http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/WebAnimation/LosPollosHermanosEmployeeTraining
An Emmy-award winning series of ten cartoons in which Gus Fring explains how to be a productive employee at his Los Pollos Hermanos franchise, which accompanied the third season of
Better Call Saul. The cartoons are:
- Communication
- Cleanliness
- Shipping and Receiving
- Customer Service
- Code of Conduct
- Loss Prevention
- Sustainability
- Brand Management
- Conflict Resolution
- Emergency Situations
Tropes:
- Adaptation Deviation: In Breaking Bad, Gus does not endorse meth production inside a Los Pollos Hermanos location. He has a massive underground facility to do so, yet one of the webtoons show an LPH restaurant containing what is strongly implied to be a meth lab.
- Artistic License: The cartoons are loaded with Breaking Bad references that audiences would pick up on, but if Los Pollos Hermanos were an actual establishment that used the cartoons to supplement training, it'd come off as unprofessional or bizarre. The first cartoon establishes this with a Mood Whiplash from Gus' cheery restaurant owner persona to a much more serious expression as he comments that "someone is always watching".
- Artistic License – History: When Gustavo is discussing the prohibited use of cameras in "Code of Conduct", the animation shows a Los Pollos Hermanos employee taking a family selfie using their touchscreen smartphone and promptly uploading it onto social media. Given that Better Call Saul primarily takes place in the early 2000s, smartphones would not be available to the general public at this moment in time, much less have any social media to upload photos and videos to.
- Asshole Victim: Ken in "Customer Service" starts making a scene going on a rampage over a wrong order and even refuses a correct order. Gus then makes him come to his office, and at the end when Ken walks out he's disturbed and shaken to the core at whatever Gus did to him in there.
- Bait-and-Switch: "Conflict Resolution" presents a scenario where communication is needed to prevent resentment — a hypothetical employee, "Diego", feels his co-worker, "Maxine", wasn't doing a good enough job wiping down the counter, and Maxine is annoyed that her contribution was underappreciated. The first choice of response given is passive-aggressive, and belittles her; the second is sarcastic and demeans her. Gus's solution? Instead of offering to help, he uses the passive-aggressive response, phrased as a statement, in an icy cold voice while never losing eye contact.
- Beware the Nice Ones: The webtoon's primary source of irony - Gus may seem like a charming, well-meaning restaurant entrepreneur but even his animated videos portray him as a bold, daring menace.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Gus, of course. These training videos serve to mold his extremely deceitful image as friendly and well-meaning, even heroic.
- Blatant Lies: The training videos are intended to make Gus look venerable.
- Continuity Nod / Continuity Porn:
- Jesse and Jane are eating at Los Pollos Hermanos. Jane is choking on her food, but then Gus arrives and applies Heimlich, saving her. Jesse thinks to himself "Heimlich Maneuver, bitches!"
- Ken (yes, Ken Wins) is the angry customer who makes a total Jerkass of himself in one video ripping up a customer complaint letter, throwing a salt shaker at the cashier, angrily stomping on the table and yelling. Gus orders him to come into his office, and some time later Ken walks out visibly disturbed and uneasy.
- Blue meth can be seen boiling in a beaker in a restricted room even employees aren't allowed in. One of the employees also gets arrested for bringing a plastic bag of it to work.
- Gus orders his employees to pour in oil used to fry chicken into orange barrels.
- Gus portrays himself as a mediator between conflicts in the video "Conflict Resolution".
- The supplier for the chemicals that Walt and Jesse use to cook, Golden Moth, has their logo appear in multiple videos.
- Gus uses a green box-cutter to open a box then pauses to admire it and tells his employees to be careful while using sharp tools.
- Spooge's lady, first appearing in Breakage, is the person attending Gus' soup kitchen charity event in Brand Management.
- Devil in Plain Sight: There are so many Mythology Gags throughout the videos to the criminal world Gus is a part of that anybody paying any more than scant attention would notice something's up, but apparently the tapes don't arouse any suspicion about Los Pollos Hermanos' higher ups and their conduct.
- Dissonant Serenity: The Emergency Situations video features Gus calmly entering the dining area of a Los Pollos building as bullets riddle the wall and destroy the scene, causing Gus to lift a pointer finger to his face as if the situation needed some careful thinking.
- Dramatic Irony: The instructional videos are built on this trope: much of the training is designed to keep the civilian employees from learning about the true reality behind Pollos Hermanos.
- Freudian Slip: In Loss Prevention, Gus refers to his fried chicken and fries as "addictive" rather than the less suspicious "irresistible" or "insatiable".
- Hypocrite: Pretty much inherent in the premise, since Gus orders his employees to be model, well-behaving people with good hearts.
- Gus when he orders his employees not to do any drugs on their shift. Despite being a drug lord, and having Jesse — a junkie — on his payroll.
- Also Gus prompts employees not to call the police if they're dealing with rude, aggressive customers in one video but in another video he warns any employee who is caught violating the "Zero Tolerance Policy" of drugs and alcohol will be handed over to the police immediately.
- It's All About Me: The training videos only prove further just what an egomaniac Gus is. This is best demonstrated in Emergency Situations, where his animated version walks out into sniper fire to protect his employees; this is despite Gus using employees in his drug trade to secure his own safety, like in Face Off where he sends Tyrus to Casa Tranquila first to make sure it wasn't a trap.
- Jerkass Has a Point: In "Customer Service", an animated version of Ken is shown angry that his order was incorrect; Gus acknowledges that while his tone leaves a lot to be desired, that doesn't make his complaint invalid. It's only when he starts getting overtly belligerent and threatening that he crosses the line.
- Mood Dissonance: The cartoons depict horrible situations using bright images, cheery music, and pleasant narration. For instance, the 'cleanliness' video has Gus chattering about how to dispose of trash while the images show a person in a duffel bag screaming and trying futilely to escape before Gus throws the bag out for 'disposal.'
- Mood Whiplash: This being Fring, he sometimes moves quite quickly between his Benevolent Boss, smiling persona and his cold, calculating, threatening persona.
- Move Along, Nothing to See Here: Gus does not want his employees to know any trade secrets of Los Pollos Hermanos and angrily pressures them to not go around snooping or investigating off-limits areas in their own workplaces.
- Only Sane Man: The toons easily portray Gus as being morally and intellectually superior to everyone else.
- Police Are Useless: Gus orders his employees not to contact the police to come to the restaurant even under dire circumstances because if they did, the police would start doing a full investigation of the restaurant to capture details of the crime scenes and should they discover any illicit drugs on his property...
- Shout-Out: There are many references to both Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. For instance, in Cleanliness Walter White's book of Walt Whitman poetry is seen in the trash.
- Shown Their Work: A lot of Gus' instructions are drawn from real life employee training videos.
- Stylistic Suck: The animation is amateur and cheap-looking to emulate the poor quality animations in employee training videos.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial: Gus orders his employees not to take pictures in their work areas because it could expose proprietary company information like that meth lab in the back of the restaurant.
- Villain Protagonist: The star of the videos is Gus Fring, a prominent villain from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. The whole point of the videos, however, is to present him as an ordinary manager of a fast food restaurant chain, so his actual villainy is limited entirely to quick Easter Egg gags for fans to get.
- Villain with Good Publicity: The videos present Los Pollos Hermanos as a respectable establishment and Gus as a kind, diligent boss.
