I found this movie to be entertaining and engaging. Kids will enjoy all the adventure and action. Disney did a good job. I did pick up on the environmental undertone of this movie. That through our actions we are heading to our own end. I thought Hugh Laurie had the best end speech near the end of the movie. It was, to me, an honest account of how we are as human beings.
The key phrase in this movie is that our children are our future and that we should never give up or except the path we are on, rather it is up to us to change it to make the world a better place so we may continue to survive and thrive.
I found there to be quite a bit of humor in this film as well and not the kind that went over kids heads to appeal to the grown ups. Granted when I went I didn't see many kids, if any in the theater at the time. That was probably due to the rating of 14+. The word 'hell' is used a few time so I have no doubt it played it's part.
The acting was well done and I would definitely call this a family movie and would recommend this to people.
Kung Fu Panda is an animated DreamWorks film, directed in 2008 by Mark Osborne and John Stevenson. It tells the story of a panda that, while helping his father in the noodle shop, dreams of becoming a martial arts master. When, one day, by chance, it sees himself thrown into the world of the Jade Palace to be educated, it is considered a hopeless case because of its physical form. Fortunately it manages to surprise everybody when the ferocious Tai Lung decides to return to destroy the valley.
The cartoon is a nice tribute to the world of martial arts and a great motivator for the children that can reflect themselves in the main character, Po. In fact, first of all, it is able to pick itself up in a bullying situation and to gain the respect of his “enemies” and, secondly, it shows how if you really want something and work to get it in a merry way, you may realize your dreams. Not to mention the fact that Po is an atypical hero, fat and with food problems – a very common thing in children today, but little shown in movies and on television – who uses his strengths to improve itself. The secondary characters are very nice, especially master Shifu that reminds me of Yoda from Star Wars, and the five cyclones that refer to the five styles of imitative kung fu: Tiger, Snake, Crane, Mantis and Monkey.
Legendary!
G, I love this movie.
Here are 15 lessons I learned from Kung Fu Panda 2
01 Never lose your sense of humor.
02 Nightmares are visualizations of your inner fears.
03 We must do, what we are afraid to do.
04 If your heart is filled with hate, it can never be filled with love.
05 Live in the moment. The here and now is the only thing that matters.
06 If you are angry, it doesn't help to release it on a pole or people next to you.
07 The problems we have, are only (reflections) inside our self.
08 If you want to find inner peace, you need to let go.
09 You are yourself your biggest enemy.
10 When you accept your past & accept who you are - you can access your full potential.
11 Anything is possible (if you are in inner peace).
12 Nobody can tell you who you are, you have to discover it for yourself.
13 Revenge can blow up in your face and your victory will be short lived.
14 Everything happens for a reason - even pain will result in meaning (loss of parents -> dragon warrior).
15 Never give up.
I needed few days to think about my impression about this magical masterpiece! It was for me the best movie in a long time, although Spotlight could enter easily in this ranking. I purely enjoyed this movie on the big screen (which is the best way to watch it) - it made me lough, smile, tiptoeing with the wonderful characters! Sebastian and Mia were easy to identify with, to follow their way through success and failure. Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling deserve all the awards and praise for their acting and vocal skills. They had the best chemistry I ever seen and they should do more movies together. I can say the same about the supporting actors who did too an amazing job.
I must also applaud the amazing directing, writing and operating jobs! The way that I was transported into the world of old-fashion modern musical was pure joy. And the music is phenomenal! The best music since Lion King and Beauty and The Beast (which for me are one of the greatest in the world). Music equaling the works of Hans Zimmer and other masterful composers! I have still City of Stars stuck in my head! Amazing!
The ending makes you think how choices, good or bad, can reflect on your way and destiny in this world! True wisdom!
I hugely recommend to everyone to watch this movie because it's once in while these days that we will have opportunity to watch this kind of magic! That was the cinema in pure content of it!
As a big marvel fan i first was very sceptical about this movie, could it be as good as they promised? My answer is yes and this could be a start of something beautiful. Actionpacked from beginning to end with an outstanding cast and in particular Tom Hiddleston as Loki is unforgettable. Also Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner delivers. All of the origin stories were already made so they didn't need to introduce all of the characters what really helped keeping the movie at rollercoaster speed. Josh whedon really did a good job keeping the story watchable with so much going on but you never get lost in the story. Special effects are one word "wow" especially the Hulk as he unleashes destruction all around him. The epic fight between the Hulk and Thor also unforgettable and without any spoilers the climax of the film in new york city is amazing. By reading reviews on other sites i was stunned how many people gave the movie a bad review because of the bad acting, bad story and all of the cliches it has. People it's loosely based on marvel comics, without the cliches there wouldn't be marvel, yeah there are good guys and bad guys, yeah it lacks emotion but do we want to see that in this kind of movie? And yeah the story is about a villain that wants world domination. Get over it and just enjoy a great superhero movie, and just can't wait to see part 2 age of ultron.
After seeing several people on SM recommend that it be seen in Spanish if possible, I waited until I could find a theater nearby that was showing it. I am estatic that I saw it in Spanish. It was an amazing treat to see it in the language that the characters would have spoken. The spanish language voice actors are all Mexican, giving the film it's final seal of authenticity that the english language is missing (though this is not a negative critique of the english language cast, but rather an extra treat of the spanish language version).
The film is a heartfelt tribute to the tradition of The Day of the Dead, part of the cultural heritage of Mexico and it's indigenous roots. The film shows the time and care the producers, writers and director took in staying true to and understanding this celebration as observed in Mexico, from the offerings to the dead, the significance of the vibrant marigolds, and the love and gathering with our ancestors and family.
Yes, Coco follows the tradition of all Pixar movies, with a focus on love, family and friendship. The difference this time is that it places Mexico, its culture and its people, at the center of the story.
The Santa Clause "trilogy" soon to be a quadrilogy, is a Christmas tradition to watch as it has become a classic. At least this first movie for some. It is a light-hearted comedy with a good sense of family humour and morals.
But it uses some crappy CGI for some scenes that keep it from being timeless and the fact that most 90s movies humour is usually restricted to those who only understand the time it was set in. Not allowing for full appreciation of the film and its interworkings. Tim Allen's performance is alright, to say the least, he didn't do it for me in the role of the big red jolly figure. But after having seen all the movies over every Christmas. It really is hard to imagine anyone else in the role of Santa. But it seemed he wanted to play the character well and that he did, just not as good as he could have been.
Another transformative story that pulls on your childhood and makes you happy all the time. Nothing really much to say. It's not great, but it has heart and will always be considered a classic to me and many others. Worth a watch if you haven't for some reason seen this well-crafted gift.
If you don't believe in Santa after watching this movie, you're just "denying your inner child."
This is my favourite Christmas film of all time. I used to watch this constantly as a kid (no matter what time of year it was!) and I still watch it every year at Christmas. It never fails to give me goosebumps, because it always takes me back to being a child, and it is an incredible reminder that magic really does exist.
I'm also a big fan of Home Improvements, and Tim Allen is equally as hilarious and entertaining here. Not only is he a brilliant comedian, but he really knows how to play those sentimental scenes that tug at your heart-strings.
Eric Lloyd who plays the young boy Charlie is fantastic throughout and can equally play a multitude of moods in a believable way to make the story flow so well.
When I was little, I always found the role of Neil, played by Judge Reinhold quite irritating, because he is too much of a grown up and his lack of understanding childhood is unreal. But now I've grown up, I understand that most adults are as stupid as his character is and so I've began to sympathise with his point of view, even though I entirely disagree with it. I understand he's MEANT to be irritatingly stupid!
Another character who deserves a special mention is Bernard, one of the Elves, played by David Krumholtz. When I was little, I used to colour in a bit of paper with a dark green felt tip pen and stick it on my forehead, so that I could have "hair" that looked like Bernard's. (I'm not sure it did look QUITE like his hair, but it was worth the effort.) I've always had a soft spot for Bernard. Even though his character can be quite bossy at times, he can also be quite endearing at other times. He has a lot of compassion for people who DO believe in magic, but doesn't have any time for people who don't.... A bit like me! And that's why I identify with him the most. Like the rest of the cast, he plays this part so well.
Both the background music and the soundtrack songs help add to the festive feel of this film, and helps bring Christmas and Santa to life. If you STILL don't believe in Kris Kringle after watching this movie, just remember this dialogue from the film:
Charlie: Have you ever seen a million dollars?
Neil: No.
Charlie: Just because you haven’t seen it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
[9.5/10] “My man!” So much to love in this one. The main story is so much fun, with all the humor the show wrings from the weak details of the simulated world (I love the pop tart driving a toaster bit). The aliens’ inability to deal with nudity, the expectedly great performance from David Cross, and using complicated crowd instructions to overwhelm the computer’s processors are all great elements. Heck, even the “simulation within a simulation” business, and the glee with which Rick and the aliens one-up each other, makes for an inventive and enjoyable adventure.
But my favorite part is Jerry’s story. The fact that Jerry not only doesn’t realize in the low-CPU end of the simulation, but has his most meaningful and fulfilling life experience in it, walks the line between tragedy and comedy so perfectly they should invent a new theater mask for it. The broken processing gags are familiar to anyone who’s played a glitching video game, and Jerry’s obliviousness to everything, and his emotional journey projected onto these blank slates, is just brilliant.
Overall, it’s noteworthy how confident and command R&M was out of the gate here, with a fun sci-fi adventure with an unassumingly dark bit at its core.
So we reach the end of Phase Three, and what an ending this is. Not as epic in scale as Endgame and not as good as it either. But, this to me, is better than Homecoming. Better arcs, a better realisation of character and overall an excellent way to represent story through visuals.
For some Mysterio has been poorly represented in recent media. But here, he is done so well and the abilities are Doctor Strange visuals of good. While still not copying anything we've seen yet. This allows for great tension and using trust against the characters that I don't think has been seen in the MCU since The Winter Soldier.
