-
Recent Posts
- Better Call Saul: There Are No Happy Endings between a “Rock and Hard Place”
- Black Widow Keeps It in the Family for Natasha’s Last Ride
- Loki Finds New Purpose in the Man behind the Mischief
- In its Debut, Star Wars: The Bad Batch Decides Whether to Obey or Rebel
- Nomadland: A Film Out of Time, For Our Times
Archives
Recent Comments
Meta
Tag Archives: Episode Reviews
After Its Season 3 Finale, Westworld May Be Unfixable
If I could make only one rule for Westworld, it would be this — no more twists. The series is addicted to pulling the rug out from under its audience, trying to make fans say “whoa”, or otherwise recontextualizing everything the audience has seen so far. That approach completely undermines the show’s attempts to tell stories, establish character, and convey meaning. As I discussed on the Serial Fanaticist Podcast, when everything the audience sees is merely a setup for some later subversion, none of it matters, and all the audience at home can do is wait for the punchline.
“A Parks and Recreation Special” Was Warm, Familiar, and Exactly What We Needed
Five years after it left the airwaves, Parks and Recreation is back for a scripted reunion special that brings together all your favorite employees of the Pawnee Parks Department during their self-quarantine. Leslie Knope has organized a phone tree with her husband, Ben Wyatt, and all her old friends to make sure everyone’s okay and maintain her connection to her loved ones while they all have to stay socially distant.
Posted in Other Sitcoms, Television
Tagged Episode Reviews, Leslie Knope, Michael Schur, Parks and Recreation
Leave a comment
Better Call Saul and the Hidden Descent of Kim Wexler in “Something Unforgivable”
Chuck McGill once described his brother with a law degree as like “a chimp with a machine gun.” That conjures a particular image, one of extreme recklessness and likely harm from a device far beyond the comprehension or abilities of its user. As Lalo showed us here, you don’t need to have perfect aim or a good line of sight to do some serious damage with one of those at your disposal. That’s why Chuck, in his own mind at least, worried so much about his brother entering his hallowed profession.
Better Call Saul: Why His Girl Friday Speaks to Kim Wexler’s Fate in “Bad Choice Road”
I’ve always thought of His Girl Friday as a tragedy. When Kim and Jimmy sit down to watch the film in “Bad Choice Road”, they’re watching the story of someone who nearly breaks free of a life and a job she excels at, but which doesn’t make her happy. But then she’s lured back into it through the dirty tricks of her conniving former paramour and the inexorable pull it has over her. (The movie is also, not coincidentally, the story of a talented and dogged female professional who ends up hitched to a manipulative, morally-dubious huckster.) That subtle call out to the 1940 classic carries meaning for both Jimmy and Kim.
Better Call Saul: The Reason to Keep Walking Through Hell in “Bagman”
One of the kindest things you can say about Better Call Saul is that it rarely feels like Breaking Bad anymore. Sure, there’s still bits of cartel intrigue, and preludes to the war between Gus and the Salamancas, and a shared propensity to write characters into corners and force them to think their way out. But despite its roots, Better Call Saul has become its own show, with its own world and voice and style that are distinct from the story of Walter White.
Better Call Saul: The Clash of the Personal and the Professional in “JMM”
It’s supposed to just be business. You come in. You sign the forms. You check the boxes. You pay the fine. What you don’t do is get sentimental. There are practical reasons to take this step — reasons that, not coincidentally, help preserve your ongoing safety and non-incarceration.
But then you look at the person standing across from you, someone whose joy and pain matters to you, and all of a sudden, it’s impossible to pretend that this is just a ministerial act or some necessary concession to the gods of legal privilege and bureaucracy. Instead, it becomes something more, something meaningful, something personal, with an emotional charge and an attendant importance that elevates it above business as usual.
Better Call Saul and the Plans and Schemes that Rule the Day in “Wexler v. Goodman”
Better Call Saul’s major players are always making plans. It’s one of the features that makes this show (and its predecessor) so engrossing. In between the committed character work and gorgeous desert styling, there’s intersecting schemes that either merge together or crash into one another, until our champions and villains are left to pick up the pieces.
Better Call Saul: When Something Means More Than Just Business in “Dedicado a Max”
We’re used to Jimmy McGill pushing limits and crossing lines. Time after time, Better Call Saul serves up scenarios where its title character faces two options: do things the safe and expected way, or do them the Saul Goodman way. The latter might gain Jimmy a little more, but it’s also riskier and sometimes even dangerous.
For once, though, it’s Kim taking that type of risk. She’s obviously no stranger to participating in Jimmy’s schemes and even concocting some of her own. But she’s also always had a limit, a certain line she refused to cross, even if doing so would get her what she wanted. It’s in Jimmy’s nature to cheat and finagle and squeeze the last bit of juice out of everything. It’s in Kim’s to dabble in those conman ways, even excel at them, but to ultimately come back to the light.
Better Call Saul: The Good Guys and Bad Guys Fight the Same Fight in “Namaste”
If there’s a persistent thematic undercurrent that touches each part of Better Call Saul (and maybe even Breaking Bad), it’s that people from very different walks of life are not all that different. Respected and superficially decent men like Chuck McGill and Walter White can be cruel and self-serving. Those on the margins of society like Nacho Varga and Jesse Pinkman can be intelligent and empathetic. And crime bosses and young attorneys can be equally determined, equally dogged, and equally committed to doing what they must to win the long game.
Better Call Saul: Misdirected Anger, Urban Antpiles, and Broken Glass in “The Guy for This”
I could write an entire review just trying to decode all the little images that “The Guy for This” parcels out for the viewer. One of the things that sets Better Call Saul (and its predecessor) apart is a penchant for that type of symbolism. The visual conveys as much of what the audience is supposed to take away as the dialogue. So when an episode begins with ants slowly but surely descending on Jimmy’s ice cream cone, and ends with the aftermath of that miniature invasion, it’s clear that Peter Gould and company are trying to tell us something.
