# Better Call Saul: Season IV **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 30, 2018, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792 "2018-07-30T04:48:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 34
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/663 "2018-09-17T01:56:16Z")
Random note: I rewatched the episode, and the pallet has 200 phones, so Jimmy is paying $20/phone. Probably reselling them for $40 or $50, so he’s making a nice profit without being super expensive. > [@hajario](#): > > Could it be that Kim’s new law firm will get involved in the Sandpiper case on Sandpiper’s side and cost Jimmy his big payout? The scene with Chuck getting a big payout for his client by finding obscure case law could have foreshadowed that. They have been Sandpiper’s lawyers since the start. Back in the first season there was a courtroom scene where Rick (the guy Kim talked to) tried to get a restraining order barring Jimmy from Sandpiper property. It failed, and Jimmy came to Chuck’s house really happy over his victory, then saw the dozens of boxes of documents that he was going to have to deal with, and Chuck convinced him they’d have to take it to a large firm. There wasn’t any personal animosity between the two of them, they were both animated in court but it was pretty clearly ‘just business’. I don’t think it bothers him now, and he’s not actively involved in the case so there’s no conflict of interest. If they do look like they’re winning the case he might feel betrayed by Kim, or he might try a scheme and try to get her to help him sabotage them (which she’ll refuse, obviously). My gut feeling is that Jimmy gets money from Sandpiper though, and uses it to set up the Saul business, not that S&K wins. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/664 "2018-09-17T03:43:02Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > My gut feeling is that Jimmy gets money from Sandpiper though, and uses it to set up the Saul business, not that S&K wins. Jimmy’s cut of a Sandpiper settlement would be millions (20% of the common fund, if I recall correctly). He could set up his Saul Goodman office for a few tens of thousands. Something happens so that he doesn’t get the Sandpiper settlement. And whatever it is is going to bring Kim down, too. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/665 "2018-09-17T04:14:02Z")
> [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](#): > > Jimmy’s cut of a Sandpiper settlement would be millions (20% of the common fund, if I recall correctly). He could set up his Saul Goodman office for a few tens of thousands. Something happens so that he doesn’t get the Sandpiper settlement. And whatever it is is going to bring Kim down, too. No, that’s just not true. His share of the settlement if he got the class representative to agree to settle in season 3 would be $1.16 million, which is just not ‘millions’. D&M’s lawyers are hoping to get a larger settlement, but ‘larger’ would likely be something like 50% larger, not multiple times what the offer was last season that would be needed to hit ‘millions’ (and it’s also possible that the eventual settlement ends up being smaller). That’s also the raw settlement amount, not the after tax amount, so he’s really looking at something in the high hundreds of thousands, not the millions. A solid chunk of change, but nowhere near enough for him to be set for life, especially since he’ll probably try and fail at some schemes. It’s certainly possible that they will decide that he doesn’t get the Sandpiper settlement, but there’s absolutely nothing that we see in BB that shows that he didn’t. Your statement that “something happens so that he doesn’t get the Sandpiper settlement” is just your speculation, it’s not based on the facts of the show. My speculation is that he gets the Sandpiper money at the same time as he loses Kim, making his ‘victory’ emotionally worthless to him and helping to drive him to darker places. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/666 "2018-09-17T04:55:11Z")
I think the fact that Kim is going to work for the firm that represents Sandpiper is going to be disastrous in some way -or several ways- to Jimmy, or otherwise it wouldn’t have been brought into the show. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/667 "2018-09-17T04:55:21Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > It’s certainly possible that they will decide that he doesn’t get the Sandpiper settlement, but there’s absolutely nothing that we see in BB that shows that he didn’t. Your statement that “something happens so that he doesn’t get the Sandpiper settlement” is just your speculation, it’s not based on the facts of the show. My speculation is that he gets the Sandpiper money at the same time as he loses Kim, making his ‘victory’ emotionally worthless to him and helping to drive him to darker places. My point was that the Sandpiper settlement would give him way more that would be needed to set up his Saul Goodman office. He could easily bootstrap his way to that kind of office once he starts serving the clientele he is meeting in his burner phone venture. And of course my statement is speculation. So is yours. Isn’t that what we are doing in this thread? Speculating, then seeing how things play out? Sheesh, lighten up a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/668 "2018-09-17T14:03:16Z")
