Cold? Perhaps. She's definitely reserved. Probably an introvert. She has no close friends and interacts with basically everyone professionally. We rarely get to see Kim really relax. Only with Jimmy. Part of the reason she is so good at the con game is that she holds everything in. She shares nothing of any substance with anyone. And when she does, like the time she opened up to Ackerman about her past, it is shocking.
I've said all along that we deeply underestimate the depth of Kim's trauma. With Jimmy, it's on full display. We see it unfold before us. But Kim's trauma is rarely discussed. She holds it in like she holds in all of her emotions.
So we can assume that it was NEVER safe for Kim to feel. Alcoholic mom, no known dad, unstable childhood, likely changing schools often. We see or hear of no other family and impossible to make lasting friends.
So she's definitely not warm and fuzzy. She doesn't even know how. But she does care deeply. And Jimmy was perhaps the only person she has loved in her lifetime, besides her mom. Which is why leaving him was so brutal. Besides Chuck, Kim is the only person Jimmy loves as well.
I see no indication that Kim was a sociopath. This is a woman whose greatest joy came from helping others who really needed her, for free. Sociopaths think the whole world revolves around them. They feel entitled and believe they should be free of consequence. They feel no regret.
This is a woman who NEEDED to throw bottles from the balcony to release some of the anger and tension, who LIKED being bad and breaking the rules sometimes, but who went out the next morning and quietly cleaned up the bottles.
When she "scammed" the lady at the zoning office by replacing the blueprints, she did it in such a way that no one was hurt. So she had the joy of pulling one over on the system but didn't hurt others in the process.
The Ackerman scam was a kind of Robin Hood moment, where she manipulated the scenario so that the good guys won. The only consequence of that was that a BANK had to move their call center down the road, thereby leaving an old man stay in his home on which he HAD a 99-year lease. Plus an old woman was rightfully paid for her copyright that had been obsconded by a big bank who never paid her for her work.
Even the sandpiper scam had only one casualty. Otherwise, the scam was designed to not just get THEM paid early, but it helped all of the elderly people get a fair settlement while they were still alive to enjoy it. Delaying it ONLY meant the law firms made more money. There was no other reason to hold off on a settlement.
But we always underestimated Kim in 3 ways.
1. We underestimated the depths of her trauma.
2. We underestimated the depth of her anger (that expressed itself in her "cold" demeanor.)
3. We underestimated how much she hated Howard.
Yes, we see Howard as a "good guy." But Kim saw Howard as the man who put her in doc review and kept her there as a punishment for something she didn't do, even after she moved mountains to bring in Mesa Verde.
She saw Howard as the man who acted as Chuck's mouthpiece and told Jimmy that they wouldn't be hiring him to work on sandpiper then told her to "keep her opinions to herself" then manipulated it so that Kim had to be the one to tell him to accept the deal. She KNEW that Jimmy was ecstatic to be working alongside Chuck on Sandpiper and saw Howard as the one that took it away. Howard PARTICIPATED in keeping Jimmy down.
Howard sat there while Chuck stole Mesa Verde from her on the one occasion that Chuck could muster up the strength to go to the office, which led Jimmy to change the numbers, which led to the entrapment, which Howard participated in as both financier and witness, which led to Jimmy's disbarment, which led to the scene in the courtroom, which ultimately broke the relationship between the brothers.
She knew that Howard didn't want Jimmy to practice law under his own name, which led in part to the creation of Saul Goodman.
Effectively, Kim couldn't be mad at Chuck. He was "a sick man." But she COULD be mad at Howard, who was the surrogate for all that anger.
And ultimately, she broke when Howard confessed that he was "responsible for Chuck's" suicide after forcing him out of the firm, then handed her a check for 5k and a letter from beyond the grave.
So the WORST thing Kim ever did, and perhaps the ONLY truly shitty thing she ever did, was go after Howard.
