S04.E10: Winner

[Bannon]

1 hour ago, Eulipian 5k said:

It didn't sound like this was a new question. It seemed that No TV Ads was "settled law" in the company. It may well have been written in company policy, anyway. All the senior staff knew it was wrong and felt it would damage their reputation. Lawyers and doctors didn't do TV ads and I got the impression that ethics was the reason. I'm sure both professions could pump up their business with a TV campaign  but where would it end?

Oh right,, it ends with those reallly, really, sleazzy ads Saul Goodman runs on TV.

No, it wasn't settled, because after Jimmy ran his cheesey, but effective ad D&M ran a staid and ineffective t.v. spot. The point is that if D&M doesn't want their brand associated with cheesey but effective t.v. spots, then you just run the spots with a different law firm's brand which then funnels the business to D&M.

Edited October 9, 2018 by Bannon

[Macbeth]

8 hours ago, Eyes High said:

The karaoke scene was terribly on the nose, with Chuck being a much better singer than Jimmy and taking over the song to show off (not to mention the lyrics), but I loved it.

Props finally paid to Michael McKean who was in "This is Spinal Tap."  I would not have been happy if Jimmy was a better singer.  Although his character, David St. Hubbins, would never sing a song by Abba.  I loved that they chose a song by Abba.

Edited October 9, 2018 by Macbeth

[DangerousMinds]

2 minutes ago, Macbeth said:

Props finally paid to Michael McKean who was in "This is Spinal Tap."  I would not have been happy if Jimmy was a better singer.  Although his character, David St. Hubbins, would never sing a song by Abba.

❤️❤️❤️

[slippity slack]

5 hours ago, Tikichick said:

 

 

It's damned refreshing to get a female character onscreen who isn't beholden to address anyone's ideas about how sexual she should or shouldn't be, rather that she should simply exist as she wishes -- something afforded to male characters without question because they gots more important things to do.  Kim and Jimmy are in a relationship.  Nobody's questioned Jimmy not being a sexual being.  Sauce for the goose . . .

Yes! I think Kim is one of the best characters. I would love to find out more about her past. Rhea Seehorn is amazing in this role.

[SailorGirl]

7 hours ago, ShadowFacts said:

 Mike didn't even seem that conflicted, 

I respectfully disagree. You could hear his voice wavering, trying not to break, when he was trying to get through to Werner the reality of what was going to happen. He was talking stoically but then the frustration and anger, and yes, sadness, that he was going to have to kill his friend creeped through. The more Werner kept talking, thinking he could reason his way out of it, had to hurt Mike because Mike had TRIED to save Werner with Gus but Gus wasn't having it. Just because Mike knew he had to do it, doesn't mean he wasn't bothered by it. 

The voice waver was VERY subtle -- just like the lip twitching during the grief group meetings  -- and proved yet again how truly talented Jonathan Banks is. 

[Bannon]

11 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

When Chuck started the deception, Jimmy was not his servant.  He was they guy Chuck freed from a prison sentence and sex offender tag and gave a job.  

Keeping a secret to avoid hurting someone's feelings, and breaking up the only family relationship that Jimmy had,  is not even close to as bad as what Jimmy did.  

I'm pretty sure just about every person on earth has, at one time or another, made up an excuse to not do something for or with a family member.   That does not make them "scumbags" especially when they saved that family member's life from utter ruin.  

So true!  I hadn't thought of that.   

I have no idea what making up an excuse to not do something for or with a family member has to do with lying to a family members face,  for years, on a matter of vital importance to that family member. The  latter is what Chuck did  and yeah that makes him a scumbag,  although that is a term I usually don't use.

[Bryce Lynch]

7 minutes ago, Bannon said:

I have no idea what making up an excuse to not do something for or with a family member has to do with lying to a family members face,  for years, on a matter of vital importance to that family member. The  latter is what Chuck did  and yeah that makes him a scumbag,  although that is a term I usually don't use.

He didn't lie to Jimmy's face for years.  He lied to him once.   I'm sure most people have told a family member they couldn't make a wedding, birthday, funeral, for a reason that wasn't true.  Others have claimed they didn't have money to lend, when they really didn't want to lend the money or didn't trust the family member to pay it back.   

All Chuck did was protect his firm, his partners, his associates. and his clients from one of the most corrupt attorneys you could ever imagine, who had been a thief and con artist since age 9.  Yeah, he lied to Jimmy about it, to prevent Jimmy from having the meltdown he had a year or so later when he found out the truth.   

The moral equivalence you draw between Chuck telling Jimmy one lie, that some would consider a white lie, and the numerous lies Jimmy told to defraud people and the numerous felonies he committed is absurd.  

It would be like equating Marie's shoplifting to Walt or the Nazis mass murders.   

[j-beda]

4 hours ago, PeterPirate said:

I guess "good science fiction" has its basis in reality.  A few months ago I did some calculations and found, to my surprise, that the magnetic field generated by a disconnected cell phone battery was pretty close to the field from an "Exit" sign about 40 feet away. 

The following is extremely rough and hand-wavy, but not totally unreasonable. My distant memory from doing chapter problems from Jackson are that magnetic fields drop off with the cube of the distance (dipole fields at reasonable distances), so 40 feet would have fields something like 1/40^3 compared to fields at 1 foot, so a factor of around 1/640. The voltage of the electrical power at that exit sign is something like 120V, while the cell phone battery is around 3v or 6v, so you might think that at the same distances, the exit sign has fields that are something like 20 or 30 times as strong, so given the distances involved, one might think that the Exit sign would have a smaller effect. Think again! The fields are not a function of the voltage, but rather a function of the current. Incandescent bulbs at 100W have about 1 Amp of current running through them, while cell phones transmit around 1-3W, giving currents in the 1 to 2A range for 3-6V (which seem absurdly high for hand-held electronics). So at similar distances, they seem to be giving similar fields, but at the 40 foot distance, the closer source would be much more important.

But of course, none of this makes any sense, since a disconnected battery has zero current flowing, and thus creates zero magnetic field beyond any intrinsic magnetism of its component parts. Magnetic fields from incandescent bulbs powered by 120V AC wiring are difficult to measure at 40 foot distances since they are so small, but they are still way bigger than zero.

