The Prestige TV Podcast - 'Better Call Saul' Season 6 Episode 5 Recap

Episode Date: May 11, 2022

Ben and Joanna start the pod by commenting on the sumptuous cinematography in this week's episode, particularly the opening scene, and ponder if this was a conscious substitution for the lack of action in this comparatively transitional chapter within the season. They then discuss the significance of spice curls in regards to Lalo's whereabouts and the reappearance of some notable characters like Erin, Francesca, and Viola.(10:08) Next, they break down the boxing match between Howard and Jimmy and ponder if the outcome was part of "the plan". (32:34) Finally, they talk about the meaning of Werner's lucite slide rule, Lalo in Germany, and take a look at the promo for next week's show in anticipation for the mid-season finale.(44:43) Hosts: Ben Lindbergh and Joanna Robinson Producer: Chris Sutton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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I can't show up looking like Leon Spinks. Why not? I'm Saul Goodman. I fight for you. Put me in the legal ring and I'll fight for you to make them pay. I'm Saul Goodman and I'll fight for you. So you better call us off or else. Hello and welcome back into the prestige team.

TV podcast feed. I'm Joanna Robinson. Joining me here, he swears. His name is Ben and not Lalo Salamanka. It's Ben Lindbergh. Hi, Ben. Yeah, I actually go by Ben Salamanka now. I'm a dashing businessman from New Mexico who picks up German widows at bars. Are you working on like cultivating a drink in the front of your hair? Working on that, working on the handlebar mustache to block most of my face. Oh, okay. The better to impersonate you by I assume. All right, we'll talk about all of that in a second, obviously. We're here to talk about Better Call Saul. We are here specifically to talk about season six, episode five, black and blue. Before I get into that, just some presi-cheevi programming reminders as per usual. Folks are still covering winning time on this

feed. Folks are still covering Atlanta on this feed. And Sean, as we mentioned a couple times, is covering Barry with Bill Hader on Sunday night. So that's all for your enjoyment on this feed. And I'm sure there's more to come in the weeks ahead. What Colonel Sanders is to chicken, the prestige TV podcast is to TV. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Poise Hermannos just stood up in anger. We have two more weeks of this before they take the break, right? Because this is episode five of a seven episode chunk.

And then the final six will be starting in July. So you'll have two more weeks of us on this piece. And then hopefully we'll be back. It kind of depends on how many people are listening to this, whether or not we'll be back for the final stretch. But I hope we are. Tell your friends. Listen to the speed.

Anyway, so today we're here to talk about season six, episode five, Black and Blue, directed by Melissa Bernstein, who's like a 15-year veteran of the Gilliganverse. This is her second episode that she's ever directed. She did season five episode, JMM. And the episode was written by Alison Tatlock, and Allison wrote, Season 4, Say Something Stupid, Season 5, 50% off, and Season 5, JMM. So it's a reunion of source for Allison and Melissa. Do these names invoke anything for you, Ben, as you head into this episode?

I believe JMMM is the origin story of spice curls, which becomes very important. later in this episode. If you're wondering what spice curls are, go back to J-M-M, learn all about it. Spice Girls is what I call Tony Dalton's Forlock when he plays Lalo Zalamanka. That's his spice curl. Which spice curl are you?

Oh, I've always been, like, I always wanted to be a ginger, but I think I'm a baby. How about you? You strike me as like maybe a sporty spice, possibly? I'll take it. And in addition to all of that, I just want to re-mentioned that there are two directors of photography. I think that really comes in to play in this episode.

There's two directors of photography working this season. The odd episodes, which this is one, is Marshall Adams, who has been, who's done like 22 episodes of the show. So he's a veteran DP of the show. So Melissa's directed two episodes, but the DP here is Marshall Adams. And I kind of want to kick off by talking about cinematography in this episode. Because this is an episode that, you know, looking around seeing people's reactions, listening to Chris and Andy talk about it on the watch. It seems to be not everyone's favorite and not one that they felt like a lot happened.

I kind of thought we wouldn't have much to talk about. And then I got dug into it. I was like, well, I have a lot to say, actually. But I want to start with the cinematography because it seemed like a very, we talked about these impossible shots in the Breaking Bad, Better Call Cell universe that is famous for these stylistic putting the camera where you don't expect the camera to be. To my taste, there was just 10% of it. 15% more of that in this episode than I really needed.

Like it just started to feel like a challenge of how many trick shots we can get into one episode. How did you feel about it? This is heresy. Heresy to him. I always appreciate the impossible shots. And even more, I'd like the makers of Better Call Saul to just do a nature documentary someday. Because, you know, they just like really get in there. You can see like the ridges of people's fingerprints and ants and everything.

I don't know how they get these shots. But I see what you mean just because there wasn't so much going on in the surface, I guess, of this episode. There's more. There's subtext. We'll get into the deep currents here. But this is an episode where everyone is waiting for something, right? Which we'll probably get into. I mean, Jimmy and Kim are waiting to put the final touches on their plan.

Howard is waiting for Jimmy's next move. Mike and Gus are waiting for Lalo, the Sandpiper people, now featuring Matt Saracen's grandma, are waiting for the loss. suit to proceed. And we, of course, the audience are waiting for something to happen here, right? So there's a lot of waiting for shoes to drop and shoes not dropping. And so maybe some of the camera work seemed a little too cute, perhaps. And maybe because there wasn't so much going on in terms of action, that was kind of all there was on some level. Like I think Andy called the camera work sumptuous in this episode or possibly the production. So that's always a pleasure, but I guess even Saul can go overboard at times. I mean, you start the episode

with the classic Saul style montage. This was like a very better call Saul looking episode for better or worse. Yeah, I love when it started, when the opening montage started. And I'll just say the moment where I was like, is as too much as when like we follow the station wagon into the garage that has Mike in the back. And then somehow they like hook the camera in that continuous shot, hook the camera onto the garage door so that it closes when as the garage door closes. And I was like, I'm sure that's a fun challenge for you to do. I'm not sure that it added anything. I hope Jonathan Banks is okay after they crammed him in the RAV for that ride. It's just not the last time that we will see Mike crammed in a trunk, unfortunately, for him. Oh, man. All right.

