Television

Season 5, Episode 2: ‘50% Off’You’re playing Texas Hold ‘Em poker with Lalo Salamanca and he raises you $200. You’ve got a strong hand. Three eights. Do you see Lalo’s bet? Raise him another $200? Whoop-whoop in anticipation of pay dirt?Or do you fold, as Domingo (Max Arciniega) does early in this week’s episode? Given the air of menace that surrounds Lalo, this is arguably a very wise career move. It is also apparently the birth of Domingo’s nickname, Krazy-8, bestowed upon him by Lalo, who thinks his petrified employee isn’t petrified at all. He’s merely loco.It’s just one of many short cons played in “50% Off,” an episode in which just about everyone, in true “Better Call Saul” style, is playing everyone else. The most productive con might be Jimmy’s, who manages to buttonhole the assistant district attorney Suzanne Ericsen (Julie Pearl), by conspiring with a maintenance guy to disable the elevator between floors. The two lawyers wind up negotiating deals for Jimmy’s clients, one after another, in 20 minutes.If you’re taking on so many cases that you must resort to such tactics, you need to dial it down a bit. Which is another way of saying that Kim was right. The limited-time offer of half-off legal counsel was a bad idea. Jimmy concedes as much as he and Kim make an impromptu stop to look at a house for sale. And the episode demonstrates the downsides of priced-to-move legal advice in the opening scene, which follows two meth-addled yahoos who celebrate Saul’s introductory bargain rate by launching into a multiday bender.Let’s leave aside the implausibility of this bacchanalia. (Seriously, would anyone think, “Let’s go insane for a while because once the cops nab us, we won’t spend huge sums on a lawyer”?) Those yahoos wind up at one of the apartments where the Salamancas peddle their meth, using a delivery system — a drain pipe — that proves catastrophically flawed. When it jams, the newly christened Krazy-8 climbs a ladder to perform some ad hoc home improvements, and that is where the cops find him when they arrive.The collaring of Krazy-8 offers Nacho an opening. He has already been treated to the scare of his life by Gus Fring, who sends Victor (Jeremiah Bitsui) into a restaurant where Nacho’s father is eating with some friends. It briefly looks as though Nacho is about to witness the gangland slaying of his padre, when Gus shows up and twists the thumb screws a bit more: Win Lalo’s trust, he tells Nacho. Figure out his plans. Share them. Or else.Nacho gets the chance to turn Lalo’s head through an apparent suicide mission to retrieve the meth left in the stash house that was quickly abandoned once Krazy-8 was nabbed. Precisely how Nacho manages this feat of drug superhero-dom is unclear, but Lalo watches from his car as the show unfolds, munching on a snack as if he were at the movies. When Nacho returns, sweating but alive, meth in hand, Lalo is suitably awed — and in a trusting mood.So much so that Lalo delegates to Nacho the decision to send dealers back to the streets. And he shares a meal and a beer with his underling, quickly signaling that he has weighty matters on his mind. Will Krazy-8 flip? He won’t, Nacho says, but offers to have him killed anyway. Nah, says Lalo.“I’ve got something much better for him.”We don’t yet know what that something else is. But soon after Jimmy emerges from his elevator tete-a-tete with Ms. Ericsen, Nacho pulls up in the passenger seat of a car and instructs the counselor to get in.A bit of back story. Nacho and Jimmy met in Season 1, and their relationship includes a very unpleasant detour to the desert. Jimmy had gotten crosswise with the volcanic Tuco Salamanca in one of the show’s early and most disastrous short cons. Nacho worked for Tuco at the time and helped haul Jimmy to a forsaken patch of land outside of town. There, Jimmy frantically produced what might have been his finest closing statement, and saved his own life.Nacho and Jimmy subsequently had more amicable dealings, but that terrifying round trip to the desert would surely have been on Jimmy’s mind as Nacho rolled up in that car.We’re left to surmise that whatever “much better” plan Lalo has in mind, it is likely to involve Jimmy. Of course, it was inevitable that Jimmy would get tangled in Lalo’s life, a development that was preordained, in a time-bendy kind of way, courtesy of an early episode of “Breaking Bad.” Walter White and Jesse Pinkman haul Jimmy to another part of New Mexico’s ample desertscape and make a good show of threatening to kill him. (They, too, were worried about a recently arrested colleague.) Once Jimmy figures out that these two masked men were not sent by Lalo — “Lalo didn’t send you?” he screams — he is vastly relieved.Then again, Lalo’s “much better” plans for Krazy-8 could involve an idea that springs from his meeting with his uncle, Don Hector (Mark Margolis), in some kind of nursing facility. Now wheelchair-bound and mute, Don Hector tries to help his nephew figure out how to handle Gus Fring, whose machinations mystify Lalo. Fring is protected by the money he makes for the cartel, Don Hector suggests, through a bit of tactical bell ringing.So expect Lalo to go on the offensive against Fring and his supply system.Finally, the episode’s saddest scene belongs to Mike, who