Better call Saul is considered one of the best written shows. It is a spinoff of ‘Breaking bad’. But why Saul Goodman? What is about him that they thought of making his own show? Of course, the popularity of the character from Breaking bad, but there is a lot more that has gone in developing the character. In this article I am going to write my observation an event which plays a key role in transforming Jimmy McGill into Saul Goodman.
I heard the term believability first time (in the context of films) from writer- director Andrew Stanton in the ‘Director’s commentary’ DVD feature of his film ‘Wall.E’. Believability stands right in the middle of realism and imagination. Every character or story you love is believable. Otherwise you would not have truly be able to love it. It can vary how much of it is realism and fiction it consists, but it is THE element that makes people spread the word about a film or a series. For example, Better call Saul!
To describe Saul Goodman in a few words, is a lawyer in a bad world struggling to be good at heart. A grey character. He is been told by several people that he seems to be a lawyer of the guilty people. He himself admits to Kim that his brother Chuck, a senior partner at HHM, is good at creating and unlike him, Jimmy (Saul) is great at destroying. Time and again Jimmy makes mistakes that are unforgiven in the world of law and lawyers. But these events come and go, they do interact with the character and move the story forward, but they do not influence the character as much as this key event I am talking about. This is not an inciting incidence but as important as one.
This incident takes place in a few episodes towards the end of the second season. Chuck is getting better from his condition. Jimmy and Chuck are not talking so instead of Jimmy, Ernesto (An employee of HHM) is taking care of Chuck. Chuck wants to win a client- Mesa Verde- back that went with Kim when she left HHM. Chuck and Howard meet the client and the client comes back to HHM. Ideally this should not have happened but its an unpredictable world we all live in. Kim is obviously disappointed but unlike Jimmy she hasn’t lost her cool. That evening, when tired Chuck, covered in aluminum sheets, sleeps on his sofa Jimmy sits in the chair next to him and eyes the box of files that has come to Chuck from the client. The same case files Kim was working on. Jimmy opens a few files. The devil runs through Jimmy’s mind and in the late of the night he is at a photocopy shop. Jimmy photocopies the documents and change one specific number which later causes tremendous amount of loss to the prestigious HHM firm and his real elder brother, Chuck.
The client comes back to Kim. Chuck knows his brother very well. He is sure Jimmy has something to do with this. He calls Kim over. Jimmy too enters with Kim. When Chuck speaks what he thinks, Jimmy does not put any effort to convince Kim that Chuck is lying and Jimmy is innocent. When Chuck it done telling what he thinks must have had happened, Kim does not believe it. Kim refuses to believe that Jimmy has anything to do with it. Instead she tells Chuck how it could be a simple mistake since Chuck uses lanterns and not electricity. Chuck continues to argue how this was Jimmy’s plan, but she does not seem to buy it. Later when they leave Chuck’s house, Jimmy is expecting Kim to argue with him because he feels Kim would know Jimmy has something to do with him. But Kim does not say anything about it. It’s hard to tell whether she is aware about that it was Jimmy or not, but she does not blame Jimmy.
Chuck obviously does not give up on this. He knows it was Jimmy and he has taken the insult on the firm so personally that he sends Ernesto to several photocopy shops to enquire. Jimmy is aware this will happen and so he too makes to the photocopy shop where he was nights before and bribes the shopkeeper. When Chuck enters the shop with Ernesto, the shopkeeper refuses to admit the fact that Jimmy was there nights ago. They continue to argue. Chuck’s condition with electricity kicks- in and he falls. Jimmy, who was watching this all from the outside rushes in the store. They admit Chuck into the hospital. When Chuck comes back to conscious the first thing, he does is to accuse Jimmy on the same issue. He claims if Jimmy is innocent how did he know about the photocopy store and why he was there? Jimmy is about to confess at this point but Ernesto interrupts as he says- “Oh that was me! I saw you getting worse and I didn’t know what to do, so I called Jimmy.” Which obviously was a white lie.
Later, Chuck tapes Jimmy confessing to him about the photocopy fraud. Ernesto hears the tape while helping Chuck in the house. Chuck warns Ernesto and yet Ernesto informs Kim about the tape. The case is filed against Jimmy, but he does not face as serious punishment as he expects he would. After that key incident, Jimmy wanted to confess the truth. But people took care of him. He only stood idle in those situations and observes. Later half of the third and entire full season Jimmy continues to lie. He is gifted with a great brain and ideas and expertise that come from experience, but he continues to lose interest in doing things legally. When his license is terminated, he works in a mobile phone store. He sells a few phones from the store and most phones, well, illegally. He is a salesman and a great advertiser with a lawyer’s degree.
Comentarios