Kim Wexler and the Heroine's Journey
MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR BETTER CALL SAUL
Maureen Murdock's version of the heroine's journey is the most fitting of the two versions for Kim's character arc. However, as Kim isn't the main character, we only sporadically get to see her journey in some of the scenes she's in over the 6 seasons. We see the first step, the "separation from the feminine" over the course of the first and second seasons. Kim is punished for losing possibly lucrative clients, has some negative exchanges with her boss, and is gradually becoming disillusioned with her career at HHM, the firm she works at. She has become tired of getting mistreated and pushed around and wants to find some way to be superior and assertive, more "masculine".
The next step in Murdock's heroine's journey, the "identification with the masculine", occurs in the episode "Switch", where Jimmy invites Kim to con and swindle a stock broker into paying the bill for $600 tequila. Kim isn't on board at first, but she follows along, giving a false identity along with Jimmy, and they order the tequila. They make their exit before the man realizes just how much the bill is, and the two share a laugh outside. Kim feels a rush of excitement that we haven't seen her get previously. This is the moment where she feels the freedom that pursuing this more "masculine" or reckless kind of living gives her, compared to her stifling job as a lawyer at HHM.
Later throughout the show, Kim faces many challenges along the "road of trials", which mainly consists of furthering her new independent career, whilst also helping Jimmy with cons along the way. Her challenges mainly center around the Mesa Verde Bank and Trust, a client of Kim's. It isn't until the final season that she and Jimmy take the entire first half of the season to ruin the reputation of Howard Hamlin--her old boss at HHM--in their biggest scheme yet, where she "finds the boon of success". They have a multi-step plan to make Howard look like he's a manic and delirious cocaine addict in front of an important meeting of clients, and it works perfectly. Afterward, Howard visits Kim and Jimmy at their home to confront them, when in the middle of his monologue Lalo Salamanca walks in and promptly shoots him in the head. The show makes it clear in the aptly titled episode "Bad Choice Road" that both Jimmy and Kim have made the choices along the road of trials that have brought them here.
After surviving her encounter with Lalo, the guilt and grief eat away at her. She has "awakened to feelings of spiritual aridity", and makes the decision to quit being a lawyer and leave Albuquerque and Jimmy (now Saul) for good. She begins her "descent to the goddess" as a way to run away from her guilt and the "masculinity" that caused it. When we see her years later in Florida, chronologically after the events of Breaking Bad, she has regressed into an indecisive housewife married to a man she doesn't care for. It takes until Gene (previously Saul, who was previously Jimmy) calls her and her guilt comes back to haunt her. She "yearns to reconnect with the feminine", which in this case is going back to Albuquerque and confessing everything to Howard's widow to "heal the mother/daughter split", which in this case doesn't really work all that well. However, it does finally give Kim a little freedom from the guilt. It takes until the final episode for Kim to "heal the wounded masculine". Jimmy confesses to all his crimes in court, and she visits him in prison to share a smoke. She has figured out the "integration of masculine and feminine", mainly through losing both. Her "feminine" side was the repressed, straight-and-narrow lawyer, while the "masculine" side was the one that did crazier and dangerous things for fun and freedom. In the end, Kim was only able to find peace after reconciling with both sides of her past.
I think Kim's story also reflects upon the economic realities that reinforce the gender roles the heroine's journey tries to criticize. To economically survive, Kim has to be subordinate to her boss in the workplace or serve a man she doesn't love as a house wife. When she strives for masculine independence and self-actualization, she finds herself in the insecure position of Jimmy's shady dealings.
ReplyDeleteI think you could also view the boon of success as occurring earlier—specifically when she starts pulling large scams with Jimmy (I think I’d point to the episode Coushatta where she comes up with the card scam). There, she uses scams to advance her legal career and she leans into the personal enjoyment she gets out of them as well. I think the final Howard Hamlin scam was the end of the stage where she pushed it too far and faces the consequences.
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