The moment when "Curb Your Enthusiasm" surpassed "Better Call Saul" in their respective take on the "side sitter" dynamic must have stung for writer Heather Marion of "Dedicado a Max." While it's clear that Larry David was preoccupied by couples seated in an L-formation at restaurants and cafes, Jimmy McGill was more amused by characters like Kevin Wachtel, who tilted their chairs at a distinct angle during business meetings, creating a differentiation from their colleagues. Despite Kevin's assurances to Kim that he "knows a scam when he sees one," both Kim and Jimmy saw right through his bluster, realizing they were up against a prideful but pedestrian adversary who had long assumed an upper hand was his birthright. Jimmy couldn't help but laugh at Kevin's most obvious tell.
However, what the duo didn't count on was the depths of Kevin's pride. Even after Kim and Jimmy manipulated Mesa Verde into a comically futile cold war over Mr. Acker's disputed property, going so far as to falsely accuse the demolition foreman of being a convicted felon and using spray paint and stencils to transform the house into a destination site for traveling miracle-seekers, Kevin would not budge. He's the kind of guy for whom pondering, "Why change horses midstream?" is a mantra passed down from generations of men with more moxy than equine metaphors.
With Kim's blessing, Jimmy had no choice but to bring in the big guns for a bit of "oppo research" on Kevin. Unfortunately, Mike wasn't really in a position to take Jimmy's calls (more on that later), leading to Plan B: "Mr. X." Or at least that's how mouthy criminal-for-hire Sobchak (Steven Ogg, returning for the first time since season one) introduces himself to Kim. But they're all operating under certain guises as they convene in the back of Mrs. Nguyen's salon.
Despite endeavoring on behalf of Mr. Acker, Jimmy has dropped the Saul façade for this freelance investigation and returned to his hustling roots. And Kim—well, Mr. X can simply call her Giselle.
Mr. X, as was the case when Mike throttled him in a parking garage some time ago, is mostly comic relief. However, he does do his due diligence, breaking into Kevin's home and snapping photos inside his palatial seven-bedroom manor. The problem is that Kevin comes up squeaky-clean, "old school" as Sobchak surmises. Sobchak offers to gather a group of his pals for a more invasive kidnapping kerfuffle, at which point he's shown the "exit through the gift shop," per Jimmy. Only when Jimmy begins to apologize for coming up empty does Kim look up and smile—not quite Cheshire-like, but with subtle satisfaction. She's got him (or specifically, appears to have caught him in some kind of copyright infringement concerning Mesa Verde's iconic man-on-steed silhouette).
The question looms: how close did she come to stumbling into Gus's menacing underground network, a veritable nightmare of terror? Jimmy, oblivious to Mike's entanglement in the impending cartel wars, finds himself in close proximity to the edge, jeopardizing Kim—or anyone from his pre-Saul life—by mingling business with friendship. Mike's stabbing wound serves as a narrow escape for now, a bullet dodged in the face of impending doom.
The most prideful man east of Tucson convalesces in the small Mexican village Gus has morbidly transformed into a living memorial to his fallen partner, Max. It is the village where he and Max first embarked on their illicit venture, slinging Los Pollos plates and side samples of meth. Dr. Barry Goodman (JB Blanc, back in the saddle) is there, sustained by his top-notch MRI machine and other perks bestowed by Mr. Fring's patronage. The children attend a local school, well-equipped with solid uniforms and sturdy backpacks.
After an ill-advised attempt to stumble for hours with open stitches towards the nearest highway, Mike is persuaded to stay and partake in Senora Cortaza's (Alejandra Flores) exquisite cooking and spare cell-phone chargers. "The anonymous benefactor," Mike sneers as he circles Gus, ever stoic beside the fountain that flows uninterrupted in Max's memory, a symbol of Gus's relentless rage. He is determined to even the score, calling on Mike as a "soldier" in his clash with the Salamancas. "You have met them. You know what they are," he beseeches Mike. "You understand revenge." And Gus is right; it beats the aimless self-loathing that leads nowhere but to being left for dead on the street, brutally pummeled by a pack of Albuquerque punks.
We, as connoisseurs of BCS/Breaking Bad (not as moral arbiters), know the long game leads to something even more anticlimactic, like getting your face blown off in a nursing home or fatally shot by a maniacal chemistry teacher with no one in sight for miles. We know what becomes of Jimmy as he jostles for position at the crossroads of wrong and right, but the wildcard is whether Kim can find a middle ground between the futility of resistance and revenge, which at best is bittersweet.