[scenario]

1 minute ago, Bryce Lynch said:

He didn't lie to Jimmy's face for years.  He lied to him once.   I'm sure most people have told a family member they couldn't make a wedding, birthday, funeral, for a reason that wasn't true.  Others have claimed they didn't have money to lend, when they really didn't want to lend the money or didn't trust the family member to pay it back.   

All Chuck did was protect his firm, his partners, his associates. and his clients from one of the most corrupt attorneys you could ever imagine, who had been a thief and con artist since age 9.  Yeah, he lied to Jimmy about it, to prevent Jimmy from having the meltdown he had a year or so later when he found out the truth.   

The moral equivalence you draw between Chuck telling Jimmy one lie, that some would consider a white lie, and the numerous lies Jimmy told to defraud people and the numerous felonies he committed is absurd.  

It would be like equating Marie's shoplifting to Walt or the Nazis mass murders.   

I don't believe that Chuck told Jimmy that he would be happy to see jimmy join HHM but Howard wouldn't let him only once. It was an ongoing lie. What Chuck did was emotional abuse. What Jimmy did was criminal. One does not excuse the other. 

[Bryce Lynch]

1 minute ago, scenario said:

I don't believe that Chuck told Jimmy that he would be happy to see jimmy join HHM but Howard wouldn't let him only once. It was an ongoing lie. What Chuck did was emotional abuse. What Jimmy did was criminal. One does not excuse the other. 

How is it emotional abuse?  It actually made Jimmy feel better about himself and happier than the truth would have.  I am not saying it was right to lie, but to call it emotional abuse seems overly dramatic.  

[scenario]

10 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

How is it emotional abuse?  It actually made Jimmy feel better about himself and happier than the truth would have.  I am not saying it was right to lie, but to call it emotional abuse seems overly dramatic.  

Stringing someone along knowing that they'll never get what they want qualifies to me. Giving someone what they want instead of what they need can be abuse. , yes 

To me its like when partner A keeps telling Partner B, "I love you,  We'll get married someday and have lots of kids." But when partner B finally pressures partner A into saying what they really plan the answer is "You really thought I'd marry someone as ugly and stupid as you."

Chuck pretended that he was trying to get Jimmy a job as a lawyer for years and years. Stringing someone along can be abusive.  

[Bannon]

18 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

He didn't lie to Jimmy's face for years.  He lied to him once.   I'm sure most people have told a family member they couldn't make a wedding, birthday, funeral, for a reason that wasn't true.  Others have claimed they didn't have money to lend, when they really didn't want to lend the money or didn't trust the family member to pay it back.   

All Chuck did was protect his firm, his partners, his associates. and his clients from one of the most corrupt attorneys you could ever imagine, who had been a thief and con artist since age 9.  Yeah, he lied to Jimmy about it, to prevent Jimmy from having the meltdown he had a year or so later when he found out the truth.   

The moral equivalence you draw between Chuck telling Jimmy one lie, that some would consider a white lie, and the numerous lies Jimmy told to defraud people and the numerous felonies he committed is absurd.  

It would be like equating Marie's shoplifting to Walt or the Nazis mass murders.   

He lied to his face, and let the lie stand uncorrected for years, which is the same as lying to him for years. It is absurd to compare a lie about going to a function, to a lie as to why someone cannot be employed at a job, a job that a person very much wants to have, especially in this circumstance, since a reasonable person might think "My senior partner brother is willing to hire me, but the other senior partner is not, but maybe the day will come when my brother, who loves me, will sway the other senior partner.", as opposed to "Well if my brother says he'll never let me work here, that dream is dead". This is not a white lie, and it is absurd that you characterize it as such, and it is absurd for you to imply that Chuck had to lie to protect the firm. Chuck lied because he was a scumbag who didn't want to have an honest conversation with his brother, for who knows what reason, although it was certainly convenient that the person he was lying to eventually was acting as his servant for years.

You misrepresent what I wrote when you claim I stated a moral equivalence between Chuck's and Jimmy's bad acts. I plainly wrote that Jimmy's were worse. That has nothing to with the fact that Chuck's longstanding, and extremely important lie to Jimmy was the act of a scumbag. Chuck doesn't get off the hook because Jimmy did worse things.

[JoeyCrown]

1 hour ago, Bannon said:

You don't need tp be an attorney to recognize poor problem solving skills, and managers at successul businesses make mistakes  and when they make them frequently enough, the business becomes unsuccessful. The idea that you are going to be able to find employees who are well above average at generating revenues, and without significant weaknesses is just unrealistic. Employees who are really good at generating revenues are rare, so when you get one, they need to be managed, so their weaknesses are mitigated. This is how managers are supposed to earn their salaries, by extracting value, while limiting risk. Does  it work all the time? Of course not, but that's why you need to be creative. Jimmy being a poor fit for a large, traditional law firm was a solvable problem, I think.

1 hour ago, Bannon said:

You don't need tp be an attorney to recognize poor problem solving skills, and managers at successul businesses make mistakes  and when they make them frequently enough, the business becomes unsuccessful. The idea that you are going to be able to find employees who are well above average at generating revenues, and without significant weaknesses is just unrealistic. Employees who are really good at generating revenues are rare, so when you get one, they need to be managed, so their weaknesses are mitigated. This is how managers are supposed to earn their salaries, by extracting value, while limiting risk. Does  it work all the time? Of course not, but that's why you need to be creative. Jimmy being a poor fit for a large, traditional law firm was a solvable problem, I think.

1 hour ago, Bannon said:

You don't need tp be an attorney to recognize poor problem solving skills, and managers at successul businesses make mistakes  and when they make them frequently enough, the business becomes unsuccessful. The idea that you are going to be able to find employees who are well above average at generating revenues, and without significant weaknesses is just unrealistic. Employees who are really good at generating revenues are rare, so when you get one, they need to be managed, so their weaknesses are mitigated. This is how managers are supposed to earn their salaries, by extracting value, while limiting risk. Does  it work all the time? Of course not, but that's why you need to be creative. Jimmy being a poor fit for a large, traditional law firm was a solvable problem, I think.

On 10/3/2018 at 7:53 PM, Tara Ariano said:

 

What happens now with Werner’s crew?

