YMMV / Better Call Saul

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• Adorkable: Jimmy McGill, for all his many faults, is frequently bombastic to hide anxiety, talks so fast it unsettles even Cartel members, and worships the ground his girlfriend-turned-wife, Kim, walks on (she adores him right back). Part of the tragedy of the show is how this very human guy becomes Plucky Comic Relief sleazeball Saul Goodman.
• Alas, Poor Scrappy:
  • Werner Ziegler frustrated more than a few viewers during his tenure in Season 4 for his clueless behavior while working with drug dealers like rambling about the top-secret job Gus has him assigned to a couple of men at a bar or snapping from homesickness and attempting to escape to see his wife. With that said, hardly anyone was cheering when Mike was forced to shoot him because of these mistakes.
  • Marie was far from the most popular character in Breaking Bad, but her surprise return in the Grand Finale is absolutely devastating, showing how she is still unable to move on from Hank's death and leaving the room indignant when it looks like Saul is gonna get away with it.
• Alternative Character Interpretation
  • Did Jimmy really lift $14,000 from the store his father owned like Chuck says, or was it the fault of their father for being an easy mark for every grifter in town? The flashback in "Inflatable" seems to confirm the fault of both.
  • As of "Pimento", does Chuck's disapproval of Jimmy becoming a lawyer truly stem from fear of the havoc that could be wrought by 'Slippin' Jimmy' as a licensed attorney, and from his deep respect for the responsibilities of the legal profession? Or is it all a thin excuse to cover his resentment at Jimmy suddenly thinking he is Chuck's equal, his brother taking a perceived shortcut to respectability after years of Chuck being seen as the responsible sibling and Jimmy as the perpetual screw-up? Or a bit of both? And to what extent is Chuck's betrayal driven by genuine moral concerns and to what extent is it driven by sheer pride?
  • In the Season 2 finale did Chuck withhold their mother's last words purely out of spite, or also to protect Jimmy from the guilt of not being there when she called for him? Considering he at this point had already made envious references to Jimmy being the favorite despite being a criminal, and was snide and condescending when Jimmy suggested getting something to eat, it leans more to the former.
  • Is it in Jimmy's nature to be bad or was he, at least partially, a product of his environment? One could argue that Jimmy's father's repeatedly falling for hard luck stories of men like the Grifter started Jimmy on his Protagonist Journey to Villain.
  • In "Off Brand", Jimmy gives a reason he called in Rebecca (Jimmy said that he knew Chuck would need someone to help him when he lost). Is this true compassion or just an excuse because he wanted to humiliate Chuck in front of her?
  • In the season three finale, was Chuck's speech to Jimmy where he says he was never that important to him the truth, or just him trying to ensure that Jimmy won't miss him when he's gone? Or could it have just been one last chance to hurt his little brother? Furthermore, how long had he been planning to end his life? Did he even plan to at all? For what it's worth, the episode itself strongly implies that he said it to hurt Jimmy and that the dishonest cruelty of it is what caused his subsequent mental breakdown, and that he only decided on suicide after said breakdown occurred.
  • Was Jimmy making up Chuck's letter to him, knowing how painful the real thing would be for Kim?
  • Did Mike actually turn to drinking after his son's murder, or was he just building up the persona of a drunk so he could catch Hoffman and Fenske off-guard?
  • Howard Hamlin: the smug, arrogant nepo-baby prick of a lawyer that Jimmy believes him to be, or a totally average and Reasonable Authority Figure forced into a position he didn't necessarily want who merely acts arrogant because he thinks that's what he needs to be in order to be a good lawyer, and who wound up being yet another victim of Jimmy's resentment?
  • Mike is noticeably morose when he has to handle Howard's corpse and does his best to treat the entire situation as respectfully as he can; he's certainly more disgusted than he was by Drew Sharp's death later on and it's shown that this incident is what killed Mike and Jimmy's friendship for the rest of their lives—if not, put a very strong strain on it. Is it just his general disgust for a civilian getting caught in the crossfire because of Jimmy's actions, or, given that Mike used to work at the courthouse, did he recognize Howard and take the death personally? As a third option, is it because Mike realizes that taking Lalo's bait is what got Howard killed and he's blaming himself for the death?
  • In "Waterworks", is Kim's decision to reveal her and Jimmy's involvement in Howard's death a sign of genuine remorse and willingness to own up to what happened, simply a self-serving attempt at trying to make herself feel better while facing little real risk in doing so, or both? Kim herself notes that, by the time she has decided to come clean, there's almost no chance that anything meaningful will come of it; all the witnesses involved are dead (or, in Jimmy's case, are wanted fugitives), there's no physical evidence whatsoever, and Howard's body will almost certainly never be found. Kim has only chosen to come forward at a point where it is almost certain that she will face no serious repercussions (either legally or from Gus Fring) for doing so, and where the only ones who will (maybe) benefit will be Kim herself for achieving some lightening of the burden she's been carrying, and Cheryl who will at least achieve some closure.
  • How much of a role, if any, did Kim divorcing Jimmy play in his becoming the sleazy Amoral Attorney of Breaking Bad fame? Was Kim correct when she told Jimmy that the two of them are bad for each other's development, or was their romance the sole thread keeping him from going full scumbag?
• Aluminum Christmas Trees: HHM trademarking a color, "Hamlindigo blue", is not unheard of. You absolutely can claim a specific color as intellectual property so long as it is an original shade. Target for example has trademarked their specific tone of red, which cannot be used for advertising purposes by any company bar Target. Same goes for McDonald's.
• And You Thought It Would Fail:
  • The idea of a prequel series to one of the most critically acclaimed and fan-beloved shows in recent memory was naturally met with a ton of skepticism, especially when it was revealed Vince Gilligan himself went into it with no real idea what he wanted to do (he first tried to make it as a half-hour sitcom). The show's own creative team have outright stated "It shouldn't have worked." And yet, by the second season, it achieved plaudits to rival its parent show and has retained that popularity ever since. By the end, it was almost universally seen as equal to its predecessor, if not superior.
  • Within the series, Vince Gilligan initially resisted every effort to introduce Lalo. With Nacho already existing from a single line of dialogue in Breaking Bad, Gilligan felt that introducing Lalo similarly would feel cheap and fanservicey. After becoming sole showrunner, Peter Gould, who had wanted to introduce him as early as season one, wasted little time in bringing the character forward. Lalo Salamanca is now almost universally seen as one of the best villains of the entire franchise, with only Gus offering any competition, and Gilligan has stated that he now feels embarrassment at his resistance to the character.
• Arc Fatigue: One may think that the arc about Jimmy and Kim’s relationship is dragged out and should have been concluded already. Jimmy cons her multiple times and she quickly forgives him each time, which makes it seem like the arc isn’t going anywhere. It ultimately comes to a head halfway into Season 5 when Jimmy and Kim get married, they stay together and gain an even deeper relationship.
• Award Snub:
  • Throughout its entire run, Better Call Saul was nominated 53 times in various Emmy categories and won exactly 0 awards, setting the record for the most number of Emmy nominations received without a win. While many attribute it to the show continually having the bad luck of going up against stiff competition, there are a number of instances (described below) where fans and critics felt BCS was more deserving than the actual winners.
  • Many fans were livid when Jonathan Banks did not win the Emmy Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for his performance in "Five-O". Peter Dinklage, who won the award for Season 5 of Game of Thrones, was so surprised by the result that he specifically cited Banks in his acceptance speech. Banks losing to Dinklage is seen as especially bad given many say “Five-O” was the best work that the former has ever done while the latter was seen as underutilized that season, and his win is seen by many as a Consolation Prize or even Award Category Fraud since Dinklage was the top-billed actor in Game Of Thrones every season except for the first but was still competing in the Supporting category. The fact that Banks never won for his work in later seasons as well only makes this snub sting more for fans.
  • Michael McKean has run into this trope quite a bit.
    • Already having some people in his corner for Season 1, fan support for a nomination free big time with McKean's larger showcase in Season 2. Despite being the show's most acclaimed supporting player that year, he didn't join Jonathan Banks in the lineup.
    • Viewers were then even more outraged when McKean was again snubbed for Season 3, where his major Villainous Breakdown scenes were universally cited as some of the best work of his quite distinguished career, with some even saying it was the best TV performance of the year. His snub was seen as especially egregious given Jonathan Banks (who's universally beloved) was nominated again despite having a much less showy and prominent role.