But let's talk about the montage that starts, the cold open here. We find out by the end of it that we're watching a slide rule that belongs to Werner go into some lucite. But when it started and we see the chemicals. I was like, are we getting a cook montage? Are we getting like a real old fashion breaking bad cook montage? But as it started, the song that we hear over it is a German song in Stiller Knox, which is a, it's a song of mourning. But the fact that it was in German, I was like, oh, Lalo is going to Germany. That's, that was my first thought. I was like, oh my God, it's happening. We're going to Germany. Something that I found out while listening to The Insider podcast is the DP on this little cook montage was one of the camera operators, Matt.

cradle because they filmed this while they were also filming the boxing scene. So they were trying to do both at the same time, which is wild. But I mean, I loved it. I love all the cook montages on Breaking Bad. So I was happy to have Goop poured over my camera in this. How did you feel? Do you remember a couple episodes ago when I made a garden of Gassimini comp about nacho and you were happy that you had just brushed up on Jesus recently so you understood the reference? Well, I learned that in this song, in Stellar Naut. is it's actually a vocal version of Jesus's prayer in the garden of Gassimini. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Then it comes back around. Finger on the Jesus pulse here. I'm so proud of those years of Catholic school finally coming in handy. The other like really splashy thing that that kicks off this episode is we get like Kim's restless night, right? And we get the shot of the clock and it's 317 on the clock. And when seen in reflection, that's the word lie fun times. on the old trick shot front.

And so what did you make of Kim's insomnia sequence starting the episode? Why do you think she's hiding the truth from Jimmy here, right? Because she pretends to be working when he wakes up. He flips his light on and she flips her light on and then she reaches for some reading material. I don't know if she forgot in that moment that she had propped the chair in front of the door, which kind of gave away the game here. So it's not just your average study sesh. But do you think that she is hiding the truth to spare him the strain of knowing that Lala is alive and out there?

Or is this cold, pragmatic Kim who doesn't trust him with that knowledge or doesn't trust him to be able to stand the strain because she doesn't think he's made of stern enough stuff? I was going to say, it's the sterner stuff. That's exactly what I was going to say. I think she knows that they need to keep their eye on the Howard Prize here, that Jimmy is already slightly vacillating on the. on the Howard plan. Yeah. And so she's like, if I add this strain, you know, it's possible he's all, he's just going to fall apart.

So I need, I need this to go well. And then we can worry together about Lalo if we need to. Right. Right. Yeah. So email we got from listener Martha. And of course, please do feel free to always email us. Kim Wexler lives at a head to email.

We got a lot of great emails this last week. Great, great emails. But she pointed out in last week's episode when we got Kim's foot towel. as she's waiting for Cliff, etc. That Martha thought that was a reference to the iconic Diane Keaton movie Baby Boom, a tremendous movie if you've never seen it, where the camera focuses on Diane Keaton's tapping foot in moments of anxiety and specifically moments of anxiety that have to do with her trying to,

quote unquote, have it all, do it all, lean in, if you will. And so I don't know if that's an intentional connection, but I love any excuse to talk about Baby Boom. so I'll just throw that out there. Yeah. Let's move to Gus and your beloved spice curls. What do you want? I'm going to fly with the southwestern kick.

Why have we heard about spice girls before in the episode JMM? And why is that related to what happens in this episode? Yeah. Well, they're a huge seller, apparently. Sales are up big, even compared to comparable restaurant scales. So, yeah, Gus presents the new menu item at the magical meeting, right, of all of the various magical subsidiaries. And so I think that is relevant.

here. Not only is it an impressive instance of salesmanship, I think, that Gus is able to upsell this guy on the spice curls after he's already ordered the 12-piece spicy chicken bucket. Wow, it's true. He's 12 pieces in. Then Gus is like, would you like to try some spice curls? He's like, yes, please, sir, please put me down for those. Oh, and a couple of coax. Yeah, in for a bucket, in for an order of spice curls, I always say. He seems to be alone, and I'm wondering whether this is a family meal or if he's ordering the extra Coke to cover it to make it look like he's ordering for someone else. Anyway, if we're here to go.

Yeah, that's a good question. If it's to go, he's taking it home to the fam, maybe. Although, do you really want to refrigerate and heat up the spice curls? I don't know that they would survive that process so well. Spice girls definitely do not travel. I completely agree with you. No. Anyway, this is an impressive instance of salesmanship.

But beyond that, I think it's relevant because it seems to be that the spice curls maybe trigger that memory of Gus presenting the spice curls at the magical meeting, which then leads to another epiphany, right? And we suddenly see Gus lose it, right? He zones out and he seems to have a realization. And I assume the way I interpret that this was that this is the moment when he realizes where Lalo is, what we've all been wondering for a few episodes now. He knows he places that Lalo must be going to Germany,

not to get the original recipe for Spice Curls. but to figure out about the super lab. Do you think there's seven proprietary herbs and spices in the spice girl? Or it's like, or because it's Gus and he does everything extra, it's like 11. Yeah, right. It was good to see assistant manager Lyle, by the way. He's still around turning in his typically acceptable work. But yeah, does that seem?

Because that's the moment when Gus, you know, to the extent that Gus ever loses his composure. Yeah. That is when he kind of freaks out a little bit and he has to leave the restaurant and we get that dramatic shot of him from the Poyos parking lot. But that seems to be when he has that realization. It's all driven by the spice curls. I don't know if we're overthinking the spice girls or not, though, like, you know, Melissa and Allison, who I think are the originators of the spice curl in the JMM episode, certainly had that in their pocket. Listening to the insider podcast, they're definitely talking about Gus's spidey sense, right? that he knows, like, he's the one who, like, can just look at Hector's face and be like,

Lala's definitely alive. And everyone's like, why do you think that? He's like, I just know, right? And if he said the phrase Spice Girls and then went, I know, Germany. Like, that's, I truly bow down to you, Gus, if that is in fact the case. That's an incredible thing. But the timing is very suspicious. He says Spice Girls, and then he's just, like, gone across the ocean to Germany.

Yeah, I hope that guy got his spice girls. Something that they mentioned on The Insider podcast, which is a fun, like, sort of rule of thumb to think about when it comes to how they write these stories is something they called Tom's Law on set, which is a reference to Tom Schnau's a long time Gilginverse figure. And that his, that Tom's law is that it's boring for an audience to watch a show where they know so much more than the main character. And so Kim knows that Lolo's still probably alive, according to Mike. And Gus knows. But if all of them thought Lalo was dead and we know Lalo's alive, there's some sort of fun tension there where we know Lalo is just like, I think Andy called him the shark from Jaws like out there in the water. Maybe that sounds like a chrisism actually to me. But like that he's out there and these people are unsuspecting and he's circling them.

but ultimately I think there's a fine, and this just speaks to the mastery of the show, there's a fine balance in saying like one or two people know, but not everyone knows, so that you, the audience, aren't ahead of everyone. Right. And I think that's an interesting equation for them to balance. There's another writer's room rule. I don't know if it has a name, but I heard Vince Gilligan mention it on a previous insider pod, which is mystery, good, confusion, bad is the way they put it, which I think is a great way to put it.

because I often feel like, I don't know what's going to happen on Better Calls Law, but I never feel lost really from moment to moment. Everything that's happening is usually completely clear. It's just that we're getting only a portion of the picture. And so for the past few weeks, we didn't know where Lalo was. And I think it was much more effective that we didn't, that we were in the dark along with Lalo and Gus and everyone else, right? Because we were feeling the same suspense and curiosity that they were.