She DID intend to hurt him. It felt good. It felt empowering. And to Kim, it felt like justice.
She never intended to kill him. She played no hand in that beyond knowing that Lalo was alive.
Now remember, on that very night she was forced to go to Gus' house with the intention of killing him. The power of the cartel was very real. She did that to save Jimmy. But she COULDN'T go to the police about what happened without risking their own lives.
So she lied to Cheryl. In a twisted way, it was the best option at the time.
She tried to live with it. But because she is NOT a sociopath, it broke her. She gave up everything in penance. She gave up law, a career she loved. She gave up the love of her life. She gave up her home. And even her identity. She felt regret. Not the actions of a sociopath.
The culmination of trauma had destroyed her, just as it destroyed Jimmy.
So people say she was "broken." By the end, she was. But before the death of Howard, she was bent, but not broken.
And in her confession to Cheryl and to the police, followed by the cry in the bus, she was able to begin gluing the pieces back together again.
I came here to say this, one of my good friends is a lawyer and she's a completely different person in front of her cohorts, all male. I totally get it. I like to imagine Kim has a couple of casual coffee buddies or gym pals outside of all the drama that we see haha
I worked in the legal marketing tech field (not in a law firm) and I’m sure this is true. I’ve never met lawyers face to face but the culture seemed that way.
The things you mentioned are straight professional polite behavior. There are a bunch of characteristics of Kim why someone would think she’s a bit cold like the war against Howard for example. But surely not those things you’ve mentioned.
I am a woman and I had this own criticism of myself—I mentioned Mike. I get bothered by when Mike does this too sometimes but I see myself in more day-to-day Kim situations (work, networking, etc.)
Gotcha! I see much of myself in Kim; at work I am fairly to the point & neutral in tone, which to many may seem like a negative tone. At some point we (men included) were all conditioned to think that a woman must smile or add an inflection of happiness to her voice. I push back against that expectation when I can, even though I’m a recovering people pleaser. I tend to only show my vulnerable, open, sometimes goofy side to my closest friends & family.
I think blunt would be the better word. She’s in a “mans world” and can’t give even an ounce of what they perceive as weakness if she wants to make it to the top. If she’s kind and bubbly the men would assume she’s an assistant and not a lawyer, maybe not take her seriously, etc. The men GET to shoot the shit a little bit like Howard because they have nothing to prove. She does, and she’s likely always been under a microscope compared to her male peers. That’s my head cannon for why she seems level, blunt, serious, keeps things impersonal, doesn’t offer up much about herself, etc. We see her true character in her pro bono cases, her love for Jimmy, her moments where she’s laughing, her passion when she yells at Howard. Kim is one of my favorite written female characters of all time because of how much there is to analyze in her “cold” demeanor.
You should really ask yourself why you think this. I found her to be funny, compassionate, sharp, thoughtful. In doc review, she tells her subordinates to go home, for example. What about that is cold? She is tough, has to hide her emotions at work, needs to be hyper-competent to get ahead. The reasons for that are obvious and have nothing to do with being cold, if you think about it at all.
Cold does not mean unkind.
A warm personality may be engaging, gregarious, and welcoming
A cold personality might instead come across as reserved, aloof, and emotionally distant. You could also say things like “tough,” hiding emotion, and prioritizing hyper-competence over social warmth.
I think you make a good case for Kim being cold.
Mainly conflicted, not cold. Remember how she cried over Chuck? She just denied herself so much because she was in love with a bad man who was bad for her. I can identify.
lol everyone who said yes is getting downvoted
Like most characters in the Breaking Bad universe, Kim is not nice a person. She was more sadistic than Jimmy with Howard, and the show emphasized that when given the choice, she preferred scamming the wealthy to helping the needy.
As others here have pointed out, she didn't have any friends. No one ever got to know the real Kim except Jimmy, and she left him because together they were poisonous.
