The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘Fargo’ Season 5, Episode 7 Recap

Episode Date: December 27, 2023

Jo and Rob are back to break down the seventh episode of ‘Fargo’ Season 5. They discuss the harrowing puppet theater visuals and Dot’s coinciding dream sequence, Gator’s increasingly ruinous character arc, and the various hints that foreshadowed Camp Utopia. Along the way, they talk about Wayne and Scotty’s wholesome father-daughter bond. Later, they close by unpacking the final scene, in which Roy finally catches up to Dot, and why this episode is the most technically impressive of the season. Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney Producer: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Galaxy Lights, Coachella, Lightning Bolt Necklaces. 20203 was the year of Scandival. On March 3rd, one cheating scandal launched a reality TV investigation that generated hundreds of conspiracy theories, thousands of podcast episodes, and millions of dollars in revenue. I'm Jody Walker, host of an American Scandival. One retrospective story told in three salacious parts. Listen, December 26th on the Ringer Reality Feast. Feed.

Back to the prestige TV podcast feed. I'm Joanna Robinson joining me today. Is it a dream? Is it a real pod? Who's to say? It's Rob Mahoney. Oh, Rob. How are you?

I will say that we wouldn't be here if we didn't need to be here. You know what I'm saying? I do know what you're saying. Wow. All right. We're here to talk about episode seven of Fargo, Linda, written by Noah Hawley and April Shee and directed by Sylvan White. And there's a lot.

I mean, just like big picture. This is a big swing episode, obviously. Yes. We've got a, what I would say, I think is probably a dream sequence, though, like, I guess there's room to question that at the end of the episode, but I think it's pretty clear that it's a dream sequence. And then inside of the dream sequence, an elaborate puppet show sequence. Quite, quite elaborate.

What do you make of this Russian nesting doll of secrets and sequences and layers and dreams? it's the episode that I'm most curious to see how people respond to because of how big the swing is. Yeah. And frankly, because I would say the heaviest episode of the season so far, the weirdest episode of the season so far. And for my money, I think probably the best episode of the season so far. Did the swing work for you, Joe? We love a swing. Rob, you and I love a swing.

Absolutely. I think this is phenomenal. I think that I was asking someone over at FX, like sort of what the inspiration was. for the puppet show because I was curious. I'm sure Noah Holly will, by the time this is out, Noah Holly will have given some, like, great in-depth interviews about this episode.

I'm sure production design people will have given great in-depth interviews about this episode. And they goddamn should. The production design, oh my gosh, just off the charts for this one. Incredible.

We do not have the benefit of that because we were pre-recording this. So I just, like, went straight to the source at FX. And I think the idea or, and inspiration was just sort of the way in which when you're talking to people have gone through abuse, the way in which they use dolls to sort of be able to process that

was sort of the inspiration for what we're doing here. I mean, they directly kind of talk about that in the context of, but to give us the audience, I think we, I can't remember, but I believe Rob when we were talking about Dorothy's past in a previous episode, did I dream this? Or, like, I think you said you didn't want a flashback to it. Yes. Right? And so this is like a way to give us the story without giving us a really harrowing. I mean, it's still harrowing, but like an even like more intense and hard to watch flashback. Is that how do you feel about that threading the needle? I feel great about it.

Because in particular, what I don't want is a narratively neutral flashback of these are the true events. For one, I just don't like that style of storytelling. And it definitely doesn't seem like something Fargo in particular would do so that we get dots recounting and dots memory and her purpose. processing of those events. I think that's the best way to do it while cluing the audience in on some of the specifics and giving us some indication of where the story is going. But as far as the puppet theater part of it, I'm very anxious to hear from Holly more about the motivation there, as you were alluding to what exactly they're unpacking. Because to me, this feels like an

unpacking of the way not only that survivors deal with their pain and their situations and their histories, but the way that trauma has been used as the core of storytelling, especially over the last decade, where it doesn't feel like a coincidence that for Dot to work through some stuff and exercise what she's been trying to exercise for a long time, just to do a little show for everybody. Like, that feels very consistent with where we've been in movies and TV for a while now. I love that. That's brilliant.

I hadn't thought about that. All right. So before we, and in our usual headings, like peek behind the curtain of the process here for when I make notes for this episode is I've been like sort of keeping the headings intact from our various episodes and sort of trying to slot which story plots under things. So like the concept of debt or the concept of constructive reality. So PubPo show under constructed reality for sure, but also like dream sequence. I really like that idea. Again, we'll get into it a little bit more detail, but this idea that like this is. is Dot's story. Yes. It is her truth that like the show says that like through the mouths of

the Linda is like this is your truth. It's not that it's untrue, but it is also like your, from your point of view to borrow a Star Warsism from a certain point of view. This is what you believe happened and that is your truth. But it is it the truth, especially when it comes to what happened to Linda? I have questions about that. I think that's a great place to start. For you and I, as we're talking about this episode, and we've been talking about constructed realities all season, as you mentioned. How do we want to talk about the constructed realities of this episode? In particular, the kind of dream, potential dream sequence reveal we get at the end. I think it opens up a lot of questions as we go along.

