Better Call Saul Thoughts: Was Chuck Right About Jimmy?

Greg Ehrhardt, OnScreen Blog Columnist

I’m rewatching Better Call Saul with my wife, who is watching this show for the first time. Better Call Saul is, not surprisingly, an incredible rewatch because the writers brilliantly built layers into every character, not only from the first season but the first episode. Events change them, but they also reveal themselves more and more as the show endures.

When the series concluded, one of my takeaways from the show was, “Chuck was right about Jimmy all along,” even though I don’t think that was the show’s takeaway. Jimmy did make good after all, but Jimmy only made good because he had someone to act good for, Kim Wexler, just as, in the show’s early episodes, he tried to make good for his brother, Chuck.

We saw what happened when Kim exited Jimmy’s life; he became the execrable Saul Goodman we loved and loathed in Breaking Bad and the man who almost terrorized poor Carol Burnett in Nebraska as Cinnabon Gene.

My specific takeaway was, “Chuck was right, but no one listened to him because of his mental illness, and well, he was an asshole”.

Upon rewatching Better Call Saul, though, I’m left re-wondering whether Chuck was right.

As the first season was carefully established, Jimmy was “Slippin’ Jimmy” from a young age. He was built by God differently from his brother Chuck.

But, as the show was also careful to establish, Slippin Jimmy met his inevitable fate being busted by the police while working with Marco, and Chuck gave him an exit plan if he vowed to make good with his life. Jimmy WAS going to play it straight, starting in the mailroom. He did want to become a legit lawyer, working in elder law. Yes, he did have a dalliance going back to Illinois to run it back with Marco again. But, his conscience took over when he saw his clients needed him. He knew what kind of life awaited him if he ran it back with Marco full-time and chose a different destiny.

Lastly, despite his mixed feelings towards his brother, he became his caretaker.

I don’t think that’s a man that’s “a chimpanzee with a machine gun”, as Chuck put it at the end of season one when it was revealed Chuck put the kibosh on him joining HHM as a lawyer.

Sure, Jimmy was never going to be a traditional lawyer. We saw what happened when he joined Davis & Main. He was a man who would always dance right next to the line.

But his actions from Season 2 on, especially when he committed forgery to screw his brother over and help Kim out, were all influenced by his brother shutting him out of HHM and when he secretly tape-recorded Jimmy admitting to a felony.

Now, a good man is good, regardless of circumstances thrown at him, regardless of what these villain origin stories say.

However, Chuck always stood by his brother and supported him wherever his aspirations were, I am convinced there is no Saul Goodman, and certainly no Cinnabon Gene, just Jimmy McGill, with a little bit of slippery to him as a lawyer.

My new takeaway is, “Yes, Chuck was right; Saul Goodman is a chimpanzee with a machine gun, but only because Chuck made the chimpanzee want a gun”. A self-fulfilling prophecy, if you will.

It makes you think twice about what you try to steer your loved ones away from.

You can read all my Season 6 episode recaps of Better Call Saul here

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