Bryce Lynch

Mike shooting the driver was my plan all along. But, why didn't he wait for him to stop the car? Then, Mike and Saul would have had a functioning vehicle to drive home in. Also a shot at a stationary target would be much easier.

There was a fun callback to BB in the Madrigal conference room scene. The restaurant names and logos on the nameplates were the same as those hanging on the wall of Madrigal headquarters in Germany, when they took down the LPH logo, in "Madrigal". One of them was the unfortunately named, "Luftwaffle". On the BB insider podcast, Vince Gilligan mentioned that you could only see part of the Luftwaffle logo in "Madrigal" and he sounded disappointed by that. In "JMM" you can see it clearly.

No, Chuck got Jimmy out of jail in Chicago when he was facing charges for a Chicago Sunroof. Squat Cobbler was what Jimmy used to explain Pryce's hidey hole to the police.

I thought Kim criticizing Kevin for not following her advice was well played, though totally unethical. Kevin has no idea Kim was conspiring against him all along. So, from his perspective, he was wrong not to follow Kim's advice. That said, I'm not sure I buy that Kevin and Paige would be so easily fooled by Kim. Would they really buy that the guy she used to share an office with and now shares a bed with was really going against her? Also, once they saw how sleazy Saul is, I would think that they might start to believe Chuck's claim that Jimmy altered the MV documents to sabotage Chuck and give the work to Kim. They might not be totally convinced Kim was working for Acker, but I think prudent people would be suspicious enough that they would stop doing business with her and her firm.

So, what was with the depiction of Herr Schuler, in this episode? Was it just me, or did he come across as possibly gay and sort of doddering fool, being manipulated by Gus and Lydia? We saw very little of him in BB, but I presumed he was a strong businessman and more of an equal partner with Gus in the drug operation.

I am pretty sure Chuck never knew about squat cobbler. But, both Chuck and Howard knew of many other dirty tricks by Jimmy.

I felt bad of Lyle. He spent hours scrubbing the fryer and Fring burns down the place.

Buddy's "Jumbo Tron" can be seen several times in the Season 4 Finale, above the scoreboard, every time they show the score and in the background when Lance kicks the game winning field goal.

I was wondering if Howard and Cliff were meeting to discuss the Sandpiper case. We haven't heard anything about it recently, and I would think they should be close to a settlement (and a nice paycheck for Saul) by now. S&C is defense council for Sandpiper. I wonder if Kim might do something unscrupulous to assist D&M and HHM in the case against her firm's big client, to help Saul get a huge check. She has already shown a willingness to screw over Kevin and Paige, who really made her career. She has no direct relationship with Sandpiper and it is genuinely a scummy company for defrauding elderly residents. I don't think it would be difficult for Saul to convince Kim that screwing over Sandpiper would be a justifiable use of their super powers.

Definitely the biggest plot moving episode of the season. I loved the Mike, Fring and Nacho stuff. I had kind of stopped caring about what happened to Mike and Fring, but this episode sucked me back in. I love when Mike is scheming and being Dave Clark, instead of feeling sorry for himself. Fring going on the offensive against Lalo was also refreshing. I had always assumed Lalo must have been in prison, when Walt and Jesse threatened Saul in the desert in BB, and this episode seems to confirm it. I guess Mike empathizes with Nacho over Fring having a gun to his father's head because Hector essentially had the Cousins put a gun to Kaylee's head. I thought the Saul scam was pretty well done. Yes, there were some potential holes in it, but I think if Kevin fought him it would be mutually assured destruction. Kevin sensed that Saul was crazy enough to launch his nukes and gave in to demands that weren't too outrageous, especially the copyright infringement part. I am not sure I bought Kim's reaction. When she was seemingly angrily taking articles of clothes off, back at the apartment, I thought she might surprise us by revealing that Saul scamming her made her horny, and jumping him. But, when she talked out the situation rationally and then suddenly came to the conclusion that maybe they should get married, I didn't really buy it. I wonder if there was any to Kim being a cello player and Chuck's wife Rebecca being a violinist. Probably not, the cello was probably just something heavy for Kim to lug home. I guess we know Kim's eviction story she told Acker was true, or based upon a true story.

FIFY

I don't want to go on forever with this but, Walt had any idea how violent it would become. Social IQ might not really be the operative thing here. Walt had a very low "meth dealer IQ". Even much later, Saul astutely told Walt and Jesse "You two suck at peddling meth." As he went along he deluded himself, but I recall him saying something like "Nobody else gets hurt." after the Emilio and Krazy-8 incidents.

Yes, Kim is nowhere near as bad as Walt. But, her fall just seems pointless. There were reasons for Walt's fall. He did some bad things and got sucked into doing even worse things to escape the consequences of the earlier things. Later, he became a power mad egomaniac. With Kim it is more like, "Let's see, I can be a very rich, very successful banking lawyer, who can give tons to charity and spend most of my time doing pro bono work. Or, I can throw it all away for the cheap thrills of conning people. I choose the latter. "

Walt had an actual IQ of probably 160 or more. But, his social IQ, especially when it came to things like the underworld of drug dealers. was closer to 60. You might want to watch Season 1 again. I don't doubt that Walt was, in part lying to himself. But, he was pretty good at convincing himself of those lies. Jimmy is way past lying to himself at this point. He is what he is, and I think that makes him less interesting than he was, while he was making the transformation. As for Kim, she still doesn't seem as self aware about what a foolish scumbag she has become. But, I am starting to find her back and forth between good girl, ambitious talented lawyer and con artist, lowlife lawyer kind of tedious, at this point. It seems like she has convinced herself that Kevin is some sort of "villain" for wanting to take possession of his own land, that he paid for and that Acker had no legal or moral right to. I think she is still deluding herself that she and Saul are using their powers for good in this case. It would be funny if Acker turned around and took maybe $50,000 and said he was looking to move all along, but wanted to squeeze more out of MV, and then Kim gets fired and or disbarred for helping the real villain con her best client and the man who gave her the job that made her career.

Obviously Walt knew it was illegal. But, I think the writers made it crystal clear (no pun intended) that, in the beginning, he had NO idea what he was getting into. Like, Gale, Walt naively thought he could just replace a portion of the local meth supply with a superior product, What Walt did was wrong, but there is no way he thought, "I'll cook some meth, it will kill X number of tweakers, and I will also have to kill X number of rival drug dealers, and indirectly cause a plane crash that kills 167 people....." Walt was brilliant in chemistry and science in general. But, he was clueless in many other things and was socially awkward. When Elliot offered him the job, he didn't even pick up on the fact that it was an act of charity until Elliot raved about how great the health plan was. It really wasn't until Tuco beat up Jesse and stole their meth that Walt started to understand the meth business and got tough.