Oh, of like when we cut away to another story, do you mean? Well, for example, like, I think because, my read is the same as yours. Like, I read basically the main body of this episode in Dot's story. as a dream. She is dreaming all of that from the diner, pancake to pancake. All of that is in her head. So do we think, for example,

did she ever get a postcard from Linda? Did the postcard ever really exist because she digs it up once she starts dreaming? Maybe it did exist, but she didn't go dig it up. Those are the kinds of things. I wonder how we want to dig into here. Or maybe a different version of that postcard exists because the postcard was Camp Utopia.

We see like a rack displaying those postcards inside the diner. And then this is like a more beaten up version of that. There's no address on it. There's no stamp on it. The fact that she digs it up under a windmill that looks like the windmill is on the Tillman farm. It doesn't, like, I mean, okay, you know, if you put me to the test, I probably could not tell you one windmill firm another. I'm not going to be a windmill expert. But like the most prominent windmill we've seen again and again and again is on the Tillman farm.

And, you know, so like this post. card is inside a rock under a wind you know this is like end of shashank redemption kind of stuff and it's just like it doesn't that that was the first moment where I was like because throughout I will say I was like is this real or is this not and I would get I would get sucked into it being real like when she shows up and she's watching the puppet show of abuse happen I was like oh this is this is a dream and then she faints and then she wakes up and I'm like or is this real there's like The first Linda who's talking to her is talking a little out of sync at first, like a twin pixie kind of.

I thought there was something wrong with my screener. I mean, I watched it a couple times. I was like, I don't know. Dream stuff. And then like how elaborate and good her puppet show is. Even though like Wayne in the scene right proceeding is like your mom can do anything. Yeah. Like climb a tree, wrestle alligators, whatever.

I was like, but can't she do a full-blown puppet show production? I'm not sure even Dot can do that. So there's just like these moments. I like the way that it is put together where it's like every moment that I'm like, oh, this is definitely a dream? Then there will be like a conversation with Linda where I was like, or is this, is this real? I don't know. You know, so.

Well, Fargo, I think more than most shows, can walk that line between making us wonder, is this a dream or is this just artistic license, right? Like, are we being immersed in the moment of the puppet show, but the puppet show is actually real? And it's just kind of more vivid to us as the viewers of this television program. or is this entirely dreamt up to begin with? And, like, I was going back and forth and having that same wrestling match all episode long. But to be honest with you, the reason this works so well for me and the reason I know it worked is because when she got snapped back to reality with the plate of pancakes, it hit me square in the chest.

I was so sad. I was so upset for her. And it's not like what she went through at Camp Utopia. Like, it was weird and it was surreal, but it was a kind of closure that clearly her subconscious is telling her that she needs. And for someone who has been going through this all alone, this idea that she had Linda with her, and she's like, we'll go together and we'll sort of defeat him together. Actually, I have one email about this that I want to read that connects to that idea because Stephen wrote in about Lorraine, but it connects. No Lorraine in this episode. But he wrote it about Lorraine. He says, I don't think that Lorraine is the Wicked Witch. I think she's probably the Tin Man. She's finding a heart, at least for Dorothy. and then he has a theory about Indira being either scarecrow or the Carly Lion. But he says, another theme to me, though, is the idea of needing community to beat men like Roy Tillman.

I think we're seeing Lorraine Lion recruit Indira and gain sympathy for Dodd because female lions live and hunt in prides. Dot was a tiger because tigers are solitary, but she realized she can't be Roy on her own, so she'll need to truly become a lion to beat Roy. So this idea of like it's going to take a village or pride of lions or whatever you prefer to, to, to, to tell you. tear down Roy Tillman, but or just this idea of like, I think in the beginning of the season, some people, some bad faith, I think viewers on Reddit were like frustrated with Dot because she wasn't telling people what was going on. And it read a bit like victim blaming to me. Yeah. But I can understand some shreds of that frustration, but we can also understand why she felt we talked about support, but we also understood like why she felt she had to do it alone.

But I think the message is going to have to be, like, you can't do this by yourself. You have to trust other people to help you. And when we see her all alone in that hospital room with Roy, like, you know, looming over her, it's just so scary and sad. I mean, that scene is terrifying. I want to give that moment as proper due at the end and we finally get John Hamm in this episode. Yeah. But the thing about the solidarity of wanting someone to go through this with is spot on. And in particular, I think highlights and reinforces and puts kind of a sad punctuation mark on the fact that we're not probably going to see the real Linda in this story.

