Better Call Saul Season 6 Episode 13

'Better Call Saul' has come to an end after six seasons. Read EW's recap of the series finale.

When he got in his machine, the only place he ever went was the future — and before he returned to his own time, he went so far forward that he witnessed the end of the world. They finish the cigarette, in that room where the barred window is nothing but a shadow above them. But as much as this final episode centers on the question of regret, the usefulness of that question is undermined by the way that this story has always been permeated by inevitability. Her hair is curled again, but still dark, still different, because Kim can't travel back in time any more than he can; this is how it looks for her to move on. Better Call Saul has always dwelled in the irresolvable tension between the two, in the way that Jimmy McGill's genuine sweetness and Saul Goodman's venal self-interest were two parts of the same whole. By the time he's finished describing how he built Walt's criminal empire, his plea agreement is toast, but Kim's safety is secure — and he's going by "Jimmy McGill" again. He tries to tell them his name is McGill. He tries not to smile. Regrets, he's had a few, but he has neither the time nor inclination to linger on them. Is it purely altruistic, that he still loves Kim, and still wants to protect her? But when he finally arrived to a life of leisure — when he'd made more money than he knew what to do with, when he'd installed himself in a home that reflected both his material wealth and his life's emptiness from every one of its copious mirrored surfaces — he could never belong there. A striver, a dreamer, a man with big plans to claw his way into the sun where he belonged. We don't see Saul's mirrored mansion in this episode, but I thought of it at one particular moment, the one where he calls Bill Oakley (Peter Diseth) from the police station.

The series finale “Saul Gone” is a supremely satisfying sendoff.

Later, in his flashback to the visit with Chuck, Chuck has a paperback book on the kitchen counter: H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine. For a minute, they are those two people in the first episode of the series, “Uno,” when they are in the HHM parking garage, oozing chemistry while they are passing a cigarette back and forth. She makes a point of telling Jimmy she got in to see him with that New Mexico bar card that has no expiration date on it. Saul gets emotional as he tries to talk about what happened to Howard, but then, when he sees Kim at the back of the room and sees that she’s really listening to him, he finally reveals what he did to Chuck, ruining his ability to practice law, to purposefully hurt him, after which Chuck killed himself. Poor Bill tries to save some semblance of the case, because while Saul was getting his Jimmy McGill on and redeeming himself with Kim, he was costing himself that sweet government deal. At first, we think Saul is angry that Kim got the better of him and has limited what he may be able to get out of the government. All is not lost, though: During that bus ride, his fellow inmates recognize him not as Jimmy, but as “Better Call Saul,” and they stomp their feet and shout his catchphrase in appreciation of their hero. - Jimmy’s big break began with dumpster diving for info to help the Sandpiper residents sue the company. In another beautifully shot scene, Kim and Jimmy (that’s what she calls him) stand against the visiting room and share a cigarette she has snuck in for him. Showrunner and episode writer and director Peter Gould’s storyline sent Saul to jail early in the finale, which amped the excitement about all that awaited us. When asked to give a hint about how Better Call Saul would wrap up during a Tribeca Festival panel in June, Bob Odenkirk offered two words: “second life.” That clue turned out to be much pithier and more perfect than anyone might have guessed. He can totally own his opponent, even when he should be looking at decades in prison.

Jimmy McGill returns to square up to what he's done and earn redemption from the person who matters most. A recap of “Saul Gone,” season 6, episode 13 and ...