Or even now, when it comes to Jimmy and Kim's plan for Howard, Right? Perfect. We know that they know what the plan is, but we don't know what it is. So we have the fun of speculating, but we have to wait and see, which I think is great, because there are a lot of shows where I feel confused on a level of I don't understand what's happening. Here, I can't follow the sequence of events. Whereas in Breaking Bad or Better Call Saul, it's just, I don't know where this is going necessarily,

but I understand where we've been and I'm willing to be led wherever it's going. Did you also watch the Westworld season four Caesar? I didn't even get that part in Westworld. That's how confused I was. Okay. Much love to Westworld. It's just an intentionally confusing show.

Not that much love on my part. Speaking of writers' rooms' roles, I wanted to ask you about this. So we see this sequence, Gus in his full throes of his paranoia. We know that he's like wearing this bulletproof vest and wearing this gun holster and he's very, since he's so fastidious about like his clothes. and how he looks and stuff like that. Like he is enraged that he has to like have all this armor on him that because he

doesn't know what's coming and he doesn't, I can't plan because he doesn't know. So he can cox a plan, right? He goes down into the lab because he's like, I guess if he says spice curls equals Germany, Lalo's in Germany, Lalo's investigating the super lab all set up a trap in the super lab. I guess that's the spice curls order of events here. I mean, the sliding doors moment here. Like, if that guy doesn't order the spice curls, if Gus is not a good enough salesman to upsell him on the spice curls,

does Gus survive to Breaking Bad? Maybe he never makes that connection. I think we both know that Lyle is not going to be mentioning spice curls. No. So he goes down into the lab. He plants his gun. He fiddles with the lights so he can, like, essentially cut the lights, grab the gun, shoot someone down there, right?

He paces out the steps, right? That's the trapy setting. Right. So my question for you, as a far, like, more learned scholar of the Gilligan verse, Gilligan Gouldverse, do you think this writer's room ascribes to the Chekhov's gun principle in that, like, we saw Gus plant that gun, we're going to have to see that gun go off? Or does it ascribe to this other phenomenon that I like to notice in television? And this has more to do with theater than guns.

But like if you're watching a show that's about a play and you get to see the dress rehearsal of that play, you're never going to, something's going to go wrong before performance. They're never going to show it to you twice. Yeah. So if they showed you rehearsal, you're not going to see the actual thing happens. So we just watched Gus rehearse a trap. Every instinct in me is saying that trap is not something we're going to see or we're going to see it go wrong or something like that. But like what do you think about? the age old Chekhov's Gun principle, does that apply here?

Yeah. On the one hand, it's almost too straightforward to Sol, because they're constantly surprising us, and almost nothing is predictable. We know some things are going to happen, but the actual beat by beat, how these things occur, we never seem to stay with them. You know, like, we didn't call the Germany trip, right? We're like, is he going to Chile? I mean, in retrospect, we probably could have picked up on that.

We did talk about Kai. We got close. True. We did talk about Kai. We circled the drain, you know? Yes. Yes, but it's hard to call these shots in advance. And so that would lead you to think that the best lead plans here are going to go awry.

On the other hand, we have so much history that says that Gus really is able to see these things, that he has some sort of foresight. I mean, not completely because we know how his life ends. So he's not able to foresee everything when it comes to Salamanca's even. But we have seen him be prescient so many times. And even here, right, because Mike is convinced that Lollah, is going to go in guns blazing. So he's like, hey, we just need to wait at some point. He's going to show up and just, you know, somersault in the window or something, right? But Lalo is being smart about it, as he always is. And Gus anticipates that. And so while he's busy getting the

grout out, however he's spending his time, like, it made me think of his speech to Hector back in season four, episode six about the kawati, right? The animal that he just laid in wait for this animal that was robbing the tree of fruit. And instead of going after it directly, he just waits for it to come to him and is ensnared in his trap. And then they finally have this confrontation, but on Gus's terms, on no one else's terms. And it certainly checks out that Lalo would be coming to the super lab at some point to verify whatever he discovers in Germany. And it would even be poetically satisfying maybe if he does meet his end there and maybe he ends up in the concrete or in the dirt, right? Maybe he is interred in the super lab and maybe that's how breaking bad. Our perception

is changed by Better Call Saul. Every time we see, you know, the fly or a cook scene in breaking bad, we'll be thinking about Lalo's corpse somewhere buried beneath the concrete. Moldering. Yeah. Someone suggested that the fly was like Lalo's spirit haunting the lab. I love that. Yeah, it's like maggots on his corpse or something. Oh, God, yeah. Lalo, like, disintegrating in the lab is a very popular theory. And I will just say that that's not what I want, mostly because I enjoy Tony Dalton so much.

I know. I'm still clinging to this hope that he survives into the gene timeline because I feel like we're going to get a lot of gene. We have to, right, at the end of all this. Yeah. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Tony Dalton, give me Tony Dalton in black and white. I would like to. Right.

Yeah, I mean, I don't know if I'm skipping ahead here, but that's the question like something that Chris and Andy talked about. Where's the suspense come from aside from Kim and maybe aside from Howard? Because we know that Lalo does not succeed, right? He does not topple Gus. He does not bring the lab to the attention of the Salamanca's. That doesn't mean he dies necessarily. But what is the scenario where he fails and yet also survives? You know, it's kind of tough to come up with a scenario where those things happen.

They're so smart and they can give this gift to me. So here's my fervent prayer to this show that they've already written. Please let Lala live. Yeah. For now at least, he's in Gus's head. He's in Mike's head. He's in Kim's head. He's in everyone's head, right?