Like all of the arrows are pointing to real Linda is in the ground somewhere. And this is another part of kind of dots constructed reality where she knows who Roy is on so many levels and what he's capable of. She knows he can't be trusted. And yet, as a literal child, she has internalized this lie that Linda ran away, that Linda up and left her. I think based on Dots retelling of the story, Linda's culpable for a lot of things. It does seem like Linda kind of brought her in as someone to distract Roy's attentions perhaps and deflect. We may never know kind of what Linda's intentions were in doing that. But that's certainly how Dot feels and how the situation read. But there just doesn't seem like any way in the world that Linda actually got out of there.

No, I completely agree. The coincidental timing of, you know, like Roy, just needing one wife out of the way so that he can move on to the next one. And we've been worried for a while now that Linda was dead. And so, yeah, I agree. I think this is the best, the most we're going to hear from the actual Linda in the show and even if she is just a dream version. The other thing it felt like that Dorothy was kind of trying to process in the dream sequence

and this didn't occur to me until the last time I watched it through is her own guilt about leaving Gator behind right? Because, you know, she's accusing like, how could you leave us behind? How could you leave and leave Gator and me there

like you left us? We were children. And Linda sort of throws Scotty into the equation there. But I think the real guilt that Dodd is carrying is leaving Gator and especially now that she's seen what has become of Gator since she left from behind

versus, again, this is a constructive reality but like this sensitive boy as depicted as a puppet that we saw in the flashback. That felt like another layer that she's processing as she's having a micro nap

at the diner table waiting for her pancakes, you know. This episode felt like it was kind of closing the door for me on the idea of Gator as a guy with a heart of gold who's in a tough situation. Like when you're blindly shooting an assault rifle at a vague silhouette through a window, I think that ship has sailed. But I think it does a great job of articulating and showing us why Dot would want to see the good in Gator. And the visual you described of the puppet, like to me, that's going to be one of the things of this episode that sticks with me. is puppet gator kind of curling up in the lap of puppet dot? Yeah.

As they're, you know, they've both been through so much together, and they're always going to be bonded by that. I'm just the thing that I'm worried about, just based on the interviews that Noah Hawley has given, is that he's not as out as we are on, like, redemption for gator, you know? But I'm, I'm pretty out. This is a tough gator episode. Also, just, I don't know.

anytime you see someone, just don't buy oranges, I think is the lesson that we've learned from the Godfather, right? Just don't ever buy oranges. The rolling orange is too evocative. You're really just inviting a kind of violence that you'd wish you'd stay away from. You're tempting fate, yeah. As we're talking about Gator, though, and really this applies, I think, to Wayne and Scotty and their side of this story, too.

My one complaint about this episode is I wish we would have stayed with Dot the whole time. I wish we would have stayed immersed in the dream state. because in retrospect, it is a little jarring thinking we're cutting back and forth between Dot's dream and things that I presume are actually happening in Minnesota. I mean, maybe that's a way to lull us into... I suspect that's it, yeah. But I suppose there's a different way to cut this episode where we get the Wayne and the Gator and all that other stuff first, and then we're just with Dot for like the last half hour or whatever of the episode. and then we end with the car crash and everything. Let me zoom back to some slightly more frivolous matters.

Oh, please. Before we get back into some of the deeper stuff. I just want to check in on Cohen Reference Corner really quickly and say that listener Andrew wrote in to let us know that there was a big Raising Arizona call out in episode 5 that I missed where Lorraine is talking to security about Dot. She says, are you going to sit around here talking in the one house in the state where I know she ain't at? which is there's a line in Raising Arizona where he says,

damn it are you going to chase down your leads. You're going to sit drinking coffee in the one house in the state where I know my boy ate at. So, you know, a nice... They're everywhere. They're just everywhere. And every line could be a reference. So thank you all for your vigilance

and letting us know what we've missed. And then the Minnesota nice question that we've been asked, I had a really hard time. I was like, last week I was like, let's do a Minnesota nice bit every week. And this week I was like, wait, was that a terrible idea? Because I had a really hard time plucking out

in Minnesota Nice moment to highlight. Did you have one? I mean, I have one, but I'm not sure it's great. I have one. And for me, it's dodging the question of whether she's coming or going by asking about the pancakes. I think that's the closest we're going to get to Minnesota Nice in this episode. It's a question, though, because the history of Fargo would tell us

the back half of the season is going to be significantly less nice than the front half. That said, the juxtaping. of those tones is what makes this show as successful as it is. So I think we're going to get little bits and pieces doled out, but maybe more sparingly than we're used to. We really need, um, Danish Graves back because I really feel like he's the king of this. But, um, I guess the closest that I have is one of Wayne's car salesman saying, because Minnesota is like painting nice over like hostility, right?

