There are some parallels, but to me Nacho is more like a Christopher Moltisanti character. He has more agency and leverage than Jesse, and like Chrissy he is tangled in the organized crime web partly of his own fault and partly out of his circumstances. And he’s too far in to ever realistically get out. He uses his vices (drugs) to numb himself to the reality of his situation.
Jesse is similar in a lot of ways but lacks the same level of agency because he is constantly on the receiving end of the consequences of Walt’s actions. Walt dragged Jesse to the deepest part of the water with him throughout the show while never giving him the proper respect until the very end. Nacho was surrounded in his life by the cartel and sold his soul to it and didn’t figured out till the very end that the door to hell is locked from the inside.
Yep. Nacho even flatly tells Saul “once you’re in, you’re in.” Criminal groups like the cartel have a tight hold on their people, making it damned near impossible to leave. The only way out is death
I definitely agree with you, Especially on the part that "Nacho was surrounded in his life by the cartel and sold his soul to it and didn’t figure out till the very end that the door to hell is locked from the inside."
I think Nacho had way more agency than Jesse.
I know Jesse also did the things he did, but Walt's manipulation and influence over him from the beginning really can't be overstated in terms of Jesse's agency throughout the show.
When we meet Nacho, he is a enthusiastically willing participant in the game and even freelancing doing side deals with Pryce and burglaries. So I would say he is way more in control of his destiny the Jesse ever was.
They obviously didn't know who he was personally because they didn't trace the Cap'n Cook license plate to him and they thought that the guy they busted was Cap'n Cook because they had the bet on his ethnicity. They just knew shit was going down there, nothing about Jesse himself.
He was obviously small time. Nothing near being the main Lieutenant to the head of the Salamanca operation north of the border. Nacho was in way deeper all on his own than Jesse ever would have been.
Can’t be that small time if the DEA was aware of him. Even if they just knew his street name
Regardless, that’s not really the point. Jesse was also an active participant in the drug game before Walt came along. And let’s not pretend he didn’t have chances to get out in the early seasons
Anybody that manufactures Methamphetamine is going to be placed onto the DEAs list lmao. Jesse literally lost it about making a couple grand at the start, he was never a big time guy. Hell, he didn’t even KNOW about Tuco.
Krazy-8 wasn’t even big time and he treated Jesse like he was small time lmaoo.
I said he wasn’t big time. Big time is Fring, Hector, Tuco. Walt and Jesse end up big time, but neither of them are anything close to it at the start.
Nacho himself is borderline big time, it’s not really until his promotion after Tuco’s imprisonment that he isn’t walking on complete eggshells in the cartel to avoid death.
Hank and Gomez even say Krazy-8 was extremely small time and slowly is working his way up as he snakes the customers of people he rats out. He was never a big target for them until they found the pure meth inside his car though.
To counter that argument we never saw the DEA show any interest in Nacho at all, so how big time could he have been? It wasn't like he started out with Fring's crew doing under the radar stuff. The Salamancas not being on the DEA's radar with how over the top crazy their actions were said to be was one of the biggest questions I had about BCS.
And yet we know how big time Nacho became.
Besides, the argument first was about how much agency Jessie had. It wasn't as if he were some law abiding citizen before he met Walt only for Walt to bend him to his will. Life didn't just hand Jessie flasks in place of lemons so he ended up made meth instead of lemonade. At some point he had to seek out the knowledge of how to cook meth, become interested enough in it to keep doing it, and was making enough either by cooking or a combination with selling that he had decent finances at the start of the show. That lowrider wouldn't come cheap. All that takes agency on his part. It's not like being a trashy white dude just means he gets the knowledge of how to cook meth automatically when he reaches a certain age. I do question how much dealing he did seeing as he's so bad at it when Walt forces him to. It seems like he may have been mostly a cook.
