Better Call Saul’s Season 6 is tying up all the loose ends from previous seasons as Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) finally commits to becoming the crooked lawyer Saul Goodman. In Episode 5, “Black and Blue,” we see the return of characters who were central to previous seasons’ development. Also, the pieces keep moving on two dangerous games that are still disconnected but very close to becoming irreversibly intertwined.
In one corner of Better Call Saul’s Season 6, Saul and Kim (Rhea Seehorn) keep working to destroy Howard Hamlin’s (Patrick Fabian) reputation. On the other side, Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito) fights for survival as Lalo Salamanca (Tony Dalton) gets ready to strike. While Episode 5 slows down the season’s pace, we finally get to see how Howard will get back at Jimmy/Saul. More importantly, we finally learn what Lalo has been doing since Season 6’s second episode. So, as we get closer to the explosive confrontations that this season teases, let’s recap the main events of Episode 5.
Ring the Bell!
In Episode 5, Clifford Main (Ed Begley Jr.) is still worried that the rumors about Howard’s behavior are true and his partner in the Sandpiper case is addicted to cocaine. Cliff watches Howard shake his leg anxiously, interpreting the gesture as a withdrawal sign — and when Howard addresses a conference room filled with impatient Sandpiper clients, Cliff wonders if his partner’s peaks of energy come from illegal substances. Cliff is so worried about Howard that he decides to confront him and reveal he’s aware of the issue. Of course, Howard is perplexed as Cliff lists every piece of evidence pointing towards Howard’s addiction. However, it doesn’t take long for Howard to realize Saul and Kim are scamming him. Howard gets ready to counterattack, but Cliff is still convinced that the drug addiction is real. Even worse for Howard, his sudden reaction to Cliff’s concerns will only reinforce the idea he’s an addict in denial.
While we know Howard will strike back at Saul as soon as he finds out about the scam, it’s still surprising how he decides to get his revenge. By pretending to be a potential client, Howard lures Saul into a closed boxing ring late in the night. There, he offers Saul the opportunity to punch out their differences. At first, Saul is hesitant, but the chance to hit Howard in the face is so juicy he cannot resist the offer. That’s right, Howard and Saul trade punches in the ring with full boxing gear and even a referee — and, of course, Saul gets his ass kicked.
Saul falls for Howard’s tricks and chooses a battle he can’t win. As a result, Howard got the satisfaction of leaving Saul on the floor, bruised and bloodied. As Howard says it, he hopes their physical dispute will help Saul get some closure. Even so, Howard takes every precaution if Saul decides to move on with his plan. That’s why Howard hires a private investigator to follow Saul’s every step. Now we can only wonder what will happen when Howard’s PI meets the men Mike Ehrmantraut (Jonathan Banks) send to follow Kim and Saul. And worse, what could happen if Lalo indeed decides to visit Saul?
While Season 6’s Episode 5 is centered on Howard’s discovery he’s being scammed, “Black and Blue” also teases the following developments in Kim’s plan to end the Sandpiper case. While Saul opens his official office, re-hiring Francesca Liddy (Tina Parker) as his secretary, Kim has a lunch meeting with Viola Goto (Keiko Agena). Viola was Kim’s paralegal while the lawyer took care of the Mesa Verde client, and was one of the people who was the most affected when Kim decided to leave the big-time law firm of Schweikart & Cokely and focus on pro bono work. Pretending to set lunch to apologize to Viola for her sudden departure in Season 5, Kim uses the meeting to learn the identity of the judge attached to the Sandpiper case. It’s a dirty move by Kim that only shows how her moral compass might be permanently broken — and the situation only gets more disturbing when we see Viola still cares deeply about Kim and even considers her leaving Schweikart & Cokely as an example of courage. We still don’t know how Kim will use the Sandpiper case’s judge to hurt Howard, but we can be sure she doesn’t care how many people she needs to betray just to get what she wants.
Lalo’s Eurotrip
Without a doubt, the most exciting reveal of Episode 5 is Lalo’s whereabouts. The reason the Salamanca leader has been missing for the past episodes? He took a plane to Germany. As Episode 5 reveals, Lalo is tracking Margarethe Ziegler (Andrea Sooch), the wife of the late engineer Gus employed to build his secret meth lab. In Season 4, Mike had to kill Werner Ziegler (Rainer Bock) after the engineer went rogue to try to see his wife, putting Gus’ entire operation at risk. At the time, Lalo almost tracked down Werner, one of Gus’s main reasons to kill Lalo in Season 5.
In Germany, Lalo charms Margarethe and tries to discover all he can about Werner’s death. Unfortunately for him, Margarethe thinks her husband died in a cave-in and doesn’t know anything about his criminal relationships. Not satisfied, Lalo breaks into Margarethe’s home to find any clue about Werner and his association with Gus. While Gus’ men destroyed any significant evidence concerning the secret lab, they left behind a commemorative statue gifted by Werner’s team of workers. Now, Lalo is determined to track down the boys and force them to tell the truth about what they know. Episode 6 is bound to get wild!
Back in the States, both Kim and Gus are dealing with the certainty that Lalo is alive and might be coming for them, each trying to do whatever they can to feel safer and move on with their lives. Gus, however, realizes that Lalo hasn’t struck yet because he’s searching for evidence of his betrayal. As the mastermind he is, Gus connects the dots and concludes that Lalo must be gathering information about the construction of the secret lab. That’s why Gus decides to visit the working site and plant a gun there. It seems like Gus is tired of waiting and might try to bring Lalo to him. Using the secret lab as bait, Gus may finally kill Lalo and move on with his plan to take over the cartel. We all know how Gus deals with the cartel in Breaking Bad, so it’s exciting that Better Call Saul is getting to the start of Walter White’s (Bryan Cranston) journey.
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