SPOILER ALERT: This story contains plot details from “Smoke,” the season premiere ofBetter Call Saul.
After nearly a 14-month hiatus,Better Call Saulreturned to AMC on Monday night.
“He always seemed so strong, but he wasn’t.
Credit: Nicole Wilder/AMC
I think he did what he did because of me.”
and then breezily asked, “I’m going to make some coffee, anybody want some?”
proceeding to whistle while he began the task.
“One that started the night before, when Chuck said that [Jimmy never mattered] to him.
And now it just gets consciously chosen now.
It’s like, ‘Should I look at this relationship?
I can’t take that apart, and he doesn’t deserve any more of my heart and soul.
So, no, I’m turning it off.’
It’s like a fracture inside of the character.
“He turns it fullyoff.
It’s already shattered and dropped down to the basement floor,” he continues.
“And of course, the first thoughts are, ‘What did he say to me?
Did he mean it?
Did he kill himself?
Or did he accidentally…?Stop.
I know what he said to me, and he meant it.
Even if he was just trying to hurt me.’
And then the other thoughts.
I won’t have it.
You don’t get to do that to me.'
So, it’s a conscious rejection too.
And a real deep one that just happens naturally out of self-protection and sadness.”
But Jimmy’s attempts to marginalize Chuck’s death won’t go according to plan, teases Odenkirk.
“By the compartmentalization that Jimmy does like, ‘I’m not going to think about Chuck!
He doesn’t get another second of my consciousness!’
guess what pops up all around him in everyone’s face?Chuck.
Now there’s 10,000 Chucks filling the world.
So the world is filled with this power that it didn’t have.
This judgmental glance that he’s getting wherever he looks.”
“Being Saul I’ve always seen it as a choice that he makes,” explains Odenkirk.
“It’s a bad choice.
If he’s rejected one too many times, he goes, “Fine, f it.
You’re all telling me I’m a sleazeball piece of s?
I’m gonna do that every day.
I’m gonna wake up every day dedicated to filling those shoes.
With no qualms, no second thoughts.
And that’s gonna be my big f you to you.”
And check out season previews from creatorsVince GilliganandPeter Gould.