And he has gotten Gus to the point that he can't concentrate at work. And really, work is often the way that Gus distracts himself from other things, right? He will de-grease the cooking surface 10-10. times while he's waiting for news about something else. And now he can't even focus at his desk, which turns out to be good because it spurred the famous spice girls connection. But that just shows, I mean, along with the glass shattering in the earlier episode, like, he is feeling the strain here. He's cracking up. I still have to wonder, this is the most interesting thing we could be doing with Gustavo fring in these final episodes. I feel like, I mean, okay,

so John Carlos Spadillo is directing next week's episode, which could either mean that it's a big Gus episode or it could mean that it's not a big Gus episode. Either he got to direct himself in a major way or he gets the week off from acting because he's making his directorial debut. So we don't know. But

we got a bunch of emails, because we were talking about Chile, right, Pinochet. We've got a bunch of emails about like, you know, Gus's past. And I kind of think this could be a cool opportunity to explore some of that or, you know, I don't know. The Saul writers are so much smarter than I am, so I don't think it's

really fruitful for me to be like what else could be doing. But what else say? Like some of these gus is cracking up sequences feel a little ponderous to me. Yeah. I think the pace of the final season because you expect it to be amped up is maybe a bit off putting to casual Saul fans if there is such a thing. I feel like Saul really inspires such loyalty, such hardcore affiliation and scholarship of the show that I don't know that anyone at this point is still around who's just kind

dipping in and out. If they are, they're probably pretty confused. They don't know where spice curls came from. But I think that if you are in, and look, like we've talked about the maybe deliberate pace of some of the earlier seasons. And there's a lot of rich character building and depth that goes on there as well as the craftsmanship just on the other side of the camera. I think people probably after the way season five ended with Bagman and just all of the other intense events there, maybe expected things to be full throttle to the finish line more the way that Breaking Bad was and it has been at times with nachos end but then it has pulled back and said hey no this is bitter cost all like this is the way the

show has always been this is the way it will be right up until the end but at some point it's got to pick up and we do have a midseason finale coming up in two weeks so yeah if we get a a gus backstory episode where poor John Carla Esposito somehow has to look even younger even younger No. I'm not going to put that on him. No, no, no. I don't know if this is the time. As much as I'd like to know more about Gus and his history,

although it's kind of nice just not knowing, right? Just having you be a cipher. Yeah, let the mystery be. Okay, I can do that. All right. On this subject of patience and waiting, let's hear from the aforementioned grandma Saracen, Luanne Stevens, on that topic.

If a document or a piece of evidence is relevant, that means it has a tendency to prove or disprove an element in the case. This whole thing is just taking. So darn long. Unfortunately, high-stakes class actions like these often move on a protracted timeline. Well, okay. For some of us, don't have a protracted timeline, if you know what I mean. I know you all want to get to the finish line.

Boy, I sure do. But I'm going to level with you. Truth is, we still have a ways to go. All right, that takes us into our next section, which is to talk about, like, the trio of women who show up in this episode. We've got Francesca, who we knew it was coming from the promo. We've got Viola, and we'll talk about her in a second. I don't know if they pronounce it, Viola or Viola, in this show. And then Aaron, which brings us to Sandpiper.

I just want to do a quick shout out to any Mythic Quest watchers. Jesse Ennis, who plays Aaron on the show, is so incredible a Mythic Quest as Joe. I mean, great name for a character. Yeah, you're an insect. But she's a genius on that show, and I hadn't seen Mythic Quest when Aaron was on Saul before. So when she came back, I was like, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Jesse Edna's great stuff.

Yeah. And sort of a similar vibe, right? The way that she looks at Howard in this episode, it kind of reminds me how she looks at Rob McElhenney in Mythic Quest. All right. So we do the Sam Piper Check-in. And before our sort of lead member of the case was a woman named Irene, but here we've got someone new,

played Luann Stevens, who played Grandma Saracen on Friday Night's as Sally. Not everyone is a huge, Friday at Lights watcher, and everyone cares as much about Grandma Saracen as I do. But so it could be that she was just here for this episode. But I feel like you don't Castleman Stevens necessarily for like three lines of dialogue. Do you feel like we're going to see more of this character, Ben? I thought so, yeah.

And shout out to Longmeyer as well, because she had a recurring role as Ruby in Longmire. So yeah, I would expect that this was not a one-off necessarily. All right. So let's keep our eye on her. I mean, we've got to, in theory, wrap up everything, Sandpiper, before we all go home here. Then we get this interaction between Kim and Viola. Viola, of course, played by another Keiko Aginahue from Gilmore Girls, et cetera, et cetera. Great, great actress.

I don't know that she's ever been, like, used her full potential on Saul, but she is used really well here, I think, in the way that she subtly gets under Kim's skin. What did you think of this interaction? Yeah, especially the line when she says, I read. really admire you changing direction like that. Sometimes I question all of it, but you make me feel better about the law. That has to hit differently. That also reminds me of our conversation about Wexler in German, right, being one who changes or inspires change. Yeah, Vexler. And so, Bial is admiring her for changing direction like this, but she doesn't even know the true directional change that she's making here away from the law. So I wondered, you know, I mean,

And Kim, by the way, is just like setting up in El Camino 24-7. Like, is she renting space in there now? This is the Kim Wexler Memorial booth where she holds all of her business meetings. I love it for her, actually. I would think that that line, like, as she says that, I mean, the whole purpose of this meeting is not just to catch up with an old workplace proximity associate, but to wheedle the information about the judge in the Sandpiper case out of her. So even as she's being told that she is just a fine ups and. standing citizen here, she is doing just the opposite. Yeah, and I can't remember, do you remember the

exact language Jimmy uses? Like, you weaseled it out of her or something like that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I thought that that was interesting. These are interesting, like, mirrors to hold up to Kim. And I thought, I thought, I thought Racy Horn's, like, the look on Kim's face as she digests that, and then it cuts away. Like, that's the end of the scene. Like, close in on Kim's uncomfortable face cut away. So, there we go. All right. Last but not least, though, our trio of, of, of, of ladies in this episode, we've got Francesca. As we said, we knew she was coming. We've known she's coming for a while.

We met her earlier in Better Call Saul. She was working for Kim and Jimmy. She really loved Kim. She didn't have much affection for Jimmy at all. So there's this big question in the audience of how is how is Francesca going to like come over to Jimmy's side when she doesn't really care for him? Like how is she going to do this? And the answer turns out to be something extremely simple.

like the right price tag apparently. So my question is, are we overthinking some of these other, like, how is this person possibly going to go from this to this? Like, is this a good lesson for us to not like expect an elaborate explanation for every single turn of the screw, you know? Although in Breaking Bad, Francesca was always a hustler, right? Like, she kind of made sense as a colleague of Jimmy's at that time because she was always working her own ankle.

