TV: Better Call Saul

[Mecca]

Kim is Saul's ride-or-die with a conscience, his Jimminy Cricket on his path to being a real boy, if you will

all through the show she is at war with herself: she is always "I will do anything for love, but I won't do that", but before she knows it, she's done everything

it's a similar arc to Skyler White's but with a less tragic / toxic tone

Skylar was an unwilling participant though; She slid into it out of survival. Kim is actively choosing the bad choice road

that's true, actually, yes; I think her attitude eventually was, if I have to do this, I'm managing you and I'm taking a cut; but it was certainly more of a hard-won decision over a gruelling journey

I really loved Skylar and was annoyed at the "I hate Skylar" discourse

I think that’s a side effect of writing Walt as an effective anti-hero; you knew he was a bad person, yet rooted for him

[Ms Harmless]

Kim is Saul's ride-or-die with a conscience, his Jimminy Cricket on his path to being a real boy, if you will

all through the show she is at war with herself: she is always "I will do anything for love, but I won't do that", but before she knows it, she's done everything

it's a similar arc to Skyler White's but with a less tragic / toxic tone

Skylar was an unwilling participant though; She slid into it out of survival. Kim is actively choosing the bad choice road

that's true, actually, yes; I think her attitude eventually was, if I have to do this, I'm managing you and I'm taking a cut; but it was certainly more of a hard-won decision over a gruelling journey

I really loved Skylar and was annoyed at the "I hate Skylar" discourse

I think that’s a side effect of writing Walt as an effective anti-hero; you knew he was a bad person, yet rooted for him

absolutely yes

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[Ms Harmless]

oh god yeah

[Ms Harmless]

I think the way the family drama kind of culminates -- with Finn defending his mother against him -- was kind of brilliant and necessary to realign some viewers whose loyalty was divided, but the thing with anti-heroes is that they always bring in bigger and badder enemies (e.g. literal Nazis) that you can always say are "worse", thereby keeping that fun "moral ambiguity" for your protagonist intact

[Mecca]

Were people still rooting for Walt past season 3?

Of course

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[Mecca]

Now that I think about, we’ve hashed this out before… Anyway, I was team Schuyler once Walt poisoned Jesse’s girlfriend’s kid. And I never rooted for Jesse, not once.

Not even after Jane died? Not after Todd kills Andrea?

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[VinylGuy]

BCS is better in pretty much every way.

[Norah]

writing of Jesse as a piece of shit is such a traggish thing to do

[Ms Harmless]

I think they did quite well at the nuance where, yes, Jesse was a POS, but he was still manipulated and exploited by the bigger and more experienced POS (Walt -- I don't mean experienced in crime but certainly experienced in manipulation and abuse); also, Jesse was born into poverty which pushed him into crime, Walter was a bored rich suburbian (the angle that America requires people to spend inhumane amounts on healthcare was a good plot device but didn't make me sympathise with him, I believe he could've found the money somewhere, I don't believe that so much of Jesse)

[Norah]

Jesse was born into poverty?

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[Ms Harmless]

the "cow house" scene was fucking hilarious

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[Ms Harmless]

Jesse was born into poverty?

actually, was he? my memory is really fuzzy, haven't seen it in years

I know I remember him as currently experiencing poverty

[Ms Harmless]

it's possible Jesse was privileged once but fell into crime and then poverty; in that case I still have more empathy for him than a middle aged family man

[Norah]

I think he was born into a middle class family but was just kind of a fuck up. To me that's a very sympathetic character.

[Ms Harmless]

I think they did quite well at the nuance where, yes, Jesse was a POS, but he was still manipulated and exploited by the bigger and more experienced POS (Walt -- I don't mean experienced in crime but certainly experienced in manipulation and abuse); also, Jesse was born into poverty which pushed him into crime, Walter was a bored rich suburbian (the angle that America requires people to spend inhumane amounts on healthcare was a good plot device but didn't make me sympathise with him, I believe he could've found the money somewhere, I don't believe that so much of Jesse)

Man I loved when Walt puts the dollar amount on how much he needs to make in the game before he quits. His decision to keep going was the real heel turn.

absolutely, that's one moment where he realises he's actually enjoying it; something in him already existed to make him the perfect guy for the game; I don't feel like Jesse had the same amount of awareness