believe, what gives it staying power. In sketch comedy, jokes will fall flat. They have to; mathematically, there’s no way to try to spin so many different kinds of laughs out of so much material and have it all land successfully. Put good acting behind it, though, and even the weakest skits become interesting, and instructive.

Odenkirk is a master. Watching those three scenes of him with clients, it’s impossible to deny that. His attempt to maintain composure in front of the secessionist (and then again for a whole other reason when he’s offered a million dollars), is solid work. His fumbling lies about practically specializing in patent law are delivered perfectly, with just the right amount of confident deflection. And his response to the old woman who takes far too long to hand him a figurine (“Oh.”) takes understatement and evolves it into an artform.

But what about the sweetness I mentioned?

Well, it comes out of last week’s cliffhanger…which was not where I expected it to be. While “Alpine Shepherd Boy” moves the story forward from Jimmy’s billboard anti-heroics, the real stakes come as a result of Chuck stealing his neighbor’s newspaper.

A very funny sequence in that episode becomes a sad one here, as poor Chuck is tasered by the police and threatened with involuntary commitment. It’s a genuine achievement for “Alpine Shepherd Boy” that the funniest extremes of Chuck’s “condition” lead us smoothly into the saddest.

Chuck — played by Michael McKean — suffers from what Jimmy oversimplifies as an electricity allergy. From the very first episode we’ve had indications that it’s a psychological problem rather than a physical one, and “Alpine Shepherd Boy” proves that conclusively. But it’s also evidence that Jimmy loves his brother, and that’s where the sweetness lies.

While Jimmy may be humoring Chuck, the fact remains that he does take care of him. He doesn’t humor him because it’s the easy way out…he humors him in spite of the fact that this means he’ll have to keep his brother in groceries, ice, and newspapers until the day one of them dies.

And when Hamlin — Chuck’s law partner — shows up at the hospital, it almost looks like Jimmy’s caved. He says he’ll commit his brother just so that he can cash him out of the law firm. A moment later we learn that this isn’t true, and he only said it to make Hamlin sweat. It was a dishonest tactic, but one that served, he felt, a better purpose.

It’s an interesting twist. Instead of a bad man pretending to be good, this is a good man pretending to be bad. And it’s kind of gorgeous.

Something I haven’t mentioned much about is Jimmy’s relationship with Kim, played by Rhea Sheehorn. Sheehorn’s been in a lot of things, it looks like, but I’ve only seen her in this…and, god, she’s good.

There’s a level of remarkable interplay between her and Odenkirk. Chemistry, as Chuck would say, is an oversimplification, even if it’s largely correct. There’s something about them that feels real. The way she’s more capable, and yet admires his tenacity. The way she’s above him in station, and yet is envious of the stories he gets to tell of his crazy clients. The way she’s attractive enough that a man like Jimmy McGill shouldn’t even turn her head, but she also knows that he listens…and that he cares. He’s open with her. He’s honest (so much so that he’ll break an NDA just to make her laugh). He’s human. She wants that.

That’s the real sweetness I felt in the episode, coming to a head in Chuck’s hospital room, when she can’t bring herself to break anybody’s heart by disagreeing with them. She knows she’s dealing with two McGills that are, each in their own way, liars. And yet she cares about them. At any given point she could open her mouth and prove both of them wrong. But she keeps her mouth shut, because she’d rather keep them than come out on top.

Kim is my favorite new character on this show, and the ease with which she and Jimmy slip into each other’s lives is a delight. In fact, I’m sad that Breaking Bad introduced us to a post-divorce Saul. It means that whatever happens between these two, there’s a termination point. And I’d be shocked if it was a fair or pretty one. As it stands, Kim is marching toward disappointment…which makes the happy accident of Sheehorn and Odenkirk working so well together feel like a profoundly distressing tragedy.

There’s also a sweetness to Jimmy’s relationship with Mike, one that looks to blossom into something truly interesting next week. So…maybe I’ll save my talk about that for then.

Jimmy McGill has a heart. He’s a showman and a flimflam man, but one (for now) with a conscience. When Kim turns him on to the idea of specializing in elder law, he latches right onto it in a way that feels exploitative (for obvious reasons), but also genuine. After all, the old woman with the figurines was the only client he was actually able to help.