[JoeyCrown]

What now happens with Werner's crew?

[LoneHaranguer]

18 hours ago, Lonesome Rhodes said:

Unspoken, but very definitely part of Jimmy's agony in the Esteem, was not just that elites would never let him truly in - but that he was never truly good enough to ever have a Kim love him.

So, Jimmy was looking at a future without esteem?

[Penman61]

8 hours ago, Tikichick said:

Why is it that only Kim's physical attractiveness is being called into question?  Funny how it's not even a consideration for the other characters.

*Correction, not funny.  Not funny in the least.

ITA.  My problem is that THE SHOW (i.e., characters, narratives, et al.) doesn't acknowledge the obvious disparity in looks/brains/character between Jimmy and Kim.  I mean, the looks disparity is EXACTLY the kind of thing Jimmy McGill would make a joke about, even (especially?) if the joke were on himself.  It just always taxes my suspension of disbelief.

Also: Werner's death was way too lyricized and aestheticized.  Would love to have seen him go insane with desperation and claw at Mike, scream, cry, tear at Mike's flesh to try to save himself.  Make Mike get his hands a little dirty to match his soul.  Instead, Mike got to shoot Werner from behind, at a distance, in the dark, against a Spielbergian starfield. 

Edited October 9, 2018 by Penman61

[Ellaria]

Apologies if I missed this discussion...

I'm interested in knowing what others thought about the scene between Gus and Gale in the unfinished meth lab. I'm not 100% certain it served a purpose in this episode (or season) beyond reminding us that Gus was in a cranky mood. Gale was his usual talkative, enthusiastic self until he caught that look of doom. 

BCS is very good about including links back to BB...reminders to essentially say "pay attention." However, in this instance, I'm not sure why Gus showed Gale the unfinished lab. Gus didn't seem open to conducting a "cook" in those conditions. Maybe it was a way to demonstrate that it remained unfinished and Kai & Company were either sent home or buried in cement somewhere.

Regardless, don't we need confirmation about what happened to them? Mike told Werner that they would be sent home. Not sure if I believe him. While I would like closure on what happened to the German engineers, I would not mind if the next time we see the meth lab, it is finished.

[Bannon]

20 minutes ago, Penman61 said:

ITA.  My problem is that THE SHOW (i.e., characters, narratives, et al.) doesn't acknowledge the obvious disparity in looks/brains/character between Jimmy and Kim.  I mean, the looks disparity is EXACTLY the kind of thing Jimmy McGill would make a joke about, even (especially?) if the joke were on himself.  It just always taxes my suspension of disbelief.

Also: Werner's death was way too lyricized and aestheticized.  Would love to have seen him go insane with desperation and claw at Mike, scream, cry, tear at Mike's flesh to try to save himself.  Make Mike get his hands a little dirty to match his soul.  Instead, Mike got to shoot Werner from behind, at a distance, in the dark, against a Spielbergian starfield. 

My guess is that Kim wouldn't score that much more highly on an IQ test. I dont know about you, but I know lots of couples with a looks disparity. Nobody talks about it, in my experience. I suppose there could have been some dialogue at some point  with regard to why Kim wasn't dating somebody with a better reputation, but I think that is kind of what the company party scene was all about.

[ShadowFacts]

14 minutes ago, Penman61 said:

Also: Werner's death was way too lyricized and aestheticized.  Would love to have seen him go insane with desperation and claw at Mike, scream, cry, tear at Mike's flesh to try to save himself.  Make Mike get his hands a little dirty to match his soul.  Instead, Mike got to shoot Werner from behind, at a distance, in the dark, against a Spielbergian starfield. 

Yes.  Werner was too passive going to his slaughter.  Mike is committing a cold-blooded execution of his "friend", and we are treated to a stunning visual.  It didn't sit right with me at all. 

1 minute ago, Ellaria Sand said:

Regardless, don't we need confirmation about what happened to them? Mike told Werner that they would be sent home. Not sure if I believe him. While I would like closure on what happened to the German engineers, I would not mind if the next time we see the meth lab, it is finished.

I don't think I believe him, and I'm not so sure Gus won't have taken care of Margarethe, too.  She is too much of a loose end.  Mike might want her to be visited by lawyers who give her an accident story, but Mike's not in charge. 

[Madding crowd]

This episode broke my heart, yet was so well done. The karaoke scene was everything. “Winner takes it all” indeed. Chuck will always be better at everything even singing and he had to grab the mic and lead, as always.

I knew Jimmy was scamming at the hearing but he wasn’t when he was talking to the scholarship applicant. Felt bad for Werner who really thought Mike was his friend and bad for the murdered clerk who was trying to be a nice guy.

I will of course watch next season but I won’t be able to see Saul as anything but a tragic character who lost the best thing to ever happened to him all because he couldn’t get his brother’s respect. I really don’t want to see anything bad happen to Kim and will hope she finds success and live. I don’t feel sorry for Mike either. He always wants to be the guy who knows everything and is always in charge-he knew where this road would lead. 

Edited October 10, 2018 by Madding crowd

[PeterPirate]

2 hours ago, j-beda said:

The following is extremely rough and hand-wavy, but not totally unreasonable. My distant memory from doing chapter problems from Jackson are that magnetic fields drop off with the cube of the distance (dipole fields at reasonable distances), so 40 feet would have fields something like 1/40^3 compared to fields at 1 foot, so a factor of around 1/640. The voltage of the electrical power at that exit sign is something like 120V, while the cell phone battery is around 3v or 6v, so you might think that at the same distances, the exit sign has fields that are something like 20 or 30 times as strong, so given the distances involved, one might think that the Exit sign would have a smaller effect. Think again! The fields are not a function of the voltage, but rather a function of the current. Incandescent bulbs at 100W have about 1 Amp of current running through them, while cell phones transmit around 1-3W, giving currents in the 1 to 2A range for 3-6V (which seem absurdly high for hand-held electronics). So at similar distances, they seem to be giving similar fields, but at the 40 foot distance, the closer source would be much more important.

But of course, none of this makes any sense, since a disconnected battery has zero current flowing, and thus creates zero magnetic field beyond any intrinsic magnetism of its component parts. Magnetic fields from incandescent bulbs powered by 120V AC wiring are difficult to measure at 40 foot distances since they are so small, but they are still way bigger than zero.