And he's like, when he says, except that's not really how capitalism works with like this big smile on his face, and he's so frustrated that is like the bake noodle of his boss's head is like the one making the decisions here? He's just like, no. Do you think the shock to the system has radicalized socialist Wayne? Has he really arrived in his final philosophical form at this point? It reminds me a lot of the iconic Harrison Ford film regarding Henry, a truly problematic film. Yeah, iconic for many, many reasons. Wayne was always a sweet guy. It's not like he had a radical change of hard air. We also did get an email. another like Minnesota Nice definition email from our listener Tony who wrote in one day while at work in my office and say Paul, oh yeah, don't you know, you betcha. I heard a coworker mumbling something about goddamn Minnesota Nice. I then heard what I believe to be the definitive description of Minnesota Nice. Quote, when you throw out a dinner party, dinner invite at your home for a nebulous, undetermined time and date in the future, knowing full well that you have absolutely zero intention of ever fulfilling or executing said invite ever. Native Minnesota.

understand this intuitively. Outsiders are initially very excited and giddy about the fact that they bonded with this very humble and friendly species, the aforementioned Minnesotan, so quickly over just a little harmless small talk. We hit it off immediately and they invited me over for dinner. How charming, how hospitable, how nice.

No, how Minnesota nice. You'll never see the inside of that home. You'll be lucky if you get a few bites of Lepsa left in the lunchroom at the company Potluck. Oofda. So that's... Joe, I feel like you just shifted into your way reading his imaginary story book mode. That was amazing. Thank you. Yeah, the empty,

dinner. We should, oh, you should come over have dinner sometime, but not meaning it at all. How nefarious. We also get several animals I don't need to read any. I'll just let you know that some of people who are familiar with these, these here states in our United States are a little confused about the geography of these episodes because there is a Stark County, North Dakota. Yeah. But it is clear on the other side of the state from where borders Minnesota. So the fact that people are going back and forth is confusing some people. And they're like, if they wanted to make it a border town, why use the name of a real county in North Dakota is the question. That sort of stuff doesn't fuss me that much, though, unless it's Game of Thrones.

I like the geography. As long as they don't forget about the dragons as they sail around, everything is going to be fine. Well, I do love, though, that we are getting a Fargo story in transit because, man, they know how to make those big open landscape shots of the Midwest great plain states that we're dealing with here. They look so otherworldly anytime we get them,

but especially in this episode where it's such a dream state and that long horizon line and the giant sky, it just feels so ethereal even before we ever get to Camp Utopia. On the like debt trade front, we have a couple things going on.

First of all, like this is literally what Munk says when this woman's shitty son comes home and is demanding a bunch of stuff from her and money from Mook himself, stuff like that, and he's like, what are you paying or whatever? He's like, no, pay, trade, right? I'm the dog in the yard.

I'm like protecting the house. Doesn't do a great job, I got to say, at the end of the day, because despite his... He does a great job murdering her son in cold blood in the front yard. Wonderful job of that. With an axe. Love that for us.

I know we were talking about Lars being in the running for the worst person to appear in this show, but Deadbeat Sandwich, son, he was making a quick lead, you know, really making up a lot of ground very quickly. This is the only part of the episode where I was like, no, no one is this comically terrible, right? Lars at least has a dream. What does this guy have? I don't know. But we've been talking about Dot sort of Kevin McAllistering, home aloning her house. the fake-out silhouette in the window is a classic Kevin McAllister move, obviously.

Yes, or classic Alfred Hitchcock. It's classic something, that's for sure. Oh, sure. Birds of a feather. But yeah, this is a trap. It's a trap for Gator. A trap that doesn't fully work because he loses this, like, woman who I guess he was transferring mother-son feelings to or whatever.

And he loses Gator, right? Like, it's not his best work, monk. We'll see what happens after that, but yeah. Yeah, I mean, he gets stuck in his own constructed reality, I guess, with his elaborate trap that slips through his fingers at the end of the day. But as far as Gator's piece of it, it really struck me after you and I were talking last week about Llewellyn in No Country and how his downfall was like going back to give a dying man some water.

Like the heart to do that was what undid him in that story. and here it's Gator, like, can't leave the bag of money behind in the window. And that's really the reason why things go sideways on him, just really spinning out in opposite directions, Gator, from basically anyone we would have respect for in a Cohen story. Also, this idea of trade pops up in that car scene, obviously, right? Wayne says, a car for a car for a car. And he quotes the Bible for each has received a gift,

use it to serve one another. I mean, I feel like Wayne's cook noodle is like slowly repairing itself, right? He seems much more coherent in this episode. Not fully. Quoting Bible versus. Yeah, not fully back. In whole. Yeah.

A little loopy, but he's getting there. And it's so incredibly sweet the way that like Scotty is caring for him, you know, while encouraging him to still care for her. It's not like, it's time for you to go to bed, dad. It's like, you've got to come read me a story. You got to come put me to bed. You got to come, like, perform. fatherhood to me right now.

This is our normal. This is what we have to do. But also being the one of like, we should have a vegetable. We shouldn't go get donuts. We should probably have a vegetable. Mom would want us to. And I want to give a quick shout too because we've talked so much about the heavy hitters in this show and the acting performances that they're delivering.

