The scene after Kim left so abruptly, with Jimmy waking up with a prostitute in his big house and then going into his office full of sleazy clients, was pretty much Saul at the start of his appearance in Breaking Bad (I think one of the new clients he was speaking about on the phone ties in directly with his first scene in BB). So other than a couple of insterstitial flashbacks, we are done with Albuquerque - the story of Saul’s rise and fall with Walt and Jesse is told in Breaking Bad. Now the story is about what happens after it all fell apart in Albuquerque. If you don’t know Saul’s story, I agree that the flow from pre-BB to post-BB is going to feel disjointed but equally, if you have seen BB then what happens next is the natural flow. I don’t think there’s a way to cater for both BB and non-BB viewers.
(Although I would have been quite content for the show to have ended with that scene of Saul in full flow post Kim’s departure).
I don’t think anyone has pointed out yet that we finally found out what happened to Huell! Last we saw him in BB he was sitting alone in that apartment, as instructed, waiting for Saul to come back. But Saul wasn’t coming back. Was he still there? There was much speculation in the BB threads at the time.
But this episode we found out that Huell was arrested, there was a screw-up in the procedure and he was released to go back to his now Saul-free life. Also Skyler reached a deal with the prosecutors and her story is closed. Saul and Jesse are the only ones the feds are still after, and they think Jesse is in Mexico (we know he’s not). Saul is the only one whose story is still unfinished.
In BB we were introduced to a fully formed Saul Goodman, lawyer to the drug cartel. He was a compelling character, who at the end of BB had to go into hiding. What was this guy?? We know the end of his story (in the BB universe) but not his beginning.
BCS is the story of how Jimmy McGill, a generally good guy with somewhat flexible morals, becomes Saul Goodman, a lawyer who will soon be perfectly comfortable in a morally bankrupt life (even if he’s not quite there yet). To understand his path we need to return to the present- his compete fall from grandiose drug cartel lawyer to sad Cinnabon manager is a critical part of the story.
So BCS spent a lot of time showing us how Jimmy became Saul, and planted the seeds for his eventual transformation to Gene, via drug cartel Saul. We needed peaks at his current life to remind us of exactly who he was in BB and how far he fell.
Now, with Kim leaving him, his BCS transformation arc seems nearly complete, so there isn’t a whole lot left of that story to tell. Some, yeah, but we’re almost there, to the Saul of BB.
So what story is left to tell? We know the Jimmy story and most of the Saul story. Now we see what happens to Gene. In black and white.
“Reached a deal” could mean a lot of things though. She might have got off scott free in return for her testimony and help locating Hank and Gomie’s bodies. Or maybe she went to jail for a long time, but not as long as if she hadn’t taken the deal?
I’d like to get more detail on her and Walt Jr’s lives after Breaking Bad, but I also recognize this is Saul’s story, not hers. So we might not get it.
The gate opening and Kim going from darkness into light was great.
Is Jessie asking Kim for advice about Saul or retcon? You could fanwank it, but I don’t think it really fits with the BB “you don’t want a criminal lawyer you want a criminal lawyer” scene.
Jesse told Walt Saul got Emilio off when they had him dead to rights. So I don’t think it was necessarily Kim’s weak recommendation that gave him that idea.
Jesse: Look, you remember Emilio? This dude got Emilio off, like, twice. Both times, they had him dead to rights, yo. And then poof! Dude’s like Houdini. Seriously, when the going gets tough, you don’t want a criminal lawyer.
Emilio was the one walking into the office when Kim was leaving
Man, just when I thought Cinnabon manager in Omaha was the most jejune life possible along comes Kim to show me just how wrong I am. Along about the happy birthday song I was sawing at my wrists with an imaginary knife dang.