Tom Halland is Spider-Man. There's no denying it, he was born for this role as Robert Downey Jr was for Iron Man. Which makes this story sink so well into the narrative when it all comes down to loss and how to avoid falling into stress and anxiety's grip. Which makes this an important movie to follow Endgame. Wrapping everything up nicely and even starting some great elements for the future.
So yes, there are end credit scenes in this movie. Two of them. But instead of not caring about a bit of strapped on humour, stay. These scenes are vital for the future of this series of films. Plus, there is an added bonus for those who are fans of the original Sam Raimi trilogy.
So yes, it is a good movie. But there are flaws. For one, there is the whole convenient timing and placement of things. Which I thought they were going to explain but never did. The story does feel like a bit of rehash of Homecoming and how the motives of some are shown, and that was my biggest gripe.
This film is funny, has good action, pretty well-done CGI and amazing performances from all its cast. This movie deserves to follow Endgame and closes Phase Three fluently. Spider-Man: Far From Home is a great movie and has given me hope for the future of Marvel's plan.
8.6/10
[8.5/10] There’s a great deal of call and response between Spider-Man: Far From Home and its predecessor, Spider-Man: Homecoming. The web-slinger’s first MCU movie centered on Peter Parker being relegated to “Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man” when he aspired to be an Avenger. In this one, he’s straining to enjoy a normal life while being pushed and prodded to fill the big shoes of some big names. Once again, Peter tries to live up to the shining example of Iron Man, while facing off against someone who sees Tony Stark as a wretched usurper to be toppled instead of emulated.
And once more, Peter Parker, and by extension Spider-Man, has to come of age, figure out who he is and where he fits into the grand, globe-threatening events that imperil his friends and into the pantheon of heroes defending the Earth against them.
Far From Home anchors itself on the pressure and difficulty of that quest. With the backdrop of an international jaunt, the threat of friendly pretender to the throne, and perils of navigating the post-“blip” high school social scene, Spider-Man feels overwhelmed. He has to try to live up to the legacy of his idol rather than try to earn his notice, to deal with the expectation of being Spider-Man, rather than to get people’s attention as the wall-crawler. The personal struggle grounds both the globe-trotting adventure and the goofy humor that are nicely marbled throughout the film’s runtime.
That’s the most impressive thing about Far From Home -- it is so many films at once, without ever losing the unity of purpose or tonal consistency. It is a superhero movie, with the appropriate number of bad guys, twists, and colorful clashes. It is a travelogue, with Peter and his classmates zipping through a number of picturesque European locales. It is a coming of age story, one that takes advantage of the shadow Tony Stark casts in a cinematic universe built around the character. And it is, assuredly, a comedy, full of the sorts of silly laughs that keep the film feeling light and fun despite its world-threatening stakes and the personal difficulties at its core.
That last part will stick with viewers as long as Peter’s personal journey will. A recent article asked where the blockbuster studio comedies have gone, and you’re looking at it! (Er...reading about it.) Whether it’s Martin Starr stealing the show as Peter’s sad sack, high spirited teacher, the adorably silly teenage romance between Ned and Betty, or the simple physical comedy of Happy Hogan flailing a shield at an attacking drone to predictably weak results, there’s ample chuckles to be had. Beyond the MCU’s usual quippiness, there’s a lighter, more flopsweat-y tone to Peter Parker’s adventures that makes these Spidey films winning outing.
Far From Home also wrings the humor from the awkward interactions between teenagers. Part of what makes the film work so well as both drama and comedy is that its kids feel like kids. While a love triangle between Peter, M.J., and suave newcomer Brad feels a little contrived, for the most part, the movie walks the line between the heightened realism of comic book flicks, and the recognizable pains and absurdities of youth well. The trials and travails of friendship, romance, and expectation are all relatable here, even if outfitted with spandex and explosions.
But those are fun too! Beyond the gorgeous settings in Venice or Prague, the visuals of the film pop. Spider-Man himself has never looked this good in live action, flipping and thwipping through any number of impressive city scapes as the camera follows his balletic rooftop leaps and bounds. In sequences like a perilous ferris wheel ride, the editing team does a nice job of balancing the swirl and swarm of a supernatural threat with the personal stakes of two people in danger for us to latch onto.
And while some of the fully-CGI sequences have that “video game cutscene” feel to them, Far From Home takes advantage of Mysterio’s presence for some visual creativity. Inventive set pieces that send Spider-Man bursting through skyscraper-level “elementals” or rumbling through a nightmare that doubles as a tweaking of his deepest insecurities, see director Jon Watts and company showing off what their version of Spider-Man, and his coterie, are capable of.
What a coterie, though! In addition to the young cast, who are just as sharp and likable as they were in Homecoming, the MCU representative du jour is Nick Fury, who is understandably a little off in this guise, but whose dry wit and gravitas-laden pronouncement fit well with Peter’s anxieties about batting in the big leagues. Jake Gyllenhall does good work as Mysterio, both in his friendly older brother mode, and in his scheming, aggrieved former employee mode. The character has intrigue and, like Vulture before him, legitimate grievances with Tony Stark that add depth to his motivation even as he goes full mustache-twirl at points. The notion of the post-superhero, post-blip world demanding beaming heroes and outlandish backstories in order for anyone to be heard lightly deconstructs both the world of the MCU and the current cinematic moment, with Gyllenhall living up to each.
The most surprising heavy hitter here, however, is Jon Favreau as Happy Hogan, who does some predictable bumbling, and some flirting with Aunt May, but who ultimately gives Peter what he needs to move forward. With a central focus of both protagonist and antagonist claiming and living up to Tony Stark’s legacy, and constant visual reminders of the mark that Iron Man left on the world, Happy tells Peter the most important thing he could here: that Tony was a mess.
There’s a distance between the sterling image our culture crystalizes for its hero and the reality of who they were. There’s a comfort to Peter knowing that the real Tony Stark, the one who lived and faltered apart from pictures painted on murals, doubted himself and screwed up and made as many messes as he solved. Far From Home signposts it a little too neatly with its song cues, but realizing that his idol is flawed and human gives him what he needs to relax and do what he does best for the people he cares about, which makes him more like Tony than he realizes.
The scene also works as a benediction from Jon Favreau, who directed the first Iron Man film, for this next, Stark-less phase of the MCU. His speech, along with a winking opening report, is an acknowledgement that the films that spurred this massive media uber-franchise were not perfect despite their veneration and consternation, and that there’s plenty of worthy ground to cover in the movies to come.
That ground will be covered by a Spider-Man, and hopefully a distinctive crew of other heroes, who better understand their place in this world. Peter Parker leaves Far From Home a different person than when he started. As in Homecoming, he’s once again made peace with the space between where he is and where he thought he wanted to be, even if, as the post-credits scene suggests, there’s plenty more challenges, pressures, and menace to come.
[9.0/10] I don’t know how Rick and Morty keeps doing it, but somehow the show continually finds new ways to combine insane sci-fi weirdness with deep and meaningful character introspection, and I can’t get enough of it.
At the same time the show crafts and adventure where Rick and Jerry turn a visit to a resort and theme park into a snowballing bout of murder attempts and changing alliances, the show also explores both the strain Rick placed on Beth and Jerry’s marriage, and Jerry’s own unassumingly weasely ethos.
The former comes in the form of an inventive resort setting with an “immortality field.” Maybe I’m just not deep enough into sci-fi, but I love the concept as a setting that not only makes for a natural place Rick would take Jerry (at Morty’s behest, naturally) but creates an interesting conundrum for the plotters trying to take out Rick. (Plus it creates one dark as hell joke from two little kids playing together.) The show certainly has its fun with the concepts, and setting a murder attempt there on a roller coaster that dips just outside the field is superb.
The great escape part is fun too. Everything from another alien forest full of crazy creatures, to a cruise line that makes dangerous people dumber rather than preventing them from boarding is inventive as all get out. Plus, the “time-preserver” sequence is the sort of Lynchian madness we haven’t seen much of from the show, but which featured some insanely creative sequences as well.
And in the midst of all this, there’s a great exploration both of who Jerry is, how Rick sees him, and what Rick’s done to his life. The high point of that is Rick’s speech to Jerry that his son-in-law plays it off like he’s prey but that he’s really a predator, attaching himself to people and bringing him down. It makes sense that Rick would see him that way, and it’s revealing of Rick that as much as he pretends his reasons for busting on Jerry are because he gets in the way, there’s a part of him that does it to defend his daughter, whose life he thinks Jerry ruined. Rick caring about things always manifests in weird ways, but that what makes him interesting as a character.
Hell, I like Jerry, and there’s something about a guy whose only crime is being “unremarkable” being treated so shabbily by pretty much everyone that feels wrong. But he’s also not a great guy himself -- a small, petty man as Principal Skinner might say. Still, his indecision about whether to let Rick die, coupled with his feelings about Rick squeezing him out and hurting his marriage, make for very rich, complex material in a pairing we don’t get all that often.
The B-story is not nearly as deep, but pretty darn great too. It has its own spate of weirdness, with Summer trying to make her breasts larger with one of Rick’s transforming rays and ending up gigantic and, thanks to Beth’s assistance, also inside out. That, coupled with the “tech support” guys being three little dudes who live in the machine and trick her into letting them out, makes the science fiction-y and comedy sides of the story spectacular. (The same goes for Beth’s bizarre “hoof collage”)
But there’s also some good character stuff there too. I’m kind of loving the direction the show’s taking Morty this season. He’s showing his own dark side (see how he treats Ethan), and he’s become the character on the show with the most perspective, being able to identify how his mom is acting like her father in her refusal to ask for help and arrogance in her belief that she can just solve the problem without engaging emotionally. Beth turning herself gigantic and inside out to comfort Summer about her body issues is a bizarre but hilarious way to resolve the story to boot.
Overall, another stellar outing from Rick and Morty that makes me lament we only get five more weeks (maybe?) of this awesome show.