A few times during “Saul Gone,” Jimmy brings up the idea of a time machine as a thought experiment — with Mike during their miserable trek through the desert, with Walt during their stay in the basement of a vacuum-cleaner repair shop, with Chuck as he’s bringing him his supplies. (Cutting to the yard afterward seemed akin to adding a denouement after “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship” in Casablanca.) Few shows in television history have been as artfully filmed as Better Call Saul. I’ll miss its images perhaps most of all. A time machine has the power to erase the past or jettison a person so far into the future that the past ceases to matter. Later, Walt seethes over his own billion-dollar company getting swiped out from under him by Elliott and Gretchen. There were more complicated reasons than money for Jimmy and Walt to act as they did, but wanting it was still a factor. While it’s true that Walt and Jesse Pinkman abducted Jimmy and held a gun to his head over an open grave, the rest of his story is nonsense. “If you don’t like where you’re heading,” says Chuck in a touching flashback, “there’s no shame in going back and changing your path.” He doesn’t have to live the rest of his life as the 22-year-old who went down the literal slippery slope by pulling “a slip-and-fall” outside Marshall Fields. He can square up to what he’s done and earn a measure of redemption from the person who matters most to him. The problem with regret is that it’s not anything close to a time machine. He saw the chance to build the drug empire that would make him a millionaire, and he didn’t have Kim around any longer to look at him sideways for doing it. “Saul Gone” is essentially about two versions of the same speech, one by “Saul Goodman” and the other by Jimmy McGill. The first is when “Gene” is finally captured and brought before a tableful of prosecutors to discuss the charges against him, with Marie Schrader as a special guest. That finale image of a gut-shot Walt returning to the lab with the tenderness of a serviceman coming home from a long tour overseas is a sublimely perverse and pathetic fantasy. Last week, the door was closed firmly on the notion that maybe Jimmy and Kim could somehow rig a future together because Jimmy could not be helped. That’s what 14 years of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul has been about — who these men are fundamentally and whether they have the capacity to change.

The finale begins in the desert. Jimmy is walking through it, dehydrated — he finds water and desperately puts his head in it; we've been here before.

Saul Goodman. The judge confirms to Saul that he wants to represent himself. Kim leaves the prison and sees Saul standing in the basketball yard. And that was the premise of the earlier seasons of Better Call Saul. His brother saw the transformation of Jimmy into Saul before anyone else did. To his surprise, it is Kim. Once left alone, Kim says, “hi, Jimmy.” This alone sends goosebumps; she knows the man she loves is back to who he is. The judge tries to stop him, but Saul wants to continue, which irritates his lawyer William Oakley. Saul is put under oath so he can continue his story. Saul continues; he describes what happened to Howard Hamlin — he explains how Kim had the guts to “start over” while he ran away. Saul is given seven and a half years in prison, but he also wants to choose the institution he is imprisoned, including the Wing he will reside in. Saul tells William that they must tell the government that he has more to trade regarding Howard. Walter tells Saul he is asking about “regrets,” not time travel — Walter tells him his regret was when he was a graduate student; he created a company with a friend and stepped away thinking it was a gentlemanly thing to do, but he didn’t realize he was being maneuvered outside of his creation. But then, Saul says he’s a victim as well and explains that a few years ago, he was kidnapped by Walter White and Jessie Pinkman. He claims he was afraid, so he worked for Walter. Saul claims he did not run from the police but that he ran away from the people associated with Walter White. He tells Marie that he has nothing. Gene is now on the run as the police begin their hunt for the infamous Saul. He needs to hide, so he gets inside a dumpster. Jimmy says he’d travel to 1965, put shares into one of Warren Buffet’s ventures, and then travel back to the present to be a billionaire.

Better Call Saul Season 6, Episode 13, "Saul Gone", the finale of the Breaking Bad spinoff, reveals the fate of the crooked lawyer.

He also asks to be called Jimmy McGill, the name he was born with, burying Saul Goodman once and for all. During the hearing, Saul also reveals he plotted to disbar Charles and took responsibility for the scheme against Howard. With one speech, Saul demolishes his deal. During his transportation to a prison where he is sentenced to spend 86 years, the other inmates recognize Saul Goodman. The prisoners start to chant his slogan, excited to be in the presence of a legend of the criminal world. Saul was fine in aiding a criminal if he could get rich in the process, even underlining how Walter and Jesse would probably have been dead or in prison after a few months if he'd never helped them Saul could have prevented Heisenberg from ever becoming the monster he turned out to be, but he decided money was more important. A similar dialogue happens in the second flashback scene, set at the moment when Saul and Walter had to stay hidden in a basement while the Disappearer worked on their escape. The promise is a ruse, though, created to force Kim to be present during the court hearing. Saul is smart, knows the law like the back of his hand, and is successful in pushing his demands. Saul, on the other hand, would go back in time to place some profitable investment that would turn him into a billionaire in the present. First, we go back to the desert where Saul almost died of dehydration by the side of Mike Ehrmantraut (Jonathan Banks). The duo was carrying seven million dollars to free Lalo Salamanca (Tony Dalton), and Saul thought more than once he would die from the heat before reaching civilization. The widow is watching the meeting from behind a mirror before confronting Saul face to face. Saul is apprehended, knowing that he’ll be gone for a long time for a very long list of crimes. There’s a lot to unpack here, and with all the time jumps, things can be somewhat confusing.