We need a thread for the FARGO TV show yah? Oh, yah!

She just gave him a packet of cigarettes, didn't she? Which is kind of default cliche prison currency. Sort of rubbing salt in the wound. Like, maybe you can trade some of these for a few days of peace.

Lots of stuff about debt in this season, and who is owed or deserves what. I'll have to think about it a little bit.

xpost Oho, that's good! Throw the old dawg a bone; she's a philanthropist too.
What and why did the Sineater consider that Dot owed him?

He thought she owed him the Sheriff’s death.

First season is still the best, 2/3/5 all interesting in their own way.

Why didn't he kill the Sheriff? Maybe because she was the one (still living) who was most sinned-against. That was why he saved her, so she could repay him by collecting from Roy?

I thought his wounded ear was the debt.

Anyway I'm happy. Glad it wasn't chili and pancakes, would have been too on the nose.

Xpost I also thought munch was wanting repayment (a pound of flesh) for his wounded ear.

Had to laugh at Dot, Wayne and Scotty just drinking beers and making biscuits with the weird undead horror guy. Looked like munch wandered from the set of a medieval movie. But it worked. And I really liked dot recognizing what was wrong and showing him a way out

U mad, first season of Legion was incredible xps

"A man...a man has a..." yeah that was high comedy. The light side of midwestern domesticity finally coming to bear.

Legion s2 was the sweet spot for me, s1 was too high on its own psychedelia and s3 was trying extremely hard to make it happen (still enjoyed it though, especially the time goblins).

Just started watching season one of this with my wife last night. We have a lot of trouble finding shows that we agree on, but we both came up with this independently, so we gave the first episode a shot. I'm very on board. She enjoyed it to an extent, but a couple of the deaths (the wife and the police chief) in the first episode were too much for her. I think it's understandable to find those upsetting, but I want to keep pushing through.

How does the rest of the series hold up as far as emotional gut-punches and brutality?

There's a fair amount of violence and death in the series but not quite that brutal.

It's pretty violent throughout, sometimes darkly comic (a la Coens), sometimes not. This season, season 5, was the first that really made me wince.

Speaking of which, pretty lame to kill the only black character in the finale

I agree, and going into the finale I actually predicted the would survive because it would be a bad look to kill him off. Also, I don't feel it worked for me because he was a tertiary character so the dramatic stakes weren't that large--like he was killed just because someone on the good guy team had to die, and folks would have cared even less about the FBI duo biting it.

Yeah, that was my thought. I get that they had to imperil a good guy for the sake of drama, but it was pretty harsh to off his character that way, to no real narrative advantage, afaict. Might have gotten some mythological mileage out of, say, having Gator stumble in and get stabbed by his dad instead.

Yeah, I mean, we've watched shows with death and violence in them. It was those two in particular where my wife was like, "I'm not sure I can see this through." Pearl Nygaard was murdered in a frightening act of deeply personal relationship violence. Vern Thurman was an expecting father who showed up at the wrong place at the wrong time. They were supposed to hit hard. I wasn't surprised, but may have been too effective for her. I might be able to convince her to come back for episode two if the whole thing isn't like that.

Oh, since I'm here and on this topic, let me just ask: any child deaths? That's definitely one of her things.

not that I recall, though there are kids in danger, IRC.

iirc

much appreciated.

My favorite moment, as moments go: Lorraine on the phone: "What's the use of being a billionaire if you can't have somebody killed?"---and then! Listens to other person's response, which we can't hear, and then she's like, "Yeah---Ha ha!" Laughing at her own line (not nec. a joek), or the op response, both---billionaires bein' billionaires---epitome of the touch JJL always brings to this mogul fairy godmother, so confident of her power, her authority, that she never has to lean in, just, to Roy or whomever,"Here are your options, and if you chose X---", or just, "Here's how it's gonna be." She loves to see that look in their eyes. Though Dot is a learning experience.

