Better Call Saul Did It Better

exterior day sidewalk an aunt looms monstrous in the frame crawling across the rough landscape of cement in macro it climbs onto an ice cream cone making its way towards the Pinnacle of the cone as it reaches the summit triumphant music plays but why why is this the opening of season 5 episode 3 of Better Call Saul if I take this random object and set it carefully here with me in the frame you won't really be able to help but pay attention to it as long as it's there because I've signaled that it's important in some way you're going to be inherently curious to find out what happens to it later in this video in the same episode as the ants there's this scene where Kim and Jimmy I mean Saul talk about each of their days it's a well-written scene and the subtext here is the two different directions Jimmy and Kim's lives seem to be headed I just realized I have all pro bono clients tomorrow all day no Mesa Verde as one celebrates being able to help people and the other is hesitantly making a lot of money by doing work for the cartel financially speaking Saul Goodman just had his best day yet teaching but there's something else going on in this scene Jimmy takes an empty beer bottle from Kim and sets it on the railing and the show really draws our attention to this object and shows Kim eyeing it up at the end of the scene Kim grabs it off the railing why place so much emphasis on this object why is Kim eyeing it up is she worried it's going to fall our answer comes later in the episode when the pair meets back up on the balcony since they last spoke Jimmy has been drawn deeper into the web of the cartel and Kim's day of pro bono work was thwarted by an emergency with her Mesa Verde case now Jimmy is flirting with dropping the bottle and what does Kim do it's complicated to articulate exactly the subtext that is packed into this action in a sense it showcases how Kim's frustrations with her work pushes her towards more Reckless Behavior but it also illustrates the weird push-pulled nature of the dynamic of Kim and Jimmy's relationship as they tempt each other into trouble the nature of their relationship on a macro scale and the motivation behind their eventual scheme to stick it to Howard plays out in a miniature version of itself in these two scenes the bottles and how Kim and Jimmy interact with them allow us to see what's happening with the characters instead of just telling us how they feel as Better Call Saul enters its Sixth and final season I've been thinking a lot about what makes it so special why I love it so much and why it feels distinct even in an era of an abundance of great TV and have become increasingly convinced that the show's Mastery of visual storytelling plays a huge role in that Showdown is such common advice in filmmaking and screenwriting that's basically a cliche at this point but it's also much easier said than done and so while the advice is extremely common good examples of show don't tell or visual storytelling aren't as common the bottles are one example of how Better Call Saul expertly uses props for visual storytelling but it also uses the way it structures scenes cinematography and the performances themselves to show us rather than tell us interesting things about the characters without spoiling anything from season six let's look at each of these elements and examine what Better Call Saul has to show us about visual storytelling Better Call Saul perhaps better than any other show I've ever watched extensively uses props as part of its visual storytelling so much so that a prop is often the visual centerpiece of an episode as is the case with the ants in the ice cream the ants on the ice cream cone is a call back to the previous episode saw Goodman 's for you where Jimmy's contented success as Saul Goodman is rudely interrupted when he's summoned by the cartel when the next episode opens this way and we see the ants eating the ice cream it reminds us of this moment which establishes the main action for the episode and it also sets the show up for this payoff later in the episode where Jimmy returns to the location after doing business with the cartel and sees the ants eating the ice cream the ice cream isn't really important to the show's plot it's not significant in terms of the mechanics of what's happening in the story but it also allows us to see and feel what's happening through a kind of Representative symbolism this visual story arc illustrates a kind of loss of Jimmy's innocence as he begins working for the cartel the childish image of the ice cream cone is not only destroyed but converted into an almost horrifying one as if the innocence of it is decaying when Saul sees the ants eating the melted ice cream it looks almost sickening and it kind of visually Clues us into how he might be feeling inside don't worry though those feelings won't stop Saul's rise he's an expert at pushing them down in my first video about Better Call Saul four years ago I talked about this trash can about how it was used in the first episode to illustrate Jimmy's frustration with hhm we see him kick it but more importantly before that we see that it's already dented telling us that him taking out his frustration on the can is a pattern of behavior this trash can resurfaces in later seasons and by attaching meaning to this specific object the writer is a Better Call Saul can then recall those objects to remind us of story beats or pieces of conflict without the need for dialogue or Exposition the use of props to show instead of tell is perhaps best illustrated by Jimmy's world's best lawyer mug the mug was a regular feature in the early seasons and so the image of it shot through with a bullet is an evocative symbol of Jimmy slipping into Saul his movement into more dangerous territory and the death of a certain in image that Jimmy has of himself but then it also sets up this fantastic moment where we get to see Kim realize Jimmy is lying to her about what happened in the desert this is what makes Visual storytelling so