I used the equation B = kI/r for the strength of a magnetic field from a wire.  In other words, the field strength drops off with distance, not distance-squared as expressed in the show.  I looked up the amperage of an exit sign, as well as the charge of a cell phone battery and the time it takes for it to lose the charge.  I assumed the loss of charge was due the flow of electrons across the barrier, hence the current.  I was lazy and assumed a constant current instead of an exponentially decaying one.  I have the numbers floating around my computer somewhere.    

I also took physics decades ago.  But my daughter is majoring in chemistry, so I have to keep on my toes in case I get asked to do her homework for her tutor her.  I tell her to hurry up and graduate so she can develop her own version of blue meth and support her old man.  

Edited October 10, 2018 by PeterPirate

[Ellaria]

23 minutes ago, ShadowFacts said:

Yes.  Werner was too passive going to his slaughter.  Mike is committing a cold-blooded execution of his "friend", and we are treated to a stunning visual.  It didn't sit right with me at all. 

I don't think I believe him, and I'm not so sure Gus won't have taken care of Margarethe, too.  She is too much of a loose end.  Mike might want her to be visited by lawyers who give her an accident story, but Mike's not in charge. 

Not passive, necessarily. Defeated perhaps. I like @Penman61's description of the scene as "lyricized." I also think we were supposed to be watching Mike more than Werner (who was doomed weeks ago). 

I forgot about poor Margarethe. Guess she could be considered a loose end since she showed up in Albuquerque. Frankly, if I were Margarethe, I would be suspicious of the phone call from Werner saying - suddenly - that he didn't want to see me. I would probably file a police report. While that would not accomplish much, it certainly would qualify me as a "loose end."

Edited October 10, 2018 by Ellaria Sand

[Blackie]

22 hours ago, AEMom said:

It's going to be a long year waiting for next season.

really another year to the next season? By then Mike is going to look like he is 100 and Gus Fring isn't  looking any younger either.  I don't know how they are keeping Jimmy looking younger then Breaking Bad but he is the only one.  I like this show, I really do, but it moves at such a snail's pace and so long between seasons, I don't how much longer the premise that this is the prequel to Breaking Bad can go on.

[Bryce Lynch]

I was rewatching the scholarship board scene.  Howard was REALLY upbeat and enthusiastic.  It seems like Jimmy's $#1++y lawyer speech did the trick.  Something did. He seems happier than he has ever been before.

Regarding, Christi the shoplifter.  Howard's question to her was "What was it like working with elders?" We don't hear the answer as all the kids' responses were cut off after a word or two.

I imagine her working with elders probably made Jimmy identify with her more.

I also noticed Chuck's portrait hovering over Howard's shoulder and staring right down at Jimmy.

Edited October 10, 2018 by Bryce Lynch

[Milburn Stone]

It seemed imprudent of Jimmy to be yelling "I sure pulled the wool over those sucker's eyes!" when any one of them could have walked right by at any moment.

But there I go (there I went) feeling nervous for Jimmy despite knowing he's a lying scumbag!

[Bryce Lynch]

Looks like Lalo climbed on top of the soda machine to get inside the ceiling.  

Lalo knows that Werner was working for Fring and needed to clear debris and then pour concrete for the South wall.  That is all he got from Werner on the job, so he might not even know it was underground.

Edited October 10, 2018 by Bryce Lynch

[100Proof]

2 hours ago, PeterPirate said:

I used the equation B = kI/r for the strength of a magnetic field from a wire.  In other words, the field strength drops off with distance.....

 

Freaky..... just what the heck is going on in the fabric of space between magnets anyway. I think most people think subatomic particles are just super tiny ball bearings. But  they're just pretty much made up mathematical probability constructs, lol.  =8-O

1 hour ago, Blackie said:

really another year to the next season? By then Mike is going to look like he is 100 and Gus Fring isn't  looking any younger either.  I don't know how they are keeping Jimmy looking younger then Breaking Bad but he is the only one.  I like this show, I really do, but it moves at such a snail's pace and so long between seasons, I don't how much longer the premise that this is the prequel to Breaking Bad can go on.

Ah, its all probably filmed and in the can already, lol

No problem. CGI can plaster a younger face on anything now. (wow that carrie fisher trick was hella creepy anyhow), lol

Edited October 10, 2018 by 100Proof

[PeterPirate]

5 hours ago, Bannon said:

You don't need tp be an attorney to recognize poor problem solving skills, and managers at successul businesses make mistakes  and when they make them frequently enough, the business becomes unsuccessful. The idea that you are going to be able to find employees who are well above average at generating revenues, and without significant weaknesses is just unrealistic. Employees who are really good at generating revenues are rare, so when you get one, they need to be managed, so their weaknesses are mitigated. This is how managers are supposed to earn their salaries, by extracting value, while limiting risk. Does  it work all the time? Of course not, but that's why you need to be creative. Jimmy being a poor fit for a large, traditional law firm was a solvable problem, I think.

It's one thing to have employees who make mistakes.  It's quite another to have employees who commit felonies, such as trying to extort people into becoming his clients, or manufacturing evidence.  

Let's start with the premise that Firm X wishes to hire Jimmy McGill after he leaves D&M.  There are, as I see it, three possibilities:

1.  The managers at Firm X are not aware of Jimmy's crimes.  In which case they do not have sufficient information to manage Jimmy adequately.  This is what happened at D&M.  Even after they hired him, they never learned about his illegal stoppage of a Sandpiper van to recruit clients.  

2.  The managers at Firm X are aware of Jimmy's crimes, but decide to go ahead and hire him anyway, with certain contractual provisions intended to prevent him engaging again in criminal conduct.  While such a service contract might prevent recidivism on Jimmy's part, I doubt there are many law firms out there that would take on that much potential liability as accessories-after-the-fact, regardless of how much revenue they stood to receive.   

3.  The managers at Firm X are aware of Jimmy's crimes, and offer to hire him with the proviso that he report all of his misdeeds to the proper authorities, thereby shielding them from liability.  I doubt Jimmy would accept employment under such circumstances.  