rages at his granddaughter after she asks one too many questions about her deceased father. Mike blames himself for his son’s death, as longtime viewers know, and his guilt and self-loathing have recently been re-triggered by his murder of the homesick construction manager, Werner Ziegler, at the end of Season 4.It’s excruciating to watch Mike lash out at the one person he seems to love unconditionally, and to whom he will try to give all of his ill-gotten fortune in “Breaking Bad.” But the outburst might also help explain a mystery. Throughout “Breaking Bad,” Mike happily spent time with his granddaughter, but he interacted with his daughter-in-law in a way that strongly suggested that the two were estranged. Maybe they will reconcile. But if they don’t, this is why — or perhaps, it’s the start of why.Did I miss a con? And some smaller questions. Can we talk about the shower in that house for sale? Can we talk about how no customers have been seen at the Mexican restaurant where Lalo now cooks? It almost seems to be a money laundering front.Opine in the comments section, please. And may your criminal record be as clean as Doris Day’s greatest hits. More

CHICAGO — Almost a year after he walked out of court seemingly a free man, the actor Jussie Smollett returned to court on Monday to again face charges that he had lied to the police about a hate crime attack that detectives said he had staged.Mr. Smollett, 37, appeared in court two weeks after a special prosecutor, Dan K. Webb, announced that a grand jury had indicted Mr. Smollett on nearly identical charges that the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office dropped 11 months ago.Mr. Smollett’s lawyer, Tina Glandian, entered a plea of not guilty as her client stood before the judge, hands clasped and with his black overcoat still on. The judge, James B. Linn of Cook County Circuit Court, allowed the actor to remain free, saying he was not a flight risk and rejecting prosecutors’ request for $10,000 bail. Mr. Smollett walked out without comment, his departure captured by a line of television cameras in the hallways outside the courtroom.[A timeline of the case|What we know about the evidence]The case has spellbound the city ever since Mr. Smollett, who played a son of a hip-hop mogul on the Fox drama “Empire,” reported on Jan. 29, 2019, that he had been attacked by two men who shouted racist and homophobic slurs, placed a noose around his neck and poured bleach on him. Mr. Smollett, who is gay, told the police that the attackers also yelled, “This is MAGA country,” a reference to President Trump’s 2016 campaign slogan.But the Police Department concluded that Mr. Smollett had paid two brothers to stage the attack because he was unhappy with his salary on “Empire.”Weeks after Mr. Smollett was indicted, the state’s attorney’s office dropped the charges against him. In exchange, Mr. Smollett performed 15 hours of community service and forfeited the $10,000 bond that had released him from jail. Prosecutors said at the time that it was an appropriate resolution because Mr. Smollett was not a violent criminal and had a long record of community service.But the outcome angered prominent officials in Chicago, including then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel; the city is now suing Mr. Smollett for more than $130,000 it said it had spent investigating the reported hate crime.Mr. Smollett has maintained his innocence throughout, denying that he had hired the brothers.A judge appointed Mr. Webb, a former federal prosecutor, as special prosecutor last year after concluding that the State’s Attorney, Kim Foxx, had acted improperly when she handed the case to her deputy instead of someone outside her office. Ms. Foxx had removed herself from the case because of contact she had with representatives of Mr. Smollett when the police still considered him a victim.Mr. Webb obtained an indictment this month charging Mr. Smollett with six counts of disorderly conduct by giving various false statements to the police. In a statement that accompanied the announcement of the new charges, Mr. Webb sharply criticized the way in which the state’s attorney’s office resolved the original case.When the office approved the first grand jury indictment, it appeared to have strong evidence against Mr. Smollett, Mr. Webb said. There was no indication that prosecutors had learned new information casting doubt on Mr. Smollett’s guilt before the office dropped all of the charges against him without requiring that he admit wrongdoing, Mr. Webb said.Ms. Glandian, the actor’s lawyer, said on Monday that she had filed a motion with the Illinois Supreme Court arguing that the new indictment constituted double jeopardy because Mr. Smollett had already been punished by forfeiting the $10,000 bond. “Trying to punish him a second time around is not permitted,” she said outside court, adding that it was “very frustrating” for Mr. Smollett to be back in court nearly a year after the charges were dropped.Mr. Webb did not comment on the motion, but is likely to argue that because Mr. Smollett never was tried or pleaded guilty, he was still eligible to be prosecuted.Ms. Foxx is running for re-election, and her opponents in the Democratic primary have criticized her office’s handling of the Smollett case. Her campaign denounced the “James Comey-like timing” of the new charges, referring to the former F.B.I. director’s public pronouncements about the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server just before she lost to Mr. Trump. Mr. Webb said that he had not found any wrongdoing by Ms. Foxx’s office, but that he was still investigating.Mr. Smollett was dropped from the cast of “Empire” after his arrest last year. Since then, his acting and singing career appears to have stalled, and he has had little public exposure beyond his court appearances.Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, the brothers who attacked Mr. Smollett — either at his behest or not — watched Monday’s proceedings from the courtroom gallery.“The brothers want the public to know that they were open and honest and remorseful about their conduct,” their lawyer, Gloria Schmidt Rodriguez, said outside the courtroom with the Osundairos by her side. “They have been truthful since day one and they will continue to be truthful.”Julia Jacobs contributed reporting from New York. More

What’s on TVTHE VOICE 8 p.m. on NBC. This singing competition is back for its 18th season, with Nick Jonas replacing Gwen Stefani as a coach. Episode 1 kicks off the competition’s blind auditions. Here, singers vying for the chance to be on the show — and mentored by Jonas, John Legend, Kelly Clarkson or Blake Shelton — will audition only with their voices. Later stages of the competition include singing battles and rehearsed performances, with the guest artists Dua Lipa, Ella Mai and Bebe Rexha, as well as Kevin and Joe Jonas.BLACK IN SPACE: BREAKING THE COLOR BARRIER 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. on Smithsonian. On Aug. 30, 1983, the astronaut Guion Bluford embarked as a crew member of the Space Shuttle Challenger, making him the first African-American in space. This documentary features him alongside Edward Dwight, an Air Force pilot edged out of a position with NASA, and Frederick Gregory, the first African-American to command a NASA mission, to examine the complications of sending a black man into space during the Cold War. Also included are Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez, the first Cuban astronaut sent into space by the Soviet Union, and Ronald McNair, an African-American pilot who died in the Challenger disaster in 1986.What’s StreamingGENTEFIED Stream on Netflix. At the center of this show tackling gentrification is Casimiro (Joaquín Cosío), a struggling Mexican restaurant owner in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles. He’s aided by his grandchildren, who aim to strike a balance between tradition and modernity: Chris (Carlos Santos), an aspiring chef; Ana (Karrie Martin), an ambitious artist; and Erik (J.J. Soria), who helps Casimiro run the restaurant. In his review for The New York Times, James Poniewozik wrote that the series sometimes “wants to be a sharp-elbowed satire.” But “sometimes — more effectively,” he adds, “it’s a working-class family dramedy, conscious of the cascading effects of small financial setbacks and the code-switching involved in moving across cultures.”HUNTERS Stream on Amazon. “The show has us at Al Pacino,” Mike Hale wrote in his review for The Times, noting a star-studded cast in this new series about World War II vigilantes. After the grandmother of 19-year-old Jonah Heidelbaum (Logan Lerman) is killed, he crosses paths with Meyer Offerman (Pacino), a concentration camp survivor who has assembled a group of Nazi hunters. The show takes place in the 1970s, and Meyer has reason to believe the Reich is again attempting world domination; this time, in America. The moral dilemma of the plot is easy enough to predict: Is vigilante killing, even of Nazis, really justified? More

Season 5, Episode 1: ‘Magic Man’Welcome home, Saul-a-holics. It’s been a long time since we gathered here to unpack the rising and falling fortunes of our favorite con man turned corporate lawyer turned mobile phone dealer turned plaintiffs’ attorney. But judging from this first episode, the wait has been worth it.Let’s just say it: That was the best season opener to date.We commence, as ever, in the future and in black and white. Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) is a Cinnabon manager in Omaha named Gene Takovic. As miserable as his new life and identity appear, Mr. Takovic wants to keep it, despite the somewhat terrifying sense that a menacing cabby named Jeff has discovered Jimmy’s previous iteration as Albuquerque’s own Saul Goodman. It’s the same Jeff, played by Don Harvey, who gave Mr. Takovic a lift in last season’s opener, and this time it’s clear that the guy isn’t just trying to drum up fares.Either Jeff is looking for a bounty or to shake down Saul — probably the latter. We leave this predicament after Saul calls the Disappearer, played with his understated gravity by the great Robert Forster, who has since passed away. Initially, Jimmy/Saul/Gene wants to buy yet another identity, his fourth. Then he decides to save his squirreled-away diamonds and “fix it” himself.Here’s hoping we don’t need to wait an entire season to learn what happens next. Though that seems likely.Cut to the show’s present. Which is the very moment we left Jimmy and Kim (Rhea Seehorn) at