    • McKean finally got nominated for his guest role in the fourth season. Which he then lost. What makes this noticeable is he was the predicted runner up and lost to Bradley Whitford for The Handmaid's Tale, who was competing on a technicality for a performance he gave the prior year. This ruling was quite contentious and a new rule came into play the next year barring something like that from happening again. In other words, McKean lost to a performance that's agreed shouldn't have even been allowed to compete.
  • Rhea Seehorn failing to earn nominations for Seasons 2, 3, 4, and 5 stood out to fans of the show as well. A case where each snub is more noticeable than the last, as Seehorn's performance has been more and more acclaimed each year. She finally received a nomination for Best Supporting Actress during Season 6... only to lose it to Julia Garner of Ozark.
  • Despite being praised up and down as giving performances that many thought were win worthy, Bob Odenkirk, Jonathan Banks, Rhea Seehorn and Tony Dalton were all snubbed for season 5, with Giancarlo Esposito being the only nominee. Fans were not happy. At all. To elaborate on this, given Odenkirk and Banks had never missed for a season before, and Season 5 was seen by many as some of their strongest work ever, most award pundits didn’t even consider the idea of them missing. Their snubs were shocking. As for Esposito, while he’s universally regarded as exceptional, many were completely lost as to how he managed to get nominated at the expense of Banks and Dalton even though those two all had a lot more to do that year, with Esposito being more Out of Focus in comparison.
  • Michael Mando never pulled off an Emmy nomination despite consistently delivering excellent work. Fans were especially enraged at his absence from the nominees for Season 6, widely considered his greatest work. Making this even worse is that the snub might've been avoided if Mando was submitted as a guest actor, which he was eligible for, but was instead made to compete with supporting actors with roles throughout their whole seasons instead. And even then, he was widely considered robbed of being nominated there.
  • Dean Norris' guest role in Season 5 had many hoping that Hank Schrader would finally get his long overdue Emmy nomination. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen.
  • Vince Gilligan was not nominated for his directorial work on “Bagman”, which some people said is the best work he’s ever done as a director and should’ve earned him a win.
  • Season 6A saw Bob Odenkirk get nominated again and Rhea Seehorn finally be recognized. However, none of the similarly acclaimed supporting actors managed a nomination that year. This is seen as especially bad in the cases of Michael Mando and Patrick Fabian, who delivered their most beloved work on the series that year and their characters' deaths meant neither would get the chance to be recognized for the season's second half.
  • Even Nate Odenkirk made jokes about Bob losing the best actor Golden Globe award to Kevin Costner, which felt to everyone like really mean irony.
  • The show missed its final opportunity at MTV Movie & TV Awards nominations in 2023 too, specifically Best Show; Best Performance (for Bob Odenkirk) and Best Villain (for Tony Dalton).
• Awesome Music: See here.
• Base-Breaking Character: Detractors consider the Kettlemans to be Flat Characters that are beneath the caliber of the show, and would rather see their time spent fleshing out the more interesting characters. Supporters of the Kettlemans maintain that people like them who take what they think they're entitled to and then stick their heads in the sand when it catches up to them are a very, very real thing that is rarely drawn attention to on television, but which professionals in all aspects of the law have to deal with all the time. The years since have only further divided opinions on them, with some fans feeling their inept white collar crimes make for a nice contrast to the more legitimately dangerous criminals that Jimmy will be involved in later on, making them an effective Starter Villain, but others feeling that the likes of Fring and the Salamancas just emphasise how monumentally unimpressive the Kettlemans were.
• Bellisario's Maxim: Characters that appear in Breaking Bad can look noticeably older or different in this series than on that show, but for most fans, it doesn't matter because it's great to see them again.
• Broken Base:
  • The season 1 finale was either an excellent falling action episode that gave Jimmy a good reason for breaking bad, or it was underwhelming and disappointing, especially following the acclaimed "Pimento."
  • Whatever the Walt and Jesse's flashbacks in the last three episodes were neccesary for the plot or just for the sake of fanservice is a point of contention. There's also those who thought it was unneccesary in the first episode but thought they were well used in the latter two.
  • The Bus Chanting sequence in the Grand Finale is very divisive, some fans found it corny and out of place in such a dark show as well as an incredibly forced way to give Jimmy something resembling a happier ending, other fans however defended given it serves to show how the Saul Goodman persona has being immortalized in the criminal underworld and actually argue that the much more bleaker alternative would being way more out of place for the show. A third faction loves the idea in theory but thought the final product was so corny it took them off the show for a minute and a fourth faction simply sees as pure Narm Charm.
• Catharsis Factor:
  • Those who still despise Walter White's actions, egocentrism and his poor treatment of Saul in the previous show were incredibly satistified when Jimmy took credit for his entire empire and portrays him at the public image as the Big Bad Wannabe he truly was, as many fans had pointed out it will be a major blow to his ego if he was alive.
  • After years of watching Jimmy hide from himself as much as possible, having done it in the past too and putting on Saul Goodman as a mask, the cheer where he asks to be called James McGill was massive.
  • Leading up to this was an intended inversion. The showrunners, knowing that the fanbase was waiting with anticipation to see Jimmy turn into Saul, worked to make it so that when it finally did happen, the result was a Gut Punch that just made them want Jimmy back.
• Common Knowledge: A lot of articles will act like Jimmy and Kim are “sexless”, maybe because the network enforced Sexy Discretion Shot, but she starts their relationship again on the basis that Evil Feels Good, they are way too into each other when they scam as siblings, “Rock and Hard Place” has them dressing each other but getting so horny they undo all of it, “Coushatta” has her push him into the wall for a Forceful Kiss, and their getting off on each other has a body count.
• Continuity Lockout:
  • While not exactly hard to follow without watching Breaking Bad first, it does make for a rather odd experience as the show follows several long-running subplots that have no connection at all most of the time, and regular arrivals of new characters who are suddenly treated as greatly important to the story. For instance, the very first episode ends in a surprise appearance from Tuco, but he's not formally reintroduced until the next. Plus, each season opens with a black and white vignette of Jimmy's life after Breaking Bad, and the cold open of one episode is set during it with no explanation. It's also not until halfway through Season 3 that you get the slightest hint of the meaning of the show's title.
  • The B Story of the Superlab, which spanned across Seasons 4 and 6, ends after Fun and Games, where its construction is still incomplete and in need of new workers. A viewer would have to have seen Breaking Bad to witness the completion and usage of the Superlab, as well as its destruction at the hands of Walt and Jesse.
  • The final scene of Fun and Games is a major Tear Jerker but only for audiences more familiar with the Saul Goodman persona from Breaking Bad, if you aren't familiar with the parent show, chances are you will be a bit confused on why the show passed from a heartbreaking sequence of Kim breaking up with Jimmy to our protagonist suddenly dropping quips and acting jerkish that the usual.
  • The last four episodes of the show take place after Breaking Bad and treat many plot points from that show as already known, including the final fates of Mike, Gus and the cartel, as well as the deaths of Hank Schrader and Steven Gomez, who cameoed in Season 5.
• Crack Pairing: Because their body position is shaped like if they were Together in Death as they are being buried under the meth lab, some fans took a crack at shipping Lalo and Howard together, despite their only connection in the series is that the former kills the latter less than a minute after they are introduced to each other. As can be seen in this fan montage to the Something Stupid song.
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • Tony the Toilet Buddy, a toilet with recorded voice lines to encourage children for potty training. With the worst possible wording and delivery you can imagine for such a purpose.
  • Jimmy excuses Daniel Wormald's hidden compartment by telling the police that it's where he stores "fetish videos" for an art patron of his. What's he into? Squat Cobbler, the act of sitting on a pie in costumes and crying. To top it off, there's an actual video of it from the DVD extras.
  • Jimmy's outrageous plans to get himself fired by Davis and Main, so he can keep his signing bonus. They include garish suits, a juicer that he loudly uses to splatter fruit onto his coworkers, not flushing the toilets, speaking poor Spanish to a Hispanic staff worker to show him how to vacuum ("Dude, I'm from Michigan"), and playing bagpipes at work. Davis and Main know he's doing it all to get fired, and when Cliff finally does it, he makes clear to Jimmy and the audience that they had bent over backward to help set up a decent legal practice with them and he had no idea why the firm had deserved that sort of treatment. Even Jimmy seems to acknowledge this and feel some shame.
