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AMC has been consistently chasing the success of its big three shows, Mad Men, Breaking Bad and The Walking Dead. They’ve been close to success with Hell on Wheels, but too many times they miss entirely like Halt and Catch Fire and Low Winter Sun.

What’s a network exec to do, you ask? Why, a spin-off show is just what Dr. Nielsen prescribes. While a show about Pete Campbell’s crazy college years or Daryl Dixon’s Crossbow Training Hour may be watched by the dedicated fans of those shows, it’s clear that Better Call Saul is the correct spin-off to start with. (And no, Breaking Bad isn’t already a spin-off of Malcolm in the Middle, even if that would be pretty cool).

This show starts off with a scene that shoves the pedigree of those that work on the show right in your face. Six beautiful minutes of Saul (now Gene) working at Cinnabon in Omaha clues everyone in on some of the things that have happened since the final events of “Felina”, the series finale of Breaking Bad.

Tune into the drinkfive TV Soup Podcast (Episode 01: Better Call Saul, "Uno" and "Mijo" Review)

Saul looks old, tired and paranoid. He’s longing for his past, his heyday, and puts on a VHS of his old commercials, the ones we loved so much in Breaking Bad. Check out http://www.bettercallsaul.com/ to join Saul on his trip down memory lane.

We are then dropped into the flashback that is basically the entire series. We see Jimmy McGill (Saul’s birth name) arguing as a public defender in a case where a bunch of juveniles appear to have cut the head off of a corpse and, well, had their way with it (“stick your wiener in the throat hole” was the Shakespearean-esque line delivered by the delinquent). I may not have that quote exact, I really don’t want to go back and watch that part again. Jimmy is clearly a loooong way from Saul Goodman at this point.

The first episode may not move as fast as future ones, mainly due to the fact that they need to take the time to introduce the new characters. We do get to meet a few skateboarding scammers (calling them scam artists would be a stretch) who try to get some money out of Jimmy, but clearly he’s a bad target. Not only is the car that he’s driving barely worth the gas in the tank – we’re talking about Slippin’ Jimmy here, the guy who knows all the tricks. Jimmy easily chases them off, but later when money becomes a bigger issue between him and his brother, he uses the skateboarders in an attempt to get a client.

In what could only be described as a plan by a desperate man, Jimmy plots with frick and frack (the skateboarders) to pull their stunt on a prospective customer of Jimmy’s. His plan is to sweep in and save the day and get their business on a much larger case.

Everything, of course, goes wrong once they fling themselves in front of a car (the wrong one). In a way that only Vince Gilligan can pull off, the ensuing scene is tense, but almost mundane. They’re chasing an old lady to a nice suburban home, and she’s too terrified to talk to anyone but her grandson. Her grandson, who just happens to be Albuquerque’s craziest gangster, Tuco Salamanca.

Episode two, lovingly titled “Mijo” (the nickname that Tuco’s grandma calls him by), is directed by Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones alumni Michelle MacLaren. MacLaren is possibly the queen of the montage in the modern day – she delivered us the “Crystal Blue Persuasion” montage from the end of season 5 on Breaking Bad, need I say more? She gives us not one, but two great montages in this episode, but more on those in a moment.

Everyone who writes for this show is great at is playing around with timelines. “Mijo” starts out a few minutes before the end of “Uno” with Tuco cooking in his Abuelita’s kitchen. We then see the end of the previous episode play out from Tuco’s perspective and Jimmy then has to deal with what is clearly the worst situation he’s ever gotten himself in (well, up to that point).

We quickly find ourselves in the amazingly beautiful and empty New Mexico countryside in a familiar situation. A couple of gangsters are preparing to kill Jimmy and his skateboarding buddies in the middle of the desert. Jimmy is able to show what may be his first flash of Saul Goodman and basically, as he says “negotiates a death sentence down to six months' probation”.

We’re then treated to a montage in a bar where a guy is endlessly breaking bread sticks and Jimmy can't get it out of his mind. Clearly he’s been affected by what happened today, even if after the whole situation is assessed he seems to have come out a winner. Jimmy may be a guy who would extort a few bucks out of people who didn’t shovel their sidewalk in Chicago, but nobody ever got hurt.