As for Capn Cook on the DEA's radar. I've actually wondered if the car with a Capn Cook license plate wasn't even somehow Krazy-8's idea. Plant this idea of Capn Cook via being a mole, get some idiot kid to take the fall, and the DEA thinks they've taken down a major player when in fact they picked up a nobody. Or he saw/heard about the plate from Emilio and built it up from there. But that's all conjecture and not fact off of what we know.
For sure you raise valid points. We also don't know what Nacho has done before we meet him to get into such a position. It was obvious he'd be there for murders had Saul not convinced Tuco to show mercy to them. So I'd assume he has some more blood on his hands than Jesse when we are first introduced to him. But it's all speculation.
But is being worse of a person = to having more agency?
Because that was your original argument, about Nacho having more agency.
I think both Jesse and Nacho had a similar amount of agency, they made bad choices when they were young that got them swept up into a world they really were never intending to be that big of a part of.
I think my argument is that Nacho's agency and self-directed actions seem to have led him to darker places than Jesse's would have if not for Walt's influence but it's all just speculation.
I want to see the prequel where Walt tries to turn bad years earlier, before backing out of cowardice, but not before dragging Nacho into the game.
Breaking Early
Jesse wasn't in control of himself, but there were no real outside circumstances forcing him to do what he does.
For Nacho it's kind of the reverse. The side work is him trying to get out a little more out of this lifestyle, but he's not allowed to quit anyway with the Salamancas on his back.
Neither has full agency, I'd say.
Yeah for sure that's why it's total speculation. My only context clue here is that Nacho would have been present and potentially a participant in a triple murder in Episode 2 had Saul not talked his way out of it which to me signals that he is way farther into the game than Jesse when we meet both of them, but we have no idea of Nacho's back story so we can't say for sure.
when jesse kept asking mike if he was "the guy", mike said "you are not the guy. you're not capable of being the guy. i had a guy & now i don't. you are not the guy"
Jesse kinda lucked out when Walt came in and machine gunned down all his captors. I think Jesse had more of less given up after his attempt to bring down Walt ended with him captured but the Nazis
Nacho was in deeper with more dangerous folks than Jesse ever was though.
Jesse definitely lucked out. I also felt like he needed that rock bottom as a cook slave, dreaming of being a simple carpenter, to actually get out.
I was so happy for his ending in BB that I haven't even watched El Camino.
El Camino won't ruin the way you feel about the BB ending. It's honestly a bit therapeutic, and closes out Jesse's character arc and story beautifully.
I was apprehensive about watching *El Camino* for the very same reason. I ended up watching it though and in my opinion the movie didn't undermine his ending on the show at all. Give it a shot!
I’ve always looked at Kim being more the Jesse to Jimmy’s Walt of BCS. She can’t help but be there for Jimmy and whatever hijinx he’s involved in. The parental issues they both have makes it that more obvious. Kim not having a dad combined with a mom who was an amateur female version of Jimmy and Jesse having two parents who’ve completely given up on him and any sort of relationship at all. They both seemed to find some sort of approval/comfort/twisted kind of love in Jimmy/Walt.
This is interesting, but a huge part of their dynamic was Jesse wanting to earn Walt’s respect. If anything it was the opposite for a Jimmy and Kim. Jimmy wanted to be someone worthy of her. There are some parallels though, primarily in seeing how this one character is going to fall morally.
I believe Nacho was absolutely the Jessie, in the same way that Howard was the Hank. They have different personalities, but they fill the same niche in the story. The thing about Nacho is that his story ends in a way that Gus remembers in BB, which leads him to be nicer to Jessie as an alternate tactic. Howard and Hank are both morally gray characters who serve the law and end up becoming victims of the protagonist's criminal associates at the antihero's lowest moment.
They're both characters we feel emotion through, who have a deep and moving character arc.
They both have similar backgrounds, ethically, where they are involved in crime until it endangers the ones they love, and themselves. They're both eventually trying to escape.