  • Jimmy's smear commercials as part of his gambit to force a bigger settlement out of Mesa Verde. Making commercials that falsely accuse Mesa Verde of illegal evictions, black mold, financing terrorism, and Kevin Wachtell's father flashing someone ("Bare genitals!") isn't funny. But when each accusation in each commercial is executed in such a kitschy aesthetic and followed up by Don's drawling "Yup!", the pendulum swings the other way.
  • By the time of "Waterworks", Kim had resigned herself to a life of mediocrity and safe choices, unwilling to even offer an opinion about what ice cream to get for a coworker's birthday and moving onto a much blander relationship. Someone desperately trying to keep their head down in every way possible after a tumultuous life due to the guilt of getting someone killed, extending to a new relationship? Tragic. A guy offering a monotone "yep" after every thrust during sex? Disturbingly funny.
• Draco in Leather Pants:
  • Ever since The Reveal that Chuck is the one who decided to not hire Jimmy at HHM and that he actually likes Jimmy very much, many viewers have been willing to overlook Howard Hamlin's more jerkass moments and behavior, like sending Kim to the "cornfield" twice, or the way he and the rest of the board behaved when choosing which pupil to award with the scholarship. Many are willing to reinterpret him as a selfless (to a certain extent) man who's had to take a bullet or two for his partners thanks to the McGills' antics. Given that Chuck was set up to be Jimmy's main friend and the extent of his betrayal, this is sort of understandable.
  • No matter how many lows he sinks to or how many terrible things he does, many fans will excuse Jimmy for his crimes and blame all of his unsavoury actions on Chuck, while ignoring the fact that, like Walter White, Jimmy had the perfect opportunity to avoid a life of crime for a legitimate path. His chance to clean himself up as a lawyer at Davis and Main, only to instead embrace the path of an Amoral Attorney, shows it isn't just Chuck he'd need to fight, but also his own worst impulses.
  • Lalo. Even though he's a quite obviously a sociopathic murderer, he's a charming, affable killer with a hidden soft side (see his interactions with the people in his complex). Of course, there are also those who were drawn in by Tony Dalton's good looks and charisma, which he uses to great effect. This comes to a head in the Season 6 mid-finale where people seem more furious with Kim and Jimmy to an extent for getting Howard killed, content to overlook the person who actually pulled the trigger and the fact that Kim and Saul both attempted to get Howard to leave the house in a failed attempt to save him.
  • This continues with Gus from the previous series. While Gus has one or two softer moments, the show goes out of its way to show that he is a cruel and ruthless criminal with very few scruples. Despite that, many fans still openly root for him and downplay his evil. In particular, you’d think it would be hard for anyone to defend Gus after he threatened Nacho's dad, confessed to sadistically torturing an animal as a child and intended to kill Werner's innocent wife had Mike not intervened.
  • Kim tends to be treated by some as a pure, virtuous innocent who is far too good for Jimmy and is being "destroyed" by her association with him. While this may have been more valid in early seasons (and even then, Word of God is that Kim isn't without her own dark side, it's just much better hidden), it starts becoming a lot less the case in later ones, especially in season 6, as she begins encouraging and enabling Jimmy's worst tendencies while making decisions of her own that leave even Jimmy feeling uncomfortable. Apparently Rhea Seehorn and Bob Odenkirk had fun joking about it, as when Jimmy screwed up it was seen as his inevitable downfall, but whenever Kim screwed up (eventually leading to her own downfall), it was always dismissed.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Dr. Lara Cruz, Chuck's doctor. She only had two scenes in the first two seasons, but due to being played by Clea Duvall, is pretty memorable. She eventually makes another appearance in the third season, helping Chuck overcome his delusion of EHS.
  • Omar, Jimmy's secretary at Davis & Main, is well liked because he's such a Nice Guy who's the only guy who's friendly to Jimmy even after the commercial incident and he's happy to help Jimmy move his stuff back to his old office after he was fired.
  • Ernesto for similar reasons as Omar: being a good friend and supporting Jimmy when Chuck pointed out that he arrived at the print store quickly.
  • Lyle, the assistant manager of Los Pollos Hermanos, is beloved for being a Nice Guy and a great worker. Fans have not overlooked the fact that he is nowhere to be seen in Breaking Bad and hope that he survives the series. He does.
  • Marion, helps that she’s played masterfully by the legendary Carol Burnett. What seemed to be a limited, but fun, cameo turned out to be a character critical to the plot and is ultimately the one who brings Saul down!
  • Sobchak is a petty criminal and private investigator who only appears twice in the entire show, but he's immensely popular thanks to his actor Steven Ogg giving him a remarkably fun performance every time he's onscreen. The fact that Ogg has been acclaimed for playing similar characters in Grand Theft Auto V and The Walking Dead definitely helps.
  • Manuel Varga, father of Nacho, for subverting Honest John's Dealership and being one of the most honest and hardworking characters in the Breaking Bad franchise by far. He refuses to rip off Mike when he first comes to his car dealership company and tries to make himself seem dumb enough for a con, instead showing a genuine interest in Mike's car and what would be best for it. He also refuses to let himself get shaken down by the Salamancas later in in Season 3, and is heartbroken upon finding out that Nacho was involved with them. Finally, after his son's death, he gives to Mike one of the most piercing examples of a "The Reason You Suck" Speech seen across the franchise, where he succinctly tears apart Mike's Consummate Professional and Hitman with a Heart qualities, showing that for all of Mike's justifications and talk, he's still a criminal who's part of a game that results in nothing but pain and suffering.
• Even Better Sequel: While it's by no means a majority viewpoint, some fans feel that the show is even better than Breaking Bad. Especially since it focuses on some of the most memorable characters from Breaking Bad like Saul, Mike, and Gus while also introducing new characters who became popular in their own rights like Kim, Nacho, Lalo, Howard, and even Chuck, making the whole package feel like it has an Ensemble Cast full of equally important main characters, instead of one compelling character like Walter White. None other than Guillermo del Toro said he found the show an improvement, due to Jimmy's moral fall being far more believable and poignant than Walt's. Its widely beloved finale has only increased this sentiment and many have started comparing it to The Godfather Part II, as a follow-up to a medium-defining masterpiece that is, against all expectations, almost universally seen as equal, if not better, in quality.
• Evil Is Cool: Eduardo "Lalo" Salamanca, a charming and intelligent, yet sociopathic and completely terrifying enforcer for the Cartel who proves himself even more dangerous and effective than Tuco and the Cousins combined. He even manages to play a successful battle of wits with Gus of all people. Bonus points for him being an incredible cook.

F-L

• Fanfic Fuel: The finale had a "Ray of Hope" Ending, with Gould, Gilligan, Seehorn and Odenkirk all saying the intention was for the audience to carry on Jimmy and Kim’s love story (as well as both working towards being better people: Jimmy at peace with who he is, Kim coming out of her rut). So there’s plenty of fanfiction about either Kim getting him out early, or figuring out a way to make prison marriage work.
• Fan-Disliked Explanation:
  • While fans tend to regarded as a great prequel, some fans took issue with the series only happening 6 years before the events of Breaking Bad as a lot of fans prefer to believe Saul and Mike were experts with many years of experience on the criminal world before meeting Heisenberg.
  • Some fans were unimpressed that Saul's Knows a Guy Who Knows a Guy criminal connections were shown to be from a little black book he purchased from Dr. Caldera in Season 6, when it seemed those connections were being created organically through his Burner Phones business and criminal law practice, making him seem less like the expert in the criminal underworld he looked like in the original series and more like a guy that simply got lucky to buy the book at the right time.
• Fan Nickname:
  • Omar and Ernesto are called "Bromar" and "Ernestbro" for their good-natured loyalty to Jimmy.
  • Kim and Jimmy are collectively known as "Slippin' Kimmy". Following Kim's turn to the dark side in "Something Unforgiveable" this name is also now used for Kim herself.
  • Kim and Jimmy's goldfish is nicknamed "Swimmy McGill".
• Genius Bonus:
  • The Adventures of Mabel, the book Jimmy and Chuck loved as kids, was the subject of a con: its author Harry Thurston Peck published it under a pseudonym, then used his day job as a teacher to write an article that praised it.
