Fargo Season 5 Premiere Recap: Episode 1 and 2 Overview
It’s been nearly three years since “Fargo” last aired on television. Season 4 represents a low point for Noah Hawley’s sparse take on the Coen brothers’ classic. At its best, Fargo has been a fascinating and worthy addition to the name, borrowing mostly just “vibes” from the film, rather than a bunch of Easter eggs and character names. I’ll admit I was a little surprised to find out there would be a fifth season, but if it continues to be as good as this two-episode season premiere, I’m extremely down for another adventure in the snowy Midwest.
Like all good stories, we begin in the midst of a slow-motion battle at Scandia Middle School’s Fall Festival Planning Committee. I don’t know what caused this mess, but it seems like everyone in the room is throwing up their hands. Except for Dorothy Lyon (Juno Temple) and her daughter Scottie (Sienna King). On her way out of the crowd, Dot accidentally insults a police officer and is quickly arrested. “Wrong place, wrong time,” she muses in the back seat of a police car, later confessing to her husband Wayne (the great David Ryssdal), “I was in the wrong place, wrong time,” she muses in the back of a police car, later confessing to her husband Wayne (the great David Ryssdal), “I was in the wrong place, wrong time.”
With a taser. ” After her short stint in prison, Dot is released on bail, and she heads to a place that seems even less appealing to her: a hideous limestone McMansion owned by her stepmother for a Christmas card photo shoot. Jennifer Jason Leigh, no stranger to matriarchal roles that she can’t turn into gold, grits her teeth and sinks a little into Lorraine Lyon, wearing a sharp suit, her preferred costume. I looked at Scotty and casually muttered, “How progressive.” There’s still time for microaggressions to become mere aggression when each member of the family is simply handed a giant assault rifle to pose with. “It’s about expressing our values as a family,” says Lorraine. Understood.
Sore thumb as she is at Lorraine’s dinner table, Dorothy’s happy and active in her own domain, putting Scotty to bed with a well-acted pirate story and kindly rebuffing Wayne’s suggestion for a roll in the hay. Settling down, she’s beset with ominous visions of a ranch-like compound complete with people in freaky masks, a crumbling old barn, and Jon Hamm in a bolo tie. It’s all a bit cryptic, but surely has something to do with her being abducted from her home by two men the very next day, though not before scarring one up right good with an improvised flamethrower and maiming the other’s ear with an ice skate. Dot’s survivalist-style skills are a delightful surprise, but not a stretch for Temple, who’s always been capable of the vicious beneath her warmth. It’s fantastic to see her firing on all cylinders after she, like so many Ted Lasso alumni, was cut off at the knees by the writing during the Apple TV+ hit’s final season.