[9.0/10] Not since The Sopranos has there been a show on television so devoted to examining the psyches of its characters. I feel like I need to rewatch this episode five times to truly unpack everything there is to glean from such a dense, psychologically complex episode. If there’s been a consistent theme to Season 3, it’s been digging deep into what makes the show’s main characters tick, what makes them who they are, and “Rest and Ricklaxation” both literalizes that (by separating its title characters into their constituent parts) and plays it out in fascinating, emotionally-wrenching detail.
The impetus for that is Rick and Morty going into a psychological toxin-clearing chamber at an intergalactic spa. The catch is that the chamber doesn’t just free you from harmful it elements, it removes those elements, personified as “booger” versions of you, and keeps them trapped in a chamber. So while the real Rick and Morty are feeling happier and more relaxed in the real world, the concentrated toxic parts of them are caught in the chamber working frantically to get out.
The initial results seem predictable, if a little twisted. Toxic Rick is even more hateful and self-aggrandizing than Real Rick. He’s constantly touting his own genius, constantly belittling Morty, and constantly lashing out at the world. Toxic Morty is entirely self-hating and debased, little more than a subservient wart of a person accepting any and all abuse.
What’s interesting is that it seems to flip the good/evil dynamic in Healthy Rick and Healthy Morty. While Healthy Rick feels compelled to rescue their toxic counterparts once he knows of their existence, Healthy Morty likes his own happiness and is constantly resisting any attempt to set things back the way they were under a the guise of not questioning it.
Now splitting protagonists into their good and evil sides is nothing new. (Lord knows the Star Trek franchise returned to that well time and time again.) But the twist, and the thing that makes the episode really stand out from the pack, is that the divergence point for “healthy” Rick and Morty isn’t some arbitrary definition of toxicity, it’s what they themselves view as the toxic parts of their being.
Which leads to all kinds of interesting complications, not the least of which is that Toxic Rick isn’t just some personification of bad, and Healthy Morty isn’t some noble personification of good. It’s a brilliant, fascinating choice to depict Healthy Morty as this honest but heartless, manipulative douchebag. The things that Morty sees as toxic in himself -- his self-doubt and self-loathing -- weigh down an overconfidence and disregard for others’ that, left unchecked, turn him into an uberpopular, successful stock broker, but one who doesn’t really care about anything else or anyone.
It’s a deranged echo of Inside Out’s thesis that negative emotions are vital and valid and help make us stronger individuals. There is something so frighteningly recognizable about Healthy Morty, between his offhand quips about his food being organic to maxims about saying important things face-to-face that reveal a deeper soulless beneath despite all the crowd-pleasing pablum. Toxic Morty isn’t a pretty sight or an encouraging reflection of the real Morty -- he’s deeply unhappy, horribly self-defeating, and outright declares that he wants to die. But the idea that these are the things keeping Morty from becoming a wide-eyed, smiling little monster is one of the boldest and darkest takes this show has offered on one of its main characters.
But that’s only half the impact of the twist. The other, and arguably more foundational reveal in the episode is that Rick really does care about the people in his life, at least Morty, but he views that as toxic, as “irrational attachments” he’d rather overcome. It’s striking in that it answers one of the basic questions the show has been teasing out forever now -- whether despite his protestations to the contrary, Rick loves his family. “Rest Ricklaxation” suggests that he does, but it’s something he hates in himself, which explains how and why he’s always trying to disclaim any such affections.
Rick may acknowledge the other parts of his personality as “toxic.” He admits narcissism, of disregard for the rest of the universe in favor of his own brilliance. But without that, without the parts of him he views as holding him back psychologically, he only has a general care for the world, about the impartial welfare of all, without any personal attachments to his grandson or anything else. The episode digs into who Rick and Morty are, what they hate about themselves, and the people they become without that, which tells you so very much about the show’s title characters.
Meanwhile, amidst all this deep psychological examination is an episode that just works on a nuts and bolts level. The conflict of reconciling toxic and healthy versions of Rick and Morty propels the episode nicely. Seeing a Rick-on-Rick battle throughout the Smiths’ house is thrilling with plenty of creative turns. Healthy Morty’s quiet psychopathy builds and builds keeping a comedic hum the whole time. And there’s even some amusing social commentary as Rick’s toxicity ray covers the globe and Morty’s restaurant acquaintance yells out “sea cucumber!” The main event of “Rest and Ricklaxation” is the show boring into the mental processes and damage of its protagonists, but it keeps the tension and the excitement up for what could otherwise be an overly cerebral exercise.
Like nearly all sitcoms must, it then returns things to the status quo. But while for most shows that’s a return to normalcy and sanity, for Rick and Morty it means returning those two characters to the fraught place where they began the episode. One of the most harrowing scenes in the entire series is the two of them sitting in Rick’s craft in the intro. Morty cries; Rick screams in anguish and admits he wasn’t in control, and the episode doesn’t turn away from the unnerving distress and damage these two individuals have accumulated over the course of their adventures.
This is what the combination of good and bad in Rick and Morty gets them. There’s the sense that both need that balance, to keep them tethered and, in different ways, to keep them caring about people, but the results of that cocktail -- of self-glorification and self-loathing, of brash confidence and debasement, of personal fulfillment and global concern -- doesn’t create a pretty picture for our heroes either.
[9.5/10] At some point, I am going to stop being surprised by Rick and Morty’s brilliance and just expect it, but the show is still at that point where I suspect it’ll be good every week, but it still manages to blow me away each new turn it takes.
I take “The Ricklantis Mixup” to be Season 3’s answer to the improv episodes from the prior two seasons -- a change of pace that allows Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland to play around in their amazing sandbox of a universe for a bit without feeling the need to develop or advance their main character. In that, they give us an episode that doesn’t have Rick or Morty or any of the other main characters, and yet has all the Ricks and Morties, in glorious, The Wire-esque splendor.
And The Wire really has to be the touchstone for an episode like this. Where else are you going to find something that addresses the challenges of cops and criminals, the rise of an charismatic and unexpected leader, the frustrations of blue collar working who feels like the system is holding him down, and the difficulties of four schoolchildren to make their way in that world. Hell, throw in a Hamsterdam, and you have all five seasons of that superlative show, filtered through Harman and Roiland’s dueling deranged perspectives and deposited into one twenty-two minute chunk. That’s an amazing achievement, the sort of praise I feel like I’m throwing out all too often for this show, but it keeps earning it.
The episode can roughly be broken up into those four stories, but what makes the episode more than just the sum of its parts (and what earns its Wire comparisons) is how interconnected those stories are, both literally, since they’re connected by the Citadel are all affected by the ecosystem that’s developed after our Rick destroyed the place, but also thematically, in the way each protagonist of each story looks at a bad situation and wants change, and gets it, but gets something unsatisfying or unpleasant or worse than they bargained for out of the process, with plenty of dead bodies floating among the garbage and blasted out the airlock.
That’s clearest for Candidate Morty, trying to win the presidency of The Citadel on behalf of The Morty Party. There’s something aspirational, almost West Wing-esque about Candidate Morty, as he gives soaring, Obama-esque speeches about dissolving the lines of division between Ricks and Morties and make The Citadel something better for all. That makes it seem particularly terrible when his former campaign manager, another Morty, tries to assassinate him. The move turns out to be all for naught since Candidate Morty survives and becomes President, in something that seems like a chance to turn around this mixed up place.
Instead, it’s revealed that Candidate Morty is the evil, eye patch-wearing Morty we met back in Season 1. It’s the perfect, knife-turning twist for the episode -- a reveal that the Carcetti-esque beacon of hope for a city in turmoil is a guy running on unifying rhetoric to pursue his own Carcetti-esque ambitions (well, maybe a touch more intergalactically evil than Carcetti’s). All of that hope, all of the communal joining together and believing that things can change just puts a tyrant into power, and holy hell is that one of the darkest things an already dark show has put forward.
Then there’s Factory Worker Rick, who seems older and more haried even by Rick standards, gazing out of subway cars, seeing wealthier and cooler Ricks succeed ahead of him, and sighing. He works at a factory that makes wafers out of the satisfaction an old fashioned “Simple Rick” enjoys when reliving the experience of spending time with his daughter (a subtly revealing bit in and of itself).
Things hit the fan when he goes postal, killing his boss and co-workers, and getting into a hostage standoff with the police. There too, the show capture a certain backbreaking ennui to this place, that even (and maybe especially) a locale populated by geniuses leads to this sort of dissatisfaction, disaffection, and anomie. And this story has just as cynical an ending, with Factory Worker Rick believing he’s won, only for the Wonka-esque Rick who runs the factory to capture him and use that feeling of freedom and satisfaction to fuel his new deluxe wafers. I mean, my god, if that is not the peak of devastating, existential irony on this show, I don’t know what is.
There’s also Rookie Cop Rick, who’s paired with Grizzled Cop Morty. More than the other stories, this one feels like it’s riffing on a sea of tropes ripped right out of the Training Day playbook. There’s plenty of political and social commentary baked in through how even Grizzled Cop Morty looks down on his fellow Morties as “animals” or how Rookie Cop Rick tries to give himself up to his brethren for the difficult choices he’s made and gets let off the hook. But it has less impact since it feels like more of those tropes played straight (or at least, as straight as can be possible given the insane circumstances) than something truly new and subversive.
Still, this is the part of the episode where the show gains strength from the crazy details of the world it’s constructed at The Citadel. The entire concept of a wild Morty club where Morty’s dress up in costumes, dance for one another, and use bad math, or of a series of news anchors from the same hierarchy of subuniverses, each of whom has it worst than the next, or just the concept of Morties who’ve been turned into lizards and Ricks adopting rural affections is bizarre and hilarious and head-scratching in the best ways.
That comes through in the episode’s final story, which sees a quartet of young Morties, soon to be assigned to a new quartet of Ricks, go out in search of a fabled “wish portal” that could change their lives. The sorriest among them is Cool Morty, who has an experimental drama chip that allows him to make things “sad and a little boring,” and who’s been through Rick after Rick. Here too, there is that sense of existential dread, of things never changing, the permeates the proceedings. Cool Morty’s suicide is unexpected and lives up to the sadness his experimental chip portends, but it’s made worse that the supposed change his dive into this sci-fi wishing well effected is the hollow one President Morty offered.