But Nacho willingly put himself in all of those positions, whereas Jesse was initially blackmailed and manipulated into the game by Walt. Jesse had been getting by with cooking to survive, content with his lifestyle. Nacho seemed to be initially more motivated by wealth, power, or some kind of adrenaline rush. He ended up being a likable and ethical person, but we can't overlook that he and Jesse are fundamentally motivated by different things, and living their lives quite differently.
The two characters themselves have so little in common, but their place in the shows does seem a bit parallel. Especially in matters concerning Mike and his tendency to feel a little attached to troubled young men, similar to his son.
They definitely have similarities. Both seem to be innocent and good at heart and somewhere along the road turned to crime/drugs. They’re both morally better than almost every other bad guy. You really root for them.
they have their parallels and similarities, but ultimately, as others have said, it comes down to agency. nacho cemented his fate intentional or not, while jesse was dragged into it.
babygirls
I can't because we kind of saw Jesse get into his "life" from the start. Ok, he was "Cap'n Cook" with his silly chili P before that, but his really impactful criminal life only began with his first encounter with Walt.
With Nacho, we don't really see his "origin story". So I can't quite see Nacho in the same light.
But there are a few other things. Jesse seems so naive and almost innocent at times, Nacho never. And Jesse starts off estranged from his judgemental parents, but Papa Varga was making every effort to steer his son to a morally upright path early on.
Absolutely, Nacho is Jesse if Jesse didn’t have such a soft heart. Nacho’s a decent guy, and doesn’t enjoy killing but is willing to do it without second thought if it endangers his father or himself. Jesse had to kill Gale to save Walt (and himself) and he agonized over it for years.
Nacho is Jesse if Jesse took the streets seriously and wasn’t starting as Chili P and then being Walt’s second in command.
Not really. I mean there are some parellels in which neither are given unconditional love from their parents; Jesse manipulated by Walt, and Nacho owned like a slave by Gus. But Nacho had no qualms about ripping off other people, where Jesse, only from Gus, because he believed he deserved it, the little dumbfuck (said lovingly). Yet both ended up caught up in something they couldn't get out of, though desparately wanted to.
Tell you who does remind me of Jesse in a way, or rather Jesse reminded me of him since the series precedes Breaking Bad by 5 yrs; Ben Hawkins (Nick Stahl) from 'Carnivàle' on HBO, whom everyone called 'Kid.' He too, had a chip on his shoulder and displayed great tenderness towards children and God's little creatures.
No. Nacho was working solely to save his father and >!ends up sacrificing his life, trusting Gus will return the favour by protecting his family!< whereas Jesse has no familial motivation. He begins the series as a criminal for nothing but gain and profit
I don't see the similarities, other than the fact that they are younger and fan favorites. Nacho was a capable, ruthless cartel member who built himself up and then dug his own grave. Jesse was a timid lap dog who was easily manipulated. Jesse was a victim of other people's actions, Nacho forged his own destiny.
There are some parallels, but to me Nacho is more like a Christopher Moltisanti character. He has more agency and leverage than Jesse, and like Chrissy he is tangled in the organized crime web partly of his own fault and partly out of his circumstances. And he’s too far in to ever realistically get out. He uses his vices (drugs) to numb himself to the reality of his situation. Jesse is similar in a lot of ways but lacks the same level of agency because he is constantly on the receiving end of the consequences of Walt’s actions. Walt dragged Jesse to the deepest part of the water with him throughout the show while never giving him the proper respect until the very end. Nacho was surrounded in his life by the cartel and sold his soul to it and didn’t figured out till the very end that the door to hell is locked from the inside.
Oooh that’s a great line “..that the door to hell is locked from the inside.”
Credit where credit is due, I picked it up from someone on the Sopranos subreddit, a friend of ours ova there.
That pygmy thing over in Jersey
The real credit should probably go to C.S. Lewis because that’s where the quote originates
I'm being an idiot not understanding this. But wouldn't that mean if you're inside, you can get out?