compelling it's that watching a character realize something is almost always more interesting than being told they feel a certain way in the dialogue but to do this kind of visual storytelling you need multiple elements working together creative writers who are willing to use the props and the physical world in an interesting way to symbolize the conflict the characters are experiencing and you also need performances that can communicate what is no longer in the dialogue when you move it to a symbolic object wait Jimmy Jimmy what it's all good man there's a short series of shots that are together one of the most terrifying chilling moments in Better Call Saul it comes towards the end of season five Jimmy and Kim are alone at home there's a knock on the door Jimmy's phone rings Kim goes to the door Jimmy answers the phone we see a shot of Mike driving like mad what I said right now can we see this shot of Kim reacting to the person who's standing at the door we don't yet know who's at the door although we can probably make a guess but the reason this moment is so intense is because we get to see how the characters are reacting to the situation the show doesn't tell us how serious the situation is it shows us how serious it is in two ways first we see Mike driving very fast uncharacteristically fast actually for one of the show's most methodical and calm characters second we see Kim another stoic unshakable character react with visible Terror to who is at the door there's a lot of setup that goes into the suspense and tension of this particular scene but it's the look on Kim's face at that moment that really sells it for me and sends chills down my spine Jimmy in my earlier review of Better Call Saul I talked about the show's richly developed characters but what really sticks out to me now is the way that building a foundation for these characters and allowing them to breathe in the earlier seasons has started to really pay off and how the show has been cultivating what I think are some of the most impressive performances on TV right now Ray seahorn Michael Mando Patrick Fabian Tony Dalton Bob Odenkirk along with everyone else are absolutely knocking it out of the park and the show knows it one of the beautiful things about TV is that you get to see what an actor can do with a character in early seasons and then write more for them in later seasons based on what you know their particular strengths are the performances have always been great but in the later seasons of the show it's increasingly leaning on subtle moments of performance and allowing them to do a lot of the heavy lifting there are entire story beats or plot developments that hinge entirely around how well the actors are selling pretty complicated pieces of performance and for the characters there are layers of Lies hidden Innovations and performances within performances which the audience needs to be able to read visually in a lot of scenes the drama of the scene hinges on whether or not a character is selling a lie to another character Jimmy and Kim for example when they're doing a scam nacho when he's undercover Mike when he's doing some investigating the drama for us the audience is not a particular word or line or piece of plot information within the scene but rather watching the character's performance and trying to see whether their Mark is buying it going back to this climactic moment between Lalo Jimmy and Kim part of what makes it so dramatic and intense is that what's dramatically important to the scene is not really what the characters are saying a lot of the scene is even just Jimmy repeating the same story walk me through it what I told you already yes but instead we're carefully studying Kim and Jimmy's faces to see if they're pulling off their Bluff and Lalo's expression and reactions to see if he's buying it I'm only stunned by the scenes where we can feel the slight corniness of Jimmy and Kim's performance within a con that they're trying to pull off oh hi and yet we can also completely buy how it's working on their Mark these are not simple performances for the cast to pull off but nobody falters for even a moment it might be strange to think of performance as an element of visual storytelling because sometimes I think we over identify performance with the way the actors say the lines but I think in Better Call Saul the most important elements of performance are often visual The Secret of Better Call Saul I think and a big part of what makes it feel so different is that the major moments aren't these massive twists or perfectly delivered lines of dialogue it's smaller than that but no less impactful it's the flit of emotion or lack of it on a character's face that reveals the show's True Heart it's up to the writers and the directors of the show to set up the moments where we get to read a significant story beat on a character's face like this moment where we see Lalo become suspicious before we're later told that he is in dialogue lawyer said his car broke down but I don't think the writers would have come to lean so heavily on these kinds of moments if the cast had improved time and time again that they could sell them excuse me may I help you oh I really hope so the scam that opens season 4 episode 9 is a beautiful example of visual storytelling or dropped into the middle of the scheme and we get to watch it unfold there's a joy in piecing together what they're doing and seeing what actually is going on while what they're saying and performing in dialogue disguises their actual intentions so if you just listen to the dialogue you get the LIE they're exactly the same no one has to know but you have to watch what's happening to see what's really going on time and time again the show just drops us into the middle of one of these scams or some other shenanigans that a character is up to and lets us discover what's going on as the character's process is in motion why is my chewing gum ah yes I see now why is Lalo climbing out of a manhole why is he crawling back into it Better Call Saul Revels