I think Sienna King is doing a great job with Scotty. That is an adorable performance. Yeah. It doesn't get into any of the kid actor territory. We talk about with so many other shows and movies where something just feels off or forced or out of place, like fitting straight into the frame of this narrative. And every time she pops up on screen, I'm happy she's there. I'm happy for what she's bringing to this dynamic.

Sweet but not saccharin, right? And just like really, and really driving home, again, because I'm a big Wayne Lion fan, you can choose wink if you prefer, but I'm a big Wayne lion fan. Scotty and Wayne have to be okay. They have to be. I will accept no reality where they are not. So, you know, be preferred for me to construct my own puppet show if things go a different way. Snoring, gasping during sleep, feeling fatigued, ask your doctor about Zepbound, terseptite.

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or if you've had multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2. Tell your doctor if you get a lump or swelling in your neck. Stop, Zepound, and call your doctor if you have severe stomach pain or a serious allergic reaction. Severe side effects may include inflamed pancreas or gallbladder problems. Tell your doctor if you experience vision changes before scheduled procedures with anesthesia. If you're nursing, pregnant, plan to be, or taking birth control pills. Taking Zep bound with a sulfonel urea or insulin may cause low blood sugar.

Side effects include nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting, which can cause dehydration and worsened kidney problems. Talk to your doctor. Call 1-800-545-9 or visit setbound.lily.com. On the Wizard of Oz front, here's where a reckoning has come for me, which is I've been exposed as not having finished season four of Fargo, which is true. I didn't. I started checked out and I apologize. But, Joe, is that really being exposed? There's a direct and overt Wizard of Oz episode in episode 9 of season 4.

Oh, damn. There's like a tornado. Our listener Charlotte says there's a whole beat for beat Wizard of Oz episode. So I feel like everyone being so blown away by Wizard of Oz stuff this season is bizarre. It's not new to Noah or his Fargo. It was all in the last season. So the episode's called East West is the name of the episode of Fargo last season. One of the character, Satchel, who I believe grows up to be Mike Milligan, the character from season two, Fargo.

is dressed as Dorothy wearing a blue shirt, red hat, even carrying a little dog discovered at the inn, tossed in the twister and the transformation was complete. And the Fargo team, the instruction that Noah Hawley gave the Fargo team

because this is from a great indie wire interview, Ben Travers, talked to all the production design people on that episode. They transitioned, the most of the episodes in black and white, and then it transitions to color at the end.

And I guess the direction that Noah Holly gave, his team was follow the yellow brick road to figure out what to do here. So, and that season was set in Kansas, which I think we mentioned when we were talking about the Wizard of Oz in the first place. I just didn't know this episode

existed, so I apologize to the season four fans. It didn't work for me, and I so very clearly did not finish the season. Well, there are dozens of them and they're furious about it. But clearly, you and I need to watch, we need to watch every Cohen movie again. We need to watch at least this one

episode of Season 4, Fargo. And I think we might need to watch, like, some nature documentaries of some kind. I need to learn more about Lion and Tiger hunting and living situations if we're going to be playing on them this overtly. It takes a village and this is what all of our lovely emailers are for

which is to help fill in the gaps of our knowledge. On the dream sequence front, I was trying to figure out like where in Cohen movies we've seen dream sequences, which we certainly have. Like, that has existed in several different films, Slavowski, like, blah, blah, all this stuff. But like the best, like,

why is there a lengthy dream sequence in the middle of this, what are we referencing? Poppy fields, right? Like, this is a whole big moment in Wizard of Oz. Definitely makes sense.

The gang goes, takes a nap in a poppy field. But, yeah, anything else you want to say about Camp Utopia in terms of, like, the ladies doing Tai Chi in the snow, not saying,

why am I so tired? It's a kind of death what her husband's do to us was like a really, biting line. What else do you want to say about that? I love so much of the staging of Camp Utopia, the cabin

core kind of aesthetic they have established here where you've got your lacy tablecloths, you're really flourishing potted plants all over the place. A lot of earth tones, a lot of earth tone clothing in there. Yeah. And honestly, a level of natural light

that I deeply admire, but also would be the most expensive heating bill on planet Earth. given where this is situated in the country. Like, how could you, the thermostat is set squarely to like 65 degrees in that place? Because how else could you possibly afford it? Right.

And who's funding Camp Utopia? I guess it doesn't matter if it's a dream. Well, before we ever get to Camp Utopia, I think there's so many ways in which we're primed for what's about to come. Oh, yeah. She has a little, she's like falling asleep at the wheel. Yep. There's a little doll show sign that she's looking at right before, while she's sitting at the table. Chicken paccata recipe on the bulletin board too. Oh,

Oh, Missed Chicken Piccata. And I think there's two needle drops kind of dovetailing as she's in the car that are worth calling out too. You get, my love is a hurricane. Yeah. You can't escape my love, it's a hurricane. Okay? Pretty, pretty overt. Yeah.