His foray into elder law is a lot like one of those optical illusions. You look and see an old crone…but keep looking, and it turns into a beautiful young woman. Keep looking beyond that, and you’ll see both images fighting in your brain for supremacy, with no clear winner. Likewise, everything Jimmy does in his elder law posturing seems to occupy a constantly fluctuating, indefinable middle ground.

That’s Jimmy in the old woman’s living room. Sure, she’s the only one who paid him…but she’s also the only one to whom he could offer any value. He wasn’t asked to do much, but he was good at keeping straight what he was asked to do.

That’s Jimmy in the retirement community. Passing out Jell-O cups as a good deed…but they also serve as promotional materials for his services. He’s glad-handing a bunch of helpless senior citizens…but they genuinely seem to enjoy his company, and are appreciative of it.

And that’s Jimmy handing Mike his new business card.

We get a wonderful, and largely silent, view of how that plays out for Mike after the red-doored Esteem pulls away.

Jimmy McGill might have found a way to do some actual good, even if he is seeking to profit from it. But to phrase that another way, Jimmy McGill needs to profit off of something…so might it not as well be doing some actual good?

The image flips. It refuses to become one thing or the other for very long. We’re in a state of flux. And it’s fucking fantastic.

It’s hard to believe Better Call Saul has only been on for four episodes. It feels as though it’s run for much longer. That’s an indication, I think, of just how effortlessly it slides into the vacancy left by Breaking Bad. It’s not a replacement in terms of subject matter — could Breaking Bad have devoted an hour of its precious time to squabbling over a billboard? — but in terms of quality, and the sheer amount of care that goes into every aspect of its production.

Watching “Hero,” something struck me. When Better Call Saul was first announced, I was worried. Not because I didn’t think Goodman (or Odenkirk) could sustain a show on his own, but because Vince Gilligan wouldn’t be writing it. He’d create it, get some plates spinning, and move on to his next project. He’d be leaving a universe he created in the hands of others, and that’s always a worrying prospect…even when the universe is nowhere near as complex and well-structured as the one he developed in Breaking Bad.

What struck me during “Hero” is this: Gilligan didn’t just write a great show; he taught a whole room full of writers how to write a great show.

Breaking Bad represents, from beginning to end, a remarkably sustained quality, and an even more strongly sustained vision. “Hero,” this most recent chapter in the life of Jimmy-cum-Saul, was written by Gennifer Hutchison…whose name was also attached to some excellent episodes of Breaking Bad. “I See You,” “Cornered,” “Salud,” “Buyout,” and “Confessions” represent her work for that show. In terms of tone, they have nothing — at all — in common with “Hero.” In terms of quality, they’re of a definite cloth.

What made Breaking Bad work at even its weakest moments — and what is making Better Call Saul work already — is a sense of artistry. There’s a level of attention given to the way shots are framed, costumes are fitted, and sets are designed that contributes to an overall feeling of mastery. At any given time, we may not know what we’re looking at, or why we’re looking at it. (Remember that kid on the dirtbike at the beginning of “Dead Freight”?) We stay attentive, however. Perhaps even more attentive, because we can trust the writers. When there’s the reassuring presence of an artist’s hand, we are willing to follow along.

“Hero” relies almost entirely on the artist’s hand, which isn’t to say it’s worse off for it. As of now I’d probably argue that it’s the weakest of Jimmy McGill’s outings, but that comes with the important caveat that it’s still very good, and oddly riveting.

The episode is responsible for a lot of setup that simply needs to be done, as until now Jimmy’s rivalry with Hamlin, Hamlin & McGill has been relegated to the background. It’s Hutchison’s job to catch us up and push that aspect of the story ahead.

It’s busywork, at least at its core. What salvages “Hero” is the fact that the show seems to revel in busywork…just like public defender Jimmy McGill. There may not be much at stake, but damned if we aren’t going to get a fireworks show.

The plot itself is simple: McGill buys and poses for a deliberately inflammatory billboard. I can’t go too much further than that without spoiling something, but I will say that once the episode comes to a close, it doesn’t actually amount to much more than what I just said. And that’s okay, because all throughout we’re sowing seeds for episodes to come.

