When Walt first meets Saul, it sounds like Saul was already in the business of laundering money, and hooking organized criminals up with the resources they need. He probably was making some good money already and then Walt's business put him over the top. They seemed to hint that he took over the Vet's business too, didn't they?
In Arizona in the 2000's, a half million bought you castle with a dragon and a moat. I always thought the Saul Goodman practice was a way for Jimmy to filter through a mass of scumbags in order to find high-value, criminal clients who don't to deal with regular lawyers.
I really liked the last episode, I was really curious how Jimmy was dealing with such a mundane existence and how his old personality was starting to break through. I like "slice of life" style storytelling and seeing how characters I'm invested live when they aren't reacting to outside forces.
Goodman's lifestyle was always depicted as absurdly low for the amount of work he was doing. Even if he was doing public defender work, he'd be doing alright with the amount of volume and low overhead he had.
Anyone who goes into criminal law and hustles up work like that will make $150k+ easy within a short amount of time. There was no reason for him to be driving a $500 car, except for dramatic affect.
Then later on he's depicted as having a room full of clients waiting and willing to profit off the sleaziest of personal injury work. He'd be racking it in at that point.
I also liked this new episode too. I think it may lead into something bigger too. I don't see them getting away with this scott free. AMC will use the flash forwards to segue into a new show.
My guess is that they initially filmed this last episode with the intention of breaking it up into smaller bits that would be shown before each episode, but realized it worked better as an independent episode and/or disrupt the flow of the other episodes.
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In Arizona in the 2000's, a half million bought you castle with a dragon and a moat. I always thought the Saul Goodman practice was a way for Jimmy to filter through a mass of scumbags in order to find high-value, criminal clients who don't to deal with regular lawyers.
House prices back then were actually almost as high as they are now in a lot of places (New Mexico included). Some of them are only getting back to their pre-2008 prices now.
Not quite as ostentatious as in the show (no gold toilet), but it looks like they used some of the interiors. They tried to get $1.5M for it in 2009, but it looks like it didn't sell. But it did sell for ~$1M recently.
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House prices back then were actually almost as high as they are now in a lot of places (New Mexico included). Some of them are only getting back to their pre-2008 prices now.
Not quite as ostentatious as in the show (no gold toilet), but it looks like they used some of the interiors. They tried to get $1.5M for it in 2009, but it looks like it didn't sell. But it did sell for ~$1M recently.
BCS is set in 2002. Housing prices in New Mexico were approximately half of what they are now:
Once again, the whole thing is set up for dramatic effect. Personally, I think it would have been better if they'd attributed Goodman's lack of affluence to a personality flaw/vice as opposed to his inability to make money.
Once again, the whole thing is set up for dramatic effect. Personally, I think it would have been better if they'd attributed Goodman's lack of affluence to a personality flaw/vice as opposed to his inability to make money.
Season 1 was 2002. By the time he's in the mansion (roughly equivalent to early Breaking Bad) it's 2007-2008:
You guys are confusing me with this whole conversation. Saul and Kim seemed to be doing ok financially with a moderately upscale apartment or Condo. He wasn't splitting costs with her in the mansion. My take is that once he lost Kim, he went all in on a shallow relationships, and shallow, flashy possessions and was driven to acquire them by utilizing his scheming skills.
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I kind of wonder if he could find a way to lawyer himself out of this. I wasn’t sure what crimes of his could be proven once they analyze everything from his mansion, or if he got sloppy and left it all in plain sight. Maybe there is a happy ending in this for Saul.
I'm doing just that; I've only watched the first couple episodes of Breaking Bad. I know Gus, Mike and Saul are in BB, and know that at least one of those characters meets a gruesome demise, but otherwise I only know a flimsy outline of the plot of BB.
So far I've greatly enjoyed BCS, and I'm glad that I didn't really get into it until just a few weeks ago and binged from start to season 6, episode 7 (Howard's end...). I don't think I would have had as much of an appreciation for the story (-ies) they've told if I wasn't able to binge a few episodes at a time; the storylines are so intertwined and serialized that it would be very easy to forget key plot points if I had to wait months/years between seasons.