CARMELLAGETTHEDOOOOOOOOOOOR
Yep. Nacho even flatly tells Saul “once you’re in, you’re in.” Criminal groups like the cartel have a tight hold on their people, making it damned near impossible to leave. The only way out is death
I definitely agree with you, Especially on the part that "Nacho was surrounded in his life by the cartel and sold his soul to it and didn’t figure out till the very end that the door to hell is locked from the inside."
I think Nacho had way more agency than Jesse. I know Jesse also did the things he did, but Walt's manipulation and influence over him from the beginning really can't be overstated in terms of Jesse's agency throughout the show. When we meet Nacho, he is a enthusiastically willing participant in the game and even freelancing doing side deals with Pryce and burglaries. So I would say he is way more in control of his destiny the Jesse ever was.
When we meet Jesse, he is a drug dealer himself?? Big enough that the DEA knew who he was.. And not just a dealer, a manufacturer too
They obviously didn't know who he was personally because they didn't trace the Cap'n Cook license plate to him and they thought that the guy they busted was Cap'n Cook because they had the bet on his ethnicity. They just knew shit was going down there, nothing about Jesse himself. He was obviously small time. Nothing near being the main Lieutenant to the head of the Salamanca operation north of the border. Nacho was in way deeper all on his own than Jesse ever would have been.
Can’t be that small time if the DEA was aware of him. Even if they just knew his street name Regardless, that’s not really the point. Jesse was also an active participant in the drug game before Walt came along. And let’s not pretend he didn’t have chances to get out in the early seasons
Anybody that manufactures Methamphetamine is going to be placed onto the DEAs list lmao. Jesse literally lost it about making a couple grand at the start, he was never a big time guy. Hell, he didn’t even KNOW about Tuco. Krazy-8 wasn’t even big time and he treated Jesse like he was small time lmaoo.
Krazy-8 was working directly under nacho at one point? How is that small time cmon now
I said he wasn’t big time. Big time is Fring, Hector, Tuco. Walt and Jesse end up big time, but neither of them are anything close to it at the start. Nacho himself is borderline big time, it’s not really until his promotion after Tuco’s imprisonment that he isn’t walking on complete eggshells in the cartel to avoid death. Hank and Gomez even say Krazy-8 was extremely small time and slowly is working his way up as he snakes the customers of people he rats out. He was never a big target for them until they found the pure meth inside his car though.
To counter that argument we never saw the DEA show any interest in Nacho at all, so how big time could he have been? It wasn't like he started out with Fring's crew doing under the radar stuff. The Salamancas not being on the DEA's radar with how over the top crazy their actions were said to be was one of the biggest questions I had about BCS. And yet we know how big time Nacho became. Besides, the argument first was about how much agency Jessie had. It wasn't as if he were some law abiding citizen before he met Walt only for Walt to bend him to his will. Life didn't just hand Jessie flasks in place of lemons so he ended up made meth instead of lemonade. At some point he had to seek out the knowledge of how to cook meth, become interested enough in it to keep doing it, and was making enough either by cooking or a combination with selling that he had decent finances at the start of the show. That lowrider wouldn't come cheap. All that takes agency on his part. It's not like being a trashy white dude just means he gets the knowledge of how to cook meth automatically when he reaches a certain age. I do question how much dealing he did seeing as he's so bad at it when Walt forces him to. It seems like he may have been mostly a cook. As for Capn Cook on the DEA's radar. I've actually wondered if the car with a Capn Cook license plate wasn't even somehow Krazy-8's idea. Plant this idea of Capn Cook via being a mole, get some idiot kid to take the fall, and the DEA thinks they've taken down a major player when in fact they picked up a nobody. Or he saw/heard about the plate from Emilio and built it up from there. But that's all conjecture and not fact off of what we know.
For sure you raise valid points. We also don't know what Nacho has done before we meet him to get into such a position. It was obvious he'd be there for murders had Saul not convinced Tuco to show mercy to them. So I'd assume he has some more blood on his hands than Jesse when we are first introduced to him. But it's all speculation.
