In the most recent episode of Better Call Saul, Mike Ehrmantraut, Gus Fring’s (Giancarlo Esposito) right-hand man portrayed by Jonathan Banks, drunkenly commands that a bartender take down a postcard featuring the image of the Sydney Opera House while drinking in a bar, but why? Better Call Saul, the prequel spin-off series of AMC’s Breaking Bad, follows Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) as he begins to transition into the criminal lawyer Saul Goodman, who was previously introduced on Vince Gilligan’s Breaking Bad.
Within season 5 of Better Call Saul, Mike Erhmantraut has trouble coping with his guilt over his past actions, from being a dirty police officer in the Philadelphia Police Department, to encouraging his son to follow in his footsteps as a corrupt cop, and more recently for killing Werner Ziegler during the finale of Better Call Saul season 4. In this week’s episode, Mike indulges in his own self-loathing by drinking his troubles away, but his guilt comes back to haunt him in the form of a postcard.
In the episode “The Guy For This,” Mike is shown drinking alone in a bar. When he asks for another round, the bartender believes that Mike has had enough to drink and offers to call him a cab. After Mike hands him his keys to stash in the register, the bartender pours him one last drink. Sitting at the bar, Mike notices a postcard featuring a photo of the Sydney Opera House tacked onto the wall and forcefully requests that the bartender take the picture down. The bartender refuses Mike’s request, stating that the postcards are a tradition and that the patrons of the bar send them in. Once Mike asks nicely, the bartender removes the postcard and Mike appears to calm down.
While the scene is never explained within the episode, Mike appears to take issue with the postcard since it reminds him of Werner Ziegler, the engineer whom he was ordered to kill in season 4. In the episode “Something Stupid,” Mike brings Ziegler and the men contracted to build Fring’s super-lab to a strip club as a break from their construction work. Noticing Ziegler’s lack of interest in the dancers, Mike takes him to a bar instead where Ziegler tells Mike about his father, the engineer behind the Sydney Opera House. When Mike sees the postcard of the Sydney Opera House at the bar, the photo of the famous structure reminds Mike of Ziegler and increases his guilt over killing him in order to protect Fring’s operation.
While Better Call Saul mainly follows Jimmy’s descent into the criminal lawyer Saul Goodman, the series also reveals how Mike transforms into Gus Fring’s hitman and a senior member of his drug empire. Having similar motivations to Walter White (Bryan Cranston) from Breaking Bad, Mike turns to crime so that he can provide for his granddaughter Kaylee (Abigail Zoe Lewis), and while Mike has always been a family man, his morals have usually teetered more towards the side of corruption. As a former dirty cop, Mike has killed people in the past, including the two corrupt cops who murdered his son, but Ziegler was the first innocent person Mike killed on Fring’s behalf. Mike has always intentionally avoided utilizing violence during his criminal ventures, and specifically goes out of his way to get Tuco Salamanca (Raymond Cruz) arrested instead of assassinating him like he was hired to do by Nacho Varga (Michael Mando).
During the episode “50% Off,” Mike yells at his granddaughter Kaylee for broaching the subject of her father’s death, which shows that Mike is beginning to be weighed down by his past mistakes and violent actions. As season 5 of Better Call Saul continues, it’s safe to assume that Mike will continue to experience a moral crisis, divided by his need to provide for his family and his wish to act in accordance with the moral code that once guided his son.
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