    • Its use also foreshadows Chuck's fate: both he and Peck committed suicide after a career-ending disgrace.
  • Howard's nickname for Jimmy is "Charlie Hustle", shared with (in)famous MLB player Pete Rose, who was banned from baseball for betting on games he managed and played in. Despite having talents that would earn him a spot in the baseball Hall of Fame, his illicit business and reliance on frivolous litigation to defend it have prevented him from being seen as one of the greats, which fits the themes of Jimmy's journey well. Also, coincidentally, both of their third wives are named Kim.
  • Those Shape-Ups Jimmy gives Irene in "Fall"? Not only have they been determined recently to not do the extra toning they advertise, they've actually been linked to stress fractures in the feet and legs some wearers have received. And Jimmy just gave some to an old woman.
  • In the season 4 premiere, when Howard is reading Chuck's obituary to Jimmy, among Chuck's listed past achievements is that he had clerked for Delaware Chancery Court, a court of equity. Given its unique status (most jurisdictions fused the common law and equity starting in the 1800s) and Delaware's status as home to many of America's corporations, Chuck's clerkship would be highly regarded in legal circles.
    • And after this, Chuck clerked at the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, which is based in Denver, Colorado and covers all the states that share a border with Colorado except Nebraska. That Chuck clerked here before going into private practice in Albuquerque, New Mexico (one of those states) would suggest that Chuck ended up in the Southwest because it was where his career path took him.
  • In the first season Jimmy uses the phrase "the worm has turned" several times to mean that things are finally going his way. He obviously means "the tide has turned", whereas the expression he's using actually means "even the most passive of people will defend themselves when attacked". It describes much of Jimmy's experiences, as he becomes a lot less passive once he finds out that Chuck has been working against him. It also appears in the script for "Magic Man", describing how he's decided against running away to fend off the cab driver as "Gene" once and for all.
  • In a bar, Werner and Mike are talking about their fathers when Werner mentions that his father was one of the engineers that worked on the Sydney Opera House. Anyone familiar with the history of that particular building will know that that is not something to brag about; the construction was originally supposed to last four years, but it ended up lasting fourteen, and by the end of the project over 10,000 people had been involved in some capacity. This foreshadows and reflects the turbulence that the construction of Gus' lab faces, to the point where their progress is described as solid but behind schedule, and how Werner himself will eventually hinder things when he makes a few rash decisions near the end of Season 4.
  • During Jimmy's trial, Chuck says he loves his brother, but he's sure the Unabomber's brother also loved him. Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, was identified to the authorities by his brother after recognizing his handwriting and certain turns of phrase in his manifesto. It not only shows Chuck's perspective of him being the responsible brother that has to put a conman like Jimmy down, but also means that Chuck is willing to equate Jimmy to such a reputation. Both men have also shared an aversion towards modern technology that may or may not have been brought about by mental illness.
  • The cold open of "Wine and Roses" shows a mysterious black notebook found in Saul's house, and the writing within seems to be in some sort of code made up of symbols. Sharp-eyed fans were able to hit pause, take some screengrabs and decipher the code to reveal the names of various criminal characters along with what appear to be phone numbers, suggesting the notebook may have been Caldera's book of underworld contacts.
  • Jimmy has a petty criminal past in Cicero, Illinois. Ancient history buffs and Latin students will know that Marcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman politician during the Late Republic who first won fame as an attorney in high-profile trials, oftentimes utilizing utterly audacious arguments and techniques, not unlike Jimmy himself.
• Growing the Beard: Season 1, while not considered bad by any means, was criticized for being slow-paced. Plus, considering that Breaking Bad was a Tough Act to Follow, it was bound to get some criticism. But Season 2 was much more warmly received, with a much quicker pace, improved Black Comedy, and great Character Development. By Season 3, with the introduction of Gus and everyone associated with his part of the drug trade, Better Call Saul has a much more Breaking Bad-esque tone.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The earlier scenes of Gene wishing he was Saul Goodman again (the Glory Days commercials, SG was here) hit a lot worse when you find out that Jimmy thinks that becoming “Saul Goodman” is a fresh start when his own identity was 1) Chuck’s loser brother 2) The Corrupter who ruined Kim 3) whose love for Kim was never enough anyway.
  • A few early commentaries express worry that because Bob has a tendency to get so into a scene (like the end of "Witness") that he gets an injury, he's really going to hurt himself badly. Come "Point and Shoot" filming and he collapses in a heart attack, terrifying everyone.
  • In "Nailed", Chuck calls Kim a fine young woman that Jimmy has "ruined". Jimmy doesn’t take him seriously at the time, but fast forward to "Something Unforgivable", he tries to break up with her because he's internalized everything Chuck has said to him and really does think he's bad for her. By "Fun and Games", he becomes Saul completely due to the belief he's destroyed her, and she becomes an Extreme Doormat in Florida because she thinks she’s broken him.
  • In “Mabel”, Gene (Jimmy’s Nebraska identity) collapses out of stress and paranoia. Come July 2021, Bob Odenkirk himself collapsed while filming the final season of the show due to a heart attack, but thankfully he pulled through.
  • In "Madrigal," when Mike was being interrogated, Hank offhandedly pointed out how the Philadelphia PD says Mike's tenure as a cop with them ended under, dramatic circumstances. Hank asks if Mike wants to talk about that and Mike says "Not particularly," to which Hank agrees as he's more interested in probing Mike for any evidence of off-the-books work he performed for Gus. Season 1 of Better Call Saul practically all but confirms that Hank and Mike were referring to the death of Mike's son and the subsequent murders of his son's partner and commander.
  • The little bell on Hector's wheelchair that highlights his pathetic condition and sometimes used for comedic purpose? As Lalo revealed, a souvenir from a hotel that they burned down because the owner offended them.
  • The malicious slander that Jimmy piles on Don Wachtell with his ads in "Wexler v. Goodman" (one of which accused one of his banks of funding terrorism) becomes this when Don's actor, Jay Johnston, was arrested for taking part in the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
  • In "Expenses", Rebecca gives Jimmy an Armor-Piercing Question regarding Chuck "he's mentally ill, what's your excuse?" By season six, where he's so fractured that becoming Saul Goodman is not the only identity he turns into, it's not unlikely that mental illness runs in the family.
  • Schuler's freak out at the hotel and his friendship with Gus makes his suicide later much more depressing.
  • The disintegration of Jimmy and Chuck’s relationship is made so much worse after the flashback in “Saul Gone”, where Chuck actually tries to reach out to his brother but Jimmy has been so burned by Chuck’s constant little stabs on his self esteem that he either rejected it or never noticed.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight:
  • Mike's protective relationship with Jesse during Breaking Bad becomes much more moving knowing about his backstory, and his quasi-friendship with Nacho. Knowing that Matty was killed after Mike advised him to compromise his morality, and the disappointment Mike felt when Nacho kills himself, it makes sense that Mike sees Jesse as a third chance to save a person who can still be saved.
  • Mike's murder of the surviving Salamanca cousin wasn't just him carrying out an order for Gus, but a chance to get payback for them threatening to kill his granddaughter.
  • While also horribly traumatising, “Point and Shoot” making it clear that Jimmy would die for Kim and Kim would shoot someone for Jimmy, makes his promise to give up lawyering in “Gloves Off” if Kim was alright, and her reassuring that she wants to throw her lot in with him in “Sunk Costs”, all the sweeter.
  • “Inflatable” had a rare moment of self-awareness regarding his identity from Jimmy, telling Kim that he’s been trying to be someone else for most of his life, and he needs to actually be himself. As it could only go, he gets worse from there, but finally he finds peace in himself during “Saul Gone”.
• He Really Can Act:
  • Michael McKean had been a popular comedy actor for several decades - known primarily for his roles in Laverne & Shirley, This is Spın̈al Tap, and Clue - but many fans were blown away by his dramatic acting skills in this show, with his "You're not a real lawyer!" Motive Rant in Season 1 and his Sanity Slippage leading to his suicide in Season 3 seen as especially impressive.
  • Bob Odenkirk himself was mostly in sketch comedy before Breaking Bad, and has admitted that when he was asked to play Saul for the first time, he had no clue what he was doing and half expected to be told to go home. But Saul became an Ensemble Dark Horse for being both very funny and an obvious mask for… something, and he got himself this prequel that consensus says made Saul Goodman a Tragic Villain instead of just comic relief.
