Better Call Saul's "Five-O" Was Maybe One Of The Best Episodes Of TV Ever

Better Call Saul has been fine so far. Seeing Jimmy slowly turn into Saul and watching him scheme and scam has been fun. But I wouldn’t say the first four episodes really grasped me in a way that it has for other Breaking Bad fans. Partly because I absolutely loathe the story line with Chuck having electromagnetic hypersensitivity – I cannot begin to tell you how much I hate that. Partly because I honestly forget it’s on Mondays. And partly because I think knowing where Saul Goodman ends up caught in the crossfires with Gus Fring and Walter White makes some of these other events trivial to me. I’m never one of those guys to say a show is “too slow” after only a handful of episodes though, but at the same time if you ask me what I think so far I’m gonna call it like I see it. I wasnt knocked over by the first chunk of this premiere season, so I planned on just casually watching BCS as a lighthearted Breaking Bad spin off good for some laughs and some cameos. That’s what I expected from this show all along.

But last night’s episode was absolutely stellar. Total game changer for the series if we’re gonna get more episodes of that caliber. All along I said the real spin off should have been called No Half Measures and should have focused on Mike Ehrmantraut’s life as a Philly cop and his eventual decline into Gus Fring’s henchman. Obviously the issue with that ever being a full show is being able to do flashbacks with an actor Jonathan Banks’ age. But if we couldn’t get a full series focusing on the life and downfall of Mike Ehrmentraut, Five-O was, at the very least, a perfect one time depiction of Mike’s arrival to the ABQ. From the moment he stepped off the train that episode was perfect. We see him with Kaylee, the only thing he ever truly cared about during Breaking Bad and immediately it had the feeling that this episode was going to be of a quality like the original series. So many things had the feel of Vince Gilligan and BB at its peak. Using a maxi pad as gauze for his bullet wound and locating the crooked veterinarian to sew him up. (PS – I think more people probably use maxi pads for gun shots like he did than for their actual intended use. Have you ever met one chick that uses pads???) Mike using the string to brake into the car and stash the gun. Faking drunk before unleashing those dead Ehrmantraut eyes and that monotone voice before pulling the trigger. The whole show had the same sort of feel as the Gus/Don Eladio flashback episode. All of it was like the dark, creative, diabolical depiction of crime and murder we watched guys like Mike and Walter and Gus carry out for 5 seasons.

And yet last night we also got an entirely different side of Mike, and that’s where this episode went from entertaining to truly great TV. Mike talking to his daughter in law about how he “broke his boy” was gut wrenching. We finally saw some emotion from Mike. A total departure from that signature dead-on-the-inside Ehrmantraut behavior we had grown accustomed to. Realizing that he corrupted his own son and made him debase himself – made his son lesser – right before his death completely broke Mike Ehrmantraut. He went from the pedestal to the gutter. Almost makes you wonder if that’s one of the last times Mike even allows himself to feel that type of emotion as he explains his feelings of guilt and remorse surrounding his sons death. The last piece of him from his previous life before he dives into another life of crime in Albuquerque.

Jonathan Banks’ monologues and soliloquies were always the highlights of Mike’s characters, and last nights explanation of the world of crooked cops and how “it’s like killing Caesar. Everyone’s guilty.” was right up there with his No Half Measures speech. “You know what happened, The question is, can you live with it?” was a very symbolic closing for almost every character from the Breaking Bad world and the life they lead. I hope for the audience’s sake and Banks’ sad there is a LOTS more of this sort of stuff to come, because it’s award winning TV if so. And again, I dont wanna knock the rest of Better Call Saul, but its a little telling that it took basically a stand alone episode completely departing from what the show has been so far to really get people buzzing.

PS – If there is more episodes like that to come, the greatest trick Vince Gilligan ever pulled was convincing the world Breaking Bad was over