Fargo season 2 episode 9 review: The Castle

A climax worthing waiting for

It's just a flying saucer (MGM)

At the risk of repeating myself: Fargo is fantastic.

This was the mythical massacre at Sioux Falls, and it did not disappoint.

The Gerhardts were wiped out, the Dakotan police were slaughtered, Sheriff Ted Danson was shot in the gut, Lou Solverson came to the rescue, Hanzee the hitman emerged victorious, and yet Ed and Peggy still got away… oh yeah and there was a UFO.

There’s still a lot to come in the finale, but this was the action-packed episode of Fargo folklore.

And everything happened because Hanzee made it happen.

Mystery man

His quiet charisma long hinted at his significance in the endgame of the series.

Hanzee, the most competent character in the show, displays time and time again that he’s operating at a different speed, on a different plain.

The narrator this episode (a weird device that somehow works) says his motivation remains unclear even years later, despite the incident’s notoriety.

Hanzee’s decision to turn on the Gerhardts, even stabbing Floyd in the chest, is not explained, though that same narrator gives a tantalisingly possible reason as to why he is so hellbent on killing Ed and Peggy.

It’s suggested that they had witnessed his vulnerability, that moment last week when he asked for a haircut and solemnly said he was ‘tired of this life’.

So he orchestrated the shootout to get to them, pitting gangster against copper — with shadow of Mike Milligan looming large.

Mike, by the way, has gotten very lucky. His enemies are dead, his Kansas city boss will probably be happy about that. Still, you’d expect he’ll be involved in whatever goes down in the finale.

And once again whatever goes down will be because Hanzee made it go down.

Superman Solverson

Sometimes it’s hard to be the hero. They’re not often all that much fun, especially versus the dastardly delights of villainy.

But gosh darn it if Lou Solverson isn’t an all-American hero you can really root for.

He began by refusing to go along with the insane sting plan cooked up by the police captain one state over, and ended up the only law officer still standing and in hot pursuit of Hanzee and Ed and Peggy.

Throughout the episode he was doing proper police work: investigating the crime scene at the convenience store, discovering that Constance - Peggy’s boss - was murdered by Hanzee at the retreat hotel, chasing after the Gerhardt army, and ultimately blasting Bear right through his head.

He chose to solve this case, to save lives, take care of his fellow Luverneans, and to ensure justice is served.

Tragically, however, he may have missed out on the final moments of his wife’s life. In a beautiful sequence that stands alone in the crime-centric climax, the mother of Molly finally succumbs to her cancer; as the music swells and tension grows, poor sweet Betsy falls to the floor, shattering her glass of squash.

The aliens didn’t suck

Just a note here. The other week I expressed my fear about the show-ruining potential of the UFO we’ve seen sporadically this season.

Now I can’t speak for what happens next week, but its major appearance this time round was anything but a disaster.

It flew right above the climactic fight, shone its lights on the key character conflicts and just left just about everyone stunned.

Everyone except now-actualised Peggy, that is. She grabbed Ed, dragged him away from the extraterrestrial thing and said simply this:

‘It’s just a flying saucer, Ed.’