Just like Munch and Roy, she can't quite topple the indomitable Dot. And just as Roy, Munch and Lorraine epitomized different kinds of power and willfulness, so did Dot. One mystery is how Dot, raised as she was, in isolation and subjugation, ended up the person she became, and not like her erstwhile brother Gator, though there is a case to be made that Dot represented a sort of primal goodness, just as Roy represented primal (chaotic?) evil (and Munch kind of neutral evil and Lorraine kind of ... lawful evil? I don't know my D&D tropes, lol).

My Prime ran out just before this last ep, so maybe won't be able to watch for a while (fucked if I'm giving bezos any more of my coin)

Y'know, I had assumed Munch's "pound of flesh" debt was the ear too (though I'd forgot about it already!) but that seemed disproportionate, so now reading some comments here I think I agree he meant the fact she didn't kill Roy, because really, that is what he wanted. He got at Gator, but not Roy.

One odd/annoying thing I found was the subtitles were spelling his name as "Oolay Moonk" when he told them his name. I dont know if that was a weird error, or intentional to show the pronunciation? Do we only know the name otherwise from IMDB?

it was definitely about the ear

I can't remember from the early episodes, but was his partner killed - the one who invaded Dot's house with him on the first night? I thought maybe that was the debt? I don't think it was connected to Roy; back in those early episodes he was upset that he did not defeat his "tiger" - Munch's whole arc is rooted in his initial failure.

Hmm, I recall that Dot did smash his partner's head in with a toilet lid at the gas station, but I'm not sure how much affinity Munch had for that partner; iirc it was kind of like the "Fargo" movie baddies, with one a midwest fuckup but the other partner (in this case, Munch) more enigmatic, and definitely not his friend. But yeah, there are a number of things Munch might consider a debt. Having rescued Dot, her having thwarted his original obligation of capturing her, or having not killed Roy, which is why he rescued her and gave her the gun.

that line that was something like “I’m the largest single donor to the Federalist society” was… oh, we’re playing a different level of the game here entirely. Roy not knowing what that was? what a small-timer

"Koreans make cars?"

Yet even he knows how to livestream, of course! Sign of the times, seriously.

Just like Munch and Roy, she can't quite topple the indomitable Dot. And just as Roy, Munch and Lorraine epitomized different kinds of power and willfulness, so did Dot. One mystery is how Dot, raised as she was, in isolation and subjugation, ended up the person she became, and not like her erstwhile brother Gator, though there is a case to be made that Dot represented a sort of primal goodness, just as Roy represented primal (chaotic?) evil (and Munch kind of neutral evil and Lorraine kind of ... lawful evil? I don't know my D&D tropes, lol).

i enjoyed watching this season fine but i don't feel like it really added up to much ultimately. this show is always so binary about good and evil but can't even do that right (JJL's character is clearly evil but is ultimately treated as a heroine - sure she's come around on dot but she's still a right-wing debtlord). however i did really enjoy the final chunk with munch in the lyons' home. the messaging is pretty simple but the munch/sin-eater thing was the most unique aspect of the show this season, i really enjoy that actor's performance and it brought the strangeness that the season really needed (the puppet show episode was the only other thing approaching this feel and it turned out to be a ~all a dreeeam~).

i've watched every season except 4 (which i started) but i can't remember - has every season been as humorless as this one? i feel like humor is an essential part of the coens' tone and there was nothing approaching funny in this season. like how do you cast lamorne morris and have him be totally serious the entire time?

i guess a way to summarize all that is that this season felt a little too much like a straight crime/revenge story with too few coens-y quirks

This season had less humor than the first three for sure. Or the humor of this season was darker than previous ones.

honestly a great season that lost me completely when the trooper chose to get knifed for no reason.

moonk obv dot's trauma/PTSD just walking around out there. biscuit obv homer's olive tree.

With an extra day to think back on the whole season, I do think this season probably had one too many characters/plot arcs. For instance, Indira stopped having anything to do once she took her new job. And Whit... enough said itt about him already. Jennifer Jason Leigh also went quiet for a few episodes. Nevertheless I loved the whole thing and I think this was the best since s2. This is probably the first show since Mad Man where I think Jon Hamm was truly excellent.