Two broken legs later and Slippin’ Jimmy is rethinking his life choices. This leads us into the second montage of the episode, where Jimmy doubles down on honest hard work, representing Albuquerque’s finest criminals as a public defender. Jimmy starts off with a chipper “It’s Showtime” before his first case, but by the end he is clearly run down by too many bad coffees and too much food from the vending machine. He even has to trade his bag of chips to the prosecutor to help out a guy he says is hungry and just stole a slice of pizza!

Vince Gilligan has shown us one man’s fall from grace and now it appears that we’re going to get to see another. The show has the pedigree – Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould are the writers/creators, Gilligan directs episode 1, Michelle MacLaren takes the reins for episode 2. The show also has a great supporting cast starting with Michael McKeen, Michael Mando from Orphan Black, and Breaking Bad alumnus Jonathan Banks as Mike Ehrmantraut.

This is Odenkirk’s first spin as a leading man in anything other than Mr. Show with Bob & David, so the jury is still out on him being able to carry a show for an entire season. If the first two episodes are any indication, Odenkirk will like what the jury has to say once the season is over. Better Call Saul is on at 10pm EST on Monday nights for the next 8 weeks and we will be reviewing the show in a live podcast every Tuesday night. Check out our podcast regarding these two episodes and stay tuned for next week.

This episode’s intro starts out with a flashback. We’re now inside of a flashback that’s inside of another flashback, for anyone who is counting. Can we go another level and see little Jimmy in grade school back in Cicero?

The intro flashback also features a clip of Chuck looking like a very young, posh lawyer, complete with electronic devices (though he’s ‘grounding’ himself to start the episode). We also get a shot of Jimmy, who apparently went and raided the wig department of “The Americans”.

Back to the main flashback (the show) and Jimmy is at his “office” late at night, enjoying some cucumber water and he calls his friend Kim (from the law firm) and just chats with her. We get some more insight into their background and Jimmy tries to warn Kim that the Kettlemans need to be careful, but he’s not great at being subtle or graceful and tries to write it off as being drunk.

Tune into the TV Soup Podcast (Episode 02: Better Call Saul, "Nacho" Review)

Jimmy is not a bad guy, ok. I think that the impression the writers are trying to make is that he, maybe unlike others in this world, does not want to hurt others along the way. His scams are always for money only and he only ever gets himself hurt. It’s this spirit in Jimmy that won’t let him sleep on this night. He knows that Nacho is planning something and he decides to try and warn the Kettlemans. One crazy phone call later (sex robot voice?) and Jimmy can finally sleep the rest of the night.

The following morning, after more courthouse frustrations (and hilarious television), Jimmy arrives at the Kettlemans empty house, swarming with police after the family has gone missing. The whole time, we feel like Jimmy is not giving up some important information, but really he’s just being a good lawyer and keeping his mouth shut until he really knows what is going on with the situation.

Jimmy is desperate to contact Nacho, and has many, many attempts to call him from a payphone. This scene builds tension and puts in on hold a few times, done wonderfully along with the music. Odenkirk's acting chops are really showing, as this entire scene he is alone. This might seem like an easy part - play a character you've already perfected, but younger and dumber. Looks are certainly deceiving as this acting job he's doing is really top notch.

Jimmy showed off his detective skills and discovers that the Kettlemans have kidnapped themselves. Jimmy still needs to convince everyone else of this though, as there’s overwhelming evidence to the contrary. At this point, nobody believes Jimmy, and this is a problem for him because Nacho is not having any of this nonsense and threatened to kill Jimmy if he doesn’t get him out of it, pronto.

Finally, we get an actual scene with Mike, when Jimmy tries to go back to the courthouse and is denied entry by Mike, the toll booth troll. Jimmy pokes him in a brief altercation and Mike has no problem taking care of him. Inside, where Mike may or may not press charges, the cops from the kidnapping case try to get Mike to lean on Jimmy to get him to give it up, but the condescending cops are too much for Mike. He believes Jimmy's story about the kidnapping and doesn't press charges. Finally, someone believes Jimmy.

Couple notes on Mike - he's the only character we've seen who looks older now than in Breaking Bad, which takes places about 7-8 years after BCS. It's also been 3 episodes, and they haven't said what his name is yet. He's well known to BB viewers, but he's really just the toll troll up until now for viewers of only BCS.

