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Ah, back to the naming convention that we all got comfortable with. I looked ahead and - no spoilers - that pattern remains through the rest of the season. Maybe season 2 will be named after Beatles songs.

We start the episode, like many of them this season, in a flashback. This is taking place in the relatively recent past, 3-6 months earlier. This episode jumps back and forth between the present day (Mike being questioned with Saul by the Philly cops) and into the past, either in Mike's last days in Philly or his first days in Albuquerque. It's pretty obvious in the show which is which due to a matrix-like blue filter. I think they have used this filter in previous episodes' flashbacks (chuck bailing out jimmy maybe?), so it's probably no big revelation.

Tune into the TV Soup Podcast (Better Call Saul, "Five-O" Review)

This episode's story is told like an old cop drama. He's got a tough exterior, made a few mistakes, but is generally a good guy. It's the tale of Mike Ehrmantraut, which might not be terribly relevant to people who have only seen BCS, but for those of us who watched all of Breaking Bad, this was some back story that was a looong time coming.

Back to present day and Mike is in an interrogation room and won't say anything until his lawyer gets there, now, apparently, Jimmy McGill. Mike has a plan, as he always does, and tries to get Jimmy to help him steal the detective's notebook. Jimmy instantly rejects the idea - he's trying to be on the straight and narrow, but of course goes along with the plan when push comes to shove. During this interview, we're finally given some insight into things that actually happened in Philadelphia.

Mike gets the notebook and gets a good look at what the cops have on him (interesting side note - the AMC story sync has some great images of the notebook so you can see what they have) and realizes that his daughter-in-law called the Philly detectives after Fenske and Hoffman were killed. She thought there could be a connection, and presumably, told them that Mike was now in Albuquerque. Mike goes to confront Stacey about her calling the cops, and while he winds up admitting the phone call Matt had that she was worried about was actually with Mike, you don't get much else. Mike just stubbornly says "My boy wasn't dirty".

We move into a flashback as smooth as silk, and Mike is walking down the street back in Philly. He niftily breaks into a police car and proceeds into the bar and Mike appears to be really deep in his cups when we see Fenske and Hoffman for the first time. Mike's already put his plan into action (breaking into the car to plant a gun) but it really gets into motion when he walks up to them and tells them that he knows it was them (who killed Matty).

The plan comes together perfectly (as most of his plans in BB did), and it's great watching it for a second time, seeing how everything falls exactly into place. Getting picked up by the cops after the bar closed, giving them the ringer gun, waiting until they did decide to kill him.

Back in the present, Mike is back at Stacey's house and ready to pour his heart out. This is one of the best scenes that Jonathan Banks has had in both shows, and showcases his talent - he's not just grumpy and rough on the exterior. Mike explains everything that happened around Mikey's death, "breaking his boy" and finishes it with "you know what happened. the question is - can you live with it?"

Better Call Saul is back for another week of the misadventures of James McGill. Last week, it was a “Jimmy lite” episode, focusing on Mike’s backstory, but this week we’re back with Jimmy firmly in focus. Of course, we do wind up starting off with a little unfinished business from last week, the return of the notebook.

On their way to talk to the detectives, Jimmy claims that he and Mike “found” the notebook in the parking lot. Sure, guys. The real meat of this scene is the discussion that Mike has with the older cop. It’s made as clear as it can be (with some cryptic words) that Hoffman and Fenske deserved what they got. It’s also made clear to Mike that if his daughter-in-law doesn’t rat on him, the case is going to end right there.

Mike decides that he’s no longer going to require Jimmy’s services, as he’s fairly certain that his daughter-in-law will not tell on him, and his business with Philadelphia is finally behind him. Mike tells him to send him a bill, and of course, knowing the relationship these guys have in Breaking Bad, we know it won’t be a typical invoice for billable hours.

Tune into the TV Soup Podcast (Better Call Saul, "Bingo" Review)

Jimmy heads over for his daily delivery of ice and bacon to Chuck, and even though they were out of bacon that day, how awesome is Jimmy as a brother to bring him bacon on a daily basis. Jimmy wants to get Chuck back into the swing of just doing something and has his own plan, but seems pleasantly surprised that Chuck is taking his own initiative, spending a solid 120 seconds outside of his house (only 200 meters away from a 60 kilovolt transformer). Jimmy leaves a big stack of paperwork to “store” at Chuck’s house, purposely dropping the wrong form name in order to get Chuck’s legal juices flowing.

