'Better Call Saul' Season 6 Episode 10 review: Saul Goodman pulls a "Nippy" con in a flashforward episode

As 'Better Call Saul' inches towards its finale, we have seen the identities or personas of Jimmy McGill and Saul Goodman merging together, with Bob Odenkirk's attorney now seemingly no different from the fast-talking lawyer we saw in 'Breaking Bad' who almost exclusively works for criminals and was instrumental in the rise of Heisenberg. The last episode of the ongoing sixth and final season of the show, titled "Fun and Games", had Kim Wexler (Rhea Seehorn) leaving Jimmy after the death of Howard Hamlin, which occurred at least partially thanks to Jimmy and Kim's pranks in a scene that was somehow more emotional and saddening than the two major deaths that came before in this season: Nacho and Lalo's.

Note: If you are yet to see "Nippy". the tenth episode of 'Better Call Saul' Season 6, do so and come back. This piece dissects the episode in detail so it is extremely spoiler-y.

In "Nippy", the tenth episode, we are shown a flashforward for the first time this season. In fact, if you were clamouring to know what has become of the "current" Saul Goodman, the entire episode is a flashforward. Earlier, a cab driver Jeff had recognised who "Gene Takavic", the manager of Cinnabon in Omaha, Nebraska really is. That he is the same Saul Goodman who's wanted by the Albuquerque police for crimes related to the infamous Walter White case.

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Gene, of course, cannot take this lightly as if Jeff rats him to the authorities, he will spend the rest of his life in jail. The episode begins with him searching for his dog called Nippy and putting up notices. The dog clearly does not exist but the fictional canine helps him befriend an old lady called Marion, who is none other than Jeff's mother. Later, when Jeff confronts Saul, he offers him to enter "the game". Saul, Jeff, and one of Jeff's friends make a plan to steal expensive goods like Armani suits and Nike Air Jordan sneakers.

To let Jeff steal the goods and save him from the CCTV cameras, Gene cooks up a plan to hang out with the two personnel strong security team at the mall and gift them Cinnabon rolls. Clearly, Saul, or Gene as he calls himself now, has not forgotten his old, more prosperous life as the criminal lawyer, with emphasis on the criminal. He was smart, brilliant, and perceptive. He was also a people person and devilishly manipulative, which allowed him to pull cons throughout his life and successfully prove himself to appear as the wronged one.

His yearning for Saul Goodman identity pops up every now and then, his assistance to Jeff in getting him to enter the game is nothing else.

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Also -- and it has happened before in 'Better Call Saul' and 'Breaking Bad' -- but it's remarkable how much the writers and creators working in the 'Breaking Bad' universe trust their audiences to be ridiculously patient for the payoffs. The sequence demonstrating Gene's burgeoning friendship with one of the security personnel would feel tedious in any other show. Here, it is painstakingly written and shot. And another top-drawer example of showing, not telling.

In the end, it turns out Gene has Jeff and his friend in his grasp. The plan to let them steal the goods was only so he could make them criminals like himself. Now they are also felons and Gene has evidence to back that. He threatens them in a fashion that evokes Heisenberg at his peak, and says if they spout some nonsense about him being Saul Goodman to the police, the three will go to jail together.

In the end, he visits the garment shop and longingly touches a suit that Saul might have worn. But he puts it back. He is no longer Saul Goodman. No matter how much he would like to be.

'Better Call Saul' Season 6 Episode 10 streams on Netflix in India.