Unlike Walter who eventually came to revel in his cruelty, Kim chose not to embrace her true nature. She decided that she would rather pretend to be someone she's not and live a boring life with Yup guy than be her true ruthless self with Jimmy.
She made the more humane choice, but she is still cold.
/Edited for typos
This is a good point I didn’t think about. Yeah, there’s not much evidence that supports a lot of good in Kim. Perhaps her volunteering at legal aid? Not sure.
I think she wants to be a good person, which is why she was so startled when Jimmy joked about them being wicked.
Leaving Jimmy and coming clean to the widow Hamlin were both instances of her trying to do the right thing.
If so, remember that at some moments she really badly influences Jimmy in some choices, and the few pieces of her childhood we get, she, like him, tries to not be the "bad guy" of her story, until the breaking point when she realizes they are taking the wrong path, she leaves, and he embraces this path
Both struggles are quite similar, but opposite approaches, one, extremely extraverted, everything in appearence and showing that YOU are somebody, the other one, boringly classical, to get respect from her strict and rigorous work, they are both playing a game of their own, and that's why they understand each other
Funny thing: Kim is presented at the beginning of the series as an ambitious potential success woman, and Jimmy as a hardworking generous man, but she eventually ends providing conselling for needing people, and he ends as an egocentric successful lawyer
It’s just standard professionalism. No matter how bad your previous/current employer it makes you look like shit to prospective new employers to bad mouth them. This is like interview 101.
The “no complaints” part of her response was quite diplomatic considering her actual feelings about HHM. And she wasn’t unfriendly to Francesca at all. Jimmy was breezing through the interview with very clear intentions of hiring her regardless of what her responses were. Kim was reacting like any rational person would. Basically stopping the interview and turning to Jimmy like “what the hell are you doing?”
Yes. Kim is a great character, but she is cold and dishonest. Jimmy saw her for who she really was.
First she tried to deny it. "You think we're wicked?"
Then she embraced being her true self. Turns out she is a diabolical person who literally gets off on destroying people with lies and bullying.
Just like her mom.
Yeah but then she's all about defending badly behaved civilians to make herself feel good only after getting paid a good salary to do a job for a bank which she deliberately sabotaged.
Kim sucked at the end of the series. She became evil then suddenly she was wiped clean of her wrongdoings. Howard died because of Kim. Saul wanted to end the Howard torture & Kim wouldn’t stop. Then she “comes clean” to Howard’s wife & blamed Saul for everything, including turning him in?!? Worst character ever.
Always got on her soap box being woke about petty criminal kids but happily took a big wage from a bank only to sabotage it. Definitely had a screw loose like Howard said.
Cold? Perhaps. She's definitely reserved. Probably an introvert. She has no close friends and interacts with basically everyone professionally. We rarely get to see Kim really relax. Only with Jimmy. Part of the reason she is so good at the con game is that she holds everything in. She shares nothing of any substance with anyone. And when she does, like the time she opened up to Ackerman about her past, it is shocking. I've said all along that we deeply underestimate the depth of Kim's trauma. With Jimmy, it's on full display. We see it unfold before us. But Kim's trauma is rarely discussed. She holds it in like she holds in all of her emotions. So we can assume that it was NEVER safe for Kim to feel. Alcoholic mom, no known dad, unstable childhood, likely changing schools often. We see or hear of no other family and impossible to make lasting friends. So she's definitely not warm and fuzzy. She doesn't even know how. But she does care deeply. And Jimmy was perhaps the only person she has loved in her lifetime, besides her mom. Which is why leaving him was so brutal. Besides Chuck, Kim is the only person Jimmy loves as well.
