"Plan and Execution" serves as the climax to this half-season and boy, what a climax it is. Jimmy and Kim's full plan to discredit Howard is revealed and it goes off without a hitch, despite a last-minute setback. As it turns out, the private investigator Howard hired to track Jimmy is secretly working for them and delivers a new batch of doctored photos to Howard laced with the drug they procured last week. By the end of it, Howard's credibility is damaged if not outright destroyed and the Sandpiper case is settled. The way the episode unfurls this is vintage Better Call Saul. once again allowing the viewer to piece together exactly what is going on rather than spoon-feeding information to them.
Meanwhile, Lalo returns to Albuquerque and sets up a hiding spot in a sewer grate across the street from where Gus' superlab is located and makes a video documenting his proof to Eladio. Upon realizing his phone call to Hector is bugged however, he concocts a story that he'll raid the lab that night and kill Gus before leaving the sewers. Gus and Mike hear the fake story and make plans to ensure that Mike's men will cover Gus and put Lalo down once and for all.
Jimmy and Kim celebrate their victory when a visibly disheveled Howard shows up and excoriates them for ruining his life. He compares them to Leopold and Loeb and correctly calls Kim out on how her part in this wasn't at all necessary; she did it because she liked it. As Jimmy and Kim tell him to leave, Lalo shows up and insists on talking with them, but not before putting a bullet in Howard's skull.
I mentioned last week that Kim's choice in forgoing her luncheon with the legal group in favor of rescuing the scam was a point of no return for the character. I assumed that this choice would result in her disbarment and while that may still definitely be the case, the immediate consequences here are much more fatal and dire. Regardless of what happens to Kim in the final six episodes (as we already know that Jimmy will survive this), an innocent man is dead because of her and Jimmy's machinations and there really is no going back. I truly have no idea how the show will be able to wrap this storyline up and catch up to the Breaking Bad timeline in just six episodes, but considering how well-crafted this season and really the entire show has been, we're in good hands.
Notes and observations:
* I already mentioned Patrick Fabian's performance a couple of weeks prior, but he truly shows his range in this episode, from the genial way he treats the HHM employee, to his mounting panic during the deposition and his final monologue towards Jimmy and Kim, where he brokenly reveals the state of his marriage to them.
* Early on in the episode, Howard shows a nervous HHM employee how to temper a shaken can of ginger ale by applying centrifugal force to it. He reveals that he got the tip from Chuck and stares wistfully at a portrait of his former partner and friend. The moment serves as a nice reminder of the man whose relationship with Jimmy formed much of the backbone of the show's first few seasons as well as a thesis statement on the slow boil that Better Call Saul has been over the past six seasons
* As sympathetic as Howard has become. I love how the episode also shows he still has a bit of an asshole side, such as his persuasion of Irene to use a wheelchair in the meeting and his determination to fight the settlement despite how many years it would take to the detriment of the clients.
* Thomas Schnauz, who previously wrote and directed last season's phenomenal "Bad Choice Road", also helms this episode and delivers a masterclass in filmmaking, from the wordless opening scene of Lalo returning to Albuquerque to the staging of the final scene in the apartment. Truly, Better Call Saul is weekly film school in television format.
* Speaking of film school, the trio of students that Jimmy once again hires for a bit of last-minute editing are truly some of my favorite side characters on either show. In what will most likely be their final appearance, we get some more insight into each one: the leader being a smug know-it-all, the girl being relentlessly perky and the generic middleman apparently being a jogger in his spare time.
* Let me know your predictions for the final six episodes in the comments below!
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