And if that wasn't overt enough, Joe, I'm your puppet. I'm your puppet. James and Bobby Purify. I'm your puppet. So we're there from the beginning, whether we acknowledge it, whether we know it or not. And it turns out that a lot of love songs, you know, when you superimpose them on this kind of story, they get pretty creepy. They get pretty creepy when you go through them. Any lyrics remind you're puppet that you want to call out?

I mean, this is just right there. There's many. But I think pull the string and I'll wink at you. I'll do funny things if you want me to. I'm your puppet. I'm your puppet. I'm your puppet. The other needle drop, or it's not really a needle drop, I suppose.

That's a needle drop. What happens after the music that plays as she's going into Camp Utopia and like seeing that puppet show? I got out the old Shazam, right? That's Crimean Sketches 3, Kitarma by Alexander Spendiarian. The old Armenian Philharmonic, you know? This rules. This music was so good. It was incredible.

And there's like, it's interesting with the Fargo score because like sometimes you're listening to score and sometimes you're listening to an incredible piece of classical music. And you don't know. Like sometimes I hold the Shazam up. The Shams like, Shams like, I don't know, Joanna. It's the original Fargo score. What do you want for me? Sometimes it's like, hey, it's a hidden gem of a classical piece. I thought this is really, really good scoring of the sequence.

Really a heart-racing piece of music. And I love that they kept in the applause note at the end of it, at the end of the actual performance of that piece of music. And we get it leading into the puppet show and Dot Fainting. I mean, beat perfect in terms of her finding Camp Utopia, early thinking she does, you know, trekking through the woods, happening upon this weird-ass puppet show. just a perfect kind of cultivated vibe for what you won in that moment.

Also, I was trying to find more information on this piece of music. And please forget my pronunciation, but the Kaitarma, that sort of subtitle of it, is a traditional dance that is a spinning, spinning, spinning, spinning, spinning, spinning, spinning, and that's what it feels. Yeah, it feels like she spins and spins and then she drops. You know, like that's what it feels like. It was just, I thought it was really good. And the last needle drop that I want to talk about that I have on my list is a long way to go by the optic nerve.

A great track that plays sort of while she's constructing her puppetry. Incredible puppet. Really, really good. The home theme, right? We got the waitress literally saying to dot, home is in your head at home or running away from home, which goes, which feeds into something I think that you were saying last week on this idea of home, which is if we're thinking about Dorothy on her journey and there's no place. like home and how in some versions of this, like the return to the farm, which is the end of the Wizard of Oz, is the return to the Tillman homestead, right? Yeah.

But, you know, or do we stay in Oz? Do we stay in our constructed reality that is like much warmer and glorious technicolor and all this stuff? Fun fact about the Oz books is eventually like Auntie M. Uncle Henry and Dorothy all move move to Oz. They're like, fucking kiss is by. genuinely happens in the books. So, you know, like this idea of where is home, home is what you make of it. Like, in what way is the Tillman farm more of a home than the one that she constructed and then slightly burned down with, with Wayne and Scotty, you know?

Yeah, and Wayne lays it out as he's kind of telling Scotty about this journey that Dodd is going on, the line he has at the end of his story. Because until you go someplace, you can't come home, I thought it was just a great bit of writing. And really does kind of bring us back to the odds. of it all to this idea of going on these journeys. Like this episode feels like an odyssey for Dot in so many ways. And that all of it ends up being in her mind. And I think more cruelly than that, you know, she's clearly reaching to confront this person.

I don't think she's ever going to be able to confront in Linda, right, to have this moment of clarity of like, why did you leave us behind? And she gets to ask it in her dream. And then when she's snapped back, not only by the reality that she won't get to do that, but by Tillman. ultimately finding her at the end of this episode, by being found by the one monster you've been running from all these years. I mean, that is a monstrous turn of events that really, really puts a button on the idea of home, right? Like, even the nurse in the hospital is,

like, your husband is here, right? Your home has come for you here to bring you to, quote, unquote, safety. Easy on the eyes, as he may be. Those are some ominous boots coming down the hall, Joe. No, when she says your husband's here and I was like, oh, no. And then she said, easy on the eyes and I was like no Even a pro Wayne Lion podcast would not call him easy on the eyes. No, I think Wayne Lion is quite handsome. I just think

this random nurse is probably talking about John Hamm you know, I was just like... Gods are in his favor. I was just like, no man, you know, and Dorothy's like oh yeah, he's a looker, my Wayne. The other, I mean, obviously there's like when, when speaking of

the very handsome Wayne getting his glasses out to read the Invisible look to Scotty. What a gem. And he says she was the son's favorite and everywhere she went there were rainbows, obviously. Like, you know, very Wizard of Ozzy. But I'm so glad you mentioned the Odyssey because when I was sort of sitting here thinking about like dream sequences and journeys home and stuff like that, like obviously the Odyssey,