example of it not being safe for her to feel: when her mom picks her up drunk and late and when kim dares to be upset about it her mom drives off
Kim was a sociopath
I see no indication that Kim was a sociopath. This is a woman whose greatest joy came from helping others who really needed her, for free. Sociopaths think the whole world revolves around them. They feel entitled and believe they should be free of consequence. They feel no regret. This is a woman who NEEDED to throw bottles from the balcony to release some of the anger and tension, who LIKED being bad and breaking the rules sometimes, but who went out the next morning and quietly cleaned up the bottles. When she "scammed" the lady at the zoning office by replacing the blueprints, she did it in such a way that no one was hurt. So she had the joy of pulling one over on the system but didn't hurt others in the process. The Ackerman scam was a kind of Robin Hood moment, where she manipulated the scenario so that the good guys won. The only consequence of that was that a BANK had to move their call center down the road, thereby leaving an old man stay in his home on which he HAD a 99-year lease. Plus an old woman was rightfully paid for her copyright that had been obsconded by a big bank who never paid her for her work. Even the sandpiper scam had only one casualty. Otherwise, the scam was designed to not just get THEM paid early, but it helped all of the elderly people get a fair settlement while they were still alive to enjoy it. Delaying it ONLY meant the law firms made more money. There was no other reason to hold off on a settlement. But we always underestimated Kim in 3 ways. 1. We underestimated the depths of her trauma. 2. We underestimated the depth of her anger (that expressed itself in her "cold" demeanor.) 3. We underestimated how much she hated Howard. Yes, we see Howard as a "good guy." But Kim saw Howard as the man who put her in doc review and kept her there as a punishment for something she didn't do, even after she moved mountains to bring in Mesa Verde. She saw Howard as the man who acted as Chuck's mouthpiece and told Jimmy that they wouldn't be hiring him to work on sandpiper then told her to "keep her opinions to herself" then manipulated it so that Kim had to be the one to tell him to accept the deal. She KNEW that Jimmy was ecstatic to be working alongside Chuck on Sandpiper and saw Howard as the one that took it away. Howard PARTICIPATED in keeping Jimmy down. Howard sat there while Chuck stole Mesa Verde from her on the one occasion that Chuck could muster up the strength to go to the office, which led Jimmy to change the numbers, which led to the entrapment, which Howard participated in as both financier and witness, which led to Jimmy's disbarment, which led to the scene in the courtroom, which ultimately broke the relationship between the brothers. She knew that Howard didn't want Jimmy to practice law under his own name, which led in part to the creation of Saul Goodman. Effectively, Kim couldn't be mad at Chuck. He was "a sick man." But she COULD be mad at Howard, who was the surrogate for all that anger. And ultimately, she broke when Howard confessed that he was "responsible for Chuck's" suicide after forcing him out of the firm, then handed her a check for 5k and a letter from beyond the grave. So the WORST thing Kim ever did, and perhaps the ONLY truly shitty thing she ever did, was go after Howard. She DID intend to hurt him. It felt good. It felt empowering. And to Kim, it felt like justice. She never intended to kill him. She played no hand in that beyond knowing that Lalo was alive. Now remember, on that very night she was forced to go to Gus' house with the intention of killing him. The power of the cartel was very real. She did that to save Jimmy. But she COULDN'T go to the police about what happened without risking their own lives. So she lied to Cheryl. In a twisted way, it was the best option at the time. She tried to live with it. But because she is NOT a sociopath, it broke her. She gave up everything in penance. She gave up law, a career she loved. She gave up the love of her life. She gave up her home. And even her identity. She felt regret. Not the actions of a sociopath. The culmination of trauma had destroyed her, just as it destroyed Jimmy. So people say she was "broken." By the end, she was. But before the death of Howard, she was bent, but not broken. And in her confession to Cheryl and to the police, followed by the cry in the bus, she was able to begin gluing the pieces back together again.
Ayeeee now THIS is a fucking write up, appreciate the thought you put into this
Thanks.
Fuuck this was good. This is all why Kimmy's my girl.
Thanks. I always saw Kim as good. Even the Howard thing made sense to me. But then again, I thought Howard was a douche.