> [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](#): > > And of course my statement is speculation. So is yours. Isn’t that what we are doing in this thread? Speculating, then seeing how things play out? Sheesh, lighten up a bit. You phrased your statement like it was definitive, I pointed out that it wasn’t. If you’re getting this bent out of shape at me pointing out something that you actually agree with completely and think is completely reasonable, then maybe you’re the one who needs to “lighten up a bit”. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/669 "2018-09-17T14:15:08Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > I think the fact that Kim is going to work for the firm that represents Sandpiper is going to be disastrous in some way -or several ways- to Jimmy, or otherwise it wouldn’t have been brought into the show. I like that they don’t hit you over the head with things like this - I had completely forgotten about the Sandpiper connection until it got brought up here, but it’s well established in the show. I wonder if they planned this twist early on or if it just grew out of the characters and situations. It’s possible that they originally planned for S&K to be one off opponents for Jimmy in S1, then liked the actor and kept using him, and serendipitously ended up with a major conflict that makes a lot of sense. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/670 "2018-09-17T15:08:19Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > You phrased your statement like it was definitive, I pointed out that it wasn’t. If you’re getting this bent out of shape at me pointing out something that you actually agree with completely and think is completely reasonable, then maybe you’re the one who needs to “lighten up a bit”. So we’re supposed to preface every speculation with “just speculating”? I’ll be sure to do so going forward. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/671 "2018-09-17T16:06:21Z")
> [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](#): > > So we’re supposed to preface every speculation with “just speculating”? I’ll be sure to do so going forward. If this is how you prefer to lighten up a bit, then shine on you crazy diamond. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/672 "2018-09-17T17:31:04Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > I like that they don’t hit you over the head with things like this - I had completely forgotten about the Sandpiper connection until it got brought up here, but it’s well established in the show. I wonder if they planned this twist early on or if it just grew out of the characters and situations. It’s possible that they originally planned for S&K to be one off opponents for Jimmy in S1, then liked the actor and kept using him, and serendipitously ended up with a major conflict that makes a lot of sense. I don’t know about this case, but Gilligan’s commentary indicates they tend to make things up as the go along. I’m sure the overall arc is known but exactly how they get there is not. After all, originally Mike was supposed to be just a walk-on in BB as Saul’s fixer. In BCS they have to reconcile the fact of Mike being both Gus’s right-hand man and Saul’s fixer without Saul knowing much about Gus. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/673 "2018-09-17T20:29:13Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > If this is how you prefer to lighten up a bit, then shine on you crazy diamond. Have a cigar… ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/674 "2018-09-17T20:52:01Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > I don’t know about this case, but Gilligan’s commentary indicates they tend to make things up as the go along. I’m sure the overall arc is known but exactly how they get there is not. After all, originally Mike was supposed to be just a walk-on in BB as Saul’s fixer. In BCS they have to reconcile the fact of Mike being both Gus’s right-hand man and Saul’s fixer without Saul knowing much about Gus. Not only was Mike originally going to be a one-episode minor character, Saul himself started off as an amusing lawyer who’d be in for one or two episodes, and Jessie was supposed to die at the end of season 1. Like I mentioned in the thread start, Chuck was originally going to be a weak and helpless character highly dependent on Jimmy… not quite where he ended up. If you told me before watching this show that a major character would be the main character’s brother who has a psych condition where he believes he’s allergic to electricity so reads with oil lamps and can’t leave the house without a space blanket, who loves his brother but also thinks he’s a danger as a lawyer so secretly worked to keep him out of the law firm he owns while having his partner take the blame, I would think it was either a source of cheap jokes or a really stupid idea for a show. I certainly wouldn’t expect what we got! ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2018, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/675 "2018-09-17T23:35:28Z")
\*\*New Episode Tonight S4 E7 Something Stupid \*\* ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/676 "2018-09-18T00:50:29Z")
Pantastic and Marvin, you’re getting pretty close to turning this into the unreadable mess of those Game of Thrones. Could you perhaps _both_ chill a bit. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/677 "2018-09-18T01:48:19Z")
