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For other uses of Wine and Roses, seeDays of Wine and Roses.

"Wine and Roses"
Better Call Saulepisode
Poster for the episode featuring a "Saul Goodman" standee and some roses floating in a pool.
Promotional poster
Episodeno.Season 6
Episode 1
Directed byMichael Morris
Written byPeter Gould
Produced by
Featured music"Days of Wine and Roses"
byJackie Gleasonand his Orchestra
Cinematography byMarshall Adams
Editing byJoey Reinisch
Original air dateApril 18, 2022(2022-04-18)
Running time57 minutes
Guest appearances
Episode chronology
←Previous
"Something Unforgivable" 		Next→
"Carrot and Stick"
Better Call Saulseason 6
List of episodes

"Wine and Roses"is the first episode of thesixth seasonofBetter Call Saul,the spin-off television series ofBreaking Bad.Michael Morrisdirected the episode written byPeter Gould.It aired back-to-back with "Carrot and Stick"on April 18, 2022, onAMCandAMC+.In several countries outside the United States and Canada, it premiered onNetflixthe following day.

In the episode,Nacho Vargagoes into hiding after aiding in the attempted assassination ofLalo Salamanca,unaware of its failure. Meanwhile,Jimmy McGillandKim Wexlerproceed with their scheme to ruinHoward Hamlin's life.

The episode'scold openfeatures a glimpse into the life of Jimmy during the events ofBreaking Badwhen he was better known as Saul Goodman. The sequence was inspired by the classic filmsCitizen KaneandSunset Boulevard.It includes an instrumental version of the song "Days of Wine and Roses".The closing shot of the opening shows a callback to an episode from the second season ofBetter Call Saul.Gould said it was a nod to the ending ofCitizen Kaneand that he wanted the moment to symbolize Saul's true character.

"Wine and Roses" was met with critical acclaim for the direction, screenplay, and on-screen performances. An estimated 1.42 million viewers saw the episode during its first broadcast on AMC.

Plot[edit]

In aflashforward,authorities remove possessions fromSaul Goodman's opulent home.[a]As a cabinet is loaded onto a truck,Kim Wexler's souvenir tequila bottle stopper[b]falls into the gutter.

In the present,Nacho VargafleesLalo Salamanca's compound.Tyrus Kittcalls Nacho and directs him to a motel. Lalo arrives at the home of his tenants, Sylvia and Mateo, kills them, then moves Mateo's body to his house to be identified as his.Juan BolsacallsGus Fringand tells him that Nacho aided in killing Lalo and that the cartel has placed a bounty on him. Gus questions the circumstances, wondering why the hit team members are all dead if they succeeded in killing Lalo. Nacho reaches the motel room, where he finds a gun, cash, and a new cell phone. He calls Tyrus, who tells him to hide until it is safe to move. Nacho attempts to callMike Ehrmantraut,who declines to answer.

The prosecutor and detective handling Lalo's murder case report that the defendant's name, address, and supposed family are fake and question whether Jimmy is complicit. Jimmy threatens to file misconduct complaints, and mistakenly refers to Lalo by his real name. He explains away the error, but afterward silently berates himself.

Kim suggests that if Jimmy intends to practice law as Saul Goodman, upgrades to his home, car, and office are in order. They decide to follow through on Kim's plan to force a resolution of the Sandpiper case by ruiningHoward Hamlin's reputation. Later, as Kim surveils Howard andClifford Mainduring a round of golf, Jimmy attempts to sneak into the club's locker room and plant a bag resembling cocaine in Howard's locker. After causing a scene in a confrontation withKevin Wachtell,Jimmy succeeds. Howard and Cliff find the fake drugs, which Howard explains away as being someone else's, but Cliff appears dubious.

Lalo intends to enter the United States, but before hiding in thecoyotes' cargo truck, he calls his uncleHectorto say he is alive and he believes Gus was responsible for the attack. Hector advises him to find proof the cartel will accept. Lalo realizes the proof is not in the U.S. and decides to stay. The coyotes refuse to return his money, so he kills them, returns the money of the others who paid to be smuggled, then uses the coyotes' pickup truck to drive away.

Production[edit]

Peter Gould at the 2018 San Diego Comic-Con International in San Diego, California.
"Wine and Roses" was written byBetter Call Saulco-creatorPeter Gould.