That’s the rub of this one. Even in this fantastical world of brilliant scientists and their boy sidekicks, there is a kaleidoscope of pain and false promises that stretch through everything. All the geniuses, all the good-natured moppets in the world can’t change that when thrown together into their own dysfunctional society. That Rick and Morty has the chutzpah to explore that society for an episode, and to deliver that message, just speaks to the boldness and off-kilter storytelling we’ve come to expect, and to make it all as funny as it is quietly devastating, is a near-miracle. Rick and Morty keeps delivering them on a regular basis.
[7.6/10] Well, I guess I was wrong about last week’s episode replacing the improv-based interdimensional cable eps we’ve gotten previously. But I enjoy this entree full of bite-sized adventures for our heroes. It’s a throwback to Harmon’s “clip show but with new clips” bit from Community and fun to see the mini-stories thrown out rapid fire.
I particularly liked the opening pair of stories. Morty mistaking his new guidance counselor for a scary moon man is the sort of Bailey School Kids schtick with a Rick and Morty twist that really tickled my fancy. By the same token, turning the usual “humans trapped in an alien zoo” routine into a Contact-based hoodwinking is entertaining.
But I also really enjoyed the fact that Rick didn’t just zap away the memories of things that were too heavy for Morty to take; he zapped away his own minor mistakes, like the phrase “taken for granite,” not to mention things that implicate his family members, like Beth choosing Summer over Morty in her alien Sophie’s Choice scenario.
While most of the stories were amusing in that black comic way the show’s mastered, it feels like they’re all another brick in the wall of Morty getting tired of Rick’s bullshit, and the rest of the family’s bullshit too. The twist that both Rick and Morty lose their memories and have to use the vials to figure out who they are revitalizes the premise a bit, but also leads to the bleak realization that after seeing all that stuff, the pair want to have a suicide pact.
It’s played mainly for laughs, with Summer barging in on them and refueling their memories in a desultory fashion like she’s had to do this dozens of times, but like most episodes of the show, it finds the humor in something that, at its core, is pretty damn dark. (And then “no wonder you guys fight all the time and are always behind schedule” sounds like a not so veiled bit of self-commentary about Harmon and Roiland, which is a little discouraging.)
Overall, it’s a fun, rapid-fire premise for an episode that allows the show to deliver its humor and demented scenarios in quick hit format, but which still uses the form to offer a commentary on its two core characters, what they’ve seen, and the frustrations and vanity and ego that drives them to want to end it all. The fact that the show can wring comedy from that is just another pelt on the wall of its achievements.
The one 16 year old girl says she's supposed to be "this great detective", the other 16 year old girl buys a bar and trades it for a diner and the third 16 year old gets crowned king of the Serpents. I don't think the writers even remember their ages at this point.
I'm not happy with the way this whole Black Hood season ended. It really feels like the writers had no idea who they wanted to put under the hood and halfway through the season they heard the theory of Hal being the Black Hood and they decided to roll with it like two episodes before the finale. For once there are no subtle hints for it to be him before episode 20 and on the other hand the whole reasoning and execution at the end felt hollow and cheap, especially the part about THE DARKNESS™. I thought at least one of the adults would finally address this as mental illness, but nope. Don't think we'll ever get to see any of them in therapy either.
Three things that I'm curious about - Chic, Alice's dead son and Polly.
Chic just disappeared and we still don't know anything. Was there even a point to begin with? I thought his creepiness would be relevant somehow, but nothing happened. I'm wondering if he'll come back next season.
Then there's Alice's dead son. I was actually thinking he's not dead because we really didn't get to see anything about him. It felt really tragic to know that Alice saw him and closed the door in his face, but I thought it would connect more with the overall story or with Chic.
And then there's Polly who definitely had something going on. I wonder if we know this mysterious guy who helped her or if her mother will get dragged into a weird cult. And I actually find this much more interesting than the cliffhanger that Archie is arrested (I was sure there would be some bloodshed after Jug's weird announcement) and Hiram is still planning to deal drugs on the New Southside. I was actually hoping for him to leave Riverdale or go to prison at the end of the season, but apparently his cheap mobster story will continue.
And even after all these complaints every week I'm still excited to watch new episodes and do enjoy it. It's over the top and crazy but at the same time I find it so entertaining :D
I kind of enjoyed this episode and that has everything to do with the fact that the parents got a bit more screentime and that for a second it looked like something really shocking was about to happen in this Gargoyle garbage which of course didn`t really.
I like seeing more of Cheryl and Toni but there has to be more there, there is not enough story there to truly get in touch with the characters. I'm actually a little relieved that Jug and Betty weren't a focuspoint of this episode, it's refreshing to see some other characters for a change, like Kevin and Josie.
Josie and Archie is a good match, way better than Varchie in my opinion and speaking of Veronica, can she possibly get more annoying? yes, of course she can. It's all about her and when her boyfriend tells her that his dad beats him up, oh well...
I liked how the parents all came together for this game and the safety of their children and that when the threat seems real that all of them come through for their kids even the ones who pretend to not care at all about their kids like Penelope. It's the little things in storylines like that that make the difference.
It is a total let down that they managed to bring forth ANOTHER Gargoyle King. How long can they stretch this out?
Well, that certainly turned DARKER rather quickly. Vanya's new beau is at the least a next level stalker, possibly a serial killer, or, on a long shot, also "special" or, has knowledge of Vanya's suppressed (since childhood) abilities, which makes her either hella dangerous, thus the suppression, or part of Daddy dearest's diabolical experiment to see what happens if you take a "special" child, and tell them they aren't worth bothering about, until they lose any and all confidence in themselves. I REALLY hope she's dangerous, cuz, otherwise, Papa needed killin' real good.
Diego has got guilt transference down really good. Kills his own "Mom" and makes Luther feel bad about wanting to shut her down. Abandons the family and turns it to "well, why did you stay, the problem is YOU". Douche. Even when his Detective Ex girlfriend / booty call FINALLY does what he's been egging her on all along to do, breaks protocol, and pays the price, he transfers the blame to HER, asking "Why didn't you wait for me? I was coming?" Dude has MAJOR issues.
What if Vanya IS the cause of the end??? Just sayin'.
Yes, Sheehan has basically been doing a glammed up Nathan, but then he always plays some version of that character since Misfits IMO.
The concept is good, the look is good, it should all be fun and exciting and right up my alley but for some strange reason I couldn't get in it. It's not a bad show but it's way too cookie-cutter I guess. It's nothing new. Add to this that the show is very long-winded... Episodes and scenes seem to go for ages and there's a lot of "quiet moments" scattered throughout the episode. Like the scene where they're in the veteran's-bar, you already know he was in Vietnam (clearly) but it goes on and on only to prove, with a picture, that he was in Vietnam...
Ellen Page (at least 5 episodes in, I'm sure something's gonna happen with her) , to me, is the weak link. She's as "unspecial" as the character she plays... (until she's not at the end of the show most likely) She's quite frankly just Ellen Page playing Ellen Page. Also... remember Mary J Blige? She's in here too! Being all percolated, crunked up in this dancery 'n shit.
All the main characters don't really FEEL fleshed out either. They have backstory but they still seem cardboard. They're not uninteresting or annoying or anything... The druggie is sometimes but he's too endearing to hate.
Due to this I don't know if this show is good or not. I like it though so I guess that's all that matters. It's forfilling, it does what it needs to do... It's a higher tier of junkfood that takes a couple of chews too much to get through. But at the end I'm sure you'll be satisfied but you didn't eat at a 5-star restaurant. And that's fine.
I wonder how Doom Patrol will be...
[7.5/10] I liked this one a bit better than the last episode. The misadventures with the descendents of the most noteworthy witch and witch hunter were more amusing that the baby switcheroo act, and we got some more Sheen/Tenant goodness, which helped.
As to the former, I like the notion that Pulcifer, the modern version at least, is just an unlucky sap. He can’t deal with anything electronic, and has the worst luck overall, which makes him endearing as a sort of sad sack “didn’t ask for this” witch hunter. By the same token, adding Michael McKean to the proceedings is never a bad way to go with your show! The notion of the two of them leading a nutball witch hunt is promising.
The actual witch (or witch descendent) was reasonably entertaining too. I like the idea that for once, there’s a psychic who actually makes useful and accurate predictions, and that her family uses them to get ahead. I’m curious as to where they’re going with Anathema, and the whole bike/book mixup has potential as well.
I’ll admit, I haven’t really latched onto Adam’s quartet of kids just yet. Sure, there’s something cute enough about them misunderstanding history or playacting the British (nee Spanish) Inquisition (ole!). But it hasn’t really gotten a lot of laughs out of me yet, and I know we’re only two episodes in, but I keep waiting for a little more. It occurs to me that we might be in for a twist where it’s the third baby who’s really the antichrist but I may be grasping at straws there.
That said, I still think that the show is a solid 40% better when it’s just the misadventures of Aziraphale and Crowley. The two of them going on the hunt for the birth records of the original antichrist is especially amusing. Aziraphale’s stuffiness and generally creampuffery mixed with Crowley’s dash of sarcasm and devil’s foodcake is still a superb recipe.
I also like the little cheats here and there. Crowley helping Aziraphale with his stain, or having the corporate teambuilding paintball match turn into one with real guns that nevertheless involves beaucoup miraculous escapes hints at a nicer streak within him. And it’s just as fun to see Crowley himself get mad and threatening when Aziraphale almost calls him out on it.
The bike crash incident is amusing as well, with the pair using their powers in fun ways to try to keep Anathema from getting suspicious. I also got a kick out of Gabriel in the book shop making alien attempts to be discreet. At times, you can still see the strings of this show trying to capture a certain tone and voice that works in literature but is hard to translate to a different medium, but this episode fared a little better on that front.
Overall, I’m still in this for the angel/demon team-up moments much more than I’m in it for any of the other apocalyptic shenanigans, but the show had a better balance of that this time around, which helped.
