In Better Call Saul’s “Nippy,” The Future Is Now: Review
The post In Better Call Saul’s “Nippy,” The Future Is Now: Review appeared first on Consequence.
[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for Better Call Saul, Season 6 Episode 10, “Nippy.”]
In its fourth-to-last episode, “Nippy,” Better Call Saul executed its most abrupt pivot yet. From just the title, we knew something different was in store, as a totally different naming scheme was in play (Saul does switch up its approach to episode titles from season to season, but within each season they typically remain consistent). But after seeing Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk) in all his sleazy glory at the end of the previous episode, “Fun and Games,” it was clear that whatever was going to come next would be a departure from the past.
However, this episode, written by Alison Tatlock and directed by Michelle MacLaren, catapulted us viewers a lot further forward than we might have expected. Rather than deliver the long-awaited return of Walter White and Jesse Pinkman, or in fact touch on any events that might have been covered during the time period in which Breaking Bad is set, “Nippy” instead picked up with our old friend Gene Takovic, living his black and white and very, very grey life in Omaha.
Given that Season 6, up until now, hasn’t checked in with Jimmy/Saul’s post-Breaking Bad identity, you’d be forgiven for forgetting exactly what’s going on here, but a quick reminder if you don’t have time to watch AMC’s recap: Gene was doing fine, hiding behind his new identity and living his quiet life, when he happened to have a mild medical incident that put him in the hospital. Needing a ride from the hospital back to the mall where he works, he took a cab — but the cab driver happened to be a former Albuquerque resident named Jeff (Don Harvey), who recognized him as Saul Goodman and later confronted him at the mall.
Gene was prepared to run, even putting in a call to Best Quality Vacuum Ed (Robert Forster) to set up an extraction… until he changed his mind, and decided to handle the problem of Jeff himself. That was where things with Gene were left in the Saul Season 5 premiere, “Magic Man,” but from the first black-and-white shot of “Nippy,” it becomes clear that we’re about to find out what happens next. Though what that is takes its time to unveil itself, as we watch an elderly yet feisty woman named Marion (Carol Burnett, making her promised guest star appearance) do her grocery shopping.
When Marion’s scooter has some trouble on the street, who should be there to help her but Gene, who uses his well-established cunning to surreptitiously disable the scooter — a maneuver that lands him in Marion’s kitchen, having a fine old time just as Marion’s son Jeff (now played by Pat Healy, due to Harvey’s commitment to We Own the Night) happens to return home.
Sometimes Saul glories in the details of an operation like this, but “Nippy” skips over the painstaking surveillance and research that Gene must have done to manipulate his way into Jeff’s home — likely because a far more interesting con is on the horizon. Gene, you see, has an offer to make Jeff, a chance at a big score that will rake in some serious cash but more importantly let Jeff feel like a part of “the game.” And so Jeff, along with the friend who was present when Jeff had his original confrontation with Gene (Max Bickelhaup) sign up to pull a wee bit of grand larceny at the Cottonwood Mall department store.
It’s an incredibly low-tech heist, made possible by Gene’s talents for observation and manipulation: By befriending the mall security guards, he’s able to learn their rhythms and use delicious Cinnabon to create a window in which Jeff, having been smuggled inside the mall in a shipping container, can run around the department store collecting high-end luxury goods. (Real talk — Better Call Saul might be the best marketing campaign an international chain of baked goods kiosks could ever ask for. Even in black-and-white, those damn buns look delicious.)
So much of the episode is devoted to the heist that it’s easy to forget why, exactly, Gene would go to all the trouble of giving Jeff this opportunity. Until, that is, he delivers the final blow, revealing to Jeff that the real con was manipulating him into committing some serious crimes with some serious time attached. Things began with Jeff threatening to expose Gene as Saul, and now Gene has power over Jeff, using the ol’ Walter White special of mutually assured destruction.
Perhaps the most heartbreaking part is the fact that Jeff seemed to feel like he was really bonding with Gene. But the shell protecting Gene is rock hard at this point. Even Gene at seemingly his most vulnerable — breaking down with his new friend the security guard (Jim O’Heir, best known from Parks and Recreation), using real details from Jimmy McGill’s life to sell it — was him buying Jeff some time after Jeff fell down mid-caper; in so many ways, Gene is a wounded animal hiding in plain sight, fight-or-flight instincts always on alert.
As a stand-alone episode, “Nippy” is great, engaging television. However, it’s yet to be seen how it will fit into the show’s grand plan, and for that reason alone it’s easy to imagine it frustrating the viewer. However, this is the kind of episode that the most artistically successful shows know is necessary — a shake-up to the status quo that leaves us genuinely unsure what happens next.
With three more episodes left, it feels like there’s still story left to be told in Albuquerque… but then again, with the existence of Breaking Bad, maybe there isn’t. What matters is that some shows, by this point in their run, would have a sense of inevitability to what happens next. Saul, meanwhile, seems to delight in keeping us guessing.
What “Nippy” does leave us with is a Gene who’s got some pep in his step, the stress of being revealed by Jeff now gone. He even takes a moment on his lunch break to go to the department store that doesn’t know it was robbed, to admire some very Saul-esque merchandise — a shirt and tie combination so loud that it’s screaming, even in black and white.
Gene leaves the shirt and tie behind, but the fact that he’s looking… Maybe we haven’t said goodbye to Saul Goodman quite yet.
Better Call Saul airs Mondays at 9:00 p.m. ET on AMC.
In Better Call Saul’s “Nippy,” The Future Is Now: Review
Liz Shannon Miller
Popular Posts
Solve the daily Crossword