So I guess it sort of makes sense even though she never liked Jimmy. She'll go where the paycheck is or where the bonus is. And I did want to mention while we're doing deep dives on various texts, can we just analyze the lyrics of the Wilson Phillips song, Release Me that Francesca is rocking out to as she's driving up here. Always. To bring the same level of analysis to this that we brought to Julius Caesar last week, the song starts, I know that it's time for a change, but when the change comes, will you still feel the same? So this reminds me again of Vexler and of changing. And we actually got an email from Dominic in Germany, who I'm sure was excited about the Germany location of this week's episode, who said that not only is Vexler someone who changes or switches, but it can also be someone who enables change like a money changer. So it's actually maybe Kim who is transforming Jimmy into Saul to some extent.

So it works in both levels. But maybe Francesca is being changed too by this interaction. as she's rolling up here. Previously, she was a fan of Kim. And she seems a little dismayed, maybe, that they're married now. I think she probably thinks that Kim could have done better. But she is getting on board with Jimmy because that's where the money is. So that's going to shape her path now, too. Doesn't matter if it's an empty office with the toilet in the middle of the floor. Yep. She's here for it. Well, thank you. Thank you so much for bringing in the sacred texts of the Bible, Shakespeare, and Wilson Phillips.

Yes. I'm really excited to see that Holy Trinity in play here. I want to show out this really interesting observation, speaking of the office from our listener, Bob, who wrote in saying, Saul showing Kim his new office space and saying it was a temporary spot until he could find something better remind me the flashback of Walt touring his home in the full measure episode of Season 3 of Breaking Bad. Walt considered the house a starter home that they'd have to move out of in a year.

Saul also views his office space as temporary solution and even hopes to get the landlord to agree to a month-a-month-lease so you can upgrade soon. both men had lofty vision of their future, home slash office, but ultimately made their temporary solution permanent. I like that because in both instances in that season three episode of Breaking Bad in and this one, we know already that these men are going to stay where they are. So there's that dramatic irony sort of hanging over it and a depressing dramatic irony. Yes. Yeah, we mentioned that last week. I think it's sort of sad that Saul thinks he's going to upgrade, that this is just the stop cap, but we know that's as good as it's going to get, at least in his Saul persona.

Maybe there are better things ahead for him as Gene, but I hadn't made the wall connection. So nice observation, Bob. You said this place was steps from the water. We just haven't found the steps yet. How much did we save? Enough. Enough to get lost. Or you could book a stay with Hilton.

Welcome to your oceanfront room. Just steps from the water. The Hilton sale is on now. Book on Hilton.com. or the Hilton app and save up to 20% to get the stay you expected. When you want savings, not surprises. It matters where you stay. Hilton for the stay.

All right, let's go to an unexpected boxing ring for Hamlin versus McGill, the fight of the century. To borrow one of my favorite phrases describing one of the best episodes of Mad Men, the thriller and vanilla between Hamlin and McGill. We get a Cicero mention twice in this episode, I think, and our listener Chris on the heels of our Julius Caesar aside last week wrote in to say Jimmy is from Cicero. Pretty sure Cicero was a lawyer and a charismatic orator and is in Julius Cesar as well.

I hadn't put that together. I love that. Did you have, I mean, I guess it was in the trailer for the season, but I missed it. But like, did you expect Howard and Jimmy to box out their feelings this season? No, I did not. No. And I don't think Jimmy did until that instant when he turns around, just as he's about to walk away.

But we got this great Howard wine, right? As he's standing over him, you've mistaken my kindness for weakness, which is wonderful. I think we're getting a lot of layers to Howard here. What I wondered, I mean, this fight, I love that Jimmy is fighting dirty, right? Even during the boxing match, you know,

he's faking that he needs a second and then he comes up swinging, or he's stepping on Howard's foot and then punching him while he's flat-footed. But I did kind of wonder, like is there a slipping Jimmy aspect to this fight or a diving Jimmy? Is Jimmy taking a dive here? Because look, I think Howard is the better qualified person to win this fight. Although I guess, you know, Bob Odenkirk is in nobody's shape maybe at this point. I don't know. They kind of hid that a little bit with his wardrobe.

Shout out to Patrick Fabian's arms. Patrick was like, if I'm going to do this, I'm going sleighless. Yeah, he trained for this. He got on the Marvel diet for this scene. But I wonder, though, is Jimmy throwing this fight, do you think? Or is he so into it because of his animosity and the grudge that he holds against Howard? Like, Howard's trying to send a lesson here, right? And he's hoping that maybe Jimmy will just get this aggression out in the ring and then he'll leave him alone, although he knows and doesn't really believe that that's going to happen. And on some level, Howard just wants to punch this guy too, right? Because he's been, you know, pranking him and gaslighting him and sabotaging him for quite a while now, going back to the bowling ball stunt and the sex worker in the restaurant stunt, et cetera. So what I wondered, though, initially it looks like Jimmy just sort of got suckered into this fight, right? He was going to walk away and then he just couldn't let it go. But then the conversation with Kim afterward painted in a new light because neither of them is at all disconcerted that Howard has seen through their plan. In fact, that seems to be part of the plan that he would. And Jimmy's like, well, why did I do this?

why did I not walk away? And Kim says it's because you know what's coming next. And we don't know what's coming next. But does that mean there's an element of guilt here? Like Jimmy wants to give Howard one more win before they spring whatever trap they have prepared for him. That's the exact journey I went on that at first I was like, oh, man, Jimmy, born to lose. Right. Like, you know, got himself put in a position where he's going to, you know.

But then in that Kim conversation, exactly. I mean, because of how she says it, how she grabs his hand. And then we're all concerned because at first you're sitting there going, of course they got caught. You know, Howard says basically like another sex worker. Like you already did this. Why are you doing this? And shout out to the folks on the Reddit who pointed me in this direction that when they were first doing the country club bit. And I think that's when she says it.

Kim goes, I'm worried this is all too subtle. Right. And I didn't pick up on that at the time. But now that we know that, like, they're trying to go for unsettle because they want to get caught because of dot, dot, dot, whatever's next in their plan. And again, I thought they meant too subtle for Cliff to pick up on. Exactly. Exactly. And I think that, again, that's a perfect example of what you were talking about before.