Kim and Jimmy go checking out a new office for the James M McGill law firm, and it's a pretty swank place. I have trouble believing that Jimmy can afford this after such a short time in elder law, though to his credit, he has been hitting the bingo circuit pretty hard. He offers a partnership to Kim (in hindsight, he may only be able to afford this place if she works with him and steals a few HHM clients), who turns it down in favor of continuing at HHM, where she's put in a lot of time. Jimmy is clearly disappointed, but stays supportive. Could Kim be one of the ex-wives he mentions in Breaking Bad?

Over at HHM, Kim is explaining the deal that she worked out for Craig Kettleman. Of course, his wife Betsy is having none of it, insisting on not using the word "deal" ("a deal is what they got O.J."), insisting that there is no money, and finally insisting on being found not guilty after a trial. Betsy is almost full on nuts at this point, completely detaching herself from reality with the thoughts of what she wants to do with the $1.6 million. It seems to me at this point, she would send Craig to jail for the full 30 years if it meant that she could keep the money.

The Kettlemans go crawling back to Jimmy, which would have made him thrilled a week or two prior to this, but now he's got his elder law gig rolling and doesn't really want to take the case. In fact, they interrupt Jimmy while being a bingo caller - proving nobody can pander quite like Jimmy. At Jimmy's conference room - aka the cafe - the bribe from the Kettlemans once again becomes a 'retainer' and Jimmy is roped into representing them for the time being.

There were two funny moments in the cafe - first, Craig can't get any coffee and doesn't say anything about it. He's definitely the weaker one in the relationship (probably pressured into robbing the money!), and they show it with their clothes. In this scene, Betsy is wearing a very bright red/pink, and Craig has a muted pink shirt. In the previous meeting, the same thing happened, but with Blue. The other moment is at the end of the meeting when Jimmy insists on talking like they all know the money exists, which nearly pops a blood vessel in Betsy's head.

This show continues to have a lot of fun with shadows. Jimmy and Kim are standing in the shadows while Kim waxes on about just how fucked the Kettlemans are. Earlier in the episode, faces had their now familiar half shadows, with the right half generally being "good" and the left being whatever was opposing that.

Jimmy, stressing out in his office over just what to do, comes up with a plan, but by the looks on his face, he's not thrilled with it. This cues an awesome and rather long montage. We see the whole plan play out, executed by Mike (Jimmy sent him his bill). Spanning what feels like forever, they are able to tell a whole story with no dialogue, while keeping everyone intrigued and revealing just one piece of the plan at a time. This montage is some of the finest work we've seen thus far in Better Call Saul. The ratings have remained relatively steady, which is a good sign that we can go beyond the second season, already under contract.

The shadow play continues after the money is stolen. Jimmy's left side is brightly illuminated, (the bad side), but now the right side of his face has just a little light cast on it (usually it's a clear 50/50). Jimmy is doing "the right thing" - insert finger quotes here. Mike is going to return the money, and Jimmy is going to be able to force the Kettlemans to return to HHM and accept the plea deal. This gets Kim back in the good graces of her boss, but Jimmy really isn't sure how to feel after all of this. He goes to the new office again, probably to say goodbye to it and lets his frustrations out on a door. He's definitely not going to be able to afford that place now.

This episode starts off like a lot of the series – blue filtered flashback! I love the way that this show is laying out its backstory, doing a lot of showing, rather than telling. (They can show that Howard Hamlin is a dick – nobody needs to say that in the show at all). This filter gets so much use, they’ve even used it a few times in the “previously on” clips at the beginning of the show. This is fun in a technical sense, but we’re not here to talk about filters, are we?

We learn about the day that Jimmy finally became an attorney. He passed the bar exam (kept secret from his brother no less) and is very excited to finally go to work WITH his big brother, not just for him passing out everyone’s mail. While celebrating later that day, Howard Hamlin (one of Chuck’s partners) just can’t wait to tell Jimmy that he won’t be working as an attorney for them, and that they’ll “revisit” the thought in six months. Maybe he’s just not impressed by a correspondence degree from the University of American Samoa, but I think it’s really about Hamlin’s power within the law firm and him not wanting the balance to slide back towards the McGill side of things.

Throughout the series, I have to remind myself that we’re watching the life of Jimmy McGill, not Saul Goodman. This means that every time I assume that he’s out to cheat somebody or be a generally shady lawyer, this is not likely to be the case. The lady he visits at the Sandpiper Crossing home is a prime example. She seems like someone who is very vulnerable, but instead of acting on it, he actually looks out for her interests (albeit because his own are not tended to – she does not have the money to pay him for the will).

This leads to Jimmy finally getting a big break on all the hard work he’s been doing. He discovers that there is fraud within the Sandpiper system, and gathers more information from a few residents before heading back to Chuck’s house to see what he thinks of the paperwork he’s managed to rustle up during the visit.