We have lots of great character moments throughout, starting from the very beginning. Caught red handed, the Kettlemans hopelessly fumble their way through a justification for their crimes…one they obviously established a long time ago, and haven’t had to revisit since. That’s why when it’s finally verbalized it starts with some vague grandstanding about getting paid fairly for overtime and ends with them pointlessly reminding McGill that human slavery used to be legal.

It’s a well-observed moment; these people made a conscious choice to break the law, and reasoned themselves into a kind of comfort before doing so. What they were doing — they taught themselves to believe — wasn’t legal, but it was right. They talked about it and thought it through. They discussed it long into nightfall and then daylight. And once they convinced themselves, they never had to think about it again. Until now…when they reveal all their clever rationalizing to be hot air that no longer even convinces themselves.

Chuck also gets an incredible spotlight moment when he needs to venture out of the house to buy — not steal — a neighbor’s newspaper, in a sequence that I simply cannot describe without stripping it of all of its humor. Having said that, I absolutely need to gush over how wonderful it was that he not only left $5, but went to find a stone to weigh it down after it started to blow away. The return trip being shot from the neighbor’s perspective was just perfect, and that camera angle alone was probably responsible for my biggest laugh of the night. (I can’t wait for a spotlight episode on Michael McKean; I’m holding back most of my comments about his character until we learn a bit more.)

Also wonderful was McGill getting himself fitted for a decidedly Hamlin suit. At first I just assumed he was spending his windfall (more on that in a moment) on anything he’d need to look legitimate. A nice suit, certainly, would fit that bill. But then, after the tailor leaves, McGill wanders over to the shelves and starts considering hideous color combinations that hint at the Goodman within. Perfectly silent, and a perfect moment.

Actually, “Hero” is shot through with echoes of that character to come. We witness the earliest (chronologically speaking) occurrence of the name Saul Goodman, a deliberate pun on the part of a too-chummy Slippin’ Jimmy, and we’re reminded of something we learned in “Uno”: the fact that Jimmy McGill is not going to be able to practice law in Albuquerque under his real name. (Well, technically he can, but as the battle lines are drawn, it’s not unlikely that the change to Saul Goodman is the result of a fight poorly picked.)

But perhaps the biggest indication of what’s to come is how the night in the woods resolves itself. McGill does indeed offer to turn a blind eye to the money for a chance at representing the Kettlemans. He outright refuses a bribe, and offers, instead, his services.

It’s only when Mrs. Kettleman reminds him of something that he relents, and allows himself to be bought off. She reminds him, in a moment of perfect, inevitable heartbreak, that they won’t let him represent them…because he’s the kind of lawyer that guilty people hire.

I know he takes the money. I know how he accounted for it. (Literally.) And I know what he did with it.

But you know what?

Part of me truly hopes that there is some humanity in Jimmy McGill. That the fact that he seems to accept his status on the seedy end of the legal spectrum doesn’t suggest comfort or complicity.

No. I want to think that, on some level, he took the money because he wanted to change the fact that he was the kind of lawyer guilty people hire. The money could, as it does, buy him some valuable publicity. It could give him a platform he hasn’t had before. It could get him in front of the right kind of clients.

Buying himself into a living of doing public good isn’t the best way of getting there…but it’s a way.

Of course, we know who Jimmy becomes. What I’m hoping is that it takes him a little bit longer to get there, because nothing would thrill me more than seeing that the slippery slope to Saul Goodman appeared to him as a ladder to a better Jimmy McGill.

Some shows struggle at creating characters. Four episodes in, I wouldn’t blame Better Call Saul if that was the case here. But already these characters are already becoming people.

“Nacho” manages to be both the funniest and most tense episode so far, which is fitting, as the entire chapter is a study in contrasts.

From the superficial (the fact that the episode is named after a character who appears in only one scene) to the artful (McGill’s brutal confrontation with Mike gives way to a surprisingly tender moment between the two), expectations are established, subverted, and reverted.

As Tom Petty once sang, “Everything changed, and then changed again.” Six words that could sum up the entire episode.

My favorite establishment / subversion / reversion comes almost exactly halfway through the episode, when McGill is pursued by what he believes to be assailants. As he flees the police roll up, and he is overcome with cosmic gratitude. Then he realizes that the assailants were police themselves, and he’s under arrest. Flip-flopping tonality is something that poorly written television shows suffer from regularly. Better Call Saul (in this sequence specifically and in this episode in general) takes what lesser shows struggle to avoid and turns it into a kind of mission statement. The result is a masterful comic tension that “Nacho,” impossibly, sustains all the way through.