And this is in addition to my previous posts about Jimmy's non-criminal but reckless behavior.  I just don't buy the notion that even the most intelligent managers can fashion conditions of employment what will sufficiently guarantee ethical behavior out of someone as willfully unethical as Jimmy.  Frankly, I find such assertions somewhat deterministic.  

Edited October 10, 2018 by PeterPirate

[scenario]

I've worked at several large international companies and ethical behavior is not really important to management. I can't remember how many times I've been ordered to lie to customers or written up for not lying to customers. Being pressured to sell stuff to customers who clearly don't need it is common. A common attitude among managers is that if you're not willing to lie and cheat, you're not really trying. Setting objectives so high that the only way to reach them is to cheat is commonplace. I can't remember how many interviews I've read where someone got killed because of unethical but legal behavior and the people who ran the company really didn't understand what they did wrong. You see unethical behavior in business, religion, government and most of the people who are acting unethically have no concept that they are being unethical. 

From my experience about 25 to 30% of people really have no understanding what ethical behavior is. That's why I tend to give Jimmy some slack. He's only moderately worse than people I've known who were well respected. He just took it one step further. 

There are an awful lot of companies out there who would have no problem with Jimmy as long as he made enough money for them. 

[Lonesome Rhodes]

Werner's passivity?  If he wanted Mike to honor his word as to protecting Margarethe, he needed to make it easy on Mike.  The basic math was all too obvious for any possibility of his escaping his fate.  Werner died a practical death.

I'm not sure of, by any means, the fate of Kai and the boys.  I think they well knew what happened to Werner and could be counted upon to stay silent.  At some point, Gus simply has to accept some risk with his associates.  To that point:  What about Mike's guys?  They know way more than the engineers.  They were not on the Fring-e of things.  They were embedded.  Whichever way Gilligan intends the fate of all those folks to have been is fine by me.  Yet, in the end, I don't think Gus is a Salamanca who glories in meting out violent punishments.  

The opening sequence with the brothers appeared to me to be a dream.  The multiple POVs is easily explained in the context of a dream. 

My first data point is that, as others have shared, Chuck had already cut Jimmy deeply with his initial reaction.  That Chuck, and the Chuck we got almost exclusively, would never have presented the chimpanzee for sacred admittance to the Bar of New Mexico.  Second, Kim's lipstick was beyond any I remember her wearing.  It was very bright and there was a ton of it.  Her face was caked with a white powder (or some type of bright white make-up) I similarly do not recall ever seeing her effect.

Jimmy's near-complete transformation into Saul happening in the context of the hearing and his actions within it make more sense and are more real to me if Chuck never honored Jimmy as we saw in the open.  

I've loved reading this thread.  I hate the thought that this is pretty much it for these as it is for the show itself.  It's another loss, after an ep steeped in loss. 

[Bannon]

1 hour ago, PeterPirate said:

It's one thing to have employees who make mistakes.  It's quite another to have employees who commit felonies, such as trying to extort people into becoming his clients, or manufacturing evidence.  

Let's start with the premise that Firm X wishes to hire Jimmy McGill after he leaves D&M.  There are, as I see it, three possibilities:

1.  The managers at Firm X are not aware of Jimmy's crimes.  In which case they do not have sufficient information to manage Jimmy adequately.  This is what happened at D&M.  Even after they hired him, they never learned about his illegal stoppage of a Sandpiper van to recruit clients.  

2.  The managers at Firm X are aware of Jimmy's crimes, but decide to go ahead and hire him anyway, with certain contractual provisions intended to prevent him engaging again in criminal conduct.  While such a service contract might prevent recidivism on Jimmy's part, I doubt there are many law firms out there that would take on that much potential liability as accessories-after-the-fact, regardless of how much revenue they stood to receive.   

3.  The managers at Firm X are aware of Jimmy's crimes, and offer to hire him with the proviso that he report all of his misdeeds to the proper authorities, thereby shielding them from liability.  I doubt Jimmy would accept employment under such circumstances.  

And this is in addition to my previous posts about Jimmy's non-criminal but reckless behavior.  I just don't buy the notion that even the most intelligent managers can fashion conditions of employment what will sufficiently guarantee ethical behavior out of someone as willfully unethical as Jimmy.  Frankly, I find such assertions somewhat deterministic.  

 

Since I specifically stated that sometimes it doesn't work, it is the opposite of deterministic. Words actually have definitions.

Look, it's o.k. to disagree,  but my point was that it would be important to not actually have Jimmy as an employee.

(edit) Eh, I see where you might think I was saying Jimmy should have been managed as an employee. I was writing generally, but elsewhere in the thread I put forth the idea that the best way to get what you need from Jimmy, without the risk, would be to have him outside the firm.

Edited October 10, 2018 by Bannon

[shapeshifter]

15 hours ago, Ellaria Sand said:

I'm interested in knowing what others thought about the scene between Gus and Gale in the unfinished meth lab. I'm not 100% certain it served a purpose in this episode (or season) beyond reminding us that Gus was in a cranky mood. Gale was his usual talkative, enthusiastic self until he caught that look of doom. 

I thought the purpose of this interaction between Gus and Gale was to be a contrast to Werner and Mike, with Mike being a proxy for Gus. That is, Gale took very seriously the displeasure of Gus, whereas Werner tended to shrug it off, as when Werner replied to Mike's, "What did you think was going to happen?!" with, "I thought you would be angry at first, and then you would forgive me."

 

 

15 hours ago, ShadowFacts said:

Yes.  Werner was too passive going to his slaughter

I, OTOH, thought this was very typical of Werner—not wanting a scene. Werner only ever became loud and angry—as far as I recall—at Margarethe on the phone because he knew her life depended upon it. I would wager he had never before raised his voice to her.
It's interesting that the traits that got Werner hired over the other guy—carefully explaining the requirements, not acknowledging experience with illegal operations—were some of the same traits that led to his failure in this venture, as well as his ultimate demise.

ETA: I just noticed how phonetically similar the title of the episode, "Winner," is to the name of poor ill-fated Werner. There really were no winners, even with Jimmy getting reinstated and Mike catching Werner for Gus and Lalo talking to Werner. Well, maybe the 3 scholarship recipients were winners — although my experience as a parent and as an employee in academia is that scholarships lead to debt for the portion not covered by the scholarship.
Editing again: Whoops! I neglected to acknowledge:

1 hour ago, Bryce Lynch said:

The direct "winner" reference is to Jimmy and Chuck's duet of "The Winner Takes it All".

