'Better Call Saul' Season 5 Episode 8 Review: Jimmy and Mike's survival in the desert paves way for Goodman
Spoilers for 'Better Call Saul' Season 5 Episode 8 'Bagman'
At one point in the episode that aired on April 6 of 'Better Call Saul' Mike Ehrmantraut tells Jimmy McGill, "If you manage to dig a hole big enough for those two bags, dig one for yourself too." And that is the salient line of difference separating the two as they embark on this near-fatal venture of retrieving Lalo Salamanca's bail money from the cartel. On one hand, we have Bob Odenkirk's gimmicks as Jimmy slash Saul is constantly the clown even when he is in the middle of a shootout in the neck of the desert.
Rivaling what is Jonathan Banks' cold cut precision as the hitman who just somehow always knows better and comes zooming like a guardian angel with a magazine of bullets saving Jimmy's day. It's the two most polarized characters with one common mission and the writing utilizes it to the full in Season 5 Episode 8 'Bagman'.
The episode kicks off with Lalo giving Jimmy directions on how to acquire his bail money. Lalo is convinced his rivals have been behind getting him locked up and there's a certain conviction that Tony Dalton sprinkles into the newest Salamanca ringmaster in town that somehow ends up making us pity the guy for the secrets he doesn't know. There's a high chance that Lalo is referring to Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito) here when he speaks of people who are likely to see him put away but knowing that he doesn't know how far Jimmy's loyalties lie with Gus, it makes sense why he is so casual about asking Jimmy to run his little errands.
This is probably what gives Jimmy this spiked confidence of heading into the middle of the desert to get heaps of money from the cartel and thinking of it as a child's play.
Well, not exactly, but enough to think that a pair of Salamanca twins meeting him at a clearance and handing him two giant bags filled with cash would be the end of it. Jimmy is confused, lost, probably a little too vulnerable under the desert sun, but he masks it with that quick wit and signature sense of humor the show has been stellar at portraying for the last five years now.
Even after the twins have left and Jimmy is cornered by the other members of the cartel who dig into the bags and discuss disposing of Jimmy, Odenkirk is still on point with his fumbling, fidgeting aura of the lawyer who just wants to win. Even when a barrage of bullets rain down suddenly, taking down the cartel members in what looked like a solid five-minute-long gunfight between the two, Jimmy transgresses from a confident good-humored lawyer about to snivel his way out, to a panic-struck man reeling under the aftershocks of the bloodbath he has just witnessed.
The vague relief that washes over his face is upon seeing that his savior is none other than the omniscient almighty Mike himself who isn't devoid of the horrors he has just been through - and thus begins a story of polarized instincts and survival, with Mike giving Jimmy the push he needs.
Banks channels all of his done-with-your-privileged-bullshit aura into his character in this episode, as he saves Jimmy from the cartel, helps him reel under the aftershock of the gunfight, and guides him towards civilization amidst the scorching heat of the desert. Jimmy might be a lawyer for the degenerate, but he hasn't really had to live a day seeking his survival by a thin thread and for Mike, it gets a little irksome at times, but that is the magic of the entire dynamic between the two that we see in this episode.
Mike is your no-nonsense guidebook to survive a couple of days in the blistering daytime and chilly nights, armed with aluminum foils to shield themselves from the cold and full of survival instincts like storing urine in case they run out of the minimal water they have. Jimmy's humor comes out in places where he suggests they take turns to carry the giant bags of money, and Mike channels his stoic cut-the-crap stance in moments when Jimmy lies down in bare sand and complains he can't go on.
His head covered with a white cloth wrapped like a durag and lips parched from dehydration, Jimmy ends up caving into drinking his own urine after yet another car comes their way - probably to seize the money back - and Mike manages to vanquish that like a bug. That is exactly what relays that Jimmy McGill is long gone; it's all Saul Goodman now with a little bit of push from the older guardian angel he keeps falling back on.
Jimmy's naive in thinking he got this and is rivaled by Saul giving in to his human instincts and doing what he deemed unthinkable just hours ago. And while Mike is the strongest link holding everything together, Saul might just be the guy you'll end up rooting for even more. That is, when not getting down on your knees and pretty much saluting the woman Kim Wexler is after she ends up visiting Lalo in jail when Jimmy doesn't come home for the night and confronts the druglord where her husband is.
Rhea Seehorn is unmatched in those moments and really goes on to prove why the entire fandom is rooting for her Emmy.
'Better Call Saul' Season 5 airs on Mondays at 9 pm only on AMC.