“Better Call Saul”: Terrific
I admired “Breaking Bad” more than I liked it — I couldn’t get through most of the episodes. I feel differently about “Better Call Saul,” which had its second-season premiere last night. The show is finding an identity apart from “Bad.” Last night’s episode was bookended with two amazing scenes featuring our protagonist Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk), the once and future shady lawyer Saul Goodman. At the beginning it’s the present and he’s taking out the trash as the manager of a Cinnabon in a bland mall in Omaha. When he locks himself in the dumpster room, he refuses to use the emergency exit because the alarm will call the cops and he doesn’t want any trouble. At the end of the hour, it’s back in the past in New Mexico and Jimmy is in his new office at posh law firm where he’s just taken a job as an associate. He finds a light switch labelled: “Never turn this switch off.†He can’t help him and flicks it anyway, waiting to see if there are any disastrous consequences. There are not.