  • Rhea Seehorn once struggled to be considered for dramatic roles, having been typecast as a sitcom actor. Better Call Saul was her first chance to prove her dramatic acting chops- and she did it in spades.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • How fitting that the last time Bob Odenkirk and Michael McKean worked together, on Bob's sketch comedy show Mr. Show, it was a sketch about law school.
  • Bob Odenkirk won the 2022 Hollywood Critics Association Award for Best Actor in a Broadcast Network or Cable Series (Drama). He beat competition including... Kevin Costner, nominated for Yellowstone. Fans had a field day joking that Odenkirk appeared to have been nominated twice.
  • Anthony Hopkins famously binge-watched Breaking Bad shortly after it ended, and declared Bryan Cranston's performance the best piece of acting he'd ever seen. Four years later, he was nominated for the "Best Actor in a Drama" Emmy for Westworld alongside Bob Odenkirk as Jimmy (they both lost to Sterling K. Brown).
  • After Nacho turned on Tuco for his increasingly unstable behavior, Michael Mando took the role of similarly psychopathic criminal Mac Gargan in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Even before that, Mando's claim to fame was as Vaas Montenegro in Far Cry 3 who is even more psychotic, unhinged and Large Ham. In fact, Mando's Typecasting as "Tuco up to eleven" is both hilarious and further prove his acting's credence whenever he played the multi-layer Butt-Monkey Nacho.
  • During the commentary for "Magic Man", Peter Gould jokingly suggests that Lalo should get a swordfighting scene sometime before the show ends, due to him and the other writers comparing Tony Dalton to 1940s movie stars such as Errol Flynn. A year after the episode's release, Dalton would end up starring as Jacques Duquesnes in Hawkeye, a character who is particularly skilled in fencing.
  • As some YouTube comments are noting, Jesse goofing off in the lab gains a darkly humorous edge with the knowledge that the lab is built on Lalo and Howards' corpses, which he's dancing atop of none the wiser.
  • In "Rebecca", Chuck briefly namedrops Carol Burnett when making a joke at Jimmy's expense. Fast-forward to Season 6, and Gene Takavic ends up briefly making friends with a woman named Marion, played by Burnett herself!
• Ho Yay:
  • Mike's growing friendship with Werner and his Villainous BSoD after killing him, to the point of demanding a bartender hide a photo tacked up behind a bar just because it reminds Mike of him could easily be interpreted as this.
  • Very much the subtext of the scene between Gus and David the sommelier in "Fun and Games".
  • It's not hard to see romantic feelings from Howard to Chuck amidst the father/older brother figure subtext. Fabian himself said Howard was a little gay, Gould called their relationship "interesting undertones to it", and much like Jimmy seeking Chuck replacements for self-punishment and affection, Howard regrets stopping deferring to him all the time and beats himself up for it after the suicide.
  • Lalo might think Kim is way hotter than Jimmy is, but that doesn't mean he can't have fun homoerotically tormenting him, getting into his personal space while he's helpless, making innuendo about his Motor Mouth, calling him a slut in Spanish, and teasing that he might have to be a drug mule later.
  • Aside from Cheryl who has very good reasons to hate her, every woman who interacts with Kim is both slightly wary of her and acts like they want her to top them. Lampshaded in the season four bloopers, as Cara Pifko and Rhea Seehorn kiss a little.
• I Knew It!:
  • Thanks to the anagram of the Season Two titles spelling out "Fring's Back", fans managed to figure out that Gus would be returning before anyone had even asked Giancarlo Esposito to come back to the role. That's right: the fans figured out Gus would be coming back before Gus knew he was coming back.
  • Several fans managed to predict that, in the season 3 finale, Chuck would knock down his lantern and burn down his house.
  • Fans quickly deduced that, in the first Season 6 teaser, the crime scene markers showing the letters "D" and "R" were clues that the season would premiere on April 18.^note "D" is the fourth letter in the alphabet, which represented April being the fourth month of the year, whereas "R" is the eighteenth letter of the alphabet. This was soon confirmed by the makers of the show.
  • A lot of fans predicted that Nacho would die early in season six after he didn't receive a new promotional poster despite still being a main character.
  • Some fans predicted that Jimmy will end up in prison by the end of the series.
  • A lot of people figured that Chuck was a Walter White parallel and Jimmy was a Jesse Pinkman parallel (to put it simply, there are other complicating factors involved, but Bob Odenkirk outright said it in promoting season three). "Breaking Bad" and "Saul Gone" confirmed it, and added on a bonus: one of the reasons Jimmy/Saul sought Walt out is because he subconsciously wanted to recreate the dynamic he had with his brother.
  • A lot of McWexler fans figured both the couple would get reconciled and that the color would come back when they did. They do, and it doesn't come back completely, but the spark is just bright enough.
• It Was His Sled:
  • Chuck McGill was the one barring Jimmy from joining HHM, rather than Howard Hamlin, and was secretly working to undermine Jimmy's law career in the first season. Initially a twist when it first aired, the consequences of this become the central focus of the second and third seasons, to the point where it's impossible to not bring it up in discussion about the series.
  • The mysterious Lalo first mentioned in Breaking Bad is a Salamanca. While presented as a curveball reveal at first given that he was never hinted to be one in the first place, nowadays Lalo being a Salamanca is very well-known due to him becoming the primary Big Bad of Better Call Saul in the show's latter half.
• The Inverse Law of Fandom Levity: Due to having more or less the same ridiculously silly fanbase as Breaking Bad, the same things apply to the equally grim and gritty Prequel's fandom as well, with them making up insanely goofy jokes about Huell eating Kim, Saul being a Memetic Badass lawyer who can Chewbacca Defense his way through any trial, turning Chuck's poignant "Chicanery" speech into a memetic copypasta, etc.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Jimmy has done plenty of bad things, and will continue to do even worse things in Breaking Bad. He's petty, plays the victim card, spiteful, two-faced and conniving. But he also Desperately Craves Affection, goes through a Trauma Conga Line that isn't entirely his fault, would even die for Kim if he had to, and eventually becomes Saul Goodman (that persona far more tragic thanks to context) through a mix of being not seeking help for the things that have happened to, blistering self loathing, and heartbreak because Kim - hating herself - admitted she lied to him about Lalo, and leaves him. This also applies to when he was a kid. He was a little horror, but a flashback shows he also used to be sweet as a five year old but Chuck was already starting to put him down, and he definitely needed actual help instead of enabling from parents and all of Chuck’s blame and resentment.
  • Howard by the end of "Pimento." He's still abrasive and sent Kim to the cornfield, but it's hard to not feel bad after finding out Chuck's been the one ordering him to not hire Jimmy, and has no choice but to go along with it, making him out to be a monster in Jimmy's eyes. Then it turns out he and Kim put in a good word for Jimmy at Davis & Main. It's not hard to feel bad for him when Jimmy's Mesa Verde scam affects his firm even though he landed Jimmy a job. He becomes more of a jerkass, yet somehow more sympathetic, as Chuck and Jimmy's feud drags on. It's easy to feel his struggle as he tries to balance maintaining the HHM brand name's reputation and catering to Chuck's self-centered whims, especially after Chuck's epic breakdown on the stand. Then when he suggests very mildly to Chuck that it's time to retire for the benefit of HHM, his oldest friend and mentor swiftly and cruelly betrays him. Howard manages to save HHM by destroying his own finances and likely his own future, but Chuck kills himself, which Howard tearfully blames himself for.
  • Gus Fring was already this to a notable extent in Breaking Bad, owing in part to his tragic backstory seeing his business partner/lover shot to death in a heartwrenching and horrific scene, but the fact that here he's attempting to take down an even bigger asshole in Hector, adds to him being oddly sympathetic for a sociopath.
  • Kim Wexler has a god complex, is a wolf in how much better she is technically with the scams, plus a bit of a sadistic Control Freak. But she also had a rough childhood with a mother who pretended to be nice in public, her integrity matches her flaws, and she leaves “Fun and Games” completely hating herself. "Waterworks" shows her a miserable Extreme Doormat with boyfriend and 'friends' who don't care enough about her to ask anything, and finally having the first breakdown in her life because she wanted a cathartic punishment so badly, she hadn't processed her Dark and Troubled Past and feels insane grief over ruining her relationship.