Tune in to the TV Soup Podcast - (Better Call Saul - "RICO" Review)

At the house, we learn just a couple of things about Chuck and Jimmy. First – Chuck thinks that Jimmy left all the paperwork at the house because he didn’t have time to take care of it, but last week I theorized that Jimmy left it there in order to get Chuck going again. I think the latter is still the case, as evidenced by Jimmy later in the episode, stating that working on a case is great for Chuck. Second, Chuck asks if these inconsistencies were present in the paperwork that he was doing. Yes, they were, Jimmy informs him, but hey, Jimmy got lucky just to stumble into this case. This is another example of people underestimating Jimmy’s abilities. He clearly came across this through his own hard work, but nobody will acknowledge this. I expect this to become a bigger issue later on.

Jimmy returns to Sandpiper, only to discover that they no longer allow solicitors (not gigolos) on their property. They also installed a few security guards, just in case he didn’t get the message. Frantically, he pens one of the best legal documents I’ve seen on TV. A demand letter is presented to the receptionist as he leaves the bathroom, written on the back of a legal pad and an indeterminate amount of toilet paper. Jimmy gets an A for creativity and improvisation, but a D on penmanship.

Mike’s scenes in this show have been few and far between thus far, save for an episode that was entirely about him. They still don’t merge very well with the show, and I suspect that people new to the Vince Gilligan universe are getting annoyed with this. Perhaps the writers are leaning too much on our familiarity with Mike from a different show – though they are also doing that with Jimmy/Saul, so it goes both ways.

Mike is thrilled to be back, in any way, in his granddaughter’s life, and is ready to take off work in order to babysit her. After Stacey (his daughter-in-law) gets home, she asks him what she should do with the money that she found (the money that Matty had taken which ultimately got him killed). Mike tells her to spend it so that some good might come from it. She then mentions that while it will help, it won’t be enough – cue Mike back at the vet’s office, asking if there’s some “work” to be done.

I’ve gone on and on about how much I like the montages in this show, but I suppose it’s always best to be careful what you wish for. This episode featured one of the grossest montages I’ve seen – Jimmy dumpster diving looking for the documents that Sandpiper was shredding earlier that day. While in the muck (seriously, this made me squirm a bit), he receives a call from Sandpiper’s lawyers, and even in his ridiculous position, he at least knows that they’re going to take this semi-seriously.

This scene is followed up with a good, short montage (ok, maybe the dumpster scene isn’t technically a montage, but it’s still nasty). Jimmy is trying to put together the shredded documents and Chuck walks in, assuming the worst. Jimmy’s defense is that it was in a public place – “You can’t say it’s private if a hobo can use it as a wigwam. That’s the standard, right?” After Chuck’s begrudging agreement that he didn’t steal it, he sets to helping Jimmy put together one hell of a word search. This is the perfect job for a guy who is a borderline nutcase.

So, it turns out that Chuck is awesome at putting together shredded documents and has a smoking gun ready for Jimmy when he wakes up. More importantly, Chuck wants to work on the case with Jimmy, as long as Jimmy is ok with it (Chuck knows its Jimmy’s case). Jimmy has all of the sudden realized one of his dreams and is working on a big time case with his brother. Not only does he finally get to do this (he’s been working a long time to do so), but this can be good for Chuck too, keeping busy with work is a good way for him to try to “get better”.

Chuck gives Jimmy his printing code (probably not been used in a year or more) in order to get background from Westlaw (an online legal research service). This has to become relevant later on, as this now means that HHM is being billed for work done on Jimmy’s case. Kim brings up an objection to this, but Jimmy insists that this is going to be fine, and besides, Kim definitely owes him one.

Jimmy and Chuck fax a copy of the reconstructed documents to Sandpiper's lawyers, thus netting some serious consideration and a meeting. Rich Schweikart and the rest of the lawyers for Sandpiper roll up to Chuck's house for the big meeting, because, after all, Chuck isn't "currently" going anywhere. There's the expected nerves before the meeting, but Jimmy is the lead here, Chuck is there for muscle.

Jimmy laughs off the weak offer from Sandpiper and turns in a great performance for him (the character) personally. He's able to shine, as a lawyer, right there in front of his big brother. That may even snap Chuck out of his funk, because as soon as they're asked how much money they want, he's back. Chuck speaks up (clearly not planned) and tells them $20 million or you'll see them in court.

