Even the most well-oiled machine needs a trip to the shop for a tune-up now and then. Better Call Saul, I suppose, is no exception. This week’s episode, “Coushatta,” is the first time that the show’s tremendous fourth season has hit any significant storytelling hiccups. They’re hardly deal breakers — the show is simply too good for that at this point, it seems — but for once, it felt like Jimmy McGill and company are playing for time.

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The opening letter-writing montage is set to as impeccable a deep cut as ever, in this case Les McCann’s funk-inflected barn-burner “Burnin’ Coal”, but the music feels like an excuse to make the filmmaking less interesting, not an impetus to get innovative. Better Call Saul obviously thrives on depicting the tedium of crime in an innovative way, but there’s nothing particularly interesting about a series of straightforward shots of a guy writing postcards on a bus as a hot piano tune plays. If the cinematography had been bolder, sure. Hell, if they’d gotten rid of the music entirely, and just let us sit on that bus with Jimmy for five minutes, soaking in the repetition of it all, that would have worked too. The choice the show made, neither fish nor fowl, feels like junior-varsity Saul at best.

I reviewed this week’s episode of Better Call Saul for TV Guide. It was the first one this season that felt less than essential to me, but it’s still Better Call Saul. I’m proud of that analysis of the musical montage, for what it’s worth.

Tags: better call saul, breaking bad, reviews, TV, tv guide, TV reviews

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