"Wine and Roses" was directed byMichael Morrisand written byBetter Call Saulshowrunner and co-creatorPeter Gould.[3]It is the firstBetter Call Saulseason premiere that does not feature a flashforward of Jimmy McGill living under the alias Gene Takavic after the events ofBreaking Bad.Instead, it shows a glimpse of his personal life duringBreaking Bad,when he was better known as Saul Goodman.[4]Gould said that since the season was 13 episodes, instead of the usual 10, the writing staff decided to wait until later in the season to show the Gene timeline. The opening scene was inspired by the classic filmsCitizen Kane(1941) andSunset Boulevard(1950). It features several callbacks to previous episodes as well as later ones. The sequence was shot in Albuquerque in the house of a wealthy family in the casino business.[3]The location was the crew's second choice. It was originally going to be set in the house Jimmy and Kim consider buying in the episode "50% Off"but it was deemed" too restrictive ", leading to the change.[5]: 10:18–11:14 Many of the actors playing the house cleaners were professional dancers from the samedance troupe,an idea that Morris and assistant director Rich Sickler came up with to give the sequence a "ballet-like precision". The scene was rehearsed on a Sunday and filmed during the next two days.[5]: 13:40–14:43 [6]

Production designer Denise Pizzini and her crew transformed the house to the point Gould said it did not "look exactly the way you see it portrayed". Portions of the bathroom were taken from a set built atQ Studios.The gold toilet in the room was a normal toilet that was painted gold and later repainted after Morris said it was "not gold enough".[3]The Saul Goodmanstandeein the sequence was a photo Gould took himself of actorBob Odenkirkwhile putting together a website of the character, back when they were filming thethird seasonofBreaking Bad.[3][5]: 1:12:28–1:13:08 A black book that is opened by one of the cleaners in the scene was later revealed to beDr. Caldera's book of criminal contacts in the episode "Axe and Grind".The book's functioning deciphers were conceived by screenwriter Ariel Levine, assistant Valerie Chu, props assistant Claudia Azurmendi, assistant producer Jenn Carroll,showrunner's assistant Joanna Zhang, and script coordinator Kathleen Williams-Foshee.[7]: 44:09–45:33 The pages shown in the scene were reportedly decoded and solved by aReddituser in May 2022.[8]The song that plays over the scene is a recording of the orchestra ofJackie Gleasonplaying "Days of Wine and Roses",a piece Gould selected because of how often he would listen to it while on his way to work.[2]

The opening scene's first shot is of several ties falling into a pile, of which the first few aremonochromaticand the last ones are colorful. Morris came up with the idea, which he said reminded him of a similar opening scene inAlice Doesn't Live Here Anymore(1974). The shot was recorded with a Photo-Sonics camera and filmed at 480frames per second(FPS). It was originally three-quarters of a second; the broadcast played the recording back at 240 FPS so it lasted longer. It was completed with only practical effects. The ties were carefully selected by costume designer Jennifer Bryan and dispensed into frame by two conveyor belts, one on each side of the camera.[3][5]: 16:47–18:33 [6]

The opening scene's final shot is of the tequila bottle stopper, produced by the fictitious brand Zafiro Añejo, that Kim keeps as a souvenir in the episode "Switch"from the second season ofBetter Call Saul.The stopper was added to the scene throughCGIto save time and give the crew control over where it was going to land and was added during post-production byRodeo FX.[5]: 32:11–36:26 The shot was challenging to film because it was the crew's last day in that location and they were running out of natural light. The shot is a nod to the ending ofCitizen Kane,where the titular character's final words are explained by the trade name of his sled, "Rosebud", which no one notices. Morris said "the general approach to opening this season has a lot in common with that great sequence ending in the Rosebud reveal. The way that this sequence funnels into that one final image is deliberately reminiscent of that great, huge, what must have felt like a magical crane shot at the time, just going through the entire mansion."[3]Gould said the inclusion of that shot "tells you, or it at least tells me, that even when Saul Goodman was at his lowest and he's advisingWalter Whiteto kill people, he still has that Zafiro stopper, so there's still some soul left in there somewhere. Maybe. "[2]