there's like the whole section with the Lotus Eater's, you know, speaking of feels of poppies, there's like the Lotus Eater section of the Odyssey. And so I think that's also a very important. text to be thinking about, you know, like thinking about, you know, Roy's cyclops, like, or any of the monsters that are waiting Odysseus on his way home to Phenelope, you know, it's like it's a, there's a lot of layers that you could go to here. Also, I love that in Wayne's little story that he's reading to Scotty says she can wrestle an alligator. And it's just a ways that it was just like a nice little undersell of that line so that, you know, like the audience

can play with it if they want to. Speaking of playing with things, by the way, we got an email just for you. It's from Rachel, who says, when I saw Wink Lion playing with the Toy Soldiers, the most recent episode of Fargo, I immediately thought of Katham the Great's husband,

Zarpier of the Third. In Dana Schwartz's podcast, Noble Blood, fabulously called Katham the Great and her husband The Mediocre. She talks about his obsession with reenacting battles with toy soldiers. So if you're a fan of,

of either Dana's Great Podcast or the great Hulu TV series now canceled The Great, you know that Catherine is running things and her husband is an absolute idiot. So, I mean, I don't know if that was an intentional sorry Peter call out, but I kind of love it. It's lovely. How do you feel about that? Does it feel like Asperians cast at your guy, Wink?

Like, how do you feel? Asperians, perhaps. But look, I would rather he be playing with his little soldier set up than committing actual acts of violence. So on this show, we grade on a curve. And Wink Lion, by my measure, He's a-in-it-he's minding his own business, sipping on cocktails, minding after his injured son.

He's the only person on the show doing it right, as far as I'm concerned. Wow. Wink, that's a lot to carry. Good luck to you, my friend, living up to that. Oh, God. He's going to be a Nazi in two episodes, isn't he? I can already see the heel turn coming. The other thing that I was thinking about in re-watching this episode is, like,

when, speaking of, like, you mentioned, like, pack animal behavior, hunting. and all that sort of stuff like that. The fact that in the puppetry show flashback, Dorothy's literally like injured in bed

when Roy makes his like first advance. Like she's laid up with a sprained ankle or whatever. And we get that echo of that again with him looming over the hospital bed at the end of the episode. But there's just this idea of like

a predator and a wounded animal. When that, when the truck hit the car and the car hit Dorothy, and I wasn't, wasn't, like, worried if she was, like, dead or anything like that. Like, but, though, actually, we did get an email from someone who was, like, you guys made all these all these allusions to know country for old men, all these connections.

Llewell and Moss, like, dies unceremoniously, like, off screen, you know, three quarters of the way through that movie. I don't think that's what's going to happen to Dorothy, but, like, they were like, what if, what if, like, then the story becomes someone else's. I don't think that's what's going to happen. I was not worried that that was going to happen to her here in this episode, but I was just sort of like, she can't. You can't expose her like that.

If she gets, like, she is in a position where she needs to just be, like, be able to move with freedom and impunity. And, like, to put her in the hospital is to put her in a vulnerable space. And that's where we find her. What do you want to say about this hospital scene? Well, for one, I think you're, the puppet parallel is pretty clear in terms of what they're going for there, like how towering John Hamm is in those scenes. The way he closes the door immediately on walking in, and as soon as it clicks shut, all the sound from the hallway disappears.

All the light around the door disappears. And man, it feels just like that dollhouse bedroom. And the design is different. The accessories are different. But just seeing Dorothe, as you're saying, that vulnerable position curled up, there's so much pink in that room that makes it feel a little more girly, a little more child-like. For Dodd, I'm in awe of it. I'm in awe of so many of things like the technical triumph of this episode, I'm blown away by. I think it was just the most exceptional episode of the season in that regard.

And a lot of it is stuff like sound design. And it's the way the sound design plays in that scene. It's the boots down the hall, like I mentioned. The sound design during the puppet show, oh my God. Like the way that they get the sound of wood hitting on wood booming. That's like hollow but booming sound. And it's a really chilling kind of effect that they were able to create. To go back to sort of, what's interesting about that is, you know, one of the earliest most famous, please, please excuse me, I'm not a puppetry scholar.

So if you want to email, if you have a PhD in puppetry or theater arts and you would like to email me and tell me how wrong I am, that's fine. But like, you know, my first understanding of like Marianne and, you know, my first understanding of like Marianne shows of that nature are like the Punch and Judy shows. The Punch and Judy shows historically was just a man wailing on a woman. Slopstick. Yeah, but like horribly violent. Like that was just sort of like what Punch and Judy was. So this idea that like we're taking this and we're translating into this other thing,

exposing how fucked up the Punch of Judy shows were in the first place. Again, not an accident that the male abusers in these. puppet shows have that kind of like puppety baton that you see in so many of those kinds of things. Exactly. But yeah, I mean, like above everything else, and above everything else, just even the visuals of like young dot as a puppet saying like, you know, I was a girl, basically, and then I like started menstruating and like the wolves show up and you get these like wolves puppets coming out of this like orchard in the fog, like chasing after her.