I won’t be able to watch the new episode until it arrives via iTunes at around 2:30 a.m. In the meantime, here are some comments and responses from earlier in the thread I’m catching up on. So how did the human pinatas get down? It looked like they were tied up pretty good. > [@divemaster](#): > > I didn’t interpret that Jimmy recognized the driver. I saw it as that Jimmy thought the \*driver \*recognized _him_. His Spidey-sense was tingling: “Have I been made?” > Maybe it was the Albuquerque air freshener dangling from the rear-view mirror. That was how I took it. Also, the cab driver was acting strangely. > [@BlankSlate](#): > > Does it bother anyone else that Kim and Jimmy have no sexual chemistry whatsoever? Objection, Your Honor: leading the witness, states facts not in evidence. 😉 I think they do have sexual chemistry. > [@Sherrerd](#): > > I think the presumption about these European ‘we cater to criminal enterprises’ engineers is that they’ve left some sort of business structure back home: partners, employees, etc. And that there’s an informal criminal network that is related to jobs of this type. And when an engineer and his crew accept a job from Gus, even if the information available is limited, _someone back home knows about it_. > > So Gus could be materially harmed if he killed off the engineer and workers, because word would get around that informal criminal network: don’t deal with this guy. > > (It’s sort of the Donald Trump story, except that Gus is a much more honorable–and skilled–businessman, than is Trump.) Exactly right. > [@TruCelt](#): > > We certainly have a new appreciation for why Mike hated Walt so much. A great deal of careful thought and preparation was undone by Walt’s ego-maniacal posturing. But again, it was “undone” because: —Walt very carefully tried to broker peace (remember the meeting in the trailer with the cheese plate?); —Jesse heedlessly went for revenge anyway; —Walt interceded and saved Jesse’s life; —Walt correctly sussed out that Gus was going to kill him and replace him with Gale; —Walt convinced Jesse to kill Gale to save both of them from being killed by Gus; —Walt realized Gus was still working his way up to killing him; —Walt schemed to kill Gus to save himself. What part of that was “ego-maniacal posturing”? Was the only non-egomanical option to meekly allow Jesse and/or himself be murdered? ---
**Author:** ![salinqmind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/678 "2018-09-18T02:11:24Z")
whut? what’s past is past. nobody cares. This was a dull episode, I think I blanked out a few times. Did anything of note happen? I gathered that the romance is cooling off, big time. That’s all I got. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/679 "2018-09-18T04:12:09Z")
Oh yeah, Kim is done with Jimmy. You could see her realizing that she was going to spend the rest of her life running damage control if she keeps him. Weirdly, he seems completely clueless. The prosecutor was clearly a Chuck fan. It seems as though the legal community has all drawn the same conclusion as Howard, but they are blaming Jimmy for it. While that’s not 100% inaccurate, Chuck chose the negativity in their relationship, not Jimmy. He’s got a huge PR problem, and Kim isn’t telling him about it. Poor Huell. Goodness only knows what Jimmy is up to; I wonder how it will affect his reinstatement. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/680 "2018-09-18T07:09:58Z")
> [@DrCube](#): > > You’d think if that were the plan though, Gene would make himself look more enthusiastic at work. This is something that used to bother me. In fiction, characters almost always display their inner mood very clearly. Presumably this is to not to confuse the audience, but it often hurts my suspension of disbelief because adults have to hide their true feelings very often – no-one is that bad at it. Also, we don’t stay in one uninterrupted state for long periods. If I’m miserable you can still make me smile for a moment with a funny joke. Ironically BCS is one of the few series that, at least sometimes, \*averts \*this trope. But yeah they play it straight sometimes too. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Shine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr_shine/32/464_2.png) [@Mr\_Shine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Shine)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 9:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/681 "2018-09-18T09:33:45Z")
So, Gunther uses the names “Mr Fring” and “Michael Ehmentraut” in full hearing of the other guys. It’s done at closing time in an active laundry with the workers already needing to look the other way. Some sooper-sekkrit lab. Huell’s case is probably going to be the final nail in the coffin of James McGill esquire. Edit, although not made clear, I assume Mike speaks German fluently and understands everything said about him. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2018, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792/682 "2018-09-18T10:10:18Z")
Oh man, we have to wait until next week to find out what Jimmy and Kim are up to? I mean, this show has always been fairly serialized (especially after the first season), but they don’t usually leave us hanging quite like that! It’ll be a long wait until next Monday. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792.md?page=33) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-call-saul-season-iv/818792.md?page=35)