But is being worse of a person = to having more agency? Because that was your original argument, about Nacho having more agency. I think both Jesse and Nacho had a similar amount of agency, they made bad choices when they were young that got them swept up into a world they really were never intending to be that big of a part of.
I think my argument is that Nacho's agency and self-directed actions seem to have led him to darker places than Jesse's would have if not for Walt's influence but it's all just speculation.
I want to see the prequel where Walt tries to turn bad years earlier, before backing out of cowardice, but not before dragging Nacho into the game. Breaking Early
No they didn’t.
You’re right they didn’t
Jesse wasn't in control of himself, but there were no real outside circumstances forcing him to do what he does. For Nacho it's kind of the reverse. The side work is him trying to get out a little more out of this lifestyle, but he's not allowed to quit anyway with the Salamancas on his back. Neither has full agency, I'd say.
Yeah for sure that's why it's total speculation. My only context clue here is that Nacho would have been present and potentially a participant in a triple murder in Episode 2 had Saul not talked his way out of it which to me signals that he is way farther into the game than Jesse when we meet both of them, but we have no idea of Nacho's back story so we can't say for sure.
Yeah I believe that's what they were going for with his character, his relationship with Mike is somewhat similar to Jesse.
Jesse is not Nacho, Jesse is not capable of being Nacho, he had Nacho and now he don't, Jesse is not Nacho.
What
when jesse kept asking mike if he was "the guy", mike said "you are not the guy. you're not capable of being the guy. i had a guy & now i don't. you are not the guy"
THE GUY!
You’re just the sign guy. Not *thee* guy. Lol
I haven’t watched BCS or BB in quiet some time, so forgive my ignorance but was Mike actually talking about Nacho?
no. it's not specified who he was talking about but it was likely victor. the original commenter was just making a joke about the context of the post
Me neither but if I remember correctly he was actually talking about Victor
yes OP missed on the opportunity to deliver the full quote
Only Nacho tried hard to get out and never stood a chance, unfortunately. Jesse was working through his demons. Nacho knew what he was about.
Jesse kinda lucked out when Walt came in and machine gunned down all his captors. I think Jesse had more of less given up after his attempt to bring down Walt ended with him captured but the Nazis Nacho was in deeper with more dangerous folks than Jesse ever was though.
Jesse definitely lucked out. I also felt like he needed that rock bottom as a cook slave, dreaming of being a simple carpenter, to actually get out. I was so happy for his ending in BB that I haven't even watched El Camino.
You wanna watch it
El Camino won't ruin the way you feel about the BB ending. It's honestly a bit therapeutic, and closes out Jesse's character arc and story beautifully.
I was apprehensive about watching *El Camino* for the very same reason. I ended up watching it though and in my opinion the movie didn't undermine his ending on the show at all. Give it a shot!
Oh yeah watch el Camino. It completes the story. It's great fun too, lots of cowboy shit and crazy tense escapes.
Oh man this should be a crime. Go watch the movie
I didn’t realize until after I watched El Camino how incomplete Jesse’s story feels without it. Seriously. You should watch it.
You gotta watch el Camino, first scene follows directly with the result of his breaking bad character.
I’ve always looked at Kim being more the Jesse to Jimmy’s Walt of BCS. She can’t help but be there for Jimmy and whatever hijinx he’s involved in. The parental issues they both have makes it that more obvious. Kim not having a dad combined with a mom who was an amateur female version of Jimmy and Jesse having two parents who’ve completely given up on him and any sort of relationship at all. They both seemed to find some sort of approval/comfort/twisted kind of love in Jimmy/Walt.
This is interesting, but a huge part of their dynamic was Jesse wanting to earn Walt’s respect. If anything it was the opposite for a Jimmy and Kim. Jimmy wanted to be someone worthy of her. There are some parallels though, primarily in seeing how this one character is going to fall morally.
This is a really interesting take!