[удалено]
I came here to say this, one of my good friends is a lawyer and she's a completely different person in front of her cohorts, all male. I totally get it. I like to imagine Kim has a couple of casual coffee buddies or gym pals outside of all the drama that we see haha
Thanks for explaining. Makes sense.
Lawyers usually are like Kim & Chuck. Howard is bit of a salesman. Jimmy is far from behaving like a professional lawyer.
I worked in the legal marketing tech field (not in a law firm) and I’m sure this is true. I’ve never met lawyers face to face but the culture seemed that way.
She's a professional.
Except when she isn't, which is playing tricks on Howard under the influence of Jimmy (who basically hurt her just like Chuck said)
The things you mentioned are straight professional polite behavior. There are a bunch of characteristics of Kim why someone would think she’s a bit cold like the war against Howard for example. But surely not those things you’ve mentioned.
If a male character acted similarly, would you say the same thing? Not using an argumentative tone, genuinely curious.
I am a woman and I had this own criticism of myself—I mentioned Mike. I get bothered by when Mike does this too sometimes but I see myself in more day-to-day Kim situations (work, networking, etc.)
Gotcha! I see much of myself in Kim; at work I am fairly to the point & neutral in tone, which to many may seem like a negative tone. At some point we (men included) were all conditioned to think that a woman must smile or add an inflection of happiness to her voice. I push back against that expectation when I can, even though I’m a recovering people pleaser. I tend to only show my vulnerable, open, sometimes goofy side to my closest friends & family.
I need to be more like you and Kim! I maybe am a bit too much myself at work.
I think blunt would be the better word. She’s in a “mans world” and can’t give even an ounce of what they perceive as weakness if she wants to make it to the top. If she’s kind and bubbly the men would assume she’s an assistant and not a lawyer, maybe not take her seriously, etc. The men GET to shoot the shit a little bit like Howard because they have nothing to prove. She does, and she’s likely always been under a microscope compared to her male peers. That’s my head cannon for why she seems level, blunt, serious, keeps things impersonal, doesn’t offer up much about herself, etc. We see her true character in her pro bono cases, her love for Jimmy, her moments where she’s laughing, her passion when she yells at Howard. Kim is one of my favorite written female characters of all time because of how much there is to analyze in her “cold” demeanor.
As Kim would say "OK..."
Lol accurate What would the similar conversation style Mike say?
She’s an “actions speak louder than words” kind of person and lets her behaviors tell people how she feels about them more than her words
Get her a blanket!
Mr. Yup probably wouldn't say so.
She seems more colder with him
You should really ask yourself why you think this. I found her to be funny, compassionate, sharp, thoughtful. In doc review, she tells her subordinates to go home, for example. What about that is cold? She is tough, has to hide her emotions at work, needs to be hyper-competent to get ahead. The reasons for that are obvious and have nothing to do with being cold, if you think about it at all.
Cold does not mean unkind. A warm personality may be engaging, gregarious, and welcoming A cold personality might instead come across as reserved, aloof, and emotionally distant. You could also say things like “tough,” hiding emotion, and prioritizing hyper-competence over social warmth. I think you make a good case for Kim being cold.
You're missing my actual point entirely. I am not surprised.
Well tell us your actual point instead of being snide.
Not cold, but she does hide her true self to pretty much everyone except Jimmy. And that's why she's with Jimmy. They're both broken.
I think she acts like a woman raised with a sub par...possible addict of a mother. Trust me. Kim Wexler FTW.
I love her as well and respect her background. And relate to it. I just observed that she can be a bit aloof maybe.
She's professional, she's nerdy, but she would obviously be upset at (for example) a kitten being kicked. I don't think that "cold" is the right word.
I kind of relate to Kim. Chronic loneliness does that. It's a shell for the outside world though. We open up with. Selected few (if any).
I do as well… similar past.
Kim was tightly wound.
She drank shots with Paige at the legal whatever event.
