Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Pop Theology

Home
Progressive Christian
Religious Music & Entertainment
Killer Serials: Fargo Season 2, Eps. 1-4

Killer Serials: Fargo Season 2, Eps. 1-4

Last updated on: November 3, 2015 at 10:22 am by J. Ryan Parker

Killer Serials: Fargo Season 2, Eps. 1-4 2015-11-03T10:22:00-08:00 J. Ryan Parker

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

I confess, I was late to the Fargo party last year, binge watching the entire first season on Blu-ray in a matter of days. I haven’t made the same mistake this season, which is every bit as brilliant as the first and loaded with similarly provocative themes.

An anthology series like True Detective or American Horror Story, although much better and more consistent than either, the second season of Fargo is set in the frigid territory of Luverne, Minnesota, and Sioux Falls, South Dakota, in 1979. The story centers on the Gerhardt family syndicate and an encroaching Kansas City mob. When the runt of the family, Rye (Kieran Culkin) tries to prove his value to the family, he triggers a series of events that ripple through a number of families in the area from young Vietnam vet and State Police Officer Lou Solverson (Patrick Wilson) to butcher’s assistant Ed Blomquist (Jesse Plemmons) and his beautician wife, Peggy (Kirsten Dunst).

Death abounds in some of the most popular television series at the moment, much to the chagrin of conservative watchdogs like the Parents Television Council, who classified American Horror Story: Hotel as the most vile television series ever created. It’s also ticked off more liberal viewers like Richard Lawson, who bashed the Hotel pilot in his article for Vanity Fair. Far from trying to push the envelope for scandal’s sake, Fargo uses death (and often grisly ones) to ask very deep questions about our relationship to/with it.

At church this past weekend, we talked about the sanitation of death and how it’s more distant from our lived experiences than it was only a few decades ago, even though we are inundated with it in 24-hour news cycles and a sea of streaming content. We shuffle our elderly from nursing homes to funeral homes to their permanent home in the grave. Such compartmentalization wasn’t as prevalent only a few decades ago.

Officer Lou Solverson (Patrick Wilson in one of his best performances to date).

So when three dead bodies show up at the Waffle Hut in Luverne, it provides the characters (and us viewers) opportunities to respond. So far, there seem to be three reactions. The first is from Officer Solverson and his father-in-law, Sheriff Hank Larsson (Ted Danson), who investigate the crime scene. Taking in the carnage around them, they sigh, “Yeah.” They take in the death around them with an affirmation of its reality, yet they go home and go about their lives, appreciative of the precious life around them. There’s a profound depth to Lou’s steadiness, his ability to witness the horrific, put himself in harm’s way (in the gripping third episode), and go home and kiss his cancer-stricken wife and read a silly book to his daughter.

Nick Offerman as the conspiracy-minded Karl Weathers.

The second might be found in town lawyer Karl Weathers (Nick Offerman), a smaller character in the first four episodes, who rails against the horrors around him, claiming conspiracies left and right. Illness and death can never simply be a part of life, but rather a gross imposition by some corrupt outside force. Of course, his attitude could change as he gets closer to the death-dealers as Episode 4 seems to suggest he will.

The third, and final (for now), approach is found in Ed and Peggy, the latter of whom runs over Rye and takes him home, bloody and bruised. She seems content to leave Rye to lick his wounds in the garage until Ed finds him and is forced to kill him when Rye attacks. Faced with a broken windshield and a corpse, Peggy’s advice to Ed is that they simply “clean it up.” This is, perhaps, the most dangerous of the three approaches and characteristic of our own relationship to suffering and death around us. We clean it up quickly with the shallow hope that wiping it away will make everything fine.

Kirsten Dunst as Peggy and Jesse Plemmons as Ed Blomquist cleaning it all up.

Like the first season, this second season also deals with the ambiguity of life and our desires and efforts to find meaning in the midst of it. In the pilot episode, a judge recounts the story of Job to Rye as he threatens her: “If Satan couldn’t change Job’s mind, what makes you think you’ll change mine.” Episode 3 is entitled “The Myth of Sisyphus,” which could serve as a subtitle for the entirety of the second season. All the characters are trying to find their place in a new world. Floyd Gerhardt (Jean Smart…where has she been all this time?!) tries to find a place for her family’s business in a world that is becoming more corporate. Peggy wants to attend a seminar where she can learn to be her best self.

All of this is set against an equally absurd (mobsters talking about shampoo preferences and hard and soft water) and sweet (a father and daughter playing cribbage late at night) backdrop. But it’s also all part of a violent cycle. The season opens with a faux behind-the-scenes clip from an old black-and-white film, Massacre at Sioux Falls. There are numerous references to multiple wars (World War II and Vietnam, especially). Here, we might find the most profound parallels with our lived experiences today as Hank says to Lou, “Sometimes I wonder if you didn’t bring that war home with you.”

Two final themes of the first four episodes are greed and selfish ambition, themes that defined the first season of Fargo. Death often follows close behind these and, if we commit ourselves to that path, we fail to see that it is close to us. In Episode 4, Lou confronts Ed and Peggy as he begins to suspect that they might be involved in Rye’s disappearance. Ed’s never been to war, so he doesn’t understand the look that a man gets when he’s fatally wounded but doesn’t feel it yet. Lou has seen that look in dying comrades, and he sees it now in both Ed and Peggy. Lou tries to give them an out, a way to fix the mess in which they’ve put themselves, but, even with all of his war-time experience, Lou might still be too naive to see that such an option is itself already dead.

New episodes of Fargo air on Monday nights at 9 pm on FX.

Previous Post

November 2, 2015

Killer Serials: Breakthrough Ep. 1, "Fighting Pandemics"

Next Post

November 5, 2015 The Armor of Light: A Review

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Classics DVD Film Music News Pop Culture Events Print Sports Television Uncategorized Video Games

Select a Month March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who interpreted Pharaoh's dreams in Egypt?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Moses Aaron Daniel Joseph