• Jerks Are Worse Than Villains:
  • Chuck is easily the most hated character in the show for constantly holding Jimmy's past as a con man against him, preaching about the sanctity of the law only to then go out and employ his own con games by using people's positive qualities against them in service to his vendetta against Jimmy, and so on. He's in the same show as the Salamanca crew and Gus Fring, who themselves do things much more reprehensible than anything Chuck does but are generally more pragmatic and do not have a tendency to be petty when they don't get their way. Also the villains of this series, just like Breaking Bad, will do anything for those they care for, while Chuck tries to take down his own brother.
  • This also extends to Kim and Jimmy, as of the Season 6 mid-finale. Viewers are a lot angrier at them for their role in Howard's death, despite Lalo being the one who shot him. Though it doesn't help that half the season was about their protracted revenge plot to ruin Howard's reputation for petty reasons, leading him to visit Jimmy and Kim to tell them off, and that Lalo visited Jimmy and Kim because they worked with him before and Howard was unfortunately in the wrong place at the wrong time.
• Like You Would Really Do It: After the whole tragedy with Werner Ziegler and how it had exactly one upside (he still managed to save his wife's life), it was not unsurprising that Lalo did not, in fact, end up killing the wife, despite seemingly being poised to do so. The Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul universe is a harsh place, but going that far would have taken things into borderline Diabolus ex Machina and "Shaggy Dog" Story territory.
• Love to Hate: Chuck is a smug, conceited hypocrite driven by envy and rage to destroy his deeply flawed yet loving brother, which has earned him a lot of hate from the fandom. He is, however, also considered one of the show's strongest characters due to his complexity, how formidable he is as an antagonist, the genuine good points he makes about Jimmy from time to time, the humorous moments that come from his arrogance, and the tragedy of his bizarre mental illness (which is never played for laughs or as weakness). There's also Michael McKean's powerful and layered performance, which makes Chuck as fascinating to watch as he is eminently hateable. Notably, Chuck's death at the end of Season 3 has been met not with cheers or triumph but with genuine sadness from the fandom. On the flipside, his guest appearance in a flashback in the series finale was met with universal approval by the fandom.

M-W

• Magnificent Bastard: See here.
• Memetic Badass: Lyle has been propped up by the fandom as an even more devious mastermind than Gus, usually as a Dragon with an Agenda who secretly plots behind Gus's back under the guise of a meek fast-food employee. It largely kicked off in "Sabrosito" when he keeps asking Gus if he'll be okay as he's being left to the Cartel, with his last "you sure?" seriously sounding like he's willing to throw down if it's needed.
• Memetic Mutation: Shares a page with Breaking Bad.
• Mentor Ship: Jimmy/Mike is probably the third most popular ship in the fandom (behind Jimmy/Kim and Lalo/Nacho) for this reason, as Jimmy is a younger brat of a man and Mike alternates between slight affection and wanting to smack him. Also Jimmy starts really needing his approval right after Chuck lets him down and he claims to not care about his brother.
• Misaimed Fandom:
  • The fans have a massive hate for Chuck after the last couple episodes of Season 1, despite that Vince Gilligan and others have repeatedly said he does have a legitimate point, however much it sucks for Jimmy. Season 2 makes this more clear as Jimmy shows over and over that he really doesn't have any idea how to be a legitimate lawyer without slipping into his old self. By Season 3, though, Chuck's legitimate points get drowned out by his Moral Event Horizon con into getting Jimmy to confess, exploiting Jimmy's genuine (and undeserved) love for him to hypocritically play him just as Jimmy has played cons in the past.
  • On the other end, you’ll also get people deciding that Chuck was always right, the moral conscience instead of a Tragic Villain himself, and his treatment of Jimmy was completely justified. McKean himself stated you don’t put dynamite underneath people you’re trying to help and then say you’re correct, and a lot of people think Walt in the finale repeating a lot of what Chuck has said, while “Saul” looks like he’s going to cry was the creators trying to make this explicit, especially with Jimmy ending atoning for what he’s done.
  • There were few cases◊ of real life◊ lawyers◊, who have advertised themselves by mimicking BCS logo in their ads. Needless to say, Saul Goodman's commercials are very sleazy and of poor quality, so a self-respecting lawyer might want to think twice about how they promote themselves.
  • In general, there's a few fans of the show who believe Saul Goodman would be a legitimately great defense lawyer for any bad situations they get into, especially for lower class individuals trying to get by in society. This is ignoring that Saul's primary clientele are criminals and drug addicts that are intentionally breaking the law, and are hoping to get bailed out so they can continue with their illicit activities. Outside of that, there's also the fact that behind the bluster, Awesome Ego and witty sense of humor, Saul himself is a broken shell of a man who cares more about getting himself paid a hefty sum of money for his services, rather than provide meaningful legal counsel to his clients. Even Jimmy himself confesses he's in the Wrong Line of Work, and was always much happier directing his little commercials.
  • Rhea Seehorn gets openly annoyed when people will act like Kim Wexler is some moral centre who is far too good for Jimmy, as she makes a lot of comments about Kim having a god complex with her own arc and complications, and she loves Jimmy because she can be herself around him.
  • Some people saw Kim destroying her career and leaving Jimmy as an unambiguously moral and noble choice, despite all the crew saying this was as much self loathing as it was integrity, and when she's trying to get him to stop begging her to stay, she reveals she lied about Lalo.
  • Many fans view Cheryl Hamlin unsympathetically as a terrible spouse who treated Howard like crap and doesn't deserve to grieve for his death. This is despite the fact that she only appears in three scenes in the entire series and we know next to nothing about their relationship except that it's strained. The scene that cements this perception is the only one she has with Howard, wherein she commits the apparent crime of being emotionally distant to him after he made her coffee.
  • There's a lot of articles on the "Something Stupid" montage (the Time Skip detailing Kim and Jimmy drifting apart) asserting this is what their relationship is really like and they need a scam to survive, when Kim is seen to be wrong when she has that worry, and their main problem is both are insecure, deeply traumatised by this point, and fear talking about their real feelings. Bonus that "Bad Choice Road" repeats the framing and they're more in love than ever.
  • Some will take Howard in “Plan and Execution” completely at heart, deeming Kim a sociopath and Jimmy born evil like Chuck said. This forgets that while Howard’s point was sound (they’re both fucked up, perfect for each other and the excuses they have don’t amount to doing this), he has plenty of Chuck issues as well, and even Patrick Fabian has pointed out that every character is just working with the knowledge and bias they have. There’s also the opposite, “Howard gets some things wrong so his point is null and void”.
• Moral Event Horizon:
  • Chuck conned Jimmy into a confession. How? He faked retirement making Howard freak out and call Jimmy, when Jimmy showed up he played up his EMS condition through the roof (note that this is taking place right after Chuck put himself in a catatonic state when he needed treatment which scared Jimmy into thinking he lobotomized his brother) all so he could have Jimmy admit he forged the paper. Jimmy cons people by playing with their selfish nature but Chuck went lower and used Jimmy's goodness to get what he wants just like the grifter who ripped off their dad. Before that Chuck was an asshole but he made a point to not break the law to stop Jimmy from being a lawyer out of valid reasons but that added to the resentment he was shown to have toward his brother makes him look like his points were just excuses to destroy his brother and will bend the law a lot to get that (deceiving people for confession is a grey area depending on the lies). Chuck then SMASHES the Moral Event Horizon by using the tape as a Batman Gambit to get his own brother jailed for breaking and entering. If that doesn't qualify for smashing it, how about firing Ernesto, someone who has been nothing but good to him, as soon as he's outlived his usefulness? Fucking hell, Chuck.
  • If Jimmy's actions during Season 3 didn't count (using Crocodile Tears to sic the insurance company on Chuck and gaslighting Irene into settling the Sandpiper case), his con during the Season 4 finale did: During his appeal hearing before the bar, seeking to have his law license reinstated, Jimmy starts reading from the letter by Chuck left to him after his death, then shifts into a monologue about what Chuck meant to him as a brother and a lawyer despite Chuck's constant disapproval of him. It's a speech that brings Kim and the members of the bar committee to tears. But outside the courtroom, after Jimmy's reinstatement is assured, Jimmy nonchalantly reveals to Kim that he didn't mean a single word of what he said about Chuck. And to punctuate that this is indeed Jimmy's point-of-no-return, Jimmy tells a horrified and confused Kim that, "S'all good, man!"