The case is really rolling now, both Jimmy and Chuck a really getting sucked into the case. Jimmy gets back from chasing old people in the mall and leaves some documents in the car. A perfect opportunity for Chuck to mindlessly go out to the car to retrieve them. We're left wondering what happened as a result, but I think that the ambient distraction fading away to the sounds of the outside is a fantastic sign for Chuck's mental state.

This episode starts off very innocently, we’re outside and Jimmy and Chuck are enjoying their feet in the grass. Chuck is trying to get more used to being outside (he’s sitting in front of the transformer). It's a quick scene, a little small talk about the case, but a big contrast from later in the episode, down to it being bright and outside, and later is all dark and shadowy. Yes, this show loves to play with lighting.

Jimmy (I wrote Saul here initially - maybe being in court really reminds me of him as Saul) argues (successfully) against a restraining order that would have kept him from seeing his clients. This was never going to stand anyways, and he's given a big thrill by an early victory, but he doesn't realize that this is just the first drop of a tidal wave his opponents are ready to unleash at him. Schwiekart is pumping him up with some false bravado before he brings in the big guns.

(Tune in to the TV Soup Podcast - Better Call Saul S01E09 - "Pimento" Review)

Jimmy gets back to Chuck’s and is snapped into reality with a ton of paperwork that Schwiekart & Cokely had delivered while he was in court. Chuck breaks it down and has to tell Jimmy that he needs to refer the case over to HHM. This is exactly what Jimmy didn't want to do. Jimmy wants to "Erin Brockovich" the shit out of the case (as a reference, this is interesting, because she's not really a lawyer), but Chuck (of all people) has to force Jimmy to see reality. "Hail Satan. I submit to the dark side".

Chuck, in the middle of the night, sneaks out to use Jimmy's phone. Think about everything he had to "overcome" in order to pull that off. That means that this phone call is incredibly important AND he can't tell Jimmy about it. What the fuck, Chuck? At least he stabbed his brother in the back in the least dignified way possible - wearing a space blanket and oven mitts.

Mike (first to work, he also does his homework) is waiting in the parking garage. He meets a gigantic dude "is this the place where we wait" and the guy from Grand Theft Auto. Literally. There's a hilarious "whatcha packing" sequence. "pimento is a cheese, they call it the caviar of the south". Their "employer" pulls up and he's worse than Walter White at the very start. The theme of this scene seems to be people who are talking way too much. Also that Mike is a complete badass.

Chuck, dressed in a foil-lined suit, heads over to HHM with Jimmy in order to refer the case to them. We see at HHM that everyone is turning in their old ass cell phones (good job props department). They cut the power to the building and Chuck gets a huge welcome from the entire firm. In the boardroom, Howard makes Jimmy really happy with the financial side of the deal, but he cannot work there. Jimmy demands an explanation from Howard, who just stonewalls him. Chuck doesn't really fight for him, and in fact almost seems to be making faces at Howard which give him up, but Jimmy is really focused on Howard. He's always taken the fall for Chuck and it's really starting to eat at him.

Kim confronts Howard after the meeting and after berating him, Howard can't stand being the bad guy on this to Kim (maybe he likes her?) and finally spills the beans (behind closed doors). Howard's been the bad guy up till now and maybe he's not all that bad, because even as a high powered lawyer, he can't stand being quite that crappy.

Mike is finally in his element that we're so familiar with from Breaking Bad. He squeezes Nacho (first sighting since ep 2) for the last $20 of the money and impresses us all with the background work he had done on the deal before getting there. Mike is like the wizened old criminal, doling out sage advice and teaching budding criminals the ropes.

The dominoes are starting to fall now, as is typical in the penultimate episode of a good series. Kim goes to Jimmy's and tells him to take the deal. She doesn't tell him about Chuck (though it's assumed that she knows by now). Jimmy goes off on her, one of his only real friends. After she leaves, he starts putting the pieces together about Chuck (his dead phone is a big clue). He has the look of a guy who knows he's about to discover a bad truth as he picks up his office phone.

Cut to Chuck's house for the final scene. Bob Odenkirk's acting all year has been great, but the last two scenes of this episode are really spectacular. I hope he's considered for an Emmy for this role. The reveal that Chuck has been the guy who kept Jimmy down since passing the bar exam is one that most of us were putting together from the beginning of the episode. The pacing of the reveal was great though. It allowed for Jimmy's long rant about the brothers working together, if that's what you really want. Chuck has a bit of a diploma entitlement thing going on, where he has no respect for the way that Jimmy became a lawyer. He knows he's still slippin’ Jimmy, but now he's a chimp with a machine gun. Funny way to put that. Jimmy isn't that guy, but Saul definitely is. Jimmy may eventually become Saul, but Chuck might be the spark that gave him life.