I think the first three were about cops vs. baddies, right? The last season, season 4, was kind of more about feuding factions, which in a sense this season was about, too. I agree that both cops were pretty ancillary in this season, though perhaps to underscore the limitations of legal power.

https://www.vulture.com/article/fargo-jennifer-jason-leigh-lorraine-finale-ending-interview.html

season two also had the kansas city mob vs gerhardt clan faction thing going on, but also there was law enforcement vs other law enforcement with lou being treated dismissively by whoever those other law enforcement guys were, like molly in season one and gloria in season three. seasons three and four had a fatal home visit in the denouement, which also happened in season five, but inverted because of dharma. emmit and loy threw their fates to the wind, as it were, maybe good, maybe bad, but dot was straight up in the sanctified and righteous zone despite being a little bitey and whatnot and therefore what unfolded was totally in keeping with the gestalt. this series has an eternal returns with variations that turn on karma mostly, but also chance, which is part of karma, i'm assuming. some seasons are like other seasons but different, and other seasons aren't, i guess.

regarding witt ,he didn't have to die. he was the only pure character or characterization in this season. he died anyway, doing what he felt obligated to do. danish perished , and it was kinda like, hey! you bastards, you killed dave foley (south park reference), dave foley is my boo! i didn't care for it, frankly. but witt, that was we. we're him, if we're at our best. we're cogs that get our spokes ground off if the wheels grind too hard. his sacrifice is our sacrifice. witt is the kermit the frog, the jim halpert, the point of entry for the common man or woman who is pure of heart and didn't ask for this shit. it's not what we hope for but at best it's what we get. if dot and indira visit our grave and offer respects that's validation of our existence.

also, yeah, there was not a lot of comedy in this season, but imo, that scene where munch was like, a man has a code, and dot and family was all, this is how you make biscuits, that was all-encompassing and over-arching. munch is a theoretical construct carrying the weight of original sin and consequence and the weight of the world and dot flips him with bisquick Jiu-juitsu i didn't outwardly guffaw or lmao but internally i've been irrevoca bly altered. so much seriousness given to munch's pronunciations in this season and then, whatever, this is biscuits and forgiveness. eat it or don't.

a man has a code, that the coen's universe in a nutshell? karma, fate, predestination, character, all as literary theory? teleological imperatives? you can see it coming? grace. dot offered munch grace, like she did to gator, and in that moment i eexperinced absolution and transcendence. granted, this is just a tv show, but i'll take it where i can get it.

wayne and scotty were also pure, but didn't have to confront eventualities like witt. witt is the secret heart of this season even if the character was given short shrift vis a vis narrative weight.it wasn't about him but he did his fucking part and paid for it. .

that aligns with a lot of my thoughts on the season, slugbuggy

the halting conversation between Dot and Munch had the tension of her attempts to feel out where he was coming from while she stayed resolute in her stance. the turning point, where she wasn’t wrong but lacked context, was her point that taking a job implies risk and that if you lose something, it doesn’t mean a debt was incurred, but that you knew you were risking something

Munch’s story about taking on sin (and eating it), when he had no knowledge of the risk and really had no choice as a starving man, was a parallel she didn’t expect. He didn’t know and was wronged. Dot was taken into Roy’s house not knowing what would happen, when she had nothing, too.

I'm convinced that Danish is based mostly on another one-eyed attorney, Phil Ken Sebben.

One of my main irritations in action-trash (which this isn't, want to be clear) is that when the people with super killing skills get going, all law enforcement agencies conveniently disappear. I liked that Fargo S5 had almost every flavor of cops — local police, rural sheriff's departments, highway patrol, FBI, and I think that was DHS in the final showdown unless the FBI has their own tactical assault team. Not that I like cops, but I like verisimilitude.

It was DHS, the product of I believe an overt Trump reference, when Lorraine gripes something along the lines "call the orange idiot, it's time to cash in on all those campaign donations."

“500 years earlier”
This season is SO DUMB watching anyway

I'm convinced that Danish is based mostly on another one-eyed attorney, Phil Ken Sebben.

HA haaaa.... SNOW.

The golfing husband doesn’t know how to grip a club

Don’t think that was unintentional

In ep 10 the denouement started with a half hour to go. I shut it off. Do I need to watch the rest ?