I started watching Breaking Bad recently, and so far so good. In retrospect I don't know why I didn't get into this show when it came out, but somehow it just couldn't keep my attention whereas now, having watched Better Call Saul, it does.
As someone who started with BCS I now get to see the call-backs and Easter eggs from BB that were sprinkled in BCS, but I experience them from the opposite side of the story. It's a credit to the writing that I think I am having the same sort of fun seeing these tips of the hat in BB as a BB fan would have had watching BCS. "Oh hey, it's Domingo! I guess after Nacho and Lalo were gone he struck out on his own. Oh, and there's Tuco! And they even 'call back' to that ######y businessman who Jimmy and Kim conned into buying them drinks in seasons 1 or 2!"
I'm up to about five episodes into BB season 2, and I find I prefer BCS quite a bit more. I find the characters in BCS much more sympathetic and interesting. Walter and Jesse are... okay, but I don't see much of a redemption arc for either of them. I thought Jimmy in particular was a much more compelling character in that he often does the wrong thing for "right" reasons, and his descent into becoming Saul Goodman is tragic. Granted there's still plenty of BB for me to watch, but I just don't find Walt and Jesse as interesting. Some of the side characters are pretty well acted though, especially given how much I dislike the characters. Skyler and Marie in particular are really loathsome to me. Did most BB watchers at the time dislike them as much as I do?
I started watching Breaking Bad recently, and so far so good. In retrospect I don't know why I didn't get into this show when it came out, but somehow it just couldn't keep my attention whereas now, having watched Better Call Saul, it does.
As someone who started with BCS I now get to see the call-backs and Easter eggs from BB that were sprinkled in BCS, but I experience them from the opposite side of the story. It's a credit to the writing that I think I am having the same sort of fun seeing these tips of the hat in BB as a BB fan would have had watching BCS. "Oh hey, it's Domingo! I guess after Nacho and Lalo were gone he struck out on his own. Oh, and there's Tuco! And they even 'call back' to that ######y businessman who Jimmy and Kim conned into buying them drinks in seasons 1 or 2!"
I'm up to about five episodes into BB season 2, and I find I prefer BCS quite a bit more. I find the characters in BCS much more sympathetic and interesting. Walter and Jesse are... okay, but I don't see much of a redemption arc for either of them. I thought Jimmy in particular was a much more compelling character in that he often does the wrong thing for "right" reasons, and his descent into becoming Saul Goodman is tragic. Granted there's still plenty of BB for me to watch, but I just don't find Walt and Jesse as interesting. Some of the side characters are pretty well acted though, especially given how much I dislike the characters. Skyler and Marie in particular are really loathsome to me. Did most BB watchers at the time dislike them as much as I do?
Oh this is why Better Call Saul is the best show in TV history. Breaking Bad is already top 3 and then to get rid of Marie, Sklyar and Walt Jr and replace them with Kim, Howard, Chuck, Lalo and Nacho?? I don't think this ever gets topped.
and it's a prequel! and I hate prequels.
__________________ Peter12 "I'm no Trump fan but he is smarter than most if not everyone in this thread. ”
Skylar was played pretty much how I think a person in her situation would react to what’s going on around her. I don’t believe there was anything wrong with it. Yeah, she was a debbie downer on occasion, but that is more realty than just accepting what’s happening.
It reminds me of Shelley Duvall’s character in The Shining being in near histrionics the entire movie. That’s what I would expect.
I'm in the midst of season 2, and right now she still hasn't given birth, smoked a few cigarettes, and to Walt's consternation she's walking off mid-day to go "out". I get why she'd be upset about being kept in the dark about Walt's meth-cooking, but she's incredibly self-centered, petty and childish about it.
It's perfect. Anna Gunn plays the part very well, and while it's probably the worst way for Skyler to react it's a very "real" reaction I've witnessed many times in my own life.
That said she's kind of like an analogue of Chuck, and Chuck is a far more interesting character to me. He's obviously also deeply flawed, and doesn't have Jimmy's best interests at heart, but maybe it's because he's more obviously mentally ill that he's more sympathetic.
