Better Call Saul, S3 Recap: When Self-Destruction Is a Group Assignment

The beginning of an end

The recording is probably not going to hold in court, and Mesa Verde’s never coming back to HHM, but Chuck has another plan for it. And Ernie is the first piece of the puzzle, walking right into the trap: accidentally playing the tape when Chuck asks him to replace the battery.

As the Air Force captain from the "Fifi" episode warns Jimmy, Jimmy may think that he doesn’t have to play straight with anybody, but the wheel is going to turn.


The beginning of Mike and Gus Fring

The people who put the “Don’t” note also put a tracker on Mike’s car. He replaces the tracker with a new one to reverse-track them. This brings us to Los Pollos Hermanos and the first meeting between Mike and Gus in the middle of a secluded road.

Gus tells Mike that it’s not in his interest for Hector to die – at this time – although he won’t stand in the way if Mike wants to disrupt Hector’s supply line again. He later tells Mike, “A bullet to the head is far too humane” for Hector.

So, on another quiet road in the middle of the desert, Mike throws a pair of sneakers stuffed with drugs on a power cable. He hides on the hill, waiting for the two men on Hector’s truck to stop by and stash their guns in the desert. Mike fires into the air a few times to make it look like the gunshots are from a hunter. As the men drive away, Mike shoots the sneakers, scattering the drugs on the vehicle. The truck fails the inspection at the border.


Kim asks Jimmy to give her a dollar

Ernie tells Kim about the tape, then Kim tells Jimmy about it, but not before asking Jimmy to give her a dollar – which has to be the OG of this “Give me a dollar” contract.

Furious, Jimmy goes to Chuck’s, kicks in the door and pries open a drawer to find the tape, not realizing that Howard and a private investigator are also in the house – now two witnesses to him breaking and entering, and destroying the tape.

Jimmy’s charged with one felony and two misdemeanours that carry fines and a jail time. Released on bail, he tells Kim that the ADA’s offering him Pre-Prosecution Diversion (PPD). Besides a monthly meeting with a PPD officer, maintaining a job and doing community service, Jimmy will stay out of jail by confessing to all charges, staying out of trouble for a year and writing a confession to the New Mexico Bar Association. It sounds good at first until they realize it could cost Jimmy his law licence.


Gus and Hector go way back

In a flashback, Hector was visiting the cartel’s boss, Eladio, bringing a bag of money and a toy gift, telling Eladio that he’d just bought an ice cream company and named it after Eladio. Then Juan Bolsa arrived, bringing bags of neatly wrapped cash and an LPH t-shirt from Gus. Eladio made fun of Hector’s gift and rubber-banded cash, leaving the man humiliated.

Following the drug setup by Mike on the truck, Hector’s ice cream shop is raided by the police. While scrapping dirt off his shoes, his feet on Gus’s table, Hector demands to use LPH to distribute the Salamancas' drugs, but Gus says he’s at full capacity.

But this only means that Gus’s scheme is going as planned: he’s going to monopolize the supply line. He offers Mike money for what Mike did to Hector’s truck, but Mike declines. Gus knows about the good Samaritan and says maybe Mike’s doing it for him, but that mistake can’t be corrected.


The hearing

Jimmy calls it a trap, but Chuck says he played up his condition to provoke an admission.

Jimmy tells the court that Chuck knew it would worry Jimmy to see his brother’s condition – that Jimmy would say anything to talk him down. If Chuck lied to get Jimmy to confess, Jimmy lied to make Chuck feel better.

Jimmy also invites Rebecca to the hearing under the pretense of worrying about Chuck, which Chuck tells the court is a way to rattle him – Jimmy has got nothing else to expose.

After asking Chuck to describe what the illness feels like, Jimmy reveals that there’s a battery in Chuck’s pocket, planted by Huell Babineaux at the stairs a few hours earlier, yet Chuck has shown no symptoms.

Chuck yells that he’s not crazy. He says he knows it was 1216. He tells the room about the bribe to Lance, the billboard, the sunroof incident and the money Jimmy stole from their parents ie Jimmy will never change. “And he gets to be a lawyer? What a sick joke,” he adds. The whole room goes quiet. He urges the panel to stop Jimmy before realizing how lunatic he sounds. Omg, how sorry we are for Chuck.


Post hearing

Jimmy’s licence is suspended for a year, which is still a win for him, but soon there’s the question of money.

He refuses to let go of the office and Francesca Liddy – whom they’ve just hired, all professional and content and different from the Francesca we knew on Breaking Bad – and promises Kim that he’ll come up with his share of expenses.

He calls his clients to tell them about his “sabbatical” and barely manages to pull his next commercial from airing. To resell the remaining airtime that he’s bought, he makes an ad using the persona Saul Goodman, the name he used when scamming in Cicero. When the music business owners change their minds about shooting subsequent commercials as agreed, Slippin’ Jimmy drops a drumstick, then pretends to slip on it, recorded on camera. He manages to sell the rest of the commercials to them but leaves with a back injury.