This is a beautiful piece of heart that we're watching here. And you go from that sort of fairy tale, like little red riding, like whatever you want to call it, into the prosaic supermarket aisle, which is where Linda shows up. And Linda in Dot's mind being just like, you know, a wolf and sheep's clothing. And again, we'll hopefully, I don't know, I don't know what kind of resolution we're going to get on Linda. Maybe it will always be a question mark of like how much her, how intentional. some of this stuff was from her. And maybe that's how it should be. But

I'm with you. I'm just like a complete awe of this episode. I just thought it was incredible. And I hope people really like it. I hope it hits the way that they're hoping to. Yeah. Especially because so many of the things they've done here, clearly big creative swings. Like this is a show where a lot of it, a lot of the runtime

is a literal puppet show. So your mileage may vary just on that alone. But what they've done in shooting it, what they've done in framing it, as I was saying with the sound, you know, it's impressive in not like a sick shot bro kind of capacity, like technical for the sake of technical. Yeah.

It's technical in a way that serves the emotional impact of the story and that heightens it. And that I had literal chills watching some of those sequences in which it's a puppet hitting another puppet. And that's a kind of magic if you can pull that off in a story where, to be honest, I love watching Juno Temple. And she had an amazing kind of powerhouse performance in this. The look on her face alone when she realizes that. that Roy is coming for her down the hall. Like she is really pulling it together, really pulling this performance and sells this episode.

But I love all these actors. And you're taking us away from them. And you're taking us away from the settings and the narrative propulsion and into this backstory and telling it with puppets in a way that you're going to have to win a lot of audience members over with something like that. And I think this is a triumph of that effort.

I think they've really aced it, at least by my watch. I'm sure there's going to be people who hate it, but I would think if you're along the ride for Fargo, that this would be the kind of thing you're into. Also, on the Juno Temple front, like her doing the voices for the puppet show where it has to be like a little comical, but like also equally like sinister at the same time, which I thought she did such a good job with. Also, on the, just on the like bare bones basic technical

level, the makeup department making her look so tired, like the red rim's eyes. And, you know, like when she's driving just at the beginning and she sort of half falls asleep, you know, and I'm just sort of like, I could feel my eyes like dry and tired and drooping just watching her because it's just like, you know, her performance plus the makeup department. Yeah, this is a great episode of television, a great series of television. I am hearing many people are saying, more and more people are saying that they're watching Fargo because I'm being like annoyingly unrelenting about it. And that makes me really happy.

and I hope, you know, if you're listening to this podcast, maybe you caught up with it over the holidays. What a better way! What a bright and sherry way to spend your holidays. You know. About home and this show, maybe, no? Get together with your family, wander into the forest and join.

I would say, you know, I think the optimistic view of Camp Utopia is, you know, it's a survivor's refuge. But part of, I think, what makes this episode so good is it really walks the line into trauma cult at some points. It's like, there's something weird happening here. Yeah, the High Linda, High Linda, which it pined High Barbie for me a little bit. But also, to your point, like, twin peaksy, like, yeah, a little culty. Oh, yeah.

Carrie Matchett, I thought, did a great job as the main Linda, as St. Linda. I thought that was a great performance. And another case where I can't tell you, I've turned on a character faster than when she said we both made choices to Dot about their decisions regarding Mr. Tillman. There's, again, all dreamed, all in Dodd's head, an imagined conversation,

but that's a tough look for a character who may be dead and buried. All right, so we'll hopefully find out more about St. Linda and Dot and everyone else on the next episode of Fargo. Anything else you want to say about this episode? One quick shout to a light moment

in a very heavy episode. Yeah. Joe, we got a freaking puppet-making montage in the middle here. and in particular, the look of absolute delight on Juno Temple's face when Dodd gets the stringing of the puppet's arm to work correctly. That's worth the price of admission alone. Thank you. Thank you for this light and these dark times.

But I also love the part where she was trying to do it really quickly at the beginning. It's just like hack sawing at it. And I'm like, that's how I'm like, if you give me a block of wood and you're like, make a puppet out of this. I'm like, I don't know. What? Do I just start. hacking off pieces. I have no idea. Anyway, thanks so much to you,

Rob Mahoney for being the best. Thanks to Fargo for being a great television show. Thanks to all of our listeners for writing in. And thanks, of course, to the incredible Kai Grady for, I think I forgot to thank him last week. I want to think him every week is the best. Double thanks this week. Double thanks this week. And happy holidays to everyone and we'll see you in the new year.

Bye.