Better Call Saul kept the tension high right until its final scene, with the audience never quite knowing if Jimmy McGill could redeem himself and if all of the many betrayals that he had been a part of could be forgiven somehow.
Nacho & Mike Set Up Tuco Salamanca
In Albuquerque, New Mexico, Tuco Salamanca is one of the most feared and volatile cartel members. He’s unpredictable and has a very short temper. Tuco’s right-hand man, Nacho Varga, realizes that associating with Tuco is a risk that could end badly for him, so he decides to betray Tuco and enlists Mike Ehramantraut to help. Of course, turning on Tuco is a considerable risk that few are willing to take as Nacho is also betraying the whole Salamanca family, which has lasting consequences.
Their plan to send Tuco away for assaulting Mike in an engineered scuffle also doesn’t really pan out, as Mike is intimidated into getting the gun charge against Tuco dropped. It just sinks him and Nacho further into the underworld.
Nacho Varga Tries To Kill Hector Salamanca
In the end, sending Tuco to prison only created more problems for Nacho. In his absence, Tuco’s uncle, Hector Salamanca, took over the operation and Hector is even more feared and brutal than Tuco. Nacho quickly becomes Hector’s most trusted confidante, but this just results in Hector wanting to use the business of Nacho’s straight-laced father to move his drugs.
Fearing for his father’s life, Nacho decides to try and kill Hector by switching his heart medication with dummy pills. Though Nacho is successful in his daring gambit, once again, this just puts him in an even worse position as it catches the attention of Gustavo Fring.
Jimmy Betrays Kim In The Acker Case
As the idea of lying to clients and manipulating people for her own ends starts to become normalized for Kim at the beginning of season 5, she embarks on her next big plan with Jimmy. The plan is for Jimmy to represent a man who Kim’s client, Mesa Verde, wants to have removed from his house, with the two causing so much havoc that Mesa Verde gives up.
After the two form what they seem to think is a slam dunk plan to get what they want, Kim pulls the plug, knowing that there’s already suspicious eyes on them. Jimmy, however, moves ahead with the plan without telling Kim in advance, creating such a scene of chaos that suspicion is drawn away from Kim, but it uses her like another mark in the process. Not knowing how to react to such a betrayal of trust, Kim considers leaving Jimmy, but it’s this betrayal that brings about their decision to get married. It’s a beautiful thing, but one that enables some ugly events to come to pass later.
Chuck Secretly Prevents Jimmy From Joining His Law Firm
The big reveal of season of Better Call Saul was that Chuck had secretly been working against Jimmy’s plans to become a successful lawyer. After he demands the truth from Chuck, Jimmy listens to a tirade of criticism from his older brother about how he believes that Jimmy will never change and only abuse the law, stating that Jimmy is “not a real lawyer.”
While Chuck is technically correct in a certain way, as Breaking Bad fans knew at the time, Kim astutely points out in a following episode that Chuck causes Jimmy’s behavior to a certain extent. As Howard Hamlin naturally sides with Chuck in the feud, it also unnecessarily drags him into the family drama too. It’s a catalyst to a lot of tragedy.
Jimmy Manipulates Irene Landry
When Jimmy focussed on elder law, he took on Irene Landry as a client and realized that the Sandpiper Community care home that she was living in was scamming her and the other residents. Jimmy ultimately hands over the case to other law firms but remains a substantial beneficiary of the lawsuit’s common fund for discovering the fraud. But when Jimmy needs the money from the payout pronto, the only way he can think of speeding up the settlement is to manipulate Irene’s decision as the class representative.
He does this by steadily turning all of Irene’s friends against her and, even though he reverses his scam at the end when he feels remorseful, Jimmy burns all of the bridges that he worked so hard to create with elders in Albuquerque.
Jimmy Switches The Numbers On Chuck’s Documents
Kim Wexler works tirelessly to bring in a new prestigious client, Mesa Verde, to HHM and when Kim leaves HHM to start her own law office, she manages to bring Mesa Verde with her. However, Chuck uses his expert powers of persuasion to steal the lucrative client back from Kim at the last minute. Convinced that Chuck made the unusual effort to retain the client in order to punish him, Jimmy decides to sabotage Chuck’s career in return, with predictably disastrous consequences.
