I’m back, baby! Margaux and I reteam to talk last night’s Better Call Saul.
Trevor: I think the hallmark of a good ensemble – like The Wire or Deadwood – is the realization that you would not only watch an hour dedicated to one character, but perhaps even an entire show. That’s how I felt watching “Talk,” and I want to go on record as believing that Better Call Saul has one of the best all-time ensembles. This isn’t revelatory, exactly, but it’s what I kept coming back to during any of the Nacho sequences during “Talk.” Why doesn’t Michael Mando have his own show? Nacho Business, perhaps? This is a tangential way to start a review, but “Talk” was a bit of a tangential episode. How did it work for you?
Margaux: First off, never leave me to review another Better Call Saul episode solo again please. I devolve to Alex Jones level of conspiracy theories when left to analyze this show alone.
Trevor: Thanks so much for filling in! I loved your review.
Margaux: But I think “Talk” suffered some of the same, ‘in the absence of something actually happening, your mind makes shit up’. Watching Mike lose the rest of the fucks he had to give was a sight to behold. I enjoyed watching him go toe-to-toe with Gus, but was disappointed that the reveal of the assignment would have to wait till next week.
I would watch the shit out of Nacho Business so long as we don’t have to be bummed out by watching his relationship with his father deteriorate before our very eyes. Every time they have an interaction you wonder how much sadder this could be, and then you see a banged Nacho in his father’s living room, begging him to crash on the couch for one night. Fun stuff!
Trevor: Michael Mando is extraordinarily good at the silent acting that he so often has to engage in – every step he took looked realistically painful. What BCS thankfully avoids doing is glamorizing this. It never asks us to consider what a badass Nacho is. It paints him as a man in over his head, scrambling to get out of a situation he helped engender, one he is rapidly losing control over. In one scene we can see him in a shootout, but at the end of the day he still just wants to crash on his dad’s couch.
Side note: I’ve said before that I’ve never been a fan of the Salamanca twins, but this is maybe the best they’ve ever been used. There was a great sight gag when Nacho said he would round up a crew to attack the Espinosas, and the twins just got out of the car to take care of it themselves. Director John Shiban (Hell on Wheels) did solid work with that shootout, only showing us what we needed to see. In that sense, it reminded me of Lorne Malvo’s office massacre in season one of Fargo.
Margaux: The Twins hitting this stash house in broad daylight (v.bold) combined with one of them offering themselves up as Nacho’s blood bag did a lot to endear them. I always thought they were this one note threat, but these past two episodes did a lot to fill in the blanks to make them fully realized (enough) characters.
It was as close to comedy as this show gets when the Twins exit the car in the middle of Nacho explaining his plan. But why did Nacho follow them in? He clearly should not be in a fuckin’ gun fight with his ruptured-ass spleen or whatever. If you need to cock your gun with your thighs because your shoulder hurts too much, YOU SHOULDN’T BE SHOOTING A GUN.
Real question, was he trying to get himself killed or was he trying to take out one of the Twins? He didn’t really need to rescue them, they seemed fine with him saying behind, so…what the f?
Trevor: I think it goes back to that impossible situation thing we talked about. He’s incredibly fucked up, but he has to maintain appearances. Does he want the twins telling Don Eladio that he sat in the car? What happens if the cartel’s two most fearsome enforcers turn up dead, with only Nacho conspicuously alive? When he returns to his father, it’s like a kind of a retreat. He needs a breather because he just can’t do this anymore. I mean it, those scenes with Mando were almost physically exhausting to watch. Definitely the highlight of the episode.
Or maybe I just think that because I…wasn’t psyched with the Jimmy portion of “Talk.” Which might be the point! (I take it for granted that Gilligan and Gould are smarter than I am.) He’s definitely in a holding pattern, reduced to playing catch by himself in an empty cell phone store. In a way, these scenes foreshadow his future life as Gene, but the problem with showing someone staving off boredom is that the audience can get bored too. I don’t know, maybe I’m missing something. Any insights into Jimmy’s time at CC Mobile?
Margaux: The most I could read into the CC Mobile gig is Jimmy avoiding therapy, and giving himself a real cover story for his minor influx of Hummel figurine money. Because of how the scenes unfold; Jimmy initially turns down the job, but after Kim brings up the possibility of a him seeing a shrink, suddenly – Jimmy has a job! I think it’s to keep up appearances. Like, look Kim! I’m back to normal, I have a job and everything! Kim is also avoiding her own feelings (over what exactly? Not liking Mesa Verde? Thinking she made a mistake in her legal career at some point and is trying to retrace her steps to find out where it all went wrong? Not clear yet) by camping out at the courtroom. Season one Kim would never waste time like this! I think the judge’s appraisal of her reasons for sitting around his courtroom were more spot on than not.
Trevor: Judge Mitch Gorfein from Inside Llewyn Davis was only one of several great one-scene appearances in “Talk.” I was thrilled to see the always-great Marc Evan Jackson (The Good Place, Brooklyn 99) show up as Henry Devore. Not just cause I love Jackson (I do), but because it gave us an instantly classic Mike scene. When Henry is going on about his fake dead wife, Jonathan Banks gives us some of his best facial acting, and we see a bit of Mike’s code of honor. Dude just hates phonies.
Margaux: Was that dude a phony though? There was never an outright confirmation, and I’d personally like to see Mike get it wrong every once in a while because well, nobody’s perfect. Either way, he totally blew up that group therapy, what was supposed to be a funny over/under with Anita ending up being, uh, a lot less lighthearted. And it was obviously all ignited because his daughter in law mentioned in group how she went the whole morning not thinking about Matty, and to your point, Jonathan Banks facial acting was clear signal that that was a stab to the heart. Speaking of Matty, the flashback cold open, was that the first time we saw him?
Trevor: I think it might have been. What a great open. I think Mike’s attack on Henry was his version of therapy. I’m glad Banks got to reprise this role. He was never bad on Breaking Bad, but he is turning in next-level work on Better Call Saul. Do you want to touch on anything else, or do you want to talk stars and end suddenly like BCS?
Margaux: “Talk” was a bit thin on plot advancement so I don’t think there’s much else to talk about, unless you have thoughts on Jimmy DIY “burners for sale” sign outside CC Mobile, which seems significant considering how many Saul ends up owning.
Trevor: I don’t know the meaning, which is fine with me, because I like when this show gives me something to think about, especially if the episode doesn’t completely bowl me over.
Margaux: That’s one way to put it. I thought after last weeks table setting, we’d get a little pay off this week, which – I guess we did in parts, but not nearly enough. I’m ready for Better Call Saul to really get started now.
3.5/5
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