‘Better Call Saul’ Final Season Details You Missed

The house seen at the start of the season six premiere was originally supposed to be the same one that Kim and Jimmy looked at in season five.

The season six premiere showcases Saul’s house, which was never shown on “Better Call Saul.” You may have gotten emotional at the start of the episode, thinking that Saul eventually purchased the dream house that he and Kim looked at, but it wasn’t.

On the “Better Call Saul Insider” podcast, the creative team reveals that the original plan was to use the same house.

“Our original idea in the writer’s room was that this would be the house that Jimmy and Kim looked at — the empty house when they kind of went house shopping last season,” “Better Call Saul” cocreator Peter Gould said. “We thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if he had bought the house that he and Kim looked at?'”

Gould added that after scouting the house, they realized it was too restrictive to film inside to accomplish what they wanted to capture.

“It was such a wonderful idea to use that same house and I held onto it probably a little bit longer than I should’ve,” Gould said.

Kim has influenced some of Jimmy’s specific choices as Saul Goodman that we see on “Breaking Bad.”

Throughout the season, we start to see that Jimmy adopted some mannerisms as Saul Goodman and made specific choices based off of things Kim said to him in the past. 

Here are the ones we’ve picked up on so far:

1. On the premiere, when Jimmy tells Kim he rented a new car, Kim tells him that Saul wouldn’t drive a brown Ford Taurus. It’s not gaudy or showy. She says Saul would drive a flashy American vehicle. Saul eventually gets a white Cadillac.
2. Kim finds the space where Saul eventually holds his legal practice.
3. On season six, episode five, Kim playfully pretends to be Saul, telling Jimmy, “I’m Saul Goodman. Pow. I fight for you!” Jimmy eventually uses that phrase and others like it in TV ads to promote his business on “Breaking Bad.”

Kim has been wearing the earrings and necklace that her mom stole for her since the show’s start.

At the start of season six, episode six, we learn that teenage Kim attempted to shoplift a matching pair of earrings and necklace, something that seemed to go against everything the audience knows about the usually noble, moral attorney.

After getting scolded, her mother shockingly presented Kim with the shoplifted items, revealing she ultimately swiped them for her daughter. You may not have noticed that the earrings in the set are the ones Kim has been wearing since we first met her on the show’s first season. You can sometimes see that Kim is wearing the necklace, too.

As Kim starts to make some questionable decisions, or “break bad,” on the show’s final season, viewers heartbreakingly learn that this behavior isn’t coming from nowhere.

The colors people wear are symbolic of their morality on the show.

Cocreator Peter Gould previously confirmed on Twitter that they have a color code on the show where “hotter colors are associated with crime.” 

He told fans to figure out the rest, hinting that those who wear blue are on the right side of the law.

If you’ve been paying attention to the colors people are wearing this season, you’ll notice that Kim’s clothing, in particular, has started to get warmer as opposed to prior seasons. Noticeably, she’s seen wearing combinations of blue and red, hinting that her morality is becoming blurred.

Nacho’s acts on his final episode symbolized a rebirth of his character before he sacrificed his life.

On season six, episode three, Nacho (Michael Mando) submerged himself in oil inside a tanker to hide from the Salamanca twins. After coming out, he shed himself of his clothing and money before heading back to the United States. 

He was given a final meal and, unlike previous episodes where he wore red to symbolize his criminal intent, wore a white shirt adorned with small crosses to show he was at peace.

On the “Better Call Saul Insider” podcast, Mando described how those actions symbolized a rebirth of the character before he took his own life in order to save his father at the episode’s end.

“We were talking about how coming out of the oil tanker, he dies, he goes into hell, and then he comes out, like coming out of the womb,” Mando said of the episode’s symbolism. “Then he pukes, he cleans himself, and then he has no more need for anything material. He gives away all the money.”

“Then, he’s wearing white,” Mando added of the imagery. “If you notice on the shirts, there were little crosses. If you zoom in on Nacho’s shirt there were crosses.”

The song that kicks off the premiere “Days of Wine and Roses” is where the episode title “Wine and Roses” comes from.

The Jackie Gleason song’s lyrics speak of happier memories between a couple, which they refer to as “the days of wine and roses.”

Overlaid with the season premiere as Saul Goodman’s personal items are being packaged up and carted away, the tune and episode title foreshadow Goodman’s pending downfall that fans expect to come by the series’ end later this year.

For the time being, the rest of the episode (and season) are showing fans Kim and Saul’s “days of wine and roses.”

The season’s opening montage has so many callbacks that make more sense after you’ve watched later episodes. You can spot Kevin Wachtell’s Mesa Verde photo.

The Mesa Verde photo is tossed into a box as Saul’s items are packed up. On season five, Kim showed Jimmy the photo and suggested that Kevin copied the horse image illegally to create the logo for Mesa Verde without crediting or compensating the original photographer.