[8.3/10] Look, I know it’s important that stories have conflicts and that six-hour shows expand their reach beyond just two people and that you need rising and falling action and all that good stuff. But damnit, I would watch the hell out of a version of Good Omens that was just “Aziraphale and Crowley hang out throughout history.”
The section of the episode before the opening credits is just so damn fun! Beyond the amusement of the costumes, and the takes on different biblical or historical moments, and the continually great banter between the angel and the demon, you just have lots of fun developments. Everything from the unicorn missing Noah’s arc, to the triple cross of the Nazis, to the secret history of why Hamlet was such a hit are all brilliant.
But I also love these segments as a way to show millennia-long bits of character development in between those two. I really like Michael Sheen’s performance in these segments, the way that he questions the brutality of old testament justice and seems appalled at the violence, but is so conditioned (and frankly repressed) that he refuses to the plan. I also really like how Crowley convinces himself he’s as evil as ever, but throughout history pops in to help his dear friend when he needs it. And I particularly like the way that, through the ages, the two slowly discover a certain futility to the way that they’re continually canceling one another out, and decide to just lay low and enjoy themselves and even help one another out rather than fighting to a stalemate between good and evil.
Despite all that, I think my favorite part is Aziraphale’s refusal to let his friend risk or even end his life. Even though the show has had its semi-dramatic moments at times, it’s been pretty irreverent, so digging into Aziraphale’s line in the sand about the holy water, only to show him bending and finally outright breaking the rules for his friend, sells the impact of their friendship on one another. That adds real weight to the final scene where the pair “break-up”, which feels both impactful given the history and change between them we’ve just witnessed, and has a certain combination of drama and humor to it given how the pair can seem like an old married couple at times.
The rest of the goings-on in the episode are fine. I’ll admit, I’m not quite sure what to make of Adam being influenced by Anathema and using his powers to neutralize nuclear power plants, but it’s an interesting development. The discovery that Aziraphale and Crowley’s “agents” turn out to be the same conspiracy nut is a funny one. And I like how Pulcifer discovers something genuinely witchy, that just happens to point him to the town where the real antichrist lives. (I also like that it’s something as subtle as always-perfect weather, and bits like “Lieutenant Milkbottle” are worth a laugh.)
Still, the heart of the episode comes from the way it focuses most squarely on the friendship between these two opposing beings who have nevertheless grown close and yet find themselves at odds. The notion of the two “running away together” has a certain potency given some subtext here (and Sheen sells it accordingly), but the way that their personal friendship and professional opposition collide here gives “Hard Times” both a dramatic and comic force that hasn’t been nearly as present in the prior episodes.
Overall this is the pick of the litter so far, and gives me hope for what the show can do going forward, particularly if it builds on the neat Aziraphale and Crowley work it did here.
[7.4/10] Not to beat this drum yet again, but I like this show best when it’s the adventures of Aziraphale and Crowley, and this one put them on the backburner. Still, there was enough to enjoy here to make things worthwhile.
For one, I’m actually on board with what’s going with Adam. I like the idea that he can make things real just by sort of willing them into existence, and with the mental influence of Anathema’s conspiracy magazines, that means the rise of Atlantis, and spying Tibetan monks, and friendly alien constables. It’s a bit of a hard shift from that to him deciding to remake the world with his three friends as captives, but there’s at least a bit of genuine scariness to that.
I’m less on board with Pulcifer and Anathema meeting and then nigh-instantly going into the throes of passion, but whatever. Shadwell realizing that he’s put Pulcifer in danger, and Queenie giving him bus fare and enough for a coffee and a snack is a kind of cute response to all of it.
And what we do get of Aziraphale and Crowley is pretty good! The “old couple having a tiff” routine between them is particularly enjoyable (especially with the random bystander telling Aziraphale that he’s been there and “you’re better off without him”). Aziraphale being roughed up by his fellow angels, and his mounting dissatisfaction with the way things are going is intriguing, and it being enough for him to utter a curse-word when being accidentally shuffled off to Heaven is a neat development.
I particularly like Crowley’s caper here too. Using Home Alone tactics to defeat his foes with holy water is a nice touch, and while a little cornball, the chase in the space between atoms has a bit of verve to it as well. But I particularly like his little breakdown before that. The discussions about being punished for asking questions, about testing but not to the point of oblivion, are pointed and sharp.
I also enjoy the introductions of Pollution and Death, and the shading given to the delivery man. His preternatural devotion to his otherwise mundane task is great, especially his “ours is not to know why” approach to it. There’s even some legitimate pathos when he writes an “I love you” note to his wife before taking the grim step toward delivering a message to death.
Otherwise, it’s interesting to see the show pulling the trigger on Armageddon with two episodes to go still. Bits like Heaven seeming as interested in the fight as in preventing it, Crowley wanting to run away to Alpha Centauri, and Adam’s view on remaking the world in his own image all have some juice and intrigue to them that makes me curious to know what happens next.
I'm glad that this was not a case of an intriguing and genuinely good pilot episode, followed by a bland rest of a season, like it tends to happen a wee bit too much in these days of the abundance of TV series. The fun and quality that was originally presented to us was steadily kept throughout the whole season, and it ended in a very satisfying and comfy way.
After these six episodes, I got vibes of Pushing Daisies (because of what I mentioned in the pilot episode), Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (for its overall quirkiness), Supernatural (a demon named Crowley and the whole bromance thing), and Stranger Things (kids on bikes trying to save the world — and, yes, I know Stranger Things was hardly an original snow). But, in the end, Good Omens was its own thing, and quite some of the most refreshing TV time I've had in a while. And it's impossible not to love Michael Sheen's and David Tennant's ineffable chemistry on screen.
A special mention to the little girl of the gang... Shows these days tend to shove SJW characters down our throats (the "politically correct" is becoming such a nuisance), but the way they handled her character turned out to be both adorable and hilarious! Characters like her often annoy the hell out of me, but she actually provided some genuine comic relief while trying to sound serious. Unintentionally or not, I say well done, show runners!
Also, did Agnes Nutter foresaw season two?
I didn't love this film, but I was certainly entertained and I thought the concept was interesting. It'll be interesting to see the what the political climate looked like leading up to this. Perhaps in the sequels.
That aside, the film does do well with portraying technology of the future. It's realistic, at least at the time of the film's making, and isn't overly "in your face". One thing that comes to mind is Charlie's glasses, which featured pretty high resolution monitors showing the feed from his RC car... wirelessly!
The film was dark, but I think it did a good job of emphasizing key aspects of each scene. I thought the PoV from the RC car was a neat touch, giving it that sort of hand-held camera effect, but without the shakiness that normally comes with that.
I feel like there's a lot going on in this story that doesn't entirely add up. The entire story exists because Charlie opened up the house to the man. Anyone can debate the ethics in doing so or not doing so, but the point is that the entire plot exists because of this one action. I'm not sure how I feel about that. They tried to redeem it in the end, though, with the neighbors wanting in on it. Even that, however, wasn't well done. It was more of a "story's over now let's add a little more to fill out some time..." and they just, literally, sit there.
I agree with the other comments that say the family needed a panic room. For such an event, the protection offered by the security system is mainly for looks. Granted, this was mentioned in the film briefly. Also, if the "polite leader" had any intention of keeping the family alive, why did he cut the power? Meh, I'll suspend disbelief for this one.
This film wasn't good, and has a lot of plot holes. It felt as if they were stretching to get to 90 minutes for a feature-length film (they didn't by the way). I was entertained, but didn't really find much realism in the concept behind the film.
Jonathan Banks is ridiculous good. He does so much with so little; plays the stoic, taciturn old hand so well, that it's tempting to think of that as the sum total of what he is. In both Breaking Bad and Community, he plays a perpetually grumpy, vaguely prideful, uber-competent ruffian, and does so with such skill, that it's easy to go back to that well again and again.
But then in an episode like "Five-O", he hits a note of vulnerability. He sits in the dark, and the tears well in his eyes as he talks to his daughter-in-law about how he "broke his boy." Mike Ehrmentraut is not made of stone. He is a simple man in many ways, who is remarkable for how unremarkable he is at times. But there is a beating heart beneath his steely exterior, one that grieves for his lost son, that blames himself for allowing it to happen, and who throws himself at the mercy of his son's wife out of a sense of guilt and fairness for having taken the man she loves away from her.
That scene is so damn quiet. There's no music to subtly or not-so-subtly massage our emotions one direction or another. There's little of the cinematic flourishes that made Breaking Bad and its successor stand out in a sea of often bland direction on television. There's just close ups of a wounded animal spilling his guts over his greatest regret, and a similar shot of his daughter-in-law, who carries a similar look of hurt but also one of understanding. It's one of the most powerful, tragic scenes in this young series, but also in its more celebrated predecessor, that deepens an already enthralling character and shows that Mike is far more than just grump and handguns.
At the same time, as good as that final scene is, it shouldn't overshadow how well the episode that precedes it is constructed. Apart from the story of Walter White, apart from the story of Jimmy McGill, "Five-O" is a wonderful little short story that works almost entirely separated from the narratives of the protagonists that Mr. Ehrmantraut finds himself associated with.
It is both a mystery and a character piece, offering details both about what led Mike to where he is when we meet him at the parking booth in the beginning of Better Call Saul, but also examining who he is and the baggage he carries with him when we first meet him in Albuquerque.
The episode begins by, not in so many words, asking a number of questions. How did Mike get shot? Was he speaking on the phone with Matty the night before he died? What brought him to Albuquerque in this state? Why won't he tell his daughter-in-law? What did they talk about? Who killed Matty? Who killed his partners on the force.
Then, one by one, the episode cuts back and forth between the present and the future, answering these questions and presenting new ones as it goes. At one point, I believed that Mike had killed his own son for some reason. Or that he at least knew what was going to happen, but didn't stop it.
Instead, the episode doesn't leave the audience guessing for long. Even as it tosses out breadcrumbs, and lets silences linger that make more of an impact than any dialogue, it eventually shows you what happened before it tells you the rest of the story.