We're like mystery, not confusion. Right. Where we're like, oh, but we're not confused as to what's going on. It's just like another piece of the puzzle clicks into place, which is really. fun. The bigger plan, I don't know what it is. But it seems to involve this judge. So Judge Rand Casamuro, which is the information that Kim weaseled out of her former colleague, has a distinctive handlebar mustache. And as you mentioned before, Jimmy says, that's a lot less face to worry about, which sounds like someone is going to be impersonated. This reminds me of like when you watch

way too many films and too much television like I do, you have this spidey. sense when someone shows up with like outlandish facial hair or something like that, you kind of wonder, are they going to be impersonated later by someone? Suddenly you think, Germany. Yeah, exactly. Space curls, damn it. So anyway, yeah, Jimmy had the same thought. He's like, handlebar, mustache, perfect for our plan that involves impersonating a judge, I suppose. I don't feel like looking at that guy, I don't feel like Jimmy himself is going to be doing this. It feels like they're going to hire an actor to do this, but that feels super illegal impersonating a judge, right? Yeah. And my question is, have they underestimated Howard, even if this was part of the plan? And in retrospect, it seems obvious that it would. They're using the same tricks from the same playbook here. How could he fail to realize this now? It could just be that they don't care if he realizes because blaming everything on Jimmy slash Saul just makes him look guiltier, right? It's even more incriminating. I mean, you can see that.

Makes him sound like Chuck. Exactly. Yeah. I mean, in the cliff scene where Cliff confronts Howard and Howard immediately is like, I don't. have that kind of problem, I have a Jimmy problem, right? I mean, I think that is even more suspicious to Cliff that he's deflecting here, that he's not admitting that he has the problem that Cliff is convinced that he has. So to some extent, like the obviousness of the plan means that that plays right into Jimmy and Kim's hands because it makes him look more guilty in Cliff's eyes. On the other hand, could it be that even so they have underestimated Howard and that now that he puts a tail on them, he basically has Axis fixer from billions following Jimmy around at this point. Oh, is that what I said?

I don't think it is, but that's who I thought it was initially. Oh, okay, sorry. Same sort of role. No-ho-hank. Yeah, right, exactly. I watch too much TV too. So I make it connections that aren't even there. But is that farther than they thought he would go?

I mean, you'd think that they would be able to anticipate that, right? That maybe that is a move that Howard would make. but if not, does that mean that they have made it so obvious that Howard will actually surprise them in some way and not just play right into their hands? So that brings us to Andy Greenwald's theory that he floated on the watch, this idea that it's not going to be the cartel or Jimmy or whatever that brings down Kim. It's not going to be that Kim dies. It's that Kim's going to be disbarred. And maybe that's a fate worse than death. It's not.

But like it feels like it might be for Kim. Andy saying that made me go back to thinking about when they're first plotting out this scheme around Howard. And Kim says we're talking about a career setback, a career setback for one lawyer. She's talking about Howard here, but is that sort of dropped in there as a foreshadowing for her? Is it a career setback for Kim for one lawyer? And is that is, is being disbarred as a result of all of this enough for her to break with Jimmy? I don't know how she can possibly blame him, so she's the one leading the child. charge in all of this, but like, you know, if she's like, that's it, I need, I need to go.

I lost this thing that was so important to me. I could see that happening. The other thing that I wanted to talk about in relation to that, and then I want to hear your thoughts, but in relation to that, we got, I don't think it was an email because I couldn't find it. So I think it must be something someone tweeted at me. This idea that going back to last week's episode when we were in the therapy session with Howard, you and I talked about how maybe that was a reason to remind us that Howard's a human. He talks about his home life. How was a human, a real human and this is a real human on the line here that they are targeting that Howard's the good guy all the sort of stuff like that but someone messaged me to say what's sad about that therapy

session right is that the therapist has to remind Howard to talk about his personal life because Howard goes in talking about work and so if we circle back to that that those lines we're talking about a career setback a career setback for one lawyer like if work is all that matters to Howard if work is his entire world that's a bigger crime than someone who has a healthy work life balance I can just be like, oh, well, at least I have my happy home life with Howard doesn't seem to have. Right. What do you think? Yeah.

I mean, now that we know he has trouble at home, work kind of is his life, I guess we could have imagined before that he did have some happy home life that we just weren't privy to. Although, I don't know that I did imagine that. I kind of just pictured Howard as someone who is sort of living for HHM, but it was at least a possibility. And now we know that he has everything to lose. And I think in the next time on, which we will talk about before we end, but on it, that board of plans for Howard here. I think one of the sticky notes is just like a nuclear cloud, you know? It's like they're going nuclear in some way. I don't know how or what form that will take, but that's worrisome. And now you have this like multiple tails situation, right?

Right. Because you have Howard's guy following Jimmy, just as Mike's guy is following Kim or maybe both of them. So the tails are going to be tripping over each other. What worries me, I think, is that Mike told Kim to ignore the tales, right? And said he didn't care about whatever caper Kim and Jimmy have going on on the side. Just ignore them, you know? And so maybe Kim sees the tale that is on Jimmy's trail, and she ignores them because she thinks that, oh, this is just Mike's guys, right? And so doesn't know that it's Howard's PI does something that she wouldn't mind Mike's guys seeing, but very much would mind Howard seeing. And then does this arm Howard with some information that helps him take down Jimmy?

I mean, if Jimmy is exposed as a friend of the cartel here and there are already suspicion surrounding him, does that help Howard? Or does that get Howard in even deeper trouble? Right? Because now maybe Howard's in the game. If he inadvertently stumbles over something Jimmy is doing with Mike and Lalo and who knows who else. So maybe Howard is about to submerge himself in even deeper waters here. So I'm worried for Howard, and yet I'm also thinking maybe Howard rallies and sort of surprises Jimmy because he's just like he's had it hard. I mean, he hasn't always been likable and easy to root for.

He's been arrogant and conceded at times, but as we have discussed, he doesn't deserve it. Yeah, he gets a bad rap. And they think he's something that he's not often. And so it would be almost unjust if he just ended up getting taken down, not that everyone gets a happy ending, who deserves one. I mean, barely anyone deserves one in the Gilligan purse. But if anyone deserves sort of a better ending than they've had, it's Howard probably of these remaining characters. So I wouldn't want to see him go down that way, you know,

just like run a foul of Gus somehow while he's trying to keep tabs on Jimmy. But if he did, if they got Howard killed when they just meant to the nuclear cloud is supposed to be, was there a handlebar mustache on the nuclear cloud? But if they're just trying to like nuclear cloud his career and they get him killed. Another thing I wondered is, does Howard think that Kim is in on this at this point? Does he know? Because he places Jimmy at the scene of the crime as soon as he hears that Cliff was meeting with Kim. That's the giveaway, right? Okay, Jimmy is involved. But does he still think that Kim is kind of a pawn of Jimmy here, that she doesn't see his true nature because of that earlier scene after the bowling ball episode where Howard, he tries to stage an intervention? But I think her reaction to him in that scene would make him think, no, she's not just a pawn. here. Maybe so. She's in on it too. So yeah, he knows that they're in cahoots at this point. She's like, this is condescending, like, how dare you. Yeah. Okay. Let's go to a segment of the

notes that I'm calling Run Lalo Run because Lalo's in Germany. Verner payoff that we've been looking for since season four. We did not go as far as Germany in our speculation, but one of our listeners did. Before this episode aired, our listener named Matthew wrote in saying like, you guys are so close. You mentioned Kai. Why didn't you make the final step? Which is Lalo's going to Germany. And Matthew was hoping to hear Tony Dalton's German. So to oblige him, here's a brief snippet of Tony Dalton speaking German ever so briefly. Stop sign. And Martinique, me too.