When Jimmy later accused Kevin of stealing the image, Kevin ‘fessed up, falsely believing that purchasing the photo gave him rights to the photo’s intellectual property.

Another item that’s tossed in that box is Saul’s “little black book,” which appeared on season six, episode six.

Saul and Kim visit Dr. Caldera, a veterinarian with connections to the criminal underworld.  He’s appeared on the show since season one as someone who has helped Mike in a pinch several times. Saul and Kim learn that Caldera’s going to retire soon and that he’s looking to part with a book full of valuable contacts.

At some point, Saul winds up with that book. 

The little black book contains some familiar names written in code.

Reddit user AsuranFish thinks they deciphered a lot of the black book’s pages that have been shown on screen this season. Among the names in the book are Huell and Nacho. The latter has been crossed out after his death earlier this season.

On the “Better Call Saul Insider” podcast, episode writer Ariel Levine said the cipher was put together by a few assistants on the series.

You can read the translations of the cipher here.

Eagle-eyed fans may have spotted the “Best Quality Vacuum” card inside the black book.

Saul eventually visits the vacuum store, run by Ed (Robert Forster), on the final season of “Breaking Bad” when he needs to flee Albuquerque and is sent to Nebraska.

The number on the card is supposed to be used when someone is in trouble and wants to disappear and start a new life with a new identity. Kim takes a look at the card, too, making us wonder if she may use the service by the show’s end.

The camera hones in on the Zafiro Añejo bottle stopper on the season premiere.

The fictional tequila goes back to season two on “Better Call Saul” when Jimmy and Kim con a man into buying them $50 shots of the expensive tequila.

The following season, Jimmy buys Kim a bottle of the tequila and she held onto the topper. It’s the only thing Kim took from Schweikart & Cokely’s when she quit the firm at the end of season five.

“Breaking Bad” fans know the tequila from season four. Gus poisoned and gifted the tequila to Don Eladio, leading to the death of Eladio and his cartel members.

Saul gets the inflatable Statue of Liberty eventually from the Kettlemans.

On season six, episode two, we’re reintroduced to Betsy and Craig Kettleman who now own a tax services company. The pair have a large inflatable version of Lady Liberty to draw in customers.

It’s the same inflatable balloon which eventually sits atop the shopping mall roof on “Breaking Bad” where Saul runs his legal practice. On season six, episode two, Saul briefly eyes it up. 

It’s currently unclear how Saul winds up wth the inflatable. We may eventually see Saul steal it, or viewers may be left to connect the dots there on their own. 

“It was impossible to find a duplicate,” Gilligan said on the “Better Call Saul Insider” podcast, confirming that it’s the original one fans saw on “Breaking Bad.” “Our crew looked all over the country and maybe even Canada … and there’s only one that we could find.”

Lalo’s decision to kill Mateo, the man in the premiere, wasn’t impulsive. That person was always meant to be his body double. The family wasn’t aware that was their role.

Lalo needed a body to make his death look believable to Gus and the world after a group of mercenaries failed to kill him on the season five finale. On the premiere, Lalo suggests that Mateo shaves his face to look similar to him before killing him off-screen.

On the “Better Call Saul Insider” podcast, the team explained how that man was always meant to be a body double of Lalo’s in case things ever went sideways. He didn’t come up with that plan randomly. 

“We had this idea that he had a double,” Gould said. “The idea was, this is a guy who he spotted, who’s a regular normal human being, and he’s brought this family to live in the Salamanca neighborhood. Unfortunately for them, this is the moment that he needs his double.”

Gould said they had many conversations about whether or not Lalo’s double should be aware that he was living on borrowed time and was Lalo’s double. They decided the couple should be in the dark. 

“I think the idea is that they’re honest people and they’re very grateful to Lalo for all the good things he’s done for them, but now it’s time to pay the Piper,” Gould said.

“I don’t think they know what their job is,” co-creator Vince Gilligan added. 

If you revisit the episode, the seemingly harmless conversation between Lalo and the man’s wife about the dentist is now a bit horrifying.

The dentist conversation, where Mateo’s wife thanks Lalo for sending him to Lalo’s dentist, seems harmless until you realize her husband is his unknowing double. 

Lalo only sent Mateo to his dentist so the dental records shown on episode two would later match up with his own.

The seemingly nice gesture is soiled once you realize the shrewd and calculating Lalo was looking out for himself.

Kim lays on her bed in the same position as a portrait that hangs in her apartment.

“There is a drawing that Kim has of a woman lying on a bed in her living room that’s on the bookshelf you pass as you go through the hallway to the bedroom and that is exactly how Kim is lying on the bed,” Rhea Seehorn, who plays Kim, said on the “Better Call Saul Insider” podcast of directing season six, episode four.

Seehorn made the artwork and others that hang in the apartment, including the bird paintings seen over Kim and Jimmy’s bed.