The sequence where Mike takes out his son's murderers is masterful. The subtle touches show who Mike is and what he's about. He's capable and smart, as seen in the way he anticipates the dirty cops taking his weapon and breaks into their cop car to plant another one. Despite his anger, he's nervous about his plan, as seen in the way his hand shakes as he makes sure to let his targets know that he's having a few as he holds his glass of whiskey. And he's wily, playing into their expectation that he's drunk, leading them to take him somewhere that an execution can take place without too much notice or trouble.
Then his demeanor changes, and he does what he feels he needs to, and we get everything we need to know except the last piece of the puzzle -- how Matty got mixed up in this in the first place. And that leads us to that final scene, with Mike at the most open and honest and wounded as we've ever seen him.
And we learn things about one of this franchise's greatest characters that were unknown before "Five-O." We know that he's a drunk, who managed to crawl his way out of a bottle. We know that he was a dirty cop, or at least one dirty enough not to raise any suspicion because That's Just How Things Are. And he is a man who carries on with a tremendous sense of shame for the man he was and what it led to. He views himself as someone unworthy of his son's admiration, as someone whose failure to live up to the sterling image his son had of him led to his son's death. Mike is not a sentimental man, not one to wear his emotions on his sleeves, but "Five-O" makes it clear that he carries that weight with him wherever he goes.
While Saul appears for an important segment here, this episode is not about him. He's a supporting character in Mike's story. And yet in the midst of all this great standalone storytelling and character development of Mike, the folks behind Better Call Saul still take time out to lay the groundwork for why a pair of individuals like Jimmy McGill and Mike Ehrmantraut would find each other useful and build a relationship, if not necessarily a friendship together.
To that point, "Five-O" is a great episode of Better Call Saul, that deepens our understanding of one of the series's major players. But even apart from that, it's just a wonderful, heartbreaking, self-contained story about a man who went along to get along, with booze and kickbacks and thirty years of the usual business along the way, and woke up when he failed the person in his life who mattered the most to him. It's easy to love Mike Ehrmantraut, the old badass with a code; but it's even better to love Mike Ehrmantraut, the grieving father ready to live with whatever consequences are to come for killing his son's murderers, who still struggles with the thought that he corrupted something pure and beautiful, and feels responsible for taking away his granddaughter's daddy, his daughter-in-law's husband, because he was not as good of a man as he might have been.
When I wrote about RICO, I talked about how much of what makes this show great is its commitment to a "show, don't tell" ethos in its storytelling. The show generally takes care not to lay its points on too thick, or be too obvious with its points and themes, preferring to let them emerge from its characters' interactions and the performances of its superb cast.
That's why I felt let down by "Marco". It's not a bad episode--it's hard to imagine any show in the Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul pantheon sinking that low--but it's not nearly so subtle or deft in how it communicates Jimmy's internal struggle after the revelation that the brother he loved, and sacrificed for, and emulated, doesn't respect him and actually resents his attempts at self-improvement.
At the end of the episode, when Jimmy rolls up to Mike's tollbooth, asks him why they didn't take the money stolen by the Kettlemans for themselves, you get hints at what Mike started in "Pimento", both his falling in as a regular enforcer for the bumbling pill-dealer, but also his code--that he may be a criminal, but he's also a good guy, who's just out to do the job he's hired to do. And yet when Jimmy declares that he's never going to worry about doing the right thing again, it's so on the nose that the moment meant to cap off the entire season feels like it warrants a response of "duh." Let us see what your characters are feeling about their circumstances through how they behave, or even through dialogue; but don't just have them announce the shift you've already spent the entire episode setting up.
It doesn't give me great faith in Peter Gould, who both wrote and directed the episode and, with his Executive Producer credit, would appear to be the main creative force in the show beyond Vince Gilligan. Too many scenes in the episode that are supposed to put a bow on the events we've witnessed for nine episodes feel clumsy, awkward, without any of the flair, in either dialogue or direction, that the franchise is known for.
It comes through in the Bingo scene, where Jimmy's breakdown at a Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead level of recurring Bs sets him off into a semi-stream of consciousness rant about the foolish act that set him on this whole path. It's a strange, disjointed sequence that tries to lean into Bob Odenkirk's great skill as an actor, but makes so much explicit that has otherwise been subtle but palpable subtext that it just seems like an odd outburst that's tonally inconsistent with the rest of the show rather than the moment of great emotional weight and character development it's meant to play as.
The same goes for the montage of Jimmy and his old pal Marco getting back into the grifting game. The flying signs and reds and blues have the characteristics of an old cop show (it's the same kind of montage The Simpsons has parodied time and time again), and it's kind of fun in the attempt at stylized filmmaking Better Call Saul and its forebear regularly traffic in, but the sequence itself still comes off oddly flat, and the recurring lines about telling secrets and swirling images descend into the cheese rather than transcend it.
To the point, the entire storyline feels kind of rote. The idea of Jimmy learning his brother is a false idol, that the backstop that kept him from sliding back into a life of flim-flamming rubes at the local bar, that motivated him to achieve all he has since Chuck helped him out of that jam in Chicago, was predicated on a falsehood, is a good one. But the consequences feel too easy, the following events and conflicts too convenient, even cliche.
Jimmy attempting to restart his old life and finding that regardless of his brother, he feels a pull to be good, to help his clients and the people he's made commitments to, is hokey enough on its own, but kind of works. It's believable enough that in the throes of lamenting what he gave up at the behest of an implacable sibling would send him back into that familiar cesspool to blow off the steam he'd been holding in for so long, and yet eventually find that once that's out of the system, his old life doesn't have the same allure it once did. Sure, that's a pretty conventional story in a show that's made its bones from being more than conventional, but it's enough, even if it's not superb.
Then, of course, Marco wants to pull off one last con. And, of course, his trademark Hollywood cough early in the episode, pays off in a by-the-book Hollywood Death to Teach the Protagonist a Lesson™, that this is the most exciting thing Marco's life and it's a sad and pathetic thing to hang your hat on as you're dying. It's set up well enough with the audience having seen Jimmy and Marco pull off the same con episodes earlier, but again, it feels like laying the stakes of Jimmy's internal conflict on too thick. We already know he's struggling with whether to, as Mike puts it in "Pimento", be a good guy or a bad guy. We already know that his moral compass it out of whack after what happened with Chuck. And thanks to his scene in Marco's basement, we already know he's feeling the pull of the changed man he's become.
Perhaps this is all supposed to build to the subversion at the end of the episode. After all of these fairly weak and typical lessons and reminders about living right, Jimmy's still so miffed at what he gave up for his brother, or so bound to what may be his true nature, that he can't bother to follow up on Kim and Hamlin's help and make good on going straight. There's something to that, but the hamfisted way in which the episode hammers that point home in Jimmy's exchange with Mike sucks all the power from the twist.
When Better Call Saul began, there was no way to know if it would have a Season 2. Maybe the rushed nature, the flimsy finality of that this episode tries to impart is a symptom of that. If there were never another episode of Better Call Saul after this, there's more than enough for the audience to fill in the gaps and understand the trajectory for Jimmy and Mike between here and Breaking Bad, and anything more ambiguous might fail in that regard. As Season 1 of the show draws to a close, there's a clear explanation for how small-time lawyer Jimmy McGill could turn from the scrappy-if-underhanded guy we meet in episode 1 to talented huckster Saul Goodman, and how Philadelphia policeman Mike Ehrmentraut finds himself as the go-to-guy in the company of criminals. But something about that tidiness, about that blatant declaration to that effect, feels too simple in a show that thrives on complexity, and it sends a tremendous season of television out on a disappointing note.
[8.5/10] You could be forgiven for asking, “Hey, isn’t there some guy named Saul in this show?” for most of the runtime of “Sabrosito.” It’s an episode that turns over most of the proceedings to the happenings in the orbit of Gustavo Fring, with enough of a narrative side dish for Mike and Jimmy to remind you that they are main characters in the series.
But I’m not complaining. Giancarlo Esposito has a presence that can hold your attention like few other actors can. The details we see here -- the cold war brewing at Don Eladio’s compound, the affronts between Gus and Hector, the declaration of resolve from Fring himself, add so much shading to what we already know about the grudges and rivalries within the cartel from Breaking Bad. In a way the rest of Better Call Saul hasn’t really, “Sabrosito” serves as a direct prequel to the events that Walter White would eventually get tangled up in, and by using Gus as a conduit for that, the show practically guarantees a compelling episode.
And, as usual, there is some connective tissue between the seemingly disparate, constituent parts of the episode. Gus’s story is ultimately about standing up to bullies, standing up to intimidation, standing up to the people who believe that you deserve less. It’s about pushing back against those who do not respect you, who believe that your new ways don’t measure up to their old ones, and who believe you need to kowtow to their wishes.
But so is Jimmy’s. Sure, an ornery older brother trying to drum you out of the legal profession is not exactly the same thing as a rival drug dealer using his standing in the cartel to lean on you, but “Sabrosito” draws a line between Chuck and Hector. Both of them are old timers, long entrenched in the systems in which they operate, ready to use their connections, their standing, the power and network they have amassed in their time, to stamp out the people who challenge their hegemony.
For Hector, that means preventing the upstart Gus from infringing on his territory. The opening of the episode in Don Eladio’s pool not only puts Breaking Bad fans on alert for little pink bears, but it calls to mind both Gus’s partner being killed at the edge of that pool, and Don Eladio himself meeting his end there. It’s an interesting shot that immediately makes the setting of the scene laden with meaning before a single word is spoken.
Don Eladio, gregarious shit-stirrer that he is, makes Hector feel the lesser man next to the bigger stack of crisp, clean bills Gus sends Don Eladio’s way, and the Los Pollos Hermanos shirt Don Eladio puts on only adds insult to injury. So Hector goes to throw his weight around with Gus, in the best way he knows how - by messing with him at his restaurant.