By doctoring some of Chuck’s documents, and instigating a deal-breaking embarrassment, Jimmy succeeds in getting Mesa Verde back with Kim but, in so doing, begins an all-out war with Chuck that does nothing but escalate from this point onwards.
Chuck Secretly Records Jimmy
After Jimmy successfully covers his tracks regarding the switching of the numbers on Chuck’s documents, Chuck takes an uncharacteristic risk and pretends to retire from HHM and slip into an exaggerated state of poor health. All of this is done to provoke an admission of guilt from Jimmy which Jimmy will never suspect Chuck is recording, due to his condition.
While Chuck’s condition regarding his sensitivity to electromagnetism is shown to be psychological, Jimmy is one of the few people in the show who never questions it, even though he clearly knows the truth. By effectively using his condition as a weapon against his brother, Chuck betrays all of the trust that Jimmy had placed in him and starts down a much darker path to destroy jimmy’s career as a lawyer.
Chuck Gets Jimmy Arrested
The war between Jimmy and Chuck ceases to be a fraternal spat and becomes a bitter rivalry when Chuck commits one of the shows most unforgivable acts and deliberately gets Jimmy arrested. Chuck’s thinking is that the tape recording that he has of Jimmy’s confession is most useful as a tool to lure Jimmy into trying to steal it or destroy it. The major flaw in Chuck’s approach, however, is that he doesn’t realize that Jimmy will be more hurt over the personal betrayal than the prospect of litigation. The same is true once again once Jimmy indeed breaks into Chuck’s house to furiously confront him, a hired private investigator waiting to bear witness against Jimmy’s crime.
Of course, it turns out that Chuck just wants Jimmy disbarred, not in jail. However, the betrayal ends any hope reconciliation between the two. Chuck is a great man in Jimmy’s eyes, but he uses the law for his own ends here, appearing to be a hypocrite as well as a bad brother.
Nacho Opens The Gate At Lalo’s House
When the conflict between Lalo Salamanca and Gustavo Fring reaches boiling point, Fring resolves himself to kill Lalo but knows that he must do it while Lalo is in Mexico. After Lalo returns home, bringing Nacho Varga with him, Nacho is contacted by Fring’s hired assassins and told to unlock the back gate at the compound.
Nacho complies, knowing that Fring will just as readily kill his father as the Salamancas, but the assassination attempt fails, leading to some terrible events, and major character deaths, further down the road.
Jimmy Reveals Chuck’s Condition To Rebecca
After Chuck gets Jimmy arrested, his next move is to get Jimmy disbarred but the unbeatable powers of Jimmy and Kim manage to flip Jimmy’s Bar hearing in his favor. Through some proto Saul Goodman showmanship, Jimmy is able to prove the psychological nature of Chuck’s condition in court for all to see, including Chuck. However, there’s a greater personal betrayal that Jimmy makes that can be overlooked as a result.
Jimmy’s first step in unsettling Chuck and making him lose his composure in public is bringing Chuck’s ex-wife, Rebecca, to the hearing. Doing so directly violates an unspoken agreement between the brothers that Chuck be the one to reveal his condition to Rebecca, who he still cares for, and on his own terms. Though a low blow to be sure, Jimmy’s worst retaliation against Chuck was still to come.
Jimmy Interferes With Chuck’s Malpractice Insurance
As innocuous as it may sound, this is the act that lies at the center of Better Call Saul, and in some respects, Breaking Bad also. Jimmy’s petty play-acting with his insurance carrier intentionally outs Chuck’s mental health issues to them, causing them to raise their premiums with Chuck dramatically. Whether Jimmy intends it or not, this results in a rift between Chuck and Howard Hamlin and ends Chuck’s legal career, with Chuck’s rapid decline and death following soon after.
Though moments throughout the series go into forming the titular persona, this moment is what truly brings Saul Goodman to life and gives him control over Jimmy McGill’s life. Jimmy’s inability to face or even admit to what he did to Chuck is something that he carries with him until the very final episode of the show, with his admission of guilt and remorse finally freeing both he and Kim of the trauma.
