Better Call Saul Season 2: Jimmy tries to think inside the box, kicks through the box.

The Binge
Jessica Zafra

ONE OF THE THINGS we loved about Breaking Bad was its sheer nerdiness. By nerdiness I mean a laser-focused expertise that manifests itself in problem-solving. What is existence if not a series of problems we are required to find solutions to? The very premise of Breaking Bad was a problem: You’re terminally ill and you want to be able to leave your family some money. Right now you’re a downtrodden high school chemistry teacher, but you were a crystallographer on a Nobel Prize-winning team. What do you do? Use your chemistry knowledge and make a fortune.

True, you can’t just get into that trade without attracting a whole new set of problems. So you deal with them using your particular expertise. Where ordinary criminals would use guns, Heisenberg used science. We learned the specific type of plastic to use when dissolving… evidence. And where to get a very big magnet. Even his henchmen were nerds. Recall Badger’s epic idea for a Star Trek episode. You may have muscle, but nerds rule.

Many of us started watching the prequel spin-off Better Call Saul in order to get our Breaking Bad fix. Two seasons later, Better Call Saul is a great show in its own right. And it maintains the nerd approach to problem-solving, which will delight the viewer even if she’s not a nerd. (Again, I remind you that the creators of the two shows are X-Files alumni.)

The second season begins with Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) reeling from two blows: the realization that his brother Chuck (Michael McKean) is undermining him, and the shock of having done the right thing and returned the Kettlemans’ stolen $1.6 million. The show does a splendid job of portraying the relationship between the brothers, which is as harrowing as Mike Ehrmantraut’s (Jonathan Banks, grumpy old badass) growing association with the Mexican cartel.

The brothers McGill genuinely care about each other, but Chuck can’t get over his moral superiority and Jimmy can’t help being a shyster. Whenever they face each other, we are tense and even indignant on Jimmy’s behalf, but we understand Chuck’s suspicions. Later we see why Chuck seems to hate Jimmy — they’re more alike than he will admit.

Jimmy is a master of the shortcut, the quick fix, thinking outside the box. The problem is that the law, by definition, is a box. Resourcefulness and inventiveness, the qualities that make him a good lawyer, are the same qualities that can get him disbarred. But Jimmy gives the legal profession a serious try, actually landing a cushy job that gives him corporate housing, a car plan (Heart-rending moment when he says goodbye to his crappy old jalopy) and on a whim, a cocobolo desk. He does it for a girl. Inside that sleaze is a romantic who wants to be a better man in order to deserve the woman.

The most surprising development this season is the way the writers have moved Kim Wexler (Rhea Seehorn) from the literal shadows — a comrade to share a quick cigarette with — to the front. She is so much more than a stock girlfriend. Kim has her own life that she’s not about to give up so she can be absorbed into Jimmy’s. She accepts him for what he is, even understands the thrill of the small-time con, but she will not make excuses for him. When she gets into trouble because she stuck up for him, she finds her own way out. There’s a terrific sequence in which she lines up her prospects on Post-Its of different colors on the glass, and cold-calls everyone until she gets an appointment.

Kim is one side of the American success story: hard work and drive. Jimmy is another: creativity and flexibility. We’re rooting for their happiness, but we know that sooner or later Jimmy will do a Jimmy. Doomed love stories are the best.

I mentioned nerdiness. What is Jimmy’s single-minded expertise? Film and popular culture. This is a guy who will placate an angry girlfriend by singing the score of South Pacific into her answering machine. A guy who in true indie filmmaking tradition will worm his way into a military base or a school in order to get the perfect shot for his low-budget TV ads. That lightning mind — confronted by the principal, he concocts a story about making a documentary on ’80s pop star Rupert Holmes. When he talks the police out of investigating a clueless drug supplier by inventing a bizarre fetish — at least I think he invented that fetish, I’m probably wrong — we are in the presence of genius. Not the genius that will predict gravitational waves, but one that will entertain the hell out of us, and isn’t that what film is for?

This is a prequel, so barring the paradox of actors looking older than they did in the future, we have the pleasure of seeing favorite characters, including the departed, return. We’ve been expecting Tio Hector Salamanca (Mark Margolis) to show up, and there he is in all his menacing glory, walking and talking. The season finale “Klick” is probably the best-directed hour I’ve seen on TV this year (except maybe for Fargo 2). It immerses us completely in Chuck’s mind as he schemes against Jimmy, and in Mike’s headspace as he goes against Tio Hector. The ensuing revelations make you check your jaws to see if they’re still fastened to your face.

I binge-watched this season over two days, and each time I clicked on the titles I noted how short they are: “Switch,” “Cobbler,” “Amarillo” and so on. Was there a code hidden in there? At first I thought it was an anagram. Then I wondered why “Klick” would be spelled with a K. Is it an acrostic of the first letters of the episode titles? No, it’s an anagram of the first letters, and they spell FRINGS BACK. Clearly the showrunners know who their core audience is. (Apparently everyone had figured it out long before I did.) I apologize to all the cats and dogs in my neighborhood that were deafened by my screech of triumph.

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