The first subversion comes as soon as the episode opens, nullifying last week’s cliffhanger while at the same time respecting it, and following it through. At the end of “Mijo,” Nacho approached McGill and asked him to assist in a robbery. McGill quietly watched him go, and we were left with two implied outcomes: either McGill helps Nacho, or he chooses not to.

This episode opens by showing us that McGill has chosen a third option: to warn the potential victims. To a yes/no question McGill indeed answered no, but he answered a very specific kind of no that ends up implicating him more deeply than a yes would have. Everything changed, and then changed again.

The victims in question are the Kettlemans. They’ve been important to the past two episodes as well, though I didn’t really have reason to get into them until now. In “Uno,” McGill loses a chance to represent Mr. Kettleman, who is accused of embezzling around one million dollars from the City of Albuquerque. Later, he enlists the help of two young con-artists to manipulate Mrs. Kettleman into hiring him…an attempted manipulation that leads McGill and his cronies to the desert at the beginning of “Mijo.” This is where McGill, in a fit of desperation, reveals his machinations to Tuco’s crew. And it’s why, at the end of that episode, Nacho makes him the offer that he does. He knows the Kettlemans have this money. The question is, does Jimmy McGill want a cut?

Or, at least, that’s the question we all inferred. And it’s certainly the question that Saul Goodman would have answered. (Quickly, and loudly.) Jimmy McGill instead helps himself to the cucumber water he isn’t allowed to have during business hours, gets drunk, and, little by little, figures out a way to do some good.

What follows is farce. Harrowing, terrifying farce. It’s like a lost episode of Fawlty Towers in which Basil unintentionally sics a murderous drug dealer on a family of four. It’s that good, and that crazy.

It’s also, again, a study in contrasts. McGill using a very DIY voice modulator to warn the Kettlemans is hilarious…tempered immediately afterward by the shot of Nacho stalking them, and then their actual disappearance. It swings back to comedy, though, when a conversation with Kim reveals that it’s the same voice modulator he uses to play the part of the Sex Robot when they talk dirty to each other.

Contrast is everywhere. There’s the contrast between McGill believing Nacho to be guilty of kidnapping the Kettlemans, and Nacho believing McGill to be guilty of setting him up. There’s the contrast between Kim taking McGill to the ransacked Kettleman home to convince him to turn Nacho in, and the fact that the visit only ends up strengthening his resolve that Nacho had nothing to do with it. There’s the contrast between the Tonight Show aping of “Here’s Johnny!” at the start of the episode, and the Shining-sourced reprise of the same line at the end.

And, of course, there’s the sequence that begins with McGill and Mike coming to blows in the parking lot and ends with them coming to an unexpected mutual respect in the stairwell. Whenever we think we’ve got our tonal bearings, we hit another jolt. And never does it feel cheap. In fact, it feels like a mandatory part of this show’s DNA; Saul Goodman was introduced to us as the reliable comic relief in a world of decay and creeping misery. Now that we dive into the past to find out what made him who he is, we don’t see a world of grey areas so much as we see a world of endlessly, insanely flickering blacks and whites.

It takes a notable toll on our hero to do the right thing, and as soon as he does he’s hit with a series of incremental punishments. This in itself is enough of an explanation of how Jimmy McGill becomes Saul Goodman. When it’s easier — and maybe even safer — to do the wrong thing, how long can a beaten man continue to do right?

Last week I wondered what it would take to push a man over the line, to stop him saying “Absolutely not” and start him saying “Yes, please.” “Nacho” has that answer; you just make “absolutely not” lead, reliably, to tragedy. Doing the wrong thing is then redefined as not an act of selfishness, but an act of survival.

The question might not be “When do we get Saul Goodman?” It may actually be “When do we lose Jimmy McGill?”

Really, though, talk like that probably makes the episode sound more tense and less funny than it actually was. “Nacho,” sincerely, is a riot. McGill getting unwittingly drafted to act as Nacho’s attorney (“…you sure he asked for me?”) is great, as is Odenkirk’s floundering as he tries to force his nervousness to evolve into confidence when meeting with his new client. (More contrast for you, there.) And the line of the night comes courtesy of Jimmy’s complete lack of self-awareness as he scolds Kim: “You see? This is why people hate lawyers.” That’s character building through brilliant punchlines, there. How often do you see that?

