I think that ever since the “monkey with a machine gun” speech it’s been clear that Chuck is not going to rest until Jimmy is out of the law. When have we seen Chuck muster up the willpower to overcome his “condition”? First to use Jimmy’s cell phone to convince Howard to push Jimmy off the Sandpiper case. Then to “bear witness” when Jimmy returns to HHM as a Davis & Main associate, almost successfully rattling Jimmy enough to embarrass him in front of his boss. Finally, to give the pitch to Mesa Verde to prevent Kim from getting the work - a clear attempt to make Kim back out of the shared office arrangement with Jimmy. As long as Chuck is in any position of influence, Jimmy’s career is at risk. Chuck has to be destroyed. And Chuck is the one who created the situation.
In an earlier post you mentioned you wanted to see a story about someone climbing out the moral pit. We’ve already seen Jimmy trying to climb out, only to have Chuck shove him right back in every time he started to make it - simply because Chuck doesn’t believe that climbing out of the pit is possible.
Maybe that’s how the writers intended to portray it but I think it is insignificant. Jimmy’s malice is a reaction to Chuck’s. And it’s not unethical to share a factual piece of information with the insurance company. He just did it in a theatrical way.
Perhaps they are both in the wrong, each in their own way. Payback has certainly consumed Chuck and now it’s starting to consume Jimmy as well. I believe the show is ultimately about hubris… about biting off more than you can chew on order to not show weakness. It’s true of Jimmy. It’s true of Chuck. That goes for Kim too. She’s a workaholic who doesn’t seem to know where to draw the line. With Gus and Hector, it’s always about not backing down. Nacho wants revenge (or maybe a pre-emotive strike) but he doesn’t think through the details. I would say that Mike is the most reasonable character in the show, save for maybe Ernesto, but even he is consumed by his fear/hate/apprehension about Hector.
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Even “Workaholic” lawyers at big firms will have associates and legal secretaries doing grunt work for them. Her client was willing to pay for a big firm to toss all it’s resources on the job. It simply makes no sense that she hasn’t taken on any help.
I think it makes perfect sense that she hasn’t hired on additional people in the first month of working with Mesa Verde, making a major staffing decision without at least a few weeks of data on the workload doesn’t strike me as something Kim would do. Also, Mesa Verde wasn’t going to pay HHM to throw all of its resources at the job, they were nowhere near that scale. While Howard and Chuck wanted them as a client, they didn’t indicate that it would take over their entire business. It’s like Sandpiper at Davis and Main - it’s a nice juicy line of work, but it’s not going to take anywhere near all of their resources.
I wasn’t paying full attention and only saw him out of the corner of my eye but I thought the last guy Jimmy and Kim saw in the bar and considered scamming was Walter White. Since no one else has mentioned this I will assume I am wrong.
I’ve seen people in the real world do more self-damaging things than working long hours for a few weeks with even less reason than ‘this is my first solo client and I need to make sure everything is perfect’.
As to the difference in what “know” means in different contexts …
Back a few more than thirty years ago my then girlfriend (now wife of 30plus) got off the phone talking to her mother with an odd expression. Me: “What’s up?” Her: “My parents just told me something my brother told them.” Me: “Oh. Did he finally tell them he’s gay?” Her: “What? You knew? How do you know?” Me: “How can you not know?”
Now I don’t have the most sensitive gaydar and in point of fact if before that call someone had asked me if I “knew” that man was gay, I would have honestly answered “No. I do not know that.” He had never told me. I had never seen him in physical or romantic with another man. I “knew”, and most outside his immediate family “knew” but we that “knew” really meant thought and assumed so.
I’ve had to give depositions on occasion. My instructions were clear: in this context do not say you know something unless you really do (and don’t volunteer any information; make them ask directly and only answer the direct question)
Any I think this episode marks where we viewers start to see Jimmy in a less sympathetic light, and Jim’s statement about how Kim was viewing him was not off the mark. It’s not his breaking bad … and even in BB time he’s never evil … but less good.
Francesca said in her interview that she had spent a long time working at the DMV. (processing drivers’ licenses and such). I don’t think she was especially qualified as a law clerk.
Then you review your people’s work. This is a woman who has been in a large firm and who knows how big cases work. She herself spent purgatory in doc review. There is no way she doesn’t know that some work can and should be given to underlings. She’s smart and wise enough to know some things are a waste of her time. It’s almost unethical in a way. You are charging your high falutin’ lawyer hourly rate for work that a legal secretary should be doing.
There’s a vindictiveness that we haven’t seen before. Sure, he’s been conniving, but this emotional display and ratting on Chuck seemed to cross a line. Saul is not the most ethical lawyer, and we can see Jimmy already being tempted by the dark side, even if only in retaliation. He didn’t have to go there about Chuck’s illness with the insurance last; he chose to go there.
That’s what I was thinking, but at the same time I think we’re definitely seeing a shift from the nice, Old People Approved James McGill towards a harder, more… expedient person who’s clearly starting to realise looking out for other people isn’t doing him any favours and isn’t likely to do so in the future either.
Like the guy that dropped the mic at the bingo first season. Just felt like he was hitting a wall every time he tried to move up in the world. But the compassion was always there, even if it went into hibernation for a while.