 

 

13 hours ago, Bryce Lynch said:

Lalo knows that Werner was working for Fring and needed to clear debris and then pour concrete for the South wall.  That is all he got from Werner on the job, so he might not even know it was underground

Despite Mike's reassuring Gus that Lalo didn't get any significant info, I think that's more than enough for Lalo to convince Hector that Gus is likely building a meth lab.

Edited October 10, 2018 by shapeshifter

[SayMyName]

I would bet that Margarethe dies in a car "accident". No way she goes home and never sees her husband again without contacting the German authorities.  What kind of job wouldn't let her visit other than something on a ship or oil rig? She had to know it was something illegal with the coded messages. Gus should have gone with all single guys on the crew.

So much for making Werner's death look like a work accident. No body or one with a bullet hole in the back its head is going to be kind of hard to explain.

Seeing Gale so excited to be a meth cook is weird...but that look Gus gave him should have told him that cooking meth isn't all fun and games.

[Dobian]

So many great moments in this one:

The scenes with Chuck in the beginning were priceless.

Jimmy's speech to that high school girl after her interview was so true to who Jimmy is, and the most honest thing anyone is ever going to tell her.  He may have launched a successful career right there.  A shady, underhanded career, but highly successful!

Mike's bubble gum trick at the parking ticket machine was clever.

Gus was as cold and ruthless as ever.

Mike's final moments with Ziegler were tough, you could tell how it was tearing him up to have to do that.

Kim's disappointment in Jimmy after he gloated about winning over the panel was palpable.

And so Saul is finally born.

[Bryce Lynch]

3 hours ago, SayMyName said:

I would bet that Margarethe dies in a car "accident". No way she goes home and never sees her husband again without contacting the German authorities.  What kind of job wouldn't let her visit other than something on a ship or oil rig? She had to know it was something illegal with the coded messages. Gus should have gone with all single guys on the crew.

So much for making Werner's death look like a work accident. No body or one with a bullet hole in the back its head is going to be kind of hard to explain.

Seeing Gale so excited to be a meth cook is weird...but that look Gus gave him should have told him that cooking meth isn't all fun and games.

Mrs. Werner was about to rent a car when Werner called her and demanded she return home.  If she listened like Werner told Mike she would, she should make it home to Germany.  

I also don't get how they will explain his death to her.  Maybe Mike meant that the German lawyers would be sent by Fring to lie to her and say he drowned or something and his body was lost, and give her some "hazard pay".  Mike swore to Werner that she would be told a story, though he might have lied.  Having Werner just disappear without an explanation seems like too much of a loose end, though.

I always liked Gale, but it always seemed odd that people trashed Walt for cooking meth, but gave him a pass.  Seeing how enthusiastic he is reinforces that feeling.

[JudyObscure]

15 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

 

I always liked Gale, but it always seemed odd that people trashed Walt for cooking meth, but gave him a pass.  Seeing how enthusiastic he is reinforces that feeling.

Gale had such a delightful personality combined with a terrible ability to disconnect from the consequences of his actions.  Walt, at least, started out with a sort of noble purpose.  His ability to sacrifice others for the sake of his wife and son was bad, but it was relatable.  Gale simply told himself one of the easiest and most common excuses to do wrong,  "If I don't do it someone else will."  He just ignored the fact that kids with undeveloped brains were stepping straight into addition with his product.  Gale's own dark side made him  able to  sense how dangerous Fring was straight away, while the truly good man Werner, thought Fring and Mike would never actually hurt him because he was judging them by his own humanity.  I thought Werner probably believed he was building something for the CIA or a medical research facility. The Gales and Lalos are more chilling to me than Hector Salamanca because of that normal, charming veneer while being casually ruthless.

[Blakeston]

14 hours ago, Eulipian 5k said:

It didn't sound like this was a new question. It seemed that No TV Ads was "settled law" in the company. It may well have been written in company policy, anyway. All the senior staff knew it was wrong and felt it would damage their reputation. Lawyers and doctors didn't do TV ads and I got the impression that ethics was the reason. I'm sure both professions could pump up their business with a TV campaign  but where would it end?

Oh right,, it ends with those reallly, really, sleazzy ads Saul Goodman runs on TV.

I don't think Davis & Main's policy was "no TV ads." In one episode, we saw an ad that they'd used before. IIRC, it was just a voiceover with text on the screen.

I'm sure an ad like that wouldn't get as many responses as a sappy, emotionally manipulative ad like Jimmy made. But like you said, there's a significant price that comes with an ad like Jimmy's, which is that it makes the firm look trashy. For a firm like Davis & Main, it just isn't worth it.

If major, well-respected firms wanted to create cheesy ads like that, it would be pretty easy. I definitely thought it was impressive that Jimmy, as an amateur director, was able to put something together that looked competent - but  I've never bought into the idea that he was some sort of advertising genius for coming up with that concept and script. 

[Bryce Lynch]

1 hour ago, JudyObscure said:

Gale had such a delightful personality combined with a terrible ability to disconnect from the consequences of his actions.  Walt, at least, started out with a sort of noble purpose.  His ability to sacrifice others for the sake of his wife and son was bad, but it was relatable.  Gale simply told himself one of the easiest and most common excuses to do wrong,  "If I don't do it someone else will."  He just ignored the fact that kids with undeveloped brains were stepping straight into addition with his product.  Gale's own dark side made him  able to  sense how dangerous Fring was straight away, while the truly good man Werner, thought Fring and Mike would never actually hurt him because he was judging them by his own humanity.  I thought Werner probably believed he was building something for the CIA or a medical research facility. The Gales and Lalos are more chilling to me than Hector Salamanca because of that normal, charming veneer while being casually ruthless.

Lalo is definitely casually ruthless.

Gale is far less evil, in my opinion.  He rationalizes that if he doesn't cook the meth, those addicts will simply buy lower quality, perhaps dangerously tainted meth from other sources.  There is some truth to that.

I just don't get how people loved Gale but claimed Walt was evil from the moment he started cooking meth to provide for his family.

