Human Lens #53: We All Have a Time Machine
Better Call Saul closes the door with a knockout episode on regret and love
Regret is something we don’t give ourselves time to linger on. Mental health, personal happiness, and strength are put on a high podium of importance now more than ever. Why linger on what we could change when all it’s going to do is remind us when we were our lowest. Jimmy McGill has never had time to regret. When would you even have time to think about it as a hustler, con-artist, lawyer?
Regret is the key focus from Monday night’s series finale for AMC’s Better Call Saul. After 12 years that included 2 shows, 125 total episodes, and a film, the Breaking Bad Universe closes the door on the misdeeds of, what have become, our good friends from Albuquerque, New Mexico. This saga of stories is entrenched in the culture of that area, the crew, and the people who have lovingly watched for years. Despite Jimmy McGill’s, or Saul Goodman’s, sketchy history as a lawyer and a criminal, he’s utilized as a vessel by Peter Gould in the writer/director’s swan song for the journey this world has taken him.
Jimmy is always scheming to get it his way, find a way out, prepare for the future. Looking back on his life isn’t on the agenda when there’s fun to be had and money to be made. Show creators Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould know that making sure what’s in the cards ahead of you is the most important thing that has driven this saga as far as it has. Their meticulous storytelling and visual style have all lead to an entire group of actors and filmmakers challenging themselves to outdo each other with each story, episode, and season of television. A drive and passion that has consumed them over the years just like how Jimmy’s passions have consumed him since the moment we met him in Breaking Bad in 2009.
In the opening scene, we flashback to season 5’s eighth episode, Bagman, when Saul and Mike Ehrmantraut are trekking through the dessert. Stopping at a well for water, and posting on the stolen money they’ve been backpacking across the barren wasteland, Jimmy poses a hypothetical to Mike. Where would he go if he had a time machine? Mike, responding with a pondering gaze from the heart, says he would go back to the first bribe he took in 1984, followed by going 10 years into their current future, to check in on a few people. When Mike asks Jimmy what he would do, the slimy lawyer responds by saying he would go back to when Warren Buffet bought Berkshire Hathaway in 1965, invest early, and be a trillionaire now.
While Mike’s quiet by nature demeanor allows him to hold back his thoughts on Jimmy’s response, Walter White is out front and honest to nearly everyone he works with. Later in the episode, while the two are holed up in a basement during another flashback, Saul asks Walter the same time machine question. Walter chastises the scientific notion of a machine like that, telling Saul that what he really wants to talk about is regrets, not dreams and science. Walter shares a story about college friends, or at least people he thought were friends, who strong armed him out of his own company of ideas. Now that the company has become successful, Saul says they could’ve done something together to get them for wrongdoing. When put on the spot to come up with something, Saul shares a story of gunning for a slip and fall con when he was 22 and actually hurt himself. “So you were always like this,” Walt says, leaving Saul to ponder how he sees his own life.
These scenes, in hindsight, play as memories, with Saul having time to think about his past for the first time after finally being caught. His days of running are over. His days of forward thinking are over. He can manipulate the system all he wants, but he’s finally been dealt a loss.
Fast forward to Saul’s trial, where, after negotiating a deal with the state prosecutors, our titular lawyer is primed to get away with just a fraction of the originally proposed punishments. In order to protect Kim from legal troubles of her own (she’s on the brink of being sued by Cheryl Hamlin after showing the widow a written admission to the truth behind her husband’s death), Saul takes credit for everything in order to protect Kim. Denouncing the name Saul, Jimmy McGill returns as a man caught up in the midst of a love story.
Kim Wexler is the backbone of this series. She’s the yin to Jimmy’s yang, and a formidable force of character work and performance that will hopefully get it’s well deserved recognition at this year’s Emmy Awards. While her whole journey encompasses one of my favorite characters in the series, it’s her decision to leave Jimmy in season 6, episode 9, Fun and Games, that sets up this Jimmy’s final decision in this saga. The last time they were together, Kim said that they weren’t good for one another because they were too much alike, pushing each other to do things that would ultimately be their end. Love, in this case, was blinding them from negative effects on those around them.
You see, Jimmy doesn’t think he has any regrets, but with hard time ahead of him no matter what, he’s been given time to reflect on things he’s never had time to before. The only thing he’s scared of is losing Kim forever. While he probably will never admit it, losing her is the one thing that could fester into a regret in the coming years. In the end, we each have our own time machine; we go to the past through our memories, and the future through our dreams. Kim is Jimmy’s future.
Some people would say he lost everything. With inmates cheering his name and the love of his life back on his side, Jimmy would tell you he got everything back. No regrets.