When he can’t get a refund from his malpractice insurer Santa Rosa for the remaining months he’s not practicing, he fakes a cry and rambles about Chuck and the hearing, which the staff takes note of.

Then he visits Irene Landry, the class representative in the Sandpiper case, to spy on the suit's progress. Apparently, a settlement has been offered – Jimmy’s share would be $1.16m – but Erin Brill at Davis & Main says they should wait, which could take years. After talking with Howard fails, Jimmy schemes to make Irene despised by her friends for not settling. With a little more nudging by him, Irene agrees to settle, but her friends stay angry at her. To mend their relationship, Jimmy fakes chastising the seniors while on mic at their yoga class, and it works. The seniors rally around Irene and leave Jimmy. So that’s the end of an era for Jimmy and elder law.

Kim, who’s already swamped with Mesa Verde’s work, is asked by Kevin to look into his friend’s – Billy Gatwood of Gatwood Oil – tax issue. She plans to refer Billy to another firm but changes her mind when she learns about Jimmy’s injury from the commercial. On the way to a meeting with them, exhausted, Kim falls asleep behind the wheel, skidding off the road and breaking her arm in the accident. She refers Gatwood Oil to Schweikart & Cokely. She and Jimmy close their office and let Francesca go.


Nacho and Hector

Going from Tuco to Hector as a boss doesn’t make Nacho’s life any better. He hates beating his dealers for not collecting enough, and now Hector wants to use his father’s upholstery shop as a front for the Salamancas' drug distribution. Nacho pleads with Hector, saying that Manuel is not in the business.

When Hector learns that Tuco has knifed an inmate, which means an extended sentence, he bursts into anger, triggering his heart condition. When he takes his medicine, one pill drops and Nacho covers it with his shoe.

Nacho pays Pryce to get him the pills that Hector takes. He fills the capsules with ibuprofen and practices throwing the bottle into a coat’s pocket. The night before the collection day, he breaks the taco shop’s air conditioner, so it’ll be hot the next day and Hector will take off his coat.

And in probably one of the best heart-stopping scenes of the series, Nacho manages to switch the pills.

At a meeting, Bolsa tells Gus and Hector of Eladio’s order: from now on, there will only be one route over the border for their products ie via Gus’s trucks. To no one’s surprise, this infuriates Hector, and he starts screaming. He gets sick and collapses but is saved by Gus, who’s suspicious of Nacho.


Mike still wants to correct the mistake that cannot be corrected

Mike has been accompanying Stacey to a grieving support group, and he starts befriending Anita during one of the group’s volunteering project. He learns that Anita’s husband was in the Navy but went missing, presumed dead, while hiking. It’s painful not knowing what happened.

Pryce hires Mike to be his bodyguard again when he’s giving Nacho the pills. At the meeting, Mike warns Nacho about covering his tracks. He checks Nacho’s gas cap and finds no tracker, telling Nacho that the Salamancas are not the only people that he needs to worry about.

Mike asks Nacho the location of the good Samaritan’s body. He finds the body and reports it to the tribal police anonymously.

He’s also thinking about his stash of money that he cannot spend. He goes to Gus to launder $200k and offers a fee. Gus says he’s not taking money from Mike’s family and – through Lydia Rodarte-Quayle – arranges for Mike to be on Madrigal’s books as a Security Consultant.


Chuck wants to get better

Chuck calls Dr Cruz to get help. He works with her for a while and seems to show progress. When asked what made Chuck call for help, Chuck tells her that he’d just had the worst experience of his life in public. The illness feels real to him, but what if it’s all in his head.

Santa Rosa is increasing HHM’s premium due to Chuck’s condition, so Howard suggests that Chuck become a partner emeritus instead, which means not practicing law. Chuck says he’s doing better, but Howard disagrees.

Chuck is suing HHM for breach of contract. Otherwise, Howard has to cash him out for $8m. The two accuse each other of betrayal. Howard gives Chuck the first $3m from his own funds to prevent the firm from going bankrupt and ambushes Chuck into formally accepting his retirement in front of everyone.


The goodbye

Jimmy goes to Chuck’s to mend their relationship. He says he could’ve made a different choice, and he has regrets. Chuck asks, what’s the point of regrets as Jimmy’s going to keep hurting people. He says they don’t have to make up; Jimmy has never mattered that much to him. So Jimmy leaves.

Chuck’s awake that night. He takes his meds and is showing symptoms. He switches everything off the next day, but the meter’s still going. Since the power company is not able to come and check it immediately, he tries every switch again and takes out all the bulbs. But it’s still not working. He cancels his meeting with Dr Cruz and unplugs his phone. Then he tears the walls apart 😭😭 and, in the end, the meter box too. It’s eerie and sad.

The last scene shows Chuck’s sitting in a chair, looking not well, kicking his desk repeatedly – a lantern is on it. The lantern eventually tumbles over. From outside, we see the house catch fire.

Image: AMC