The episode includes anextreme close-upof an ant crawling on the finger of a dead body. Cinematographer Marshall Adams said the "ant was not being cooperative at all. He was the clumsiest ant I've ever seen. He was falling off the finger. He couldn't hold on. And then, all of a sudden, everything just happened to land perfectly in one take." Later on in the episode, Nacho (played byMichael Mando) hides in a pipe tunnel and drinks from the water coming out of it. The crew used an area behind the production studio to film the scene because a natural road was already built there. They dug the hole and put the pipe in it themselves, making sure it was sterilized and regularly cleaned. Adams said they had to be careful in making sure they were not leaving any dirt in the water so Mando could drink from it.[6]A shot of Jimmy's bag going through a metal detector was filmed with aBlackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera."Thegafferactually had to put a little green light in there, but it literally was strapping a monitor and a cable so that we could watch it go through, "Adams said. The restaurant where Jimmy and Kim converse, El Camino Dining Room, is a real location and a nod to theBreaking Badsequel filmEl Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie(2019).[1][9]: 38:48–39:52 During post-production, editing for the episode was completed by Joey Reinisch in his first solo editing credit on television.[5]: 0:37–1:07 

In the scene where Nacho enters a motel in Mexico, a woman can be seen watching an episode ofCasados con hijos,the Argentine version of the sitcomMarried... with Children,featuring actorsDaríoandLuisana Lopilato,despite "Wine and Roses" taking place in 2004 andCasados con hijosnot premiering until 2005.[10][11]

Reception[edit]

Critical response[edit]

Bob Odenkirk and Rhea Seehorn at the 2018 San Diego Comic-Con International in San Diego, California.
The performance ofBob OdenkirkandRhea Seehornreceived praise from critics.

On the review aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes,100% of ten reviews are positive, with an average rating of 9.0/10.[12]David SegalofThe New York Timesdescribed the episode as "strong, twisty and gripping" and said the writing "must be hailed as a masterly curtain raiser, one that managed to pick up the story right where it was left, two years ago, and hurl it forward at a promising pace." Segal also praised Morris's direction in the opening scene but criticized Kim's con against Howard at the country club, calling it "dimmer and daffier than the rest of the show" and "pointlessly cruel".[13]Reviewing "Wine and Roses" and "Carrot and Stick" together,The A.V. Club's Kimberly Potts graded them with an "A" and gave positive notes to Gould's screenplay and the performances of the cast, especially those ofRhea Seehornas Kim and Michael Mando as Nacho.[14]

Steve Greene, writing forIndieWire,said the first two episodes were "astonishingly short on false moves so far". He also notedEd Begley Jr.'s acting as Clifford Main and the symbolism in Kim throwing away the "World's 2nd Best Lawyer" coffee mug, calling it a "a poetic bookend of sorts."[15][16]IGN's Tara Bennett said Odenkirk and Seehorn "lead a fantastic cast who all continue to bring nuance to their characters, even when they embark upon some inhumane life choices. They all make balancing a story about morality, corruption, revenge, and love, with an overriding side mystery of what happens to a lawyer who wears terrible suits, look easy."[17]IndieWireranked "Wine and Roses" the eighth best TV episode of the year.[18]

Ratings[edit]

An estimated 1.42 million viewers watched "Wine and Roses" during its first broadcast onAMCon April 18, 2022.[19]It was the number one cable drama premiere of 2022 at the time of its airing. According to AMC, the two-episode premiere generated over half a million engagements across social platforms including Twitter and Facebook, an increase of more than 60% compared to "Magic Man",the premiere of the show's fifth season. Social analytics tracker ListenFirst said a 10-hour national trend on Twitter made the show the" #1 television drama in social engagement, organic search, conversation, and content shares. "The premiere also resulted in the biggest day of new subscriber sign-ups forAMC+.[20]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^The flashforward is set during theBreaking Badepisode "Granite State"(2013), after Saul flees after his association with the drug lordWalter Whiteis exposed.[1]
  2. ^First seen in "Switch".[2]

References[edit]

