This is kind of where I fall too. S1 was chock full of great performances on the whole, which I felt trumps S2's more interesting characters and more ambitious storyline. No slight on S2 - I just liked S1 more. Also, it felt more authentic to the film, which, at least to me, wins it points.

Billy Bob was just 2 strong season 1.

The actresses playing the old actress and the young actress are mother and daughter(which I thought was great) and they matched up fine, they just cast a guy who was way, way too young to play the young author since they kept saying he was 82 in 2010. Do they not have a calculator on set or something?

I guess we haven't seen how he changed his name, maybe he stole someone's identity in Minnesota and Ennis Stussy was a real person, but that bothered me too.

I figured it was just a legal change and he got his name from the toilet. We see him puke in his motel room after beating the dude senseless, then cut to the present where Gloria is in the same room getting ready to leave. She looks at the toilet and sees this:

But the age difference was so great it can't be just bad casting.

1) Fargo doesn't make mistakes, blessed be Hawley.

2) Seriously the guy would've been 47 in 1975 if he was 82 in 2010, we're not talking about a 23 year old playing a HS senior, he was off by 20 ****ing years.

S1 > S2 imo for sure.

Haven't got around to S3 yet, will probably binge once it's over.

True. But it would also be very un-Fargo/Hawley to bury an obscure mystery 3 ep's deep like that. The show tends to wear its conceits on its sleeve.

my guess is they were afraid a 47 year old getting scammed like that would be less sympathetic

Solid ep tonight. I'm still trying to figure out what Varga's game is. He came onto the scene claiming he was sent by somebody or some sort of group, but we don't know who he's working for, or if he's working for anyone at all. And Emmit and his parking lot empire is a bizarre business to take a huge interest in. There's something else Varga wants imo.

McGregor and CC killed it as usual, love the new girl and the BBT cameo.

I'd also quit my job for MEW.

So the police chick is kind of a ghost? Mkay

From reddit

even though I find it stupid it makes sense.
.

Nice S2 callback with the dog cremains of Luverne.

Not loving Varga compared to previous villains yet, but the Peter and the Wolf setup is a nice bit. Doesn't look good for Ray the duck.

Agreed. This was legitimately distracting. My guess is some kind of artificial aging due to space travel or magic toys.

What a phenomenal episode, and loved the Billy Bob Thornton voiceover/call back.

The straight-up-communist antagonist is so perfect.

Ewan McGregor is crushing this.

+1... and going back to Kirsten Dunst of last season or a few others. Prestige TV is bringing out some some amazing acting chops.

Seems like random sequences of events/the butterfly effect is the major theme of this season. If Emmit doesn't trade Ray for the stamp as kids, both their lives are completely different... perhaps Emmit turns out to be the loser and Ray the success. Ennis takes his name from a toilet in a motel where he happened to vomit, then years later is murdered because of that name. Maurice happens to lose the piece of paper with the correct address out the car window, leading to Ennis' death. Sy hits Ray's car but also happens to clip the other woman's car on the way out, otherwise there's no investigation, which leads Winnie into the case. Winnie happens to meet Gloria in a public bathroom, and they end up working together. The frame with Emmit's stamp just happens to break right before Nikki breaks in to steal it, and she mistakenly takes the replacement picture as an insult.

Varga seems to represent chaos and the futility of trying to escape one's fate. There is the sense that trying to reason with him or fight against him would be futile. I wonder if at some point we will learn what the V.M. stands for.

Futility seems to be a main topic in this series . Season two had the Sysyphus theme , pushing a rock up the hill to only have it roll back down again. The present season is fueled by the dispute over the Sysyphus stamp and also features the Useless Machine which turns itself off as soon as it's switched on .

Also loved the Peter and the Wolf piece which is a deep-rooted part of Russian folklore.

i played the trumpet in HS orchestra and we performed peter and the wolf.
great having BBT do the voiceover and man the acting by the whole cast is so phenomenal.

one thing i think would've been cool to do this season is go the other way with the police chief (not gloria but her new boss).

every season they have a dumb chief who doesn't want to investigate and gets in the way of the lower ranking, smarter officer who is trying to solve the case and so on and so forth.

think it would've made for a nice change of pace this season to have the new chief be totally supportive and agree that something was fishy and get behind the investigation.

Well, there's still time. I doubt they hired Shea Whigham just to be a random *******.

Doesn't make sense to let Nikki live, guess she was wearing plot armor.

That was embarrassing, taking a 10 punch beating and coming out of it with a twisted ankle. Or her leg fell asleep. Didnt even mess up her hair. Immaculate makeup. Lullllllzzzzzzzz

they wuz bodyshotzzzzzz imo

Did you not see her in the tub at the end? Bruises all over her torso. Looked a little worse than a twisted ankle.

This season just doesn't do it for me they way s1 and s2 did. I don't feel myself intrested on any of the characters or the storyline. Not as bad as true detective s2 though and will watch to end.

Yeah, we're halfway through, and the season ranking is looking like 2>1>>>>>3 aorn. Nothing's really clicking.

season still has a lot of potential. cant judge it half way through. the acting and story is still great thus far even if its not as epic as the first 5 eps of S1 or S2