Seeing Gale's enthusiasm, I am also starting to become conviced that Gale either knew or suspected that once he told Fring he had Walt's process mastered, Fring would kill Walt.  He seems less naive than he came across in BB.

[shapeshifter]

4 hours ago, Dobian said:

Mike's bubble gum trick at the parking ticket machine was clever.

But so very MacGyver. I mean, with Lalo hot on his tale and all.

[Bryce Lynch]

The more I consider it, the more I think the writers blew a huge hole in the plot with the strip club/bar trip, and letting us know that the Germans knew they were in ABQ.

When it seemed like is was crucial for them to not know where they were, the warehouse compound, the tight security and the urgency in not letting Werner or anyone else escape made perfect sense.

But, once they already knew they were in ABQ, what is the big deal if Werner runs off for 4 days with his wife?  There would be a slight delay in the work, Gus would be pissed and it would create trust issues, but it was not a new threat to the secrecy of the lab.

Ironically, the panicked search for Werner is what got Lalo on Mike and Werner's trail, got Travel Wire Fred killed, and through his conversation with Werner, gave Lalo some significant clues about what Fring is up to.     

Edited October 10, 2018 by Bryce Lynch

[ShadowFacts]

8 hours ago, Lonesome Rhodes said:

Werner's passivity?  If he wanted Mike to honor his word as to protecting Margarethe, he needed to make it easy on Mike.  The basic math was all too obvious for any possibility of his escaping his fate.  Werner died a practical death.

I didn't get the sense of a negotiation, though, as far as Werner trying to ensure his wife's safety.  Was that going to depend on if he went quietly to his execution, and if he made it "hard", then Mike wouldn't do what he said he would do?

8 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

I, OTOH, thought this was very typical of Werner—not wanting a scene. Werner only ever became loud and angry—as far as I recall—at Margarethe on the phone because he knew her life depended upon it. I would wager he had never before raised his voice to her.
It's interesting that the traits that got Werner hired over the other guy—carefully explaining the requirements, not acknowledging experience with illegal operations—were some of the same traits that led to his failure in this venture, as well as his ultimate demise.

Not to belabor the point, this isn't A Tale of Two Cities, but going to one's death is an occasion to become more vocal.  At least if it were me, and I am definitely putting myself in Werner's place, there would be some attempt at appealing to his humanity, and then there would be some f*** this, you don't have to do this.  But I get that his not wanting a scene was part of his persona.  And that we had to see Mike take his final descent. 

[Bryce Lynch]

9 hours ago, Lonesome Rhodes said:

The opening sequence with the brothers appeared to me to be a dream.  The multiple POVs is easily explained in the context of a dream. 

I'm sure it was not a dream.  The flashbacks have been used to give us more insight into the relationship between Chuck and Jimmy.  This one showed more of the love that Chuck had for Jimmy.

While I was surprised that Chuck vouched for Jimmy, when you think about it, it makes sense.  a) If he wanted to maintain the deception that Howard was the one who rejected Jimmy, he couldn't say no. b) Saying no, would not have prevented Jimmy from becoming a lawyer.  Kim could have vouched for him.  c) While he didn't like it, he never actively tried to prevent Jimmy from practicing law (until the MV incident).  He tried to prevent him from practicing with HHM or with McGill in his firm's name, but that was it.  

[Bryce Lynch]

9 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

ETA: I just noticed how phonetically similar the title of the episode, "Winner," is to the name of poor ill-fated Werner. There really were no winners, even with Jimmy getting reinstated and Mike catching Werner for Gus and Lalo talking to Werner. Well, maybe the 3 scholarship recipients were winners — although my experience as a parent and as an employee in academia is that scholarships lead to debt for the portion not covered by the scholarship.

The direct "winner" reference is to Jimmy and Chuck's duet of "The Winner Takes it All".  Last night, on rewatch, I noticed that Jimmy said "the winner takes it all" to Christi the shoplifter, near the end of his awful, speech fullof self pity, blaming others and horrible advice.

Christi's mistake is not going to haunt her for the rest of her life, unless she lets it.  Her future is as bright as she makes it.  Her juvenile shoplifting conviction would be sealed and she can go on with her life as if it never happened.  

Jimmy is such an ahole, trying to fill that promising girl's head with a false sense of hopelessness.  Even with his background, and low character,  Jimmy was able to get a cushy job with a great law firm, but he threw it in the trash.  

Edited October 10, 2018 by Bryce Lynch

[benteen]

That was Jimmy being all about Jimmy.  He has a ME ME ME personality and that showed with Christi. 

[PeterPirate]

9 hours ago, scenario said:

I've worked at several large international companies and ethical behavior is not really important to management. I can't remember how many times I've been ordered to lie to customers or written up for not lying to customers. Being pressured to sell stuff to customers who clearly don't need it is common. A common attitude among managers is that if you're not willing to lie and cheat, you're not really trying. Setting objectives so high that the only way to reach them is to cheat is commonplace. I can't remember how many interviews I've read where someone got killed because of unethical but legal behavior and the people who ran the company really didn't understand what they did wrong. You see unethical behavior in business, religion, government and most of the people who are acting unethically have no concept that they are being unethical. 

From my experience about 25 to 30% of people really have no understanding what ethical behavior is. That's why I tend to give Jimmy some slack. He's only moderately worse than people I've known who were well respected. He just took it one step further. 

There are an awful lot of companies out there who would have no problem with Jimmy as long as he made enough money for them. 

I think this is all true.  Just think of some of the major scandals in big business over the years.  Wells Fargo is currently in the news.  From time to time I use Enron to make a point about something.  

As Mike told Squat Cobbler Guy, being a criminal did not necessarily make him a bad guy.  Just a criminal.  Whenever I have used the word "scumbag" in referring to Jimmy, I have used quotation marks to indicate that I was articulating the point of view of other people such as the ADA or the cop that Huell clocked.  While I think their use was not inappropriate from their perspective, it is not a word that I would necessarily use for Jimmy.  And I have three reasons for making this choice.  

1.  Jimmy gave up a payoff of over a million dollars to restore Irene's reputation with her peers, and he did so completely on his own with no prompting from Kim.