I don’t think “Nacho” hit the highs of “Mijo,” but I also think it accomplished something very different than that episode did. Whereas “Mijo” assured us the show could achieve greatness, “Nacho” shows us the show’s inherent cleverness, spinning an intentional befuddle out of what — at heart — is a simple, uncomplicated mystery.

My only real question about the episode is the ending. The way the duffel bag rips open, spilling money everywhere, is played like a revelation. I’m not sure why. Did I jump the gun on assuming the Kettlemans were guilty? Maybe that was something I wasn’t supposed to realize until the end…but the fact that they kidnapped themselves rather than turn to the police cemented it for me well before we saw the evidence.

I’m not quite sure what to make of it. It doesn’t seem to be either an effective shock or a riveting cliffhanger. We expected them to have the money, and then they are shown to have the money. I may well be missing something here (go to town, dear reader), but even if I’m not, it barely amounts to a complaint.

When a story is told this well, I’m not going to quibble about its punctuation.

Is it too early for Better Call Saul to produce a masterpiece? Maybe. But I’m calling this one anyway.

“Mijo” is an incredible piece of television. A tragic comedy in four distinct acts, each showing us another side of James M. McGill, amounting to what is essentially a portrait of the man we will be spending the rest of our episodes with.

I’ll start by saying that I cheerfully retract my concern that McGill was already Goodman. While there’s an awful lot of overlap, there’s a crucial difference; McGill has a conscience, and a reluctance to stay at the table after being dealt a lucky hand. It provides us, at least potentially, with an idea of the psychological territory Better Call Saul might chart. What will it take for him to willingly silence his conscience? How much must he stand to gain before he stops saying, “Absolutely not” and starts saying, “Yes, please”?

“Mijo” illustrates that very clearly in my favorite scene of the night, but we’ll come to that in due time.

“Uno” left us with a pretty intense cliffhanger; maniacal drug baron Tuco visited from Breaking Bad to jam a gun in our new protagonist’s face. This, I concede, is a thrilling taste of the great things Better Call Saul can do by keeping its action in the same town that Heisenberg eventually destroyed.

After all, in Breaking Bad, Tuco was fucking terrifying, yes. And yet he was also neutralized as a threat fairly quickly. I could go on to list all of the other threats that came and went over the course of that great show, but your mind is spinning through them already. A resurrection of a character like this is by no means a cheat, and gives us a chance to either further flesh out what made them tick (which is what happens here), or simply unleash them once again to do more damage (as I expect we’ll eventually get with Mike).

Perhaps the most interesting thing about Tuco’s appearance is the fact that, relatively speaking, the guy’s at a pretty even keel. Of course he beats two teenagers half to death and nearly cuts off McGill’s thumb, but it’s that “half” and “nearly” that signify the difference. As with McGill, there’s a push that hasn’t happened yet…a tipping point that’s not quite been reached. Tuco is still on this side of his own personal event horizon; he’s a maniac, but not yet beyond reason.

It’s different from the Tuco we knew, and yet perfectly in line with what we know to be his destiny. There’s even a physical manifestation of this relative calm: his third hanger-on, Nacho.

When Gonzo and No-Doz show up, it’s for the purposes of cameo. Right? Well…no. They don’t have much to do, but their presence is required, simply because they enable us to feel that something is off. We remember the Tuco / Gonzo / No-Doz dynamic. We remember, especially, how it ended. Now, here, there’s what feels like an interloper.

He’s an artifact of calmer times for Tuco. Times we never knew, but which are immediately understandable. Nacho has a much bigger role than either of the two henchmen we’ve known longer. He takes control. He lets Tuco feel like he’s the king, but it’s Nacho pulling the strings. He regulates his boss’s heat. He’s cruel (or at least criminal), but he uses his mind. He’s clearly the brains of the group. The fact that he doesn’t make it to Breaking Bad in itself explains the entirely unbridled Tuco we encountered there.

McGill’s dealings with Tuco make up the first act of “Mijo,” and they reinforce an observation I made in the previous review: if you want to win against the man who would be Saul, you can’t engage with him. Tuco is in total control in the living room, when he lets Jimmy spill a stream of desperation to willfully deaf ears, and our hero is helpless. In the desert he allows himself to drift into a discussion, and everything tips immediately (and hilariously) in McGill’s favor.