  1. ^abSepinwall, Alan(April 18, 2022)."Better Call SaulSeason 6 Premiere: Kim Wexler Breaks Bad ".Rolling Stone.Archivedfrom the original on April 19, 2022.RetrievedApril 19,2022.
  2. ^abcFienberg, Daniel (April 18, 2022)."Better Call SaulBoss PromisesBreaking BadReturns Won't Be Season 6's Biggest Surprise ".The Hollywood Reporter.Archivedfrom the original on April 19, 2022.RetrievedApril 19,2022.
  3. ^abcdefChaney, Jen (April 19, 2022)."A Deep Dive IntoBetter Call Saul's Colorful Cold Open ".Vulture.Archivedfrom the original on April 20, 2022.RetrievedApril 19,2022.
  4. ^Snierson, Dan (April 18, 2022)."Better Call Saulco-creator breaks down Jimmy and Kim's scheme, Lalo's mission ".Entertainment Weekly.Archivedfrom the original on April 19, 2022.RetrievedApril 19,2022.
  5. ^abcdefMcCaleb, Chris;Dixon, Kelley;Gould, Peter;Gilligan, Vince;Morris, Michael;Pizzini, Denise; Reinisch, Joey (April 19, 2022)."601Better Call SaulInsider "(Podcast).AMC.Archivedfrom the original on April 21, 2022.RetrievedApril 23,2022.
  6. ^abcGreene, Steve (April 20, 2022)."Better Call SaulHired a Dance Troupe to Stage the Wordless Season 6 Opening Sequence ".IndieWire.Archivedfrom the original on April 21, 2022.RetrievedApril 21,2022.
  7. ^McCaleb, Chris;Dixon, Kelley;Gould, Peter;Gilligan, Vince;Esposito, Giancarlo;Levine, Ariel; Reinisch, Joey (May 17, 2022)."606Better Call SaulInsider "(Podcast).AMC.RetrievedMay 26,2022.
  8. ^Kurp, Josh (May 18, 2022)."ABetter Call SaulFan Is Pretty Sure That They Cracked The 'Little Black Book' Code ".Uproxx.RetrievedMay 18,2022.
  9. ^McCaleb, Chris;Dixon, Kelley;Gould, Peter;Gilligan, Vince;Schnauz, Thomas;Levine, Ariel; Reinisch, Joey (April 19, 2022)."602Better Call SaulInsider "(Podcast).AMC.Archivedfrom the original on April 23, 2022.RetrievedApril 23,2022.
  10. ^"El insólito guiño de Better Call Saul a Casados con Hijos que no pasó desapercibido entre los fanáticos"[Better Call Saul's unusual nod to Casados con Hijos that did not go unnoticed by fans].La Nación(in Spanish). April 19, 2022.RetrievedMay 1,2023.
  11. ^""Casados con hijos" y su sorpresiva aparición en "Better Call Saul""[ "Casados con hijos" and its surprise appearance in "Better Call Saul" ].Clarín(in Spanish). April 19, 2022.RetrievedMay 1,2023.
  12. ^"Wine and Roses".Rotten Tomatoes.Fandango Media.RetrievedApril 23,2022.
  13. ^Segal, David(April 18, 2022)."Better Call SaulRecap, Season 6 Premiere: Run Nacho, Run ".The New York Times.Archivedfrom the original on April 20, 2022.RetrievedApril 20,2022.
  14. ^Potts, Kimberly (April 18, 2022)."Better Calls Saul's final season opens with a duo of tense, thrilling episodes ".The A.V. Club.Archivedfrom the original on April 20, 2022.RetrievedApril 20,2022.
  15. ^Greene, Steve (April 18, 2022)."Better Call SaulReview: Brilliant 'Wine and Roses' Sets the Stage for a Whole Lot of Loss ".IndieWire.Archivedfrom the original on April 19, 2022.RetrievedApril 20,2022.
  16. ^Greene, Steve (April 4, 2022)."Better Call SaulSeason 6 Review: An Exquisite Start to the Beginning of the End ".IndieWire.Archivedfrom the original on April 11, 2022.RetrievedApril 20,2022.
  17. ^Bennett, Tara (April 7, 2022)."Better Call Saul Season 6 Premiere Review: 'Wine and Roses' and 'Carrot and Stick'".IGN.Archivedfrom the original on April 15, 2022.RetrievedApril 20,2022.
  18. ^Greene, Steve; Khosla, Proma (November 30, 2022)."The 20 Best TV Episodes of 2022".IndieWire.RetrievedDecember 7,2022.
  19. ^Metcalf, Mitch(April 19, 2022)."ShowBuzzDaily's Monday 4.18.2022 Top 150 Cable Originals & Network Finals Updated".ShowBuzzDaily.Archivedfrom the original on April 19, 2022.RetrievedApril 19,2022.
  20. ^Bonomolo, Cameron (April 19, 2022)."Better Call SaulSeason 6 Premiere Sets Records for AMC and AMC+ ".ComicBook.com.Archivedfrom the original on April 23, 2022.RetrievedApril 23,2022.

External links[edit]

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