"Rock and Hard Place" is the third episode of the sixth season of Better Call Saul, the spin-off television series of Breaking Bad.

Meanwhile, Jimmy McGill questions his reputation as a lawyer when he involves his friend Huell Babineaux in his scheme to ruin Howard Hamlin's life.

Actor Michael Mando, who plays Nacho, described his character's journey and the allusions in the episode to the ancient legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, practices in the Aztec and Mayan cultures, and the religious motif of weighing a person's soul.

A series of misfortunes arose in the process of shooting the final scenes, such as Mando having to be rushed to the hospital after severely cutting his finger and a sandstorm hitting the set.

As rain begins to fall, a close-up scan of a small patch of desert stops on a blue flower, then settles on a piece of broken glass.

Jimmy and Kim work with Huell Babineaux and another associate to obtain copies of Howard's car key and remote unlock button.

[c] Nacho uses the piece of broken glass he retrieved from Gus' trash[d] to cut his restraints, seizes Bolsa's gun, and shoots himself in the head.

"Rock and Hard Place" marked the death of longtime character Nacho Varga, played by Michael Mando, who had been with the series since the second episode.

The first scene that was shot was of Nacho pouring himself a drink and noticing the broken glass in Gus' trash, which had been thrown out in the previous episode "Carrot and Stick".

[7][8][6]: 29:41–40:50  The episode's cold open was shot simultaneously with the oil tanker scene on a different soundstage, where they added a 40 by 40 feet (12 by 12 m) patch of desert with a green screen in the background.

[6]: 1:01:53–1:04:24 Mando compared Nacho's phone call to his father (played by Juan Carlos Cantu) to the legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, which details the story of a man between a rock and a hard place who voluntarily goes through Hades to save the person he loves on the condition that he can never see her again.

A Latin American documentary about the Aztecs and the Mayans, which said the victors of a sport would sacrifice themselves for their gods to bring rain, inspired Mando's performance.

He viewed his character's suicide as a moment of no regrets because Nacho knew when and for what reason he was going to die: "For the first time in his life, he has a clear image of himself.

"[4][5][10] Mando called the finale ominous because every other character present during Nacho's execution would eventually meet their own fates on Breaking Bad: "These are all dead men walking, watching the first man die.

"[12] He also said that the purple flower that appears in the opening scene at the site of Nacho's suicide represents enlightenment from these cultures that comes from facing death.

On the first day of filming the desert scenes, a sandstorm hit the set and production was paused; at the time they stopped, everyone's coverage had been shot but Mando's.

[4][7][10][6]: 22:56–24:49  Smith's approach as director was to meet audience expectations and focus on maximizing the tension in the scene despite the outcome seeming obvious in hindsight.

[6]: 20:39–22:56  Mando brought some of the character acting he did as the villainous Vaas Montenegro from the video game Far Cry 3 in the final scene, though he had to tone it back at Smith's request.

[13] Smith compared Jimmy and Kim's relationship in "Rock and Hard Place" to an episode of Arrested Development where a character gets married after "a series of escalating dares".

[18] Alan Sepinwall of Rolling Stone complimented the episode's straightforward narrative and said Mando's performance was "fantastic throughout — so tired, so defeated, and yet so insistent about ending things on something resembling his own terms if he can.