It’s unexpectedly tense for a scene set at a fast food chicken restaurant. Still, Hector knows the best way to violate the sanctity of Gus’s domain, to twist Gus where it will bother him the most. He wanders around the meticulously kept restaurant violating every norm of cleanliness and decorum imaginable. He intimidates customers; he smokes; he wanders in the back and carves gunk off his shoe. The message is clear -- I am in charge here, and even if there’s a greater authority than myself to consider, you’ll accede to my wishes.
That’s the message Chuck sends as well. There is the same air of tension as the McGill brothers, and their legal representatives, file in to accept the A.D.A.’s deal. Chuck, true to form, leans on his brother about every niggling detail, from the wording in Jimmy’s confession to the cost of the destroyed cassette tape. And from the minute Ms. Hay converses with Chuck about his condition, it’s clear that this is far from a neutral proceeding, removing any doubt that she is, knowingly or not, taking Chuck’s side on this. The peak is when she requires Jimmy to not only sign his confession and make restitution, but to apologize to his brother.
This is where Gus and Jimmy stand in the same position. Both are clearly on edge, facing the men who want to squeeze them out. But each maintains their composure, not rising to the bait meant to throw them off balance, letting their tormentors believe that they have won this battle. Gus, stoic as he is, simply makes velvety threats and stands there dignified and unmoved. Jimmy, a little more heart on his sleeve, turns his supposed apology into a recrimination, albeit one subtle enough to pass muster with the A.D.A.
But neither of them is beaten. Through Kim’s clever phonebooking and Jimmy’s use of Mike’s combined conman/handyman skills, the pair not only have a plan to thwart Chuck from getting Jimmy disbarred, but they have evidence and the benefit of Mike casing the joint to go on. Gus, for his part, stays resolute, but clearly is unspooling a big plan in his own mind. When he speaks to his frightened employees, he speaks off a refusal to bend, to allow the old guard to flex its muscles and have the newcomers cower in fear. He resolves to stand his ground, and the people who work for him applaud him for it.
And poor Mike may be a big part of that big plan. His is the most understated story in the episode, but it’s also, in its way, the most poignant. Mike is a taciturn individual by nature, which calls upon Jonathan Banks to fill in the blank spaces of dialogue with his world-weary expressions. With his granddaughter Kaylee nestled in his arm, there is a hint of wistfulness, of regret in his eyes, enough for his daughter-in-law to pick up on it. These are the loved ones for whom he committed those terrible deeds for, for whom he got other innocent people killed. Better Call Saul plays its cards close to the vest, but Banks’s performance gives the sense of the moral calculus of those acts weighing on Mike in that moment.
When sitting down with Jimmy at the diner, Mike remarks that it was nice to fix something for once. When we see him later in the episode, he’s reading Handyman Magazine. Mike is good at what he does -- the way he manages to nonchalantly shoo Chuck away with his power tools shows that -- but there’s also a sense that he’s weary of this. Keeping his daughter-in-law and granddaughter in that nice neighborhood, with the good schools and safe havens, costs real money, and Mike’s most marketable skill, the one that brings those brown paper bags full of dollar bills, isn’t a pleasant one. Maybe, Mike just wishes he could rest -- build things instead of tear them down.
One of the best qualities of Better Call Saul is the way it uses its status as a prequel as an advantage rather than a difficulty. The tension between Gus and Hector in “Sabrosito” is heightened because we know there is enough bad blood between the two of them in the future that Hector sacrifice his own life so long as he can take out Fring at the same time. Jimmy’s tet-a-tet with Chuck has added intrigue because it seems as though Chuck has his brother dead to rights, and yet we know that Jimmy will continue practicing law, by hook or by crook, leading the audience to wonder how he’ll wriggle out of this one.
But it also creates a sense of tragedy, of star-crossed destiny for characters like Mike. It isn’t a bully who compels him, and it’s hard to imagine someone being able to intimidate him into doing anything. And yet, he is no less pulled by forces beyond his control -- the need to care for his family, the need to make up for the death of his son that he feels responsible for -- that we know will keep from the life of a contented handyman.
The encounter between Mike and Gus at the end of the episode, where Mike agrees, in his typically cagey way, to work for Gus, is in part a momentous one, because it serves as a milestone for a partnership that will pay dividends for each of them. At the same time, it’s a recommitment to a line of work that will ultimately grind away at Mike, that will lead to his death, that will jeopardize those stacks of dollar bills he has stashed away for his granddaughter.
It’s hard to say it will lead him to ruin. Mike is not a young man and he enjoys close to a decade of being able to care for his family. But for at least a moment in “Sabrosito”, it seems that at a time when Gus and Jimmy are desperate and resolute to stay in the game, Mike wants out. And we know, however much he may want that, the ability to while away his time fixing doors instead of dusting cartel goons, he’s fated to keep at this until, one day, it kills him.
[8.8/10] One of the great things about The Sopranos was the way it would show a character meeting someone or having a moment that changed their emotional state, planted some idea or bit of perspective in their head, that they would then carry throughout the rest of the episode, often taking it out on people entirely divorced from that inciting incident. It was part of the show’s deft emotional calculus, where it could capture the way thoughts and feelings flit around in the background, popping up in surprising ways or at unexpected times.
As much as the aptly titled “Expenses” is devoted to the financial corner Jimmy finds himself in, it’s also devoted to that same idea, the notion that one interaction, one exchange with another person can reframe the way you feel about something or someone, in a way that lingers and cannot be easily erased.
It starts with another of Better Call Saul’s cold opens, that again succeeds in displaying visual virtuosity -- in the motley crew of individual framed against a blank wall and the cars and trucks rushing overhead -- but in the way it serves the message being communicated -- that here, Jimmy is just another guy and he’s hindered from doing what he does best by all this noise.
That’s the overarching theme to Jimmy’s portion of the episode. The now Saul Goodman is used to being able to use his powers of persuasion, his winning attitude and ability to feel out any situation to bend things to his advantage. For all Jimmy’s faults, there’s always been a cleverness to it, and a way with people, that have kept him from the harshest of consequences in any jam he’s in.
But now he finds himself embroiled in circumstances where all his winning ways can’t extricate him from the financial difficulties he finds himself in. It begins with the Community Service Supervisor docking him all but a half hour of the four hours he worked picking up garbage because he was using his phone to answer calls for Saul Goodman productions. He tries to negotiate, to rally his fellow garbage-pickers to his side, to appeal the the man’s sympathies, but all he gets in return is “we could make it zero.”
That’s the response Jimmy gets throughout the episode, as the thought of his remonstrations falling on deaf ears continues to wear on him. At a time when his dire monetary straights require the best of his salesmanship abilities, the desperation and unavoidable strictures of him circumstances seem to hobble him. His attempts to upsell his commercial-shooting services on the phone lead to hang up. His effort to try to upgrade a paying customer to a bigger package gets him nowhere. And in his desperation, he actually allows a couple of savvy business owners (played by the Sklar Brothers of the underrated show Cheap Seats) to hold him over a barrel and get him to work for free.
Jimmy is used to having power, It may not be the sort of positions of privilege that the Chucks and Howards of the world enjoy, but he’s accustomed to being able to use his silver tongue to give him an advantage in any random situation in which he needs it. But from that first moment with the Community Service Supervisor, he feels stymied, closed in, powerless. It’s natural, then, that he takes that out on others where he can, repeating those words, “we could make it zero” to a Chinese food delivery boy who looks askance on him for a low tip. Each indignity seems to snowball from that first one, until Jimmy is at his wits end and blowing off his steam at delivery boys and random marks in bars for whom his scorn is misdirected, intended for causes of his frustrations that are out of his reach.
Mike finds himself with solace, rather than frustration, when he meets Anita, a woman who attends church with Stacey. When Anita initially offers to help Mike build the playground he promised to assist with in the last episode, he brushes her off, with hints that it’s due to a certain strain of sexism. But Anita won’t take no for an answer, something Mike clearly admires, as he acquiesces and she proves herself a capable aide in the effort.
Mike’s respect and interest in her only grows when he learns at their support group that she lost her husband, who was also a man in uniform (albeit a navy man, rather than a cop). The show seems to be setting up Anita as a love interest, which is an interesting, though mildly concern direction to go with the character. But what’s particularly notable is how his interactions with Anita -- where she tells him that her husband was lost while hiking with the body never being recovered -- effect a change of heart in him.
When Nacho leans on Daniel, of “Squat Cobbler” fame, to get him some heart pills that he can use to poison Hector, Daniel seeks out Mike’s protection once more, explaining the scheme (or at least as much of it as he knows). Mike initially wants no part of it, brushing Daniel off and washing his hands of it.
But something about his conversation with Anita changes his mind. Maybe it’s the idea that her husband, somebody who left and never came back, reminds Mike of the innocent person whose death he indirectly caused when he knocked over one of Hector’s trucks. There’s hints that Mike has been trying to buy his soul back, from what happened with Matty and with the cartel, when he donates all the materials for the church playground. His agreement to be Daniel’s muscle seems unlikely to be out of a particular care for that dolt’s well-being, but Nacho may be a different story.
Nacho isn’t exactly pure of heart, but Mike does take a certain paternal tone with him -- here and in episodes past. It was Nacho’s presence that gave him pause in “Klick”, and Mike’s smart enough to read into what Daniel’s telling him, figure out what Nacho’s planning, and feel the need to warn him to cover his tracks and protect himself. “Expenses” stays a bit cagey about what exactly’s pulling Mike here, but it’s clear that the small emotional reminder from Anita is enough to move him to do something different.
Kim might be moved to do something different as well, though in a far less pleasant manner. When Paige from Mesa Verde compliments Kim on how she and Jimmy won at Jimmy’s disciplinary hearing, deriding Chuck all the while, the persistent guilt bubbling within Kim rises to the surface. In going over some numbers with Paige later, Kim is unexpectedly short with Paige, immediately realizing the slip and apologizing. Without ever saying as much, Kim admits that she’s bothered by being complimented on what happened with Chuck, telling Paige that as far as she’s concerned, all she and Jimmy did was tear down a sick man. It’s a small part of a larger conversation, but it brings out something that’s been bothering Kim, that manifests itself in a sideways fashion.