We saw a bit of actual lawyering in the first episode, but here we get a sense of why Jimmy is good at what he does. The incompetence isn’t genuine; we knew that from Breaking Bad, and we see that it’s no less true here. McGill never positions himself as more intelligent than who he’s talking to, but we know he is. He’s a student of human nature, throwing out as much as he can in the hopes that something sticks, and always willing to look foolish. If he looks like he’s not a threat, after all, people will let their guard down. Tuco lets his guard down, and gets to feel like he’s being “tough but fair” by giving McGill what he wants. He gets to be the judge. The fact that this lawyer is deciding every move for him — and reigning him back whenever he starts to stray from McGill’s intentions — doesn’t register. Tuco feels like he’s in control because that’s what proto-Saul wants him to feel. And Odenkirk plays it masterfully.

Of course, Jimmy McGill knows when he’s won (an important difference between he and Saul Goodman), and so ends the negotiations with a couple of broken legs for his accomplices. He knows he can only push so far.

Which leads us into the second act, in which we see Jimmy at ease. “Mijo” opens with the man in a corner, doing his best to worm his way back out of danger. There’s an element of almost invisible panic driving everything he says. But when he’s free? He gets to be himself.

And that’s my favorite scene in the episode. Jimmy flirting with a woman he meets at the bar is the adorable kind of sleazy, an accomplishment that was only possible because we don’t hear a damned thing he’s saying, I’m sure. In fact, until its final moments, we don’t hear a word that anybody is saying in this sequence. Body language, gestures, implications, gazes. Those are what tell this amusing short story that we’re treated to after the first act’s Waste Land.

In the background, however, a man is snapping breadsticks, and it rattles McGill in a way that we know it won’t rattle Goodman. It’s his conscience that drills in on this image — and its accompanying sound effect — and won’t look away. He’s aware of the fact that people are hurt because of him. He’s correct earlier when he reminds one of the boys that he talked them out of a death sentence, which for Goodman would be enough. For McGill, however, it makes him physically sick.

Its effects linger on into the next day, when he wakes up on Chuck’s couch and every viewer in the world is reminded that only Bob Odenkirk could make a line like “Take off the space blanket” sound like the funniest thing in history.

The third act is a long, gorgeous, artful, clever, soaring montage of McGill doing the closest thing to public good he’ll ever do: acting as a public defender to whomever needs him. Everything about this sequence is perfect. The framing of every shot, the overlapping crowds in time-lapse, the continuous plunk of disposable coffee cups, the way he squeezes aside to let a criminal — and then the police chasing him — down a stairwell, the gleefully repeating punctuation of his arguments with Mike.

It’s this sequence that elevates “Mijo” for me from something quite good to something excellent. A reminder that Better Call Saul knows its purpose, even if we maybe don’t. It’s a confident, elaborate, brave setpiece in an episode that already had one. That’s how strong Vince Gilligan is at what he does; he can afford to double down. He knows just how to play with a tipping point, and we get one here, in act three, with what could almost qualify as an alternate future for James McGill.

Sure, he wouldn’t amount to much, and he’d never bring home more than $700 per defense. He’d argue with parking lot attendants until the day he dies, and be cheated out of every thirtieth cup of coffee.

And yet, he just might be happy. And safe. And doing a world of good for the rare defendant that really needs him, and who deserves a showboat lawyer who can turn a jury against their preconceived notions.

But we don’t end there. We have a fourth act.

We’ve seen Jimmy in danger, Jimmy at ease, and Jimmy at his best. Now we see him alone. Unsatisfied in a dingy office, nestled deep in the back of a nail salon. A door that won’t open all the way. A telephone that never rings. However full his weeks as a public defender may be, he wants something different. Maybe not even something more…but something different.

Nacho returns. Without saying it in so many words, he’s looking to partner up with Jimmy. At least once.

It’s unquestionably a bad idea. But…it’s still something different.

When he’s at his lowest, when he’s vulnerable, when he has nothing to distract him from the fact that he’s nobody, that’s when an opportunity like this can really sweep him away.

There’s a clear — ethically, legally, rationally — correct response to this offer. But, well…we already know the ending.