  • Jimmy's actions in Season 5 push him past the Moral Event Horizon to the point where it's obvious there's no turning back. He spend almost the entire season being absolutely horrible to Howard for no reason. While no saint himself, Howard attempts in good faith to bury the hatchet and offers Jimmy a partner position at HHM. Jimmy responds to the job offer by smashing the shit out of Howard's car with bowling balls, and hires a pair of hookers to cause a scene at a restaurant where he's discussing business with Cliff Main, in an attempt to publicly humiliate him. Between that, and his betrayal of Kim's trust by going behind her back with their original plan in the Acker/Mesa Verde debacle, it's clear that Jimmy is beyond redemption at this point.
  • Both Jimmy and Kim continue their petty crusade against Howard in Season 6, trying to publicly humiliate him with actions like planting fake cocaine in his locker, Jimmy posing as Howard and pretending to solicit hookers right in from of Cliff, and culminating in them drugging Howard with pupil dilating drugs and tricking him into thinking the mediator for the Sandpiper case has been taking bribes. This results in the entire Sandpiper case getting torpedoed, with Howard and Cliff getting far less settlement money than they were hoping for, and directly hurting all of the elderly plaintiffs who would have benefited from a larger settlement. Not to mention, Jimmy and Kim's actions indirectly lead to Howard's death, as he figured out their con and went to their home to confront them, only to be murdered by Lalo because he had the bad luck to arrive at the same time as him. Had Jimmy and Kim done nothing, Howard would still be alive.
  • Kim gaslighting Howard's widow at his memorial service is perhaps the last straw for her, especially since In-Universe she abandons her career and Jimmy days after. The script openly calls this the worst thing Kim's ever done.
  • In probably the character’s lowest point yet, Jimmy/Gene full-on threatens Marion, an elderly woman, with strangulation in “Waterworks” to prevent her from outing him to the police as Saul Goodman. His facial expressions look incredibly menacing, and many viewers believe he was actually ready to murder her.
    • Notably, the creators have said that while it was definitely his lowest point, the fact that Gene ultimately did not go through with it was intended as him turning back from the point of no return.
  • In-universe, the members of the Albuquerque legal system believe Saul crossed it with his tricks in support of Lalo Salamanca. All of the people in the courthouse Saul had spent years successfully charming? They won't talk to him. The assistant district attorney Saul has been playfully sparring with all series? He tells Saul that what he did was "just wrong." Tricks and schemes are fine, but lying and creating an elaborate fake identity for a sociopathic drug lord, which lets him go free? That crosses a line.
  • Tuco crosses it by threatening to make "colombian neckties" ^note cutting the victim's throat and pulling their tongues out through the slits to the skater brothers because they called his grandmother a "biznatch".
  • If Hector didn't cross it by forcing Mike into a job by threatening the lives of his daughter-in-law and granddaughter, he definitely did when he shot a Good Samaritan because he couldn't be bothered to come up with an alibi for why his minion was Bound and Gagged in the side of the road. He stays past it when he has said minion executed when he couldn't come up with any information surrounding the person who tied and robbed him, as Mike covered his tracks expertly. Mike certainly seems to think the death of the innocent man was too much, as he tries to kill him later as revenge, and is only stopped short of doing it by Gus.
  • The Cousins were already murderous gangsters who threatened Mike's family on Hector's orders, but they stay past the line with their torture and murder of Ximenez Lecerda.
  • In true Salamanca fashion, Lalo crosses it by killing the completely innocent Fred Whalen to get access to his security records. Unlike his family, he does try a peaceful resolution first, but gives up the moment Fred shows any sign of uneasiness. He stays past the line in almost every subsequent episode he's in.
  • Gus crosses it with the unnecessarily drawn out death of Arturo Colon, done simply to instil fear unto Nacho.
• Most Wonderful Sound: Chuck McGill's singing, as to be expected from Michael McKean. Several fans have lamented that we didn't get a full version of him doing "The Winner Takes It All".
• Narm:
  • During the scene where Hector is harassing the employees of Los Pollos Hermanos because he wants to speak to Gus, he tells the assistant manager "I need to see your boss." Due to the character's thick accent, it sounds like he's actually saying "I need to see your balls."
  • To Spanish speakers, any time Hector speaks Spanish due to it sounding very unnatural. Mark Margolis didn't actually know Spanish, and it shows.
  • Jimmy's rant at Howard in the end of "JMM" for some. Jimmy suffers an emotional breakdown in the middle of the courthouse, but the contents of the speech have caused viewers to make a few jokes, especially with comparisons to Dennis and his starter car.
  • Lalo managing to escape the assassins at the end of season 5. The scene is supposed to show him as clever enough to out-maneuver them, but due to the execution, many have expressed exasperation at the assassins, believing them to be incompetent. This also comes from hearing Gus call them "the best in their business".
  • While Howard Hamlin's memorial is a dramatic scene, the fact that the portraits used in the service are cropped directly from Patrick Fabian's Instagram can be hilariously jarring.
  • The Doctor specialist from no less than Johns Hopkins explaining stroke rehabilitation to the Cousins is rather surreal considering their demeanor and job.
• Not Badass Enough for Fans: The subsection of fandom who worshipped Walter White in Breaking Bad tend to hate Jimmy for “feminine traits” of being emotional, vain and talking his way out of situations. They also ask why Kim likes him so much (or just assuming she doesn’t actually), thinking she should go with the more “manly” Howard or Lalo, despite Howard being her boss for a time and Lalo she’s terrified of, while Jimmy makes her laugh, won’t judge her, never stops being loyal and is perfectly happy being slammed into a wall with a Forceful Kiss.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Tony the Toilet Buddy, a speaking toilet meant to encourage potty training with recorded lines whenever it's used. Unfortunately for the inventor, he never once considers the adult innuendos evoked by Tony's lines, only made worse when Jimmy suggests he cater to a different market instead.
  • Mr. Sipes, the potential client who wants to secede from the United States. He tops his claims off by paying Jimmy in millions of dollars printed with his face on them.
  • Sobchak the Gun Nut, played by Steven Ogg. Apart from his portrayal essentially being a less-dangerous version of Trevor Philips, after demeaning Mike, he eats his words when he's quickly disarmed and left groveling on the floor. He even shows up again as "Mr. X", hired by Jimmy to get dirt on Kevin Watchell.
  • Fudge Talbot, an elderly former client of Jimmy's, who's used to sneak a commercial shoot with FIFI, the last Boeing B-29. The man keeps switching between his dementia-riddled persona masking his rather sharp personality, managing to correct Jimmy's history by noting how FIFI fought Japanese forces in the Pacific Theatre and not the Nazis.
  • Jeff, the cab driver who recognizes Jimmy (or rather, Saul Goodman). He's just so obnoxiously persistent and vocal about it.
  • Just like the parent show, Robert Forster makes a single appearance as Ed the Cleaner, made all the more impactful by airing several months after his death.
  • The jaded judge who presides over Jimmy and Kim's wedding, and couldn't care less about any of their drama.
• One True Pairing: As Destructive Romance as they are, both fandom and creators really grew to love Jimmy and Kim together, to the point where when they broke up, even the crew working on the scene were close to tears.
  Bob Odenkirk: The writers acknowledge that it really is this relationship that was the real life of this show.
• Padding: Season 6 is criticized for its extended, slow-paced and clearly padded-out Cold Opens, that can drag for 5-6 minutes in some atmosphere-building exercise, while episode length don't even make it 50 minutes of total running time. This is particularly jarring, since the season goes for 13 episodes, rather than the usual 10.
• Pandering to the Base: Season 6 can come off as doing this. It has quite a lot of scenes where it reintroduces characters from both Breaking Bad (Walt, Jesse and Marie to name a few) and from earlier seasons of Better Call Saul (like The Kettlemans). While it is indeed nice to see some of these characters again, the scenes themselves don't contribute that much to the overall plot. Even worse is that the season is also being padded, further making some accuse the show of doing fanservice rather than bringing something to the actual story.
• Periphery Demographic: The creators have expressed slightly amused pleasure that the prequel has a heavier queer/female audience than the parent show. The complexities of Kim Wexler, very attractive men in the form of Lalo and Nacho, the fact that Jimmy even on worst days is softer than Walter White (and goes shirtless more often), and that said writers have recognised that a big part of the show is the love story between him and Kim probably all help.