Still, once that thought has reared its ugly head, it’s hard to tamp it back down. When Jimmy and Kim are together at a bar, sizing up potential marks as they did in “Switch” as Jimmy is trying to get his mojo back, Kim starts to seem just the slightest bit aghast. Jimmy speaks with a malevolence about taking down certain marks, going to elaborate extremes (frankly sounding like Chuck) in his imagined schemes against certain unkind gentleman in the establishment.
There was a mutual allure between Jimmy and Kim when they first tried to pull this sort of con off in “Switch.” Kim seemed impressed by Jimmy’s ability to persuade and flim-flam and Jimmy was enthralled by a partner who could also be an effective partner in crime. But that one moment with Paige, the glee at a mentally ill man’s downfall, fostered a nagging impulse within her, one that seems to make her question whether the man she’s thrown in her lot with is a decent person in a bad situation or whether he is the scorpion atop the frog.
Jimmy seems to embrace the latter label in the episode’s closing scene. His efforts to get a refund on the malpractice insurance he’ll no longer need are the last bit of insult to injury. Not only can he not received a refund, he’s told, but when he returns to practice, his rates will go up 150%. The one minor life raft in the midst of his stormy financial sea turns out to be the promise of an anchor.
It’s then that Jimmy starts crying, and just as I did for his brother in “Sunk Costs,” I almost believed him. “Expenses” does a superb job at showing how far Jimmy is being stretched, how much he’s willing to break his own rules and grasp at whatever straws he can to get the money he needs to keep going. This could be the final one, the thing that breaks the emotional defenses of the normally unshakeable Jimmy McGill.
In truth, it could still be that. Jimmy is not above mixing truth with fiction to serve his ends. But whether they’re real or fake, he uses those tears to subtly cue the malpractice insurance adjuster, who also insures Chuck, to the disciplinary hearing transcripts that expose his brother as a sick man. It’s a way that, even in what seems like his lowest point, Jimmy can regain some joy, some pleasure, in sticking it to his brother once again. While Kim is coping with guilt over what she rationalized as a necessary action, Jimmy is twisting the knife.
And why wouldn’t he? From the start of “Expenses,” Jimmy finds himself stymied and rebuked in everything he tries to do, whether it’s get full credit for his community service or get a refund on his insurance premiums. He sees Chuck as the person who put him in this situation, and the one thing he can still do, even if he’s caged and neutered in every other respect, is stick it to his brother. Jimmy is still powerless for much of the episode, unable to deploy his persuasion in the way he’s used to for his own personal gain, but he can still use it for Chuck’s personal loss, and for now, that’s enough, something the devilish smile on his face as he leaves the office reveals.
Often times it’s the little moments that move us, that create some niggling thought in our brains that festers or flourishes into something more. For Mike, it’s a reminder and a call to action. For Kim, it’s a warning, a lingering concern about the individual she’s tied her life to. And for Jimmy, it’s a nagging impulse, a prickling thought, that he can only stamp out by running up the score on his brother, to prove to himself that he still can.
[8.6/10] The opening of “Slip” is a little more direct than episodes of Better Call Saul tend to be, as it fills in some gaps Jimmy’s backstory and perspective. When pressed by Marco about Jimmy’s parents’ shop, about how they worked hard and everyone liked them, Jimmy admits it’s true, but questions the value of it. He declares that it got them nowhere, and characterizes his own dad as a sucker.
Jimmy’s philosophy becomes a little clearer, snapping into place with the flashback to his youth. His dad was someone who refused to bend the rules, who wouldn’t take even so much as a valuable coin for himself, who wouldn’t sell cigarettes to the kids from the local religious school to make ends meet, and in Jimmy’s eyes, that got him nothing. It’s a little too tidy and pat, but Jimmy sums it up nicely -- Papa McGill wasn’t willing to “do what he had to do,” and Jimmy definitely is.
That’s the thrust of “Slip,” which is as much an ensemble piece as any episode of Better Call Saul so far. Jimmy, Mike, Chuck, Kim, and Nacho are willing to go the extra mile, to do the difficult thing, not because they want to, but because they believe it needs to be done. It’s what unites those disparate individuals and their different challenges here. Each of them strains a little more, goes a little farther, in the name of biting the bullet and doing what needs doing.
For Jimmy, that means going back to his old ways. What’s interesting is that Jimmy tries to be good here. He tries to build on the success of his first ad with the owners of the music shop, and all they do is try to squeeze him. Granted, it’s Jimmy, so he’s probably inflating costs a bit, but still, the episode sets them up as jerks, and Jimmy as at the end of the rope. So hey lays out a drumstick, asks them one more time if they’re committed to not paying him what they originally agreed to, and then he intentionally takes a painful looking spill in their store to get leverage. Look out, Slippin’ Jimmy is back.
He also returns to his huckstering to get back at this community service supervisor and make a little scratch in the process. His big show of a potential lawsuit and deal with a fellow worker grow a little farfetched in terms of persuading the grumpy supervisor who eventually gives in, but the purpose of these scenes is clear. Jimmy tried doing things his parents’ way, the good way, and the only thing it got him was an empty bank account. Now, he’s back to taking the (literally) painful, less-than-savory steps that ensure he has enough money to hold up his end of the bargain with Kim.
But Kim’s willing to go the extra mile too. When Jimmy offers her the money, she obliquely hints at the idea that he might need time to regroup, that she’s willing to carry the load for the two of them for a little while. It’s not entirely clear whether she’s worried he’ll return to conning people full time and wants to alleviate the financial incentives to do so, or she’s simply concerned that whatever his assurances, unreliable Jimmy may not be able to come up with his end on a monthly basis without his legal practice. Either way, she takes on a new client, one where she already seems pretty slammed, to make sure that they’ll be able to make ends meet, with or without Jimmy’s contributions.
The Mesa Verde head honcho refers that client to her at a lunch meeting, where she just so happens to run into Howard. Howard, ever the politician, is plastically cordial, but Kim, unlike her beau, still has pangs of guilt and offers him a refund on the law school tuition he put up for her. Howard, letting the scales fall for the first time in a while, reveals that he too is working overtime, having to reassure scores of clients after the incident with Chuck gets out. Kim’s willing to take the (figuratively) painful step of handing over $14,000 dollars to assuage her conscience, and Howard is out there hustling to preserve his firm’s good name after his partner’s public breakdown.
But some good seems to have come out of it. Chuck is back with his doctor and (self-)reportedly making great progress. He may be overestimating himself a little bit, but he’s pushing through his exposure therapy and accepting that his illness is a mental not physical one. When Dr. Cruz warns him about taking it easy and not setting his expectations too high, he remains optimistic, anxious to get better.
In a tremendous sequence, without a word of exposition, “Slip” suggests that Chuck might overexert himself in this effort. He’s using the coping techniques the doctor suggested for him when standing in front of the blaring fluorescent lights of the grocery story. He lists the colors and objects he sees, taking his focus away from the pain. Director Adam Bernstein uses the tools in his toolbox to underscore the severity of what walking through the freezer case does to Chuck, the zooms, the noise, the vertigo of it all. It seems like Chuck has pushed himself too far, that he’s about to suffer another attack
But when we see Chuck later, he has the groceries and is no worse for wear. These things are difficult for him, painful for him, but he is ready and willing to push, to take that damn step, in the same of what he wants to achieve.
The same is true of Mike, who is clearly still haunted by Anita’s story from the prior episode of her husband dying in the woods without anyone ever finding the body. He digs and digs in the New Mexico desert, metal-detector in hand, until he finds where the unfortunate Good Samaritan was buried by the cartel. He calls it in anonymously, presumably in the hopes of ensuring that another family won’t have to go through the uncertainty that Anita did.
But he’s worried about leaving his own family in a state of uncertainty too. He still has his cash from his various extra-curricular activities, but he’s worried about how he could get it to his family should something happen to him. So he goes to Gus Fring, in the hopes Gus can help him launder it. It’s a scene that shows the two men’s growing mutual respect. The meaningful handshake that closes the episode (along with Gus turning down Mike’s offer of 20% to launder it) signifies the ways that their values are the same. They are both smart, decent men who get mixed up in indecent things, and they’re willing to do what it takes to make that work.
That just leaves Nacho, who has what is possibly the most difficult task of all. What I love about this series of scenes is the way they show how meticulous, how careful, how deliberate Nacho is about all of his. There is nobility in Nacho wanting to protect his father from Hector, but he is not in any way reckless about it.
Instead, he does the legwork, he takes the extra steps that will make his operation successful. He is delicate and careful as he grinds the poison into dust and fills the lookalike pills under a magnifying glass. He practices, over and over again, the act of palming the pill bottle and depositing it into a coat pocket, so that when the moment comes, it will be second nature. And he even goes so far as to climb onto the top of the restaurant that serves as Hector’s headquarters the night before, messing up the air conditioner so that Hector will have a reason to take off his jacket.
The subsequent scene where he actually makes the switch is masterful. “Slip” holds the tension of each step in the process: from the would-be fake bill, to the probing of the wrong pocket, to the pill switcheroo, to that grand moment of truth where Nacho has to make the move he rehearsed so many times and land the pill bottle into Hector’s jacket without him realizing. It’s a great outing for Michael Mando, who conveys the way that Nacho is trying to exhibit a practiced, casual calm, but inside is anxious beyond words. His deep exhale and clenched fingers in the back after it’s all done says everything.
Each of the tasks taken up by the main characters in this episode -- planting poison pills, finding a dead body, braving the height of your illness, taking on extra work, and even breaking your own back -- require something extra, more sacrifice, more pain, more difficulty. But when something important is at stake -- your livelihood, your well-being, or your family -- the major figures of Better Call Saul are the type of people who face that head on and take whatever measures the situation requires, even if that means drastically different things for each of them. Those steps are painful, tense, and even dangerous, but for better or ill, Jimmy McGill and the people in his orbit, are the people who do what they need to do.