the end of Season 4, as Jimmy celebrates his masterful hoodwinking of the gatekeepers of the New Mexico State Bar. He’s been readmitted to practice, and his next move is to change his doing-business-as name to Saul Goodman. Kim is skeptical of Jimmy’s new career path, in particular his cellphone giveaway and half-price approach to finding clients.But Jimmy seems like a man who has finally figured out his purpose in life, and he has a point when he says that if he walks the legit, corporate path he’ll always live in the shadow of his deceased and far more accomplished older brother.So we get a montage scene of new customers, who have come for free phones and get a one-on-one pitch, in a tent. Worth noting: Once again the casting staffers on the show deliver, in this case one Fellini-meets-carnival-sideshow face at a time.At the end of this episode, Kim has her moral compass titled Saul-ward when Jimmy improvises a con that convinces a client of Kim’s take a plea deal. While initially reluctant to roll with Jimmy’s plan, she quickly learns that his underhanded approach works where her honest approach does not.Moral compromises — Kim is going to have to choose between them and Jimmy in episodes to come.Plot-wise, the core of this episode, called “Magic Man,” centers on the looming conflict between Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito) and Eduardo (Lalo) Salamanca (Tony Dalton). Lalo learns that customers are complaining that his minions are slinging diluted meth and he investigates. You know how a great sommelier has a great palate? Well, Lalo apparently has a great nose, and he can tell immediately which portion of his family’s cut of Fring’s product has been “stepped on.” Time to pay a visit to Gus to find out what has gone wrong, and whether it has any connection to the vanished German he’s heard about, and Fring’s surreptitious construction project.What’s curious about the sit-down that follows, mediated by the Mexican cartel upper manager Juan Bolsa (Javier Grajeda), is that Lalo seems unsurprised that Fring has anticipated that he — Lalo — is angry about the stepped on meth. Either Fring knows about Lalo’s super discriminating nostrils or there is a spy in the House of Salamanca. There is, of course, and his name is Nacho Varga (Michael Mando), who was blackmailed into serving Fring as a double agent in Season 4 after Fring realized that Nacho had tried to murder the Salamanca overlord, Don Hector.Lalo doesn’t bother hiding his distrust of Fring, even though, as ever, Fring has an alibi at the ready when it comes time to explain the construction project.The vanished German was working on a chicken refrigerator, Fring explains, and to “prove” it, Gus has the German crew, which was previously building the meth superlab, clanging away at what is either a massive cooling warehouse for fouls or a Potemkin chiller.Lalo isn’t buying this performance and he lets Fring know it.“You know, it’s going to be a very nice chiller,” he says, winking. “South wall’s going to be beautiful.”Fring knows that Lalo must be dealt with, and superlab construction is suspended until this Salamanca is either in the ground or back in Mexico. With nothing to do for the foreseeable future, the German crew is sent home. Mike (Jonathan Banks) hands out the tickets and punches the ever punchable Kai (Ben Bela Böhm) after he suggests that their now deceased leader, Werner Ziegler, whom Mike reluctantly killed at the end of last season, was “soft.” Casper (Stefan Kapicic) fares better by praising that leader (“He was worth 50 of you”) and daring Mike to hit him.Bonus (Chicken) Nuggets:Fun fact: The book that Gene is reading on his lunch break at the Omaha mall is “The Moon’s a Balloon,” a memoir by David Niven.Season 5 is teed up beautifully in this episode. At long last, Jimmy has become Saul, at least during his professional hours. Whether he’ll be Saul off the clock isn’t clear because we didn’t spend a lot of private time with the man in “Breaking Bad.” His wardrobe, however, is evolving.Lalo is a fantastic villain and foil. He’s ruthless, charming when necessary and smart enough to see through Fring in ways that Bolsa does not. His battles with Gus and Mike will be riveting.As we revel in upbeat premonitions about what’s to come, your recapper would like viewer help with some questions about what we just watched.1.) Who “stepped on” Fring’s meth? Clearly there has been a major supply disruption, courtesy of the demise of Herr Ziegler. But how precisely does that translate into diluted product?2.) When Lalo is debriefing with Bolsa after the meeting with Fring, he says he doesn’t trust the Chilean. That’s ridiculous, Bolsa says. Fring is all business.“All business?” Lalo replies. “Like what happened in Santiago?”Uh, what happened in Santiago? It is the town where Max Arciniega, Fring’s murdered boyfriend, attended university, as we learn in “Breaking Bad.” But that murder occurred in Mexico. Is this Lalo’s oblique way of referencing that killing, which he’d just mentioned to Bolsa a moment earlier? Or did something else happen in Santiago — perhaps something that we viewers don’t know about yet?To quote Jimmy, “Is there some angle I’m not seeing here?”Help a Saul-a-holic out in the comments section, and opine away on the episode. More