• Play-Along Meme: Any Breaking Bad scene featuring the meth superlab usually has fans pretending that Lalo and Howard are still alive in those scenes as well.
• Retroactive Recognition: James Austin Johnson, who plays poor doomed Fred Whalen, would eventually become a featured cast member on Saturday Night Live.
• Ron the Death Eater:
  • Davis & Main are looked at as the bad guys by the fans just because they've lambasted Jimmy for producing a commercial ad without their consent. Despite the fact that they had every right to be upset, given that the partners would be liable for anything stated in the advertisement.
  • Goes both ways for the McGill boys, as they’re both meant to be tragic villains and a deconstruction of Cain and Abel, but you’ll see plenty of “Jimmy was always evil and Chuck was right to keep him on a tight leash” or “Chuck is the sole reason why Jimmy eventually became Saul Goodman.”
  • In a Played for Laughs example similar to Darth Jar Jar, fans tend to joke that the meek and unassuming Lyle was the real mastermind behind Gus Fring's criminal empire and remains at large after the show ended.
• Salvaged Story: In Breaking Bad's final episodes, Walt inexplicably leaves the watch Jesse gave him on a payphone on his way back to Albuquerque. It was done to resolve a continuity issue - Walt wasn't wearing the watch in season 5's first flash-forward - but there's literally no attempt to explain it, and the crew has lampshaded since that the audience should just assume he has a reason to do that. "Saul Gone" finally gives an explanation; when Jimmy asks Walt what his greatest regret is (during what would be the events of "Granite State"), he glances at the watch, indicating that he leaves it because he regrets selling Jesse out to the Nazis too much to keep it.
• Shocking Moments:
  • In the very first episode. While Saul/Jimmy's presence is obvious and Mike's cameo is a nice touch, it's safe to say that no one was expecting Tuco Salamanca of all people to show up so soon.
  • Chuck burning down his house at the end of Season 3.
  • Lalo executing Howard for being at the wrong place at the wrong time at the Season 6 mid-finale.
• Signature Scene: Jimmy's cross examination of Chuck during the disciplinary hearing and Chuck's ensuing Motive Rant in "Chicanery" is among the most beloved scenes of the show and the rant in particular is frequently snowcloned even outside of the show's context.
• Spoiled by the Format: Scenes of specific characters in danger can feel like their tension is undercut by the presence of those characters on Breaking Bad which takes places after the continuity of Better Call Saul.
• Squick:
  • Jimmy braving a nursing home dumpster to find evidence of fraud. Bob Odenkirk is a little too good at portraying how disgusting it smells.
  • The Title Sequence of the ninth episode in each season shows a shot of a grimy urinal with one of Saul's cards floating, getting swept up in a flush. It's rather disgusting, and even unwanted if it wasn't for its symbolism.
  • In "Off Brand", Nacho, feeling trauma after having to beat Krazy-8 for being short on his payments, is not concentrating on his work when using a sewing machine to create car upholstery and puts the needle though the skin between his thumb and forefinger. The episode shows this close-up.
  • Season Five's "Bagman" features Jimmy having to drink his own piss after getting hopelessly stranded in the desert.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Some think that Hank and Gomez should have had a bigger role in the fifth season rather than just being cameos for just two episodes that was mostly for fanservice.
  • Similarly, Nacho who has been a tritagonist in the previous seasons barely has an important role in the fifth season. He mostly shows up in scenes with Gus or Mike as a side character but doesn’t do anything important until the last episode when he participates in the attempted assassination of Lalo and that’s about it.
  • For all of the show's interesting tie-ins with Breaking Bad and prominent showcasing of the Salamanca family, this show doesn't reveal anything more about minor members of the family who were briefly seen or indirectly referenced in the original show and could have done interesting things with the Salamanca dynamics. Specifically, Hector's niece/Tuco's sister^note  Hector's niece (Tuco has a sister, given how he is unmarried and his enforcer Gonzo is his brother-in-law (given her romance with a family enforcer, apparent role in having not been brought up by Hector like her brother and cousins, and status as a rare Salamanca who seemingly survives both shows), siblings (the parents of the nephews he raised), sole biological son (whose relationship with his unhinged cousins who view Hector as a Parental Substitute could have been interesting), and grandson Joaquin (the only known Salamanca in the youngest generation, and a Future Badass who may be in a Used to Be a Sweet Kid phase at this point in the franchise).
• Trapped by Mountain Lions: The show can come off a bit like this. It is as much about Jimmy McGill's descent into Saul Goodman as it is Mike Ehrmantraut's rise to Gus Fring's enforcer. Although both plots are well-received, they also rarely interact with each other until season 5, when Lalo Salamanca becomes a threat that ties together the two plot threads.
• Unexpected Character:
  • Ed Galbraith appears in the Season 5 premiere, months after Robert Forster's death, thanks to the crew being lucky enough to film a scene with him while he was back for El Camino.
  • Most viewers predicted Jesse Pinkman would appear in a flashback in the episode titled "Breaking Bad". His appearance in "Waterworks" where he interacts with Kim Wexler was much less anticipated.
  • While most called Walt and Chuck appearing in the finale, nobody expected Betsy Brandt reprising her role as Marie for the first time since the final episode of Breaking Bad.
• Unintentionally Sympathetic: Jimmy revealing to Kim that he didn't mean any of the kind words he said about Chuck and that he had simply been crying Crocodile Tears to get the Bar Association to reinstate him is clearly meant to be his Moral Event Horizon, especially with how betrayed Kim is at the entire affair. But considering the fact that Chuck did absolutely everything in his power to screw Jimmy over no matter the cost to himself or anyone else (a vendetta that Kim herself became collateral damage of) Jimmy is well within his right to despise his brother, and when telling his true feelings about Chuck got him nothing but judgement from everyone else then it's logical that he would try the exact opposite strategy.
• Viewers in Mourning: The creators often talked about how they needed to make viewers dread the day when ultimately likeable Jimmy becomes Saul Goodman, and were just destroying him slowly until the final Despair Event Horizon. The consensus is that they pulled it off with agonising relish.
  Vince: If we do this right, nobody’s going to want to see him turn into Saul Goodman. It’s too ugly, especially when we know what he used to be like. Jimmy McGill is kind of a rascal, but he basically had a good heart. And he intended to do well by people and it’s just this is just grotesque, this is just sad.
• The Woobie:
  • Chuck manipulates Ernesto into overhearing Jimmy's confession tape, correctly predicting that Ernesto will try to tip him off. Then when Jimmy commits the break-in, Chuck unceremoniously cans him after he has served his purpose, probably using the confidentiality he used to pressure Ernesto as a pretext. All for the crime of being Jimmy's friend.
  • Within just one episode is Irene, the main plaintiff in the Sandpiper lawsuit. With a sizable offer on the table but HHM insisting they can get more, Jimmy sinks to whole new depths as he methodically estranges her from all her friends, making her appear to be deliberately dragging the lawsuit out with far more money to burn than any of them, all to pressure her into making the deal as it stands and posing as the one person still standing by her.
  • Mike definitely is this after he reveals his guilt over his past as a Dirty Cop and how it led to his son Matthew's death.
  • Lyle, the Los Pollos Hermanos employee who has the misfortune to be in Gus' eyeline when he's especially angry over having to give up a good deal of money to the DEA. Gus forces him to repeatedly clean the deep fryer with zero indication of what he's supposedly doing wrong, with anyone who's had a similar job able to relate all too well.
  • He may be a named partner at a prestigious law firm who lives in a mansion, but things rarely seem to go Howard's way after Season 3. His mentor betrays the firm they built together, forcing Hamlin to go into debt to buy him out. Howard blames himself for Chuck's suicide, and needs extensive therapy to come to terms with it. His devotion to restoring HHM sabotages his marriage, and his wife seems uninterested in his attempts to rebuilt their relationship. He tries to make amends with Jimmy and Kim, but the two only use the opportunity to torment him, eventually deciding to destroy his career so the Sandpiper case will be forced to settle. They succeed, and after being professionally humiliated, Howard is shot and killed by Lalo Salamanca for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He is buried with the body of his killer in a shallow grave underneath a meth lab, and his death is staged as a suicide brought on by a drug addiction that he never actually had.

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