2.  We rarely see Jimmy--or Saul, for that matter--participate in a crime involving an innocent victim.  His moniker, "Slipping Jimmy" does imply there were innocent victims back in Ciero, but we never see them.  I think the Music Store guys were innocent, but to the best of my recollection they were the only ones.  

3.  Jimmy is the titular character, and to use such a term on a regular basis would take away my ability to assess the character.  Same thing goes for Chuck.   There are a lot of scenes where others think they were lying or had mixed motives, but where I choose to take their words more or less at face value, because in doing so I can experience them as heavily flawed human beings who articulating the truth as they understand it, instead of scumbags who are always trying to manipulate others.  

Edited October 10, 2018 by PeterPirate

[Bannon]

49 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

The more I consider it, the more I think the writers blew a huge hole in the plot with the strip club/bar trip, and letting us know that the Germans knew they were in ABQ.

When it seemed like is was crucial for them to not know where they were, the warehouse compound, the tight security and the urgency in not letting Werner or anyone else escape made perfect sense.

But, once they already knew they were in ABQ, what is the big deal if Werner runs off for 4 days with his wife?  There would be a slight delay in the work, Gus would be pissed and it would create trust issues, but it was not a new threat to the secrecy of the lab.

Ironically, the panicked search for Werner is what got Lalo on Mike and Werner's trail, got Travel Wire Fred killed, and through his conversation with Werner, gave him some significant clues about what Fring is up to.     

It only makes sense if the rest of the Germans get sent to Belize as well. I can buy them giving up on the location secrecy goal, if simply faced with a construction crew on the verge of mutiny, due to being cooped up too long. I can buy denying Werner 4 days off with his wife,  because you are already way behind schedule, and then you get the rest of the crew asking  for 4 days off.

Once you give up the secrecy goal, then the question becomes whether you decide to kill the crew at the end of the job. I can buy letting them live, because having a bunch of German nationals disappear in the SW United States (Werner could have easily told people in Germany of the general vicinity of his work), causes problems too. The problem is that Werner has shown himself as being wholly unreliable now. Everybody's gotta go, because Werner's disappearance will be talked about. The least bad option is a charter flight to Belize for everybody.

[peeayebee]

14 hours ago, Ellaria Sand said:

I'm interested in knowing what others thought about the scene between Gus and Gale in the unfinished meth lab. I'm not 100% certain it served a purpose in this episode (or season) beyond reminding us that Gus was in a cranky mood. Gale was his usual talkative, enthusiastic self until he caught that look of doom. 

I wondered the point of this scene, too. One thing I figured is that this is probably the first time Gale saw the scary side of Gus. But why did Gus take him there? I may be wrong, but I think that Gus is going to put off the construction of the lab since Lalo is nosing around, so why bring it up with Gale?

[Bryce Lynch]

2 minutes ago, Bannon said:

It only makes sense if the rest of the Germans get sent to Belize as well. I can buy them giving up on the location secrecy goal, if simply faced with a construction crew on the verge of mutiny, due to being cooped up too long. I can buy denying Werner 4 days off with his wife,  because you are already way behind schedule, and then you get the rest of the crew asking  for 4 days off.

Once you give up the secrecy goal, then the question becomes whether you decide to kill the crew at the end of the job. I can buy letting them live, because having a bunch of German nationals disappear in the SW United States (Werner could have easily told people in Germany of the general vicinity of his work), causes problems too. The problem is that Werner has shown himself as being wholly unreliable now. Everybody's gotta go, because Werner's disappearance will be talked about. The least bad option is a charter flight to Belize for everybody.

I basically agree.  I think once all the workers knew the location, the safest thing for Gus is to send them all to Belize.  But, if they are not sending them all to Belize, I see no reason to send any of them there.  It it just mind boggling that they would go to all the trouble they did to keep things secret, then take them to a bar in freaking ABQ, instead of going to Vegas, or pretty much anywhere else.  The ABQ trip would make sense if they planned to kill them all at the end of the job anyway.  But, if that is the case, all the drama over Werner was manufactured.  

2 minutes ago, peeayebee said:

I wondered the point of this scene, too. One thing I figured is that this is probably the first time Gale saw the scary side of Gus. But why did Gus take him there? I may be wrong, but I think that Gus is going to put off the construction of the lab since Lalo is nosing around, so why bring it up with Gale?

Good question.  Maybe he wanted to get an idea from Gale about how much more work would be absolutely necessary to get cooking.  Maybe Gale's goofy and over enthusiastic behavior convinced Gus that he should wait until it was done right.  It is also possible Gale's behavior caused Gus to question how cautious and reliable Gale is, after what he just went through with Werner.  Maybe he wants to consider finding a different chemist, while the basement is completed.  

[Bannon]

4 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

I basically agree.  I think once all the workers knew the location, the safest thing for Gus is to send them all to Belize.  But, if they are not sending them all to Belize, I see no reason to send any of them there.  It it just mind boggling that they would go to all the trouble they did to keep things secret, then take them to a bar in freaking ABQ, instead of going to Vegas, or pretty much anywhere else.  The ABQ trip would make sense if they planned to kill them all at the end of the job anyway.  But, if that is the case, all the drama over Werner was manufactured.  

Again, the sense of being way behind schedule is what makes the R&R in ABQ a credible possibility for me. Every decision maker on the planet is prone to conceding a goal once thought very important, once the primary goal of getting the task accomplished, in a time frame that allowed for overall success, is threatened. That's how you end up with a bunch of Astronauts killed in front of a world wide television audience. I read the scene with Gus and Gale as an angry, chastened, Gus conceding that he had allowed a sense of haste (he really does need the lab producing before the Salamancas get back on their feet, and before Don Eladio gets wind of it) to get the better of him, and going back to his insistence that things be done right, no matter the time involved.

[Dobian]

1 hour ago, Bryce Lynch said:

But, once they already knew they were in ABQ, what is the big deal if Werner runs off for 4 days with his wife?  There would be a slight delay in the work, Gus would be pissed and it would create trust issues, but it was not a new threat to the secrecy of the lab.   

 

The big deal to Gus is that the more these guys are out on their own, the more chance they have to talk, and word starts getting around.  Werner proved this when he was running off at the mouth at the bar.  Gus likes to keep things under control with nothing left to chance.

Edited October 10, 2018 by Dobian