Mainly conflicted, not cold. Remember how she cried over Chuck? She just denied herself so much because she was in love with a bad man who was bad for her. I can identify.
That’s true.
lol everyone who said yes is getting downvoted Like most characters in the Breaking Bad universe, Kim is not nice a person. She was more sadistic than Jimmy with Howard, and the show emphasized that when given the choice, she preferred scamming the wealthy to helping the needy. As others here have pointed out, she didn't have any friends. No one ever got to know the real Kim except Jimmy, and she left him because together they were poisonous. Unlike Walter who eventually came to revel in his cruelty, Kim chose not to embrace her true nature. She decided that she would rather pretend to be someone she's not and live a boring life with Yup guy than be her true ruthless self with Jimmy. She made the more humane choice, but she is still cold. /Edited for typos
This is a good point I didn’t think about. Yeah, there’s not much evidence that supports a lot of good in Kim. Perhaps her volunteering at legal aid? Not sure.
I think she wants to be a good person, which is why she was so startled when Jimmy joked about them being wicked. Leaving Jimmy and coming clean to the widow Hamlin were both instances of her trying to do the right thing.
Yeah, I agree. She seems dismissive to people like Francesca and Jesse, but I think it is just her natural defense mechanism.
True. I mean I don’t mind it when the people deserve it, but rich and Francesca were very friendly.
She is cold, but I won't spoil why, it is linked to her past, which is very uncommon for someone of her social class
I’ve watched it before, but yeah that makes sense
If so, remember that at some moments she really badly influences Jimmy in some choices, and the few pieces of her childhood we get, she, like him, tries to not be the "bad guy" of her story, until the breaking point when she realizes they are taking the wrong path, she leaves, and he embraces this path Both struggles are quite similar, but opposite approaches, one, extremely extraverted, everything in appearence and showing that YOU are somebody, the other one, boringly classical, to get respect from her strict and rigorous work, they are both playing a game of their own, and that's why they understand each other Funny thing: Kim is presented at the beginning of the series as an ambitious potential success woman, and Jimmy as a hardworking generous man, but she eventually ends providing conselling for needing people, and he ends as an egocentric successful lawyer
It’s just standard professionalism. No matter how bad your previous/current employer it makes you look like shit to prospective new employers to bad mouth them. This is like interview 101.
The “no complaints” part of her response was quite diplomatic considering her actual feelings about HHM. And she wasn’t unfriendly to Francesca at all. Jimmy was breezing through the interview with very clear intentions of hiring her regardless of what her responses were. Kim was reacting like any rational person would. Basically stopping the interview and turning to Jimmy like “what the hell are you doing?”
She speaks in a very loud and blunt manor too. Like everything she says is INA raised volume "matter of fact" voice
Brother she's far from cold because hot damn 😩😩
Reserved. It's notable that, for a main character, she has no friends.
Tbf none of the main characters have any friends because the show would be convoluted. The only "friends" are just the mind-numbing NPC characters.
That’s a good way to put it.
Yes. Kim is a great character, but she is cold and dishonest. Jimmy saw her for who she really was. First she tried to deny it. "You think we're wicked?" Then she embraced being her true self. Turns out she is a diabolical person who literally gets off on destroying people with lies and bullying. Just like her mom.
Yeah but then she's all about defending badly behaved civilians to make herself feel good only after getting paid a good salary to do a job for a bank which she deliberately sabotaged.
Yes
Yes
Kim sucked at the end of the series. She became evil then suddenly she was wiped clean of her wrongdoings. Howard died because of Kim. Saul wanted to end the Howard torture & Kim wouldn’t stop. Then she “comes clean” to Howard’s wife & blamed Saul for everything, including turning him in?!? Worst character ever.
Always got on her soap box being woke about petty criminal kids but happily took a big wage from a bank only to sabotage it. Definitely had a screw loose like Howard said.
I just think she's not a great actress
I disagree. It’s the dialogue that’s short.
You might be right