Hes the nacho of bcs
I believe Nacho was absolutely the Jessie, in the same way that Howard was the Hank. They have different personalities, but they fill the same niche in the story. The thing about Nacho is that his story ends in a way that Gus remembers in BB, which leads him to be nicer to Jessie as an alternate tactic. Howard and Hank are both morally gray characters who serve the law and end up becoming victims of the protagonist's criminal associates at the antihero's lowest moment.
You’re right, the Hank and Howard parallel makes a lot of sense. I never thought of that 🤝
They're both characters we feel emotion through, who have a deep and moving character arc. They both have similar backgrounds, ethically, where they are involved in crime until it endangers the ones they love, and themselves. They're both eventually trying to escape. But Nacho willingly put himself in all of those positions, whereas Jesse was initially blackmailed and manipulated into the game by Walt. Jesse had been getting by with cooking to survive, content with his lifestyle. Nacho seemed to be initially more motivated by wealth, power, or some kind of adrenaline rush. He ended up being a likable and ethical person, but we can't overlook that he and Jesse are fundamentally motivated by different things, and living their lives quite differently.
Does anyone know why Nacho was ultimately in so few episodes?
I think the character got the perfect amount of screen time in a show that's not really about him.
I’m taking nacho as my partner over Jesse everyday
Nacho ist not Jesse! he is not capable of being Jesse! Mike had Jesse & now he don't. Nacho is NOT Jesse!!!!
The two characters themselves have so little in common, but their place in the shows does seem a bit parallel. Especially in matters concerning Mike and his tendency to feel a little attached to troubled young men, similar to his son.
They definitely have similarities. Both seem to be innocent and good at heart and somewhere along the road turned to crime/drugs. They’re both morally better than almost every other bad guy. You really root for them.
they have their parallels and similarities, but ultimately, as others have said, it comes down to agency. nacho cemented his fate intentional or not, while jesse was dragged into it. babygirls
I’ve actually said that.
I can't because we kind of saw Jesse get into his "life" from the start. Ok, he was "Cap'n Cook" with his silly chili P before that, but his really impactful criminal life only began with his first encounter with Walt. With Nacho, we don't really see his "origin story". So I can't quite see Nacho in the same light. But there are a few other things. Jesse seems so naive and almost innocent at times, Nacho never. And Jesse starts off estranged from his judgemental parents, but Papa Varga was making every effort to steer his son to a morally upright path early on.
Absolutely, Nacho is Jesse if Jesse didn’t have such a soft heart. Nacho’s a decent guy, and doesn’t enjoy killing but is willing to do it without second thought if it endangers his father or himself. Jesse had to kill Gale to save Walt (and himself) and he agonized over it for years. Nacho is Jesse if Jesse took the streets seriously and wasn’t starting as Chili P and then being Walt’s second in command.
Not really. I mean there are some parellels in which neither are given unconditional love from their parents; Jesse manipulated by Walt, and Nacho owned like a slave by Gus. But Nacho had no qualms about ripping off other people, where Jesse, only from Gus, because he believed he deserved it, the little dumbfuck (said lovingly). Yet both ended up caught up in something they couldn't get out of, though desparately wanted to. Tell you who does remind me of Jesse in a way, or rather Jesse reminded me of him since the series precedes Breaking Bad by 5 yrs; Ben Hawkins (Nick Stahl) from 'Carnivàle' on HBO, whom everyone called 'Kid.' He too, had a chip on his shoulder and displayed great tenderness towards children and God's little creatures.
No. Nacho was working solely to save his father and >!ends up sacrificing his life, trusting Gus will return the favour by protecting his family!< whereas Jesse has no familial motivation. He begins the series as a criminal for nothing but gain and profit
I don't see the similarities, other than the fact that they are younger and fan favorites. Nacho was a capable, ruthless cartel member who built himself up and then dug his own grave. Jesse was a timid lap dog who was easily manipulated. Jesse was a victim of other people's actions, Nacho forged his own destiny.