And what's that, an entire episode without a montage? Scoff at the idea! We find Jimmy on a trip through the woods where he's quite ill-equipped, but after what seems like most of a day of walking, he stumbles upon a tent full of the Kettlemans singing "b-i-n-g-o" and we get Saul barging into the tent with a very theatrical "Here's Johnny!".

As Saul tries to drag them out, a fight over a bag ensues and all the cash comes flying out, leaving off at that moment. We’re left on a classic Vince Gilligan cliffhanger, Jimmy is in the middle of nowhere, he’s already alerted people that he found them and now he’s standing in front of a big pile of money. I can’t wait until next Monday, but I’m sure at that point I’ll just have more questions than answers.

This episode starts off with another flashback. This time we're in Cicero (immediately recognizable due to the Daily Herald newsstand, ok, yes I live in the suburbs too). I really like it when shows play around with the timeline, and I think now we're going to get a little bit in each episode in order to show more back story of Jimmy. This time around, we see him in his prime as "slippin' Jimmy". Since it's not winter, we're getting a scam that's a bit more complicated than just falling on ice on Michigan Ave.

Jump back to the main timeline and we're still in the woods, just after Jimmy has scared the crap out of the Kettlemans. They plead with him to leave them alone, but really, they're terrible criminals (as in they're terrible at it). They had no plan aside from running after the warning call they received the previous evening. Jimmy tries to take control of the situation, but all the Kettlemans want to do is put some money in his hand and get him to go away. This, of course, won't solve their problem, but Jimmy will gladly oblige them and walks away with probably around $35k.

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

The end of this scene is a revelation for Jimmy. He tells the Kettlemans he can accept their money if it's a retainer to make him their lawyer, but they still won't go for it. The words are like a dagger to Jimmy - "you're the kind of lawyer only guilty people hire". This is probably two clues to Jimmy - criminals are stupid and they're probably the only people who are going to hire him. Anyone who is familiar with the character can see that this is another piece of the puzzle falling into place in the creation of the Saul Goodman that we all know from Breaking Bad.

So, Jimmy hatches a plan, but it's really more of a fight than a plan. He's pissed at Hamlin for trying to squeeze his brother, Chuck, out of the law firm. Jimmy gets himself made up to look exactly like Hamlin and puts himself on a giant billboard, complete with a rip-off of the HHM logo and the "Hamlindigo blue" color. This leads to one of the funniest scenes in the show in which Jimmy defends himself against the cease and desist while dressed almost exactly like Howard Hamlin.

"This is a classic david vs goliath story" is the line that Jimmy tries to feed to reporters, leading to everyone's favorite moment in any episode, a montage. We're fed all kinds of fun quotes "I'm talking woodward and bernstein here", "It's a miscarriage of justice" and "the war is an important story, as well". The presence of strong show runners like Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould ensures that even though we have a different writer and director for every episode so far, the show has had a consistent voice so far. I suppose it doesn't hurt that it all relies on a backbone of awesome montages every episode.

The episode gets its title from perhaps the best scam we've seen Jimmy pull so far. When it's all said and done, Jimmy looks like he was two steps ahead of everyone the entire time. This is a really fun one to watch unfold, and I didn't see it coming until Jimmy was way up on the billboard. Upon a second watch, however, you can gauge reactions and how it all unfolds and see Jimmy's big sigh before he has to run up the ladder.

Hamlin (and probably Kim) are the only ones who can easily see through this stunt (when looked at as a whole, it's pretty easy). It's also not surprising that early in the episode, when Jimmy says "upon this rock, I will build my church", he comes up with a pretty good scam to give himself a jumpstart.

So finally, we see Jimmy doing what he doesn't want to do - lie to his brother. Jimmy's face is plastered all over the front page of the Albuquerque Journal, and while that's good for business (7 phone messages!), it's bad for his relationship with his brother. So, Jimmy hides the paper, drops off his provisions and bolts without so much as looking Chuck in the eye.

Chuck, being not a stupid man, sees that all of his neighbors got their paper like they always do, so he dons the space blanket (side note: why wouldn't someone with this 'illness' live far away from civilization) and heads out into the terrifying world of electricity in order to get a copy of the paper, and he knows what's up right away.