^ Yes I'd agree, certainly these final few episodes have felt as much of an epilogue for BB as they are for BCS, and that's probably completely the right way to go but as I said a few weeks ago it has felt almost like a different show to the one we all watched and loved. Again not necessarily saying that is a bad thing, but it is a thing. It was unavoidable I guess. Couple of other thoughts. I loved how Jimmy's initial phone call was to his workplace to ensure the rotas were done and for them to tell HQ they needed a new manager! Re the ending, apparently they did give thought to just ending it with Jimmy and Kim standing there smoking, before they decided on having her walk out and keep looking back at him. Have to say I think they should have gone with their initial idea. That last bit felt unnecessary, even before you factor in Jimmy conveniently making his way to the exercise yard. the two of them stood there like old times would have been a wonderful image to end on, and we still know this might be the last time they see each other, it doesn't give us any hope that Jimmy's ever getting out of there * *I don't know anywhere near enough about the US justice system to have any idea whether as time passes he has any chance of his sentence being reduced sufficiently for him to get out, but I'm guessing it isn't likely.
Damn! I completely forgot how Chuck and Rebecca talked about Carol Burnett and her ear tug! Marion has a twin sister! Yeah, I'm not mad. Just a little sad that the Sandpiper arc unfortunately fell to the wayside for the larger story. Alas. Yeah, I loved that little touch. I fully expected it to be code. But nope. He genuinely cared for that place. I guess he did learn something as Gene. I can see arguments for both endings (and I think I also would've preferred ending with the shared cigarette) but I really loved that wide-angle shot of the two of them with the double fences dividing them. So much to unpack from that moment.
Jimmy calling Cinaboon reminded me of Gus calling Lyle that he would need to be manager for awhile because he was going to be away for awhile. Perhaps a shared respect for working class people and people they would see as citizens and not criminals like the other people they often deal with.
That checks out. At the trial, Jimmy mentions Walter White came to him two years ago and he spent 16 months "running" the meth business. So, that leaves an eight month stint as Gene Takovic (obviously Gene was under a lot of stress because he lost a HELLUVA lot of hair in eight months [or Saul was wearing a toupee ])
He wasn’t wrong though. If they even managed to prevent Badger from naming him. Take away Jimmy, nobody calls off the twins when they wait for him outside the shower. I don’t know a lot about the specifics of the justice system but I see plenty of paths to Jimmy getting paroled in his 60s or 70s.
One nice detail I saw posted in a fan group. The value of the portfolio of the guy with cancer was exactly the amount Walt calculated he needed to leave to his family.
If they did a third series in the BB universe, you know who I think should be the main character? Holly White. Make her around 11 years old, already dealing with the normal stresses of being a pre-teenage girl going through puberty in the modern world, just coming about the age to really understand who her father is. It'd be a very different show, lots less violence, more emotional, but there's some major statements they could make about bullying and identity. She could even visit Jimmy in prison to ask him about her father. I wonder, in future BB/BCS viewings. Should I watch the shows in the order: Better Call Saul except last four eps Breaking Bad El Camino Better Call Saul last four eps
That's the order I've decided to go with. I thought about skipping all of the Gene stuff until the end but decided that it acts just like all of the other flashbacks from both shows. To untangle all of those would be a crazy mess.
Of course their are now flashbacks during the final 4 episodes that need to be added into previous episodes from both Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad.
Nah, that's fine. Treat them like the regular flashbacks of the shows and film. Otherwise, that path leads to madness.
Yeah, I'm not going to be trying to pick apart the Gene scenes. There aren't all that many before then anyway. It'd be interesting if anybody did a project to just cut every scene in the entire two shows into chronological order. So you'd probably start with the 'Wolves and sheep' scene, then Fring's buddy getting shot, then move onto the Slippin Jimmy days and Chuck saving him from prison, then Walter flirting with Gretchen while talking about elements. Then you'd get to the actual show.
Now that I think about it the earliest scene might be when Hector held his son's head underwater. Tucco was older than Jimmy, right? I wonder what happened to Hector's two brothers. They must have both died in the war that got Hector all his territory. I'm watching the early episode of Breaking Bad where Jesse goes back to his parents' house. It seems to me like he honestly really wanted to reset his choices in that episode, and his parents' reaction reminds me of that scene in Better Call Saul where that girl with a criminal record was denied the scholarship and Jimmy said "They will always see you as the worst thing you did."
As I power through my rewatch, I've noticed certain things now my viewing is much more compressed and I'm not compromised (as much) with shitty memory. That and hindsight is 20/20. I specifically remember loathing Howard with every single appearance in the first few seasons (I only began to feel sympathetic for him after Chuck's suicide originally). And yet. This time around, I largely don't mind him. Yeah, he still had his moments of douchesnozzleness and he was certainly a schmooze with every public breath. But aside from when he indepedentantly sent Kim to the doghouse twice due to his huge overreactions (and still kicked her to the dirt after she brought in Mesa Verde), he really wasn't that bad of a person. Much of his bad actions were directly because of Chuck and we, the viewers, have the benefit of seeing that he was controlled and cajoled by Chuck right up until he stood up against Chuck about the malpractice insurance dispute. And he was right. But Chuck had to Chuck things all up and Howard could only blame himself. That's the tragedy of Howard: He always lived under the shadow of both his father and Chuck and the one time he stood on principle, when he was absolutely right, it blew up in his face and he couldn't see fault beyond himself. Nacho's storyline is even more tragic this time around. We always knew it was going to end badly for him thanks to the desert grave scene and his absence during the Breaking Bad era, but seeing it all play this time around is heartbreaking. All he ever wanted was security for himself and his father and every time he tried to protect each other, he made it worse. First he rightly got rid of the volatile Tuco...only to get Hector and all of his madness. He managed to induce Hector's stroke...only to fall under Gus' thumb immediately. And then Lalo showed up to fill in Hector's absence. Suddenly he was stuck between two terrible masters and forced to be a rat for one against the other. All he wanted to do was to escape with his father and he couldn't make it happen, despite all that Mike tried to do. And then there's Kim. It's really curious to see how she slowly breaks bad over the course of four seasons. And it all happened because Jimmy helped her develop her taste for the con. It all started with that Zafiro Añejo con and then it just slowly built up from there. As her career progressed, with its ups and downs, her desire to do Jimmy's cons grew stronger, even when Jimmy (if only half-heartedly) suggested to stop on his end. I just watched the brilliant con at the Lubbock, Texas city hall to swap in the revised Mesa Verde plans without having to refile. It's so crazy and so elaborate and yet so simple at the same time and she was all in. She did 95% all of the work of the con with just Jimmy playing the hapless brother leaving the leaky milk on the plans. But she had to earn the clerk's sympathy with her injured foot, single motherhood, and the hapless brother (built up before his glorious appearance) and Kim clearly relished every moment. She would've kept doing those cons as they got bigger and bigger, even pass the Sandpiper con against Howard, if it weren't for Lalo. I can't help but wonder how her career would've developed in the world where Lalo didn't just happen to come by that evening...
I actually thought he was going to escape to Canada with his father. I thought that would be one of the final scenes, them fishing or something.
Fair. I had hoped for a happy ending for them. But that doesn't really happen in this universe. Jesse is the exception.
If I was Skylar, I would have moved away. It must have been really hard for Walt Jr so I would want Holly to grow up where nobody knows who her father was. She might have, as it'd explain Skylar not being there to support her sister in those hearings and courtroom scenes...
I just watched the second Kim flashback and I don't know how I missed this before: The earrings she stole and then her mom swiped from the manager are the same ones Kim wore on a regular basis (including that episode).