Better Call Saul Season 6, Episode 10 “Nippy” Review: The Game is the Loneliest Place
Greg Ehrhardt, OnScreen Blog Columnist
I’m not sure “Nippy” was the episode I was breathlessly looking for the way last week’s episode ended, but it was a likely a good thing Better Call Saul took a breath as it gears up for the final episode, and it was still a very meaningful, character building, episodic week for Gene Takovic, err, Saul Goodman.
The episode opened up in black and white for the first time since Season 5, episode 1, where, last we left Gene, he was ready to run away from trouble again, talking to Ed at “Best Quality Vacuum” over a payphone at the Mall, when Gene had a change of heart and decided to settle things himself. After (in real time) years of the audience wondering what Gene was up to, we see immediately his plan, if we don’t quite know what the end game is (per usual when it comes to the Breaking Bad universe).
Up until this point, Gene was not the Saul or Jimmy we had seen. He was reclusive, quiet, monotone, and scared. Gene had no social life to speak of, and it seemed his life was based on the same repeated routine.
He seemed miserable, and lonely.
After a quick introduction to newcomer Carol Burnett’s character, we see Gene in a familiar spot, setting up a con (uh oh). But this was as alive as we had ever seen Gene, interacting with his fellow man, seemingly helpful and kind. With Gene though, after everything he went through as Jimmy and Saul, perhaps only a grift can bring out these emotions, which brings us to this episode’s big idea: the game is the loneliest place.
Gene explains “the game” to Jeff the taxi driver: “cars, clothes, the cash, the ladies, it’s knowing all the angles, and winning big”. This was certainly Jimmy’s enticement to becoming the Saul Goodman we knew in Breaking Bad and bringing in other people into the game (if only to unwittingly become his pawn to secure his safety) was his way to end his own misery.
In theory, “The Game” could induce camaraderie: we’ve seen in other movies how gangsters often stick with each other because they couldn’t identify with anyone who didn’t appreciate the game. That’s certainly what Jeff thought after they pulled off the mall heist, until Gene set him straight. It is also what the security guards thought when Gene was giving them Cinnabon rolls every night, engaging in typical guy talk about the Nebraska football team. Gene of course had no idea about the ins and outs of the football players and coaches, and only faked interest as a distraction to pull off the mall heist.
The episode ended like a many a Better Call Saul episode, with a hop in Gene’s step, even forgetting his usual Gene routine, even though his happiness resulted in other people’s lives being worse, per usual. Sure, the closing shot was him leaving a flashy Saul Goodman-esque shirt and tie on the clothing rack, which indicates some initial melancholy that Gene decided he can’t return to full-on Saul Goodman, but the bigger sadness to us is this is what makes Gene happy, absent Kim Wexler.
He has no interest in camaraderie for camaraderie’s sake. Any bonding with his neighbors must involve his direct interests, to advance his specific goals. This isn’t particularly new; we never saw Jimmy or Saul with any friends. His only friends were really his brother Chuck, who called him a chimp with a machine gun or, of course, Kim, who called their relationship poison.
We have only seen one true friend from Jimmy’s past, Marco, a fellow con artist whom Jimmy shared genuine affection for. Of course, Marco died of a heart attack, with no one left to really remember him fondly, except for Jimmy, and this is probably where we see Jimmy’s real fear lies.
Jimmy opens up to the security guard (only to keep him distracted, of course) that he has no wife, no kids, no family, no friends to remember him should he die. That is the result of playing “the game”.
The game results in using people as means to your end. Its thrilling, its financially rewarding, its empowering. You can be master of your domain, but, without a partner in crime, whether it be Marco or Kim, it is a sad, depressing place to be.
When Saul disappeared to Omaha Nebraska to become Gene, he thought he was along as he could be. But he could have started a new life, with new relationships, maybe even turned over a new leaf.
But Jimmy is in too deep; his true love is “the game”. If he can’t be with “the game”, he just can’t be any version of himself. To put another way, he can’t bond with other human beings at this point, period. The only bonding he can do is fake, as a means to an end.
That’s why, unlike other commentators, I don’t think there’s a way this ends with a happy ending for Gene. Everyone in his life has told him he is too dangerous to allow to operate normally in society. He is alone, and will always be alone, whether he is forced to live normally, or whether he is running “the game”.
There’s just no world, in black and white, or in color, where that kind of innate loneliness can end well.
Better Call Saul welcomed back Michelle Maclaren, my favorite Breaking Bad universe director, and her first BCS episode since season 4 “Breathe” episode. My favorite directing moment in this episode was in the initial scenes when Gene is seemingly helping Marion get into her house, and the camera shows the sun peeking through the trees and blasting into the camera. Just a gorgeous shot, and perhaps foreshadowing that the world of color, the world of Saul Goodman, was starting to come into the black and white Nebraska world? Maybe just my over-interpretation, but a great shot nonetheless, and it is just a treat to have talented directors like MacLaren continuously involved in the Breaking Bad universe.