After last week’s episode, I thought I had this season figured out. Jimmy and Kim were going to do one last scheme to keep Huell out of jail before parting ways permanently, eliminating the final encumbrance to Jimmy’s inevitable track to Saul Goodman.
I also figured Mike would, at some point this season, have a major issue to handle with one of the members of Werner’s crew. Kai would be obvious, but Casper (the guy who knocked over the pole last week) might be a candidate as well.
Well, it turns out I know nothing. That affection between Kim and Jimmy isn’t gone, it just needed a spark in the form of Kim and Jimmy running a scam together. Now, of course, that is not sustainable. Kim will not end up with Jimmy pulling scams in Breaking Bad, but her renewed affections for the future Saul Goodman mean their parting is unlikely to be the quiet separation I was envisioning last week.
And did anybody see Werner as the biggest threat to Gus’s lab-building operation? Turns out, no one handles their alcohol worse than Werner. Because while Kai gets kicked out of strip clubs when he’s drunk, Werner turns on the “Let me show you all the top secret meth labs I’m building” part of his brain.
We also checked in with Nacho for the first time in awhile as he received some unwelcome oversight. But we’ll start with Mike as he takes Werner and his crew for some much needed R and R.
“Nothing like this will happen again.”
A strip club is where Mike takes Werner’s crew to blow off steam. And all the guys seem to be having a good time when Mike and Werner decide they can leave and talk alone at another bar.
The two men have always had an understanding of each other, as close to a deep bond anyone that is not Mike’s granddaughter can have with Mike. But Werner put that relationship and more in jeopardy after having a few too many drinks while Mike checked in on the crew at the strip club.
Mike had a Kai issue to take care of as the troublesome crew member got kicked out of the strip club. The bouncer was going to call the police on Kai. But Mike pays the bouncer off to keep Kai’s presence in America off police records.
But even worse, when Mike gets back to the bar to pick up Werner, the German architect has drawn the plans of the lab he’s building on a napkin and is going into great detail with a couple of guys at the bar about the building process.
When Mike confronts Werner about his indiscretions, Werner promises Mike it will never happen again. But Mike does not look convinced. Later, when Gus asks for an update, Mike doubles down in trusting Werner. But once again, he doesn’t look convinced.
“It’s gonna be like I’m not even here.”
It’s good to see Nacho is healthy and active as the man now running the show at the restaurant while dealers come in and deliver the Salamanca’s their cut from the streets.
It’s a seat Tuco sat in early in the show. Then Don Hector took that spot temporarily after Tuco went to prison. But it’s Nacho looking on as a dealer comes in and doesn’t have the expected amount of money. Crazy 8 let’s him off with a warning to bring it next week. But Nacho learned his lesson last season as he calls the dealer over and rips an earring out of his ear, demanding the money be brought back with interest. Nacho also admonishes Crazy 8 for not doing it himself.
Later in the restaurant, Nacho walks in to find a visitor. The man’s name is Eduardo (he also goes by Lalo), and Nacho knows the man is here to check up on him. Considering Nacho is working undercover for Gus, this is bad news. Do the Salamancas know Nacho’s been compromised? Or do they simply think he can’t do the job? Or maybe they suspect (and correctly as it turns out) that he needs watching because he might be ready to escape.
“I think we might be past that.”
Meanwhile, Kim and Jimmy still aren’t talking, at least not in a way lovers do. They discuss the execution of the scam to keep Huell out of jail, but that is it.
And what a scam it was!!! All those office supplies turn out to be for Jimmy to write fake letters of people in Huell’s home town of Coushatta, Louisiana, begging the judge to free Huell. Jimmy writes all the letters on a bus taking him to Coushatta, pays passengers to write letters so different types of handwriting are included, and places phone numbers on a handful of the letters.
The letters are sent from Coushatta to Albuquerque, and Judge Munsinger (the man whose courtroom Kim sat in several episodes ago) is the one receiving all of them. The letters encourage the judge to free Huell with several of them by people threatening to come to Albuquerque during the trial if a resolution is not reached.
Assistant District Attorney Suzanne Ericsen wants to know who these people are, so she starts reading the letters. She calls the phone numbers listed on the letters, which are all Jimmy and his film crew talking in Cajun accents defending Huell. Jimmy plays the role of pastor at a church Huell attended and says the big man once pulled a bunch of elderly church members in a bible study out of a burning building.
“Let’s do it again.”
After Jimmy threatens to bring a large bus of church members to Albuquerque, the ADA finally caves. Kim gets the deal she was asking for and delivers the news to Jimmy by making out with him in the stairwell. So turns out, the passion is not entirely gone just yet.
Later, Kim is losing focus in a meeting with Kevin and Paige when she is awoken from her daydreaming by another crazy scheme of Kevin’s. Kevin wants to change the building designs of one of the branches that’s already been approved and already under construction to be more like the one with the large cowboy statue (I think). That’s the one doing the best business, so he wants more branches just like it. But Kim agrees with Paige that doing the permit process all over again for an already approved branch just can’t be done.
Clearly, Kim is still bored with her work at Mesa Verde. When she gets back to the office, she pulls the top to the Tequila bottle she and Jimmy claimed after scamming Ken back in season 2. She meets Jimmy at another law office he’s scouting out for when he returns to practicing and tells him she wants to do it again.
Of Note:
-It appears each week the office buildings Jimmy views are going to get worse and worse.
-It also appears Kim was paying for Huell’s defense. She tells ADA Ericsen the legal team Kim put together for Huell’s defense is not pro bono, so someone has to be paying that bill.
-I also liked the touch of the website promoting Huell’s cause.
-I also think that if Jimmy tried the scam today, he would need a slight tweak. That story with Huell pulling people out of the fire would have popped up in any google search today. So Jimmy would have to create a fake news site with an article about Huell’s “heroics.”
-Mike updates Gus on the progress of the lab. He says the work is solid, but it is well behind schedule. That doesn’t seem to bother Gus at all. He’s ruthless and calculating, but also realistic.
-So Crazy 8 is one step closer to the place he will hold in Breaking Bad just before Walt chokes him down in Walt’s garage.
-Nacho also has fake ID’s prepared so both he and his father can flee to the Manitoba province of Canada.
-Who were those girls hanging out at Nacho’s house? I didn’t Nacho to be the kind of drug dealer who had random junkies hanging out where he lives.
-Lalo (Eduardo) was referred to in Breaking Bad when a masked Walt and Jessie took Saul out in the desert with plans to shoot him. Under duress, Saul mentioned both Lalo and Nacho’s name in that conversation.
Only two episodes left!!! See you next week.