Votka gin. Give me whatever you like. You're American. I guess you could spot us a mile away. I could have used. so much more than that just that clip. I love that he switches to English almost immediately. And then the bartender goes, American.

And he's like, oh, I guess you can always tell. I'm like, well, maybe because you were speaking English immediately. Yeah. I don't know what to tell you. I got some questions on Twitter about like, how is it that Lalo was able to make, like remind us, refresh us on how Lalo knows to go to Germany to search out Werner's widows, stuff like that. So in a reminder, in the season four finale, Lalo called Werner.

pretending to sort of be part of Fring's organization and Werner, the leakiest ship that ever was, just starts blabbing. You know, and he mentions Mike. He mentions a South Wall. He mentions Kai's name. Like there's a bunch of stuff that Werner just babbles on to Lalo about as Lalo is like casually fishing for intel on what this construction site is. Anything that sticks out to you particularly from that season four? exchange. Yeah. Well, also, I think he got more info when he was at Travel Wire, right? When he

mission impossible down through the ceiling. That's what I knew Lolo was going to be my favorite. I think he looked through the records, right, of the transfer that Margarita sent to Verner. And so presumably there was some information there about who she was or an address, something like that. I mean, we know that he is a super PI. You want to put Lalo on the case. We want that spin-off. But I think he had more of a paper trail here than that, just the name. So we circle back to this plaque that we saw. I mean, first of all, lovely, sex, like, I would happily watch Lalo seduce widows all over Europe. Oh, yeah.

Till the end of time, I love it. And I love that on the insider podcast, they were sort of like, their understanding of this exchange is that, like, Lalo is kind of into it. And that, like, ultimately, though he puts the silencer on the gun and is ready and has it out if he needs it, like, he would prefer to go out. the window than kill her if he you know so like he doesn't you know we like her he likes her he no one wants her dead you know essentially i don't think he has a conscience exactly but i think he doesn't want to kill her for maybe multiple reasons one they had a nice conversation two i think also if she were to be killed that would probably get back to gus and mike right i mean maybe gus knows anyway what lalo is up to but that would kind of be a giveaway if someone yeah exactly so i don't think he's

wants to kill her. And can I just say, I don't know if you know this about me, but I'm a doxen guy. Oh, are you? This was hard for me. I'm so happy that Bershon is okay. I know that our mutual friend Mallory Rubin is usually the one who is on the edge of her seat and possibly on the edge of peers when it comes to all creatures, large and small. But this was tough for me. I am the person for whom the website does the dog guy exist. So to have a doxin, this was a triggering scene for me. I mean, watching Nacho get got was tough enough, but if something had happened to Bershin, I don't know that Lalo could have come back from that for me.

But I will also just say that as a nearly lifelong doxon donor, that of all of Lalo's superhuman powers, you know, all of the windows that he climbs out of and the ceiling tiles that he finds through. And flights, flights he catches out of Mexico to Germany, sure. Convincing a dachshund that doesn't understand Spanish, presumably, to stop barking, that's at the top of the list, because my dog would have died in this scenario. She never would have stopped barking while Lolo was in the house. So just as I would watch Lalo seduce widows of across Europe, you would watch Lalo like Dog Whisper in Spanish? Love it. Okay. Give us all these Lolo's spin-offs. Okay, so the piece of information that Lalo gets from the house here is we circle back to this

Memento that it turns out Werner's loyal men gave to, I'm assuming it's post-mortem, like a gift that they sent because Margarita says they sent flowers, they sent cars. She didn't say they sent a slide rule in Lusite. Maybe they did that from another job. But the slide rule in Lusite, the inscription, please forgive my shoddy German in Lieber Dyn Jung's which means love from your boys and there's a sticker on the bottom that is the manufacturer's name

which is Volker's. I froze the frame, I enhanced but I'm pretty sure there was an address on there or if not he can find it in the phone book but Volker's is like the person who produces so presumably he can go to the manufacturer say who commissioned this very specific piece and then go find

and Kai or Casper or whoever that he wants to find and then get the squeeze the intel that he wants out. When we talked about Kai last week, we talked about that exchange when Mike in the season five premiere is sending all of Werner's boys back to Germany. And Kai says, talk some shit on Werner and Mike punches him down into the sand. There's another person in that scene, Casper, who says he was worth 50 of you to Mike. So Kai and Casper top of my list of like to, Kai perhaps because he got punched by Mike or Casper perhaps because he was so vocal about his admiration for Werner.

But my question is, you know, if the Bader Cross All writers feel like Mike made an error in that scene that will come back to haunt him, is it just letting those boys live at all? Like should they all have, you know, been paved under in the super lab or something like that? What do you think? Right, it could be that. It could be pissing them off so that they are eager to give away, Mike. And I haven't seen it, but I saw sourced from Reddit, right, that there's a DVD commentary of that scene, I think, from Peter Gould's where he says that Mike may have made a misstep here, either, you know, when he punches Kai possibly. And he lets Kai drive away alone. He says it's a long drive. I think he's the only one maybe who gets to go solo. So maybe something happens to Kai on that trip that will make it easier. for Lalo to pick up his trail, or maybe he just gets his address from the company because he commissioned it. I don't know if Kai would have been the one paying for that, but I assume that he will track them down. And, you know, I don't know. Like if Mike hadn't punched Kai,

would he have gone to his grave to protect the secret from Lalo when Lalo shows up? You know, probably not, maybe. But just out of fear, he is going to be afraid to say anything because of what happened to Werner, but I assume that Lalo has ways of making people talk, and it's not just having a great pickup line and buying you a drink always. So I worry for Werner's voice, but you would think that he's going to weasel some information out of them, too. Hopefully it's just weaseling and not the other methods that he might use. The last thing I want to say on the Werner front is, did you? You feel like the Lalo line in the bar where he says minerals is a Marie, Hank.