in the details of a character's process and then it shows you why they're doing what they're doing or when Kim quits weikart and Coakley the show doesn't let us hear the most obvious bit of that plot point the lines I quit instead it frames the scene in a much more interesting way we see Kim have a realization and we see her taking the steps of quitting and leaving we slowly start to realize what she's doing as the scene moves along probably one of the things I love most about the show is the sense of Discovery you have watching it and a big part of that sense of Discovery is that you actually have to watch and pay attention to the screen in order to see the answers to your questions no exactly does that work doing things this way creates a real tangible sense of mystery within the episodes which is important for a show where the broad overall trajectories of so many of the characters are already predetermined and known I think Better Call Saul really shows it can be about the journey with a character more than the destination that even if you know where a character is headed if you make the process of the character getting there interesting and dramatic will be hooked Better Call Saul has always had bold striking cinematography that gives it a distinct feel from any other show out now but I want to move past how the cinematography makes the show nice to look at and focus on how the cinematography is effectively used to convey important elements of the story visually for example this show really uses wide shots like none other that I know but these wide shots aren't just cool they really flesh out the world these characters exist in and Breaking Bad you had a sense of Albuquerque turkey and the show used both the city and the desert in interesting ways a Better Call Saul really finds a way of integrating it all into what feels like a single place they give you a sense of the downtown landscape and position it with the desert in the background and they start using these night scenes out on the edge of the desert where you can see the light from the city shimmering in the background it creates this feeling of a place where two worlds are colliding a shot like this illustrates the separation between two characters in the composition which also gives the world such a real texture the locations team does a great job in the show and the wines really showcase what feels like a vibrant tangible world that surrounds the characters but this isn't just nice aesthetically sometimes it's actually important to understanding a character's motivation like in this scene where Kim has shown the room where the backlog of cases in need of a public defender are kept seeing the way the room feels the neglect is a helpful part of really understanding Kim's motivation and why she's moved to do this kind of work I've already mentioned how composition can create the separation between two characters but camera movement can also highlight a character's aloneness or a realization they're having using a telephoto lens can reveal heat Distortion rising from the ground so we can actually see how hot the air is Noir styled lighting can make the characters feel trapped or imprisoned or underwater and when you build a show with mostly careful precise locked down framing you can create a lot of intensity in the moments where you do break away from that and go handheld in this scene which does that how its shot Keeps Us mostly inside of Jimmy's perspective emphasizing the chaotic nature of his experience even when we get a shot that isn't directly from his POV it's close to the ground because Jimmy is close to the ground and sometimes you can increase the dramatic tension of a scene by keeping an object that symbolizes the dramatic tension in the shot when nacho arrives at Lalo's compound the doors of the Fortress are visually emphasized we know nacho is going to have to get to a door and when he's caught off guard by Lalo being awake and they sit down for a conversation leaving the door in frame increases the tension of the scene and reminds us of what nacho is trying to do this is a kind of chekhov's gun the dramatic principle that states that if there's a gun hanging over the door in the First Act it should go off by the third when heavy emphasis is placed on something we read it as significant if we don't yet know why it's significant it will create mystery and will want to know if it's a bomb we'll be holding our breath waiting for it to go off creating suspense in this scene we're waiting for a literal bomb to go off when there's a problem with the dynamite we wait in suspense as Werner tries to find the problem as he descends into the hole we worry that the dynamite might explode but then we see him have a panic attack and the Show puts a more complex dramatic bomb on the screen werner's freakout is a problem that will eventually explode and until it does we're tensely waiting for it to happen that's visual storytelling constructing your story so that the audience sees what is important and what you're trying to convey rather than just having a character tell it to them through dialogue and it's what makes Better Call Saul one of my favorite things on TV right now this video is sponsored by nordvpn a VPN is a virtual private Network and there are two reasons I think you might want one the first is privacy when you're browsing the internet you don't really have privacy from whoever you're paying for your internet so if you use a VPN it encrypts all of your traffic and your ISP can't see what you're doing you also can keep your location private from the websites you're visiting the other thing you can do is use a VPN to make it look like you're browsing the internet in a location that you're not in with nordvpn they have over 5 000 servers in over 59 countries your 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Channel: Thomas Flight

Views: 1,372,115

Keywords: Video Essay, Thomas Flight

Id: obIWs9p0boE

Length: 19min 43sec (1183 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 15 2022