Rock's joke? Yeah, I wasn't sure what that was in records to, but maybe. Reddit seems to think so, and I, and I love that for them. And I liked also that she spoke up to correct the trivia players about the first female astronaut, right? because we have seen Werner do something similar to maybe back in season four in a bar scene when he spoke up to correct someone, I think, maybe about the pronunciation of a German drink. So they're soulmates. Oh, half a Weizen.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right. So they lament for each other. I wish that they enjoyed a long retirement of correcting people in bars. But I guess, you know, that's why Lalo didn't get invited in there. Who could turn down Lalo? But when you had Werner and you're still in mourning, I guess I get it. Werner's the gold standard. They broke the mold, I guess, and they made him.

Yeah, that was really relatable content from Margarita. I, too, have corrected people on trivia and bars. Okay, let's wrap up here with a little, like, pre-ster egg, as they like to call it, the insider podcast segment. One thing they mentioned on the insider podcast this week is they dropped this phrase, Shnauss, Tom Schnauz, we mentioned earlier, Schnauz Farms cheese. And they're like, oh, that's an Easter egg for the future. I don't know what that means.

Schnauz Farms Cheese? we'll find out. Are we going to a dairy farm? Who knows? Next week, as we mentioned, the episodes directed by Jen Carlo Esposito. It's called Axe and Grind Along our X and Y. Trajecture here in this season, we know something. So we're going to talk about the promo for a second. If you're the kind of person who does not like to watch the promos, those people definitely exist. We will see you next week, but we're going to get into it right now. So let's talk about, first we see a character we've seen before, Dr. Caldera, who is this like, very, very that cartel Dr. Fixer connection have.

We also see a shot of the business card for best quality vacuums. So do you think these things are related? Do you have any thoughts or feelings about Dr. Caldera coming in next week? Happy to see him again, Albuquerque's best veterinarian slash underworld hookup guy. Maybe he makes the connection to add the disappear. I mean, I wonder, because unfortunately the actor who. played Ed Robert Forster. He passed away a couple years ago, right? Which makes you think that we will probably not be seeing Ed, I imagine. So that kind of complicates things because you could come up

with some scenarios where that would have made some sense. But even just having the card, I guess that explains how Jimmy has it later on, right? Maybe he gets it from Dr. Caldera. Who knows? Who's in need of disappearing as early as next week? Well, we know Kim will not be exiting that soon, I would think, unless she shows up later in the season in the future. You never know which way they're going to go. Are we going from, like, chair under the door handle to disappear me? It's a big leap. Maybe.

We also get a shot of the Albuquerque isotopes car freshener. It seems to be something that, like, Kim is using in a court case, but it is also the key item from the Gene flash forward where Jeff the cab driver in the Gene timeline has one dangling. That's how we know he's from Albuquerque, why he recognizes Saul, which is, if you recall, it's been a while, but puts Jean in quite a pickle being recognized at the Cinebon. Do you think this is just like a fun little unrelated Easter egg? Or what do you think? Do you hear my little bershin barking in the background? I heard your bershin.

While I was here, I got to go. Yeah, I don't, I'm always, as a baseball guy, happy to see any baseball reference in Better Cause All, which is always a baseball show. I don't know what to make of this unless it is kind of a precursor of jumping forward in time. And, you know, there was another shot in this promo, a heavily tattooed hand. I don't know whether you place that. I was trying to figure out whose hand that might be. I was Googling Skinny Pete's tattoos and I kept getting Pete Davidson. or I thought maybe it's Emilio, who we know was part of connecting Jesse with Saul and he had some tattoos. So I...

Let's just hope again, it's Danny Trejo. Yeah, sure. That's great, too. Let's just spend the rest of this stretch of show wishing for Danny Trejo. Jesse Walt's expectation check. Okay, so like we've got two more episodes of this sequence. There's a theory that part two takes all, takes place all in the gene timeline. I'd be a little surprising.

at this point, given how slowly things are unfurling here, uncurling, and spice curling. What's your Jesse Waldex? Do you think we're going to get them next week or the week after or in part two? I guess I would lean part two, but maybe part one is a way to make it not seem anticlimactic if it ends up just being sort of a small role, which I imagine it will be and kind of hope it will be. you know, I saw someone maybe suggest that maybe we just get a shot of them in the future over Lalo's burial place in the super lab, you know, just like during one of their cooks potentially. I think you suggested last week maybe after we stopped recording that maybe we will see them in the initial introduction scene of Saul when they take Saul out to the desert, right? And I thought that might make sense because conveniently they were wearing masks in that scene, at least the beginning of that scene, which would help with the aid.

issue. So either way, I guess that could happen part one. Maybe that's kind of the mid-season finale curtains on Walt and Jesse. All right. Well, we will be on tenter hooks to see if Walt and Jesse show up anytime soon. Yes. Yeah. And one more observation I meant to make earlier. We talked in a recent episode about all the ways that Kim has shaped the Saul persona now recommending the car and the office and everything else. And in this one, this is her reaction to the Howard fight, right, that she suggests the slogan of I'll fight for you, which Jimmy seems quite taken with. And as we know, in Breaking Bad, he does go through with the Better Call Saul, I Will Fight for you ad, which is, you know, again, maybe that's another little echo where if we're re-watching

Breaking Bad, we think back to the origin story of that ad, which we did not know at the time. But whether Kim is present or not, her impact is still being felt. She's kind of. in that long shadow over that series, even if she's not appearing in it. This is how you know Ben and I are on the same Spice Girl Brainwave. That is the clip you will have heard open this episode, is Kim making that suggestion, and then I dug up a little promo of Saul. Fun fact about that you heard at the beginning of this episode, that was made in 2012.

So before Better Call Saul was even a glimmer in anyone's eye, they made that little promo, and I think they drafted two real MMA fighters to be in that promo, which is very boxing heavy. So that's what you heard in the beginning. Thank you, Ben, for bringing it full circle. We will be back next week to talk about Axe and Grind. And always a huge thank you to our producer, Chris Sutton. We'll see you next week.

Kim Wexler-Loos at gmail.com. Send us your thoughts, feelings, and theories. Bye. Cancel our whole week. Looking for the best place to shop this Mother's Day, go with the brand that makes it easy to send something thoughtful to everyone on your list. 1-800flowers.com. Right now at 1,800 flowers, order one dozen roses and get another dozen free.

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