# Fargo Season 5 discussion (Starts 21NOV2023) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** tv-shows-scripted\ **Created:** [November 16, 2023, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228 "2023-11-16T08:16:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/141 "2023-12-30T18:10:28Z")
I’ve also seen pointed out (G)Linda. ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/142 "2023-12-30T21:12:41Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > BTW, when Lorraine learned that Dot ran away from her marriage to Roy, I thought she would use that to show that Dot wasn’t legitimately married to Wayne. I was unreasonably happy when Lorraine didn’t just give Dot up to Roy. Even if it _was_ because she considered Dot Wayne’s “property.” ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/143 "2023-12-30T21:38:25Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > It was described upthread, in [post 103](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/103?). That link shows someone who still thinks that the Wizard of Oz was "A parable for the populist campaign of William Jennings Bryan, who advocated replacing the gold standard with a bimetallic standard of Silver and Gold backed money. " **which has been thoroughly and totally debunked.** And that cite continues in that totally wrong headed vein. Once you go down that wrong road- you are not gonna get to the right location. About all he has to lean on is the name “Lyon”. ---
**Author:** ![LVBoPeep](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/858c86/32.png) [@LVBoPeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LVBoPeep)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/144 "2023-12-30T21:48:33Z")
I had to rewatch that scene between Lorraine and Roy- I loved Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance in it and the way Roy was just flabbergasted by Lorraine’s refusal to give Dot up. I read it as whatever happens, Lorraine will protect her own and she considers Dot, maybe by way of being Wayne’s “property”, her own. Though admittedly, her protection methods are questionable. ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/145 "2023-12-30T21:52:33Z")
Yes, I loved that scene, too. Made me do an almost 180 on Lorraine. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/146 "2023-12-30T21:55:57Z")
Be that as it may, i can’t stand Jennifer Jason Leigh in anything she’s in. Just a terrible overactor. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2023, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/147 "2023-12-30T23:01:43Z")
Lorraine may hate Dot but she hates paternalistic assholes much more. And having learned more about Dot, she respects her much more. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/148 "2023-12-31T01:30:32Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > Lorraine may hate Dot but she hates paternalistic assholes much more. Yes, that. Plus, I like how she describes Roy and his ilk: freedom without responsibility = baby. ---
**Author:** ![iamatractorboy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iamatractorboy/32/21261_2.png) [@iamatractorboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamatractorboy)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/149 "2023-12-31T08:44:36Z")
Starting watching this the other day and now caught up. Frustrating to have to wait for new episodes now; box set binging really does spoil you! I like the twist on the film’s set up, with the (attempted) kidnapping of a car salesman’s wife by a couple of oddballs, amd subsequent traffic stop. Mr kiltman (sorry not sure on his name) being the Peter Stormare character and his burnt face pal Steve Buscemi. I’m sure they even threw in a snippet of Wayne on the phone promising to send over some car serial numbers (or whatever they’re called), just like William H Macy. Also the focus on the dealer plates for the cars. I love Dot’s character. Does anyone think she is putting on a Minnesota accent or that it’s just Juno Temple’s accent slipping? Lorraine on the whole is a bit of a piece of work, but does have some redeeming qualities. Roy on the other hand is a complete monster. Their scene together was the first time I liked Lorraine. Good calls about the puppet song and postcard influencing Dot’s dream. I think I’d just put it down as foreshadowing whilst watching it. So who do we think is going to give Roy his comeuppance? As people have said, it would fit with the theme that a woman (or women) get to do this, but if Gator did it, it wouldn’t be a surprise really. I don’t think kiltman; would be disappointed if it is. ---
**Author:** ![Smid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/838e76/32.png) [@Smid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smid)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/150 "2023-12-31T12:43:36Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > About all he has to lean on is the name “Lyon”. Well Oz references: Four Lyons (though Dot is a Tiger), One is Wink (Winkies are residents of Oz). Tillman is close to Tinman. Dorothy. Munch(kins). I’m convinced it’s there from those. Whether the Debt stuff is discredited, that’s there too with Indira. Off that, to me, the truck hitting her in that style and that time just wasn’t real. She was still in dream then, and the sleep in the car got her. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/151 "2023-12-31T14:30:23Z")
> [@iamatractorboy](#): > > So who do we think is going to give Roy his comeuppance? Well, it could be anyone, it could be no one. That was the nominally open-ended but (to me) implied ending to season 3. Not everything is _The Magnificent Ambersons_, you know? Sometimes, the uppance does not come. > [@Smid](#): > > Off that, to me, the truck hitting her in that style and that time just wasn’t real. I took that as a nod to _No Country for Old Men_. There’s been a couple already in this series. The tracking device (I mean, I’m sure there’s less clunky cellphone technology one might use these days that’d be _a lot_ easier to come by, but they went with the charmingly analogue option, a la NCFOM, which takes place circa 1980), Roy talking about his Sheriff’s lineage with his grandfather in an opening narration, and now we’ve got a “shit happens” freak car accident that just comes out of nowhere but has major consequences for a main character. ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/152 "2023-12-31T15:29:21Z")
I’m starting to think the ‘truck’ didn’t happen - that she simply feels she’s been hit by one. The actual accident happened at the beginning of the episode when she fell asleep while driving - and ran off the road into some trees, etc. That even ties into her having to go off road to Linda’s place. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/153 "2023-12-31T15:36:28Z")
We’ll see, I guess, but “dream within a dream” seems an unnecessarily clunky way to get to the same end (providing backstory in a plausible way that isn’t annoying to the viewer) than just “a dream.” Nodding off at the wheel _could_ be a way to begin the dream within a dream, _or_ (more plausibly, I think) it could be a way of introducing that she is tired and needs to stop somewhere (so that she can fall asleep and give us backstory). ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/154 "2023-12-31T15:37:33Z")
> [@simster](#): > > The actual accident happened at the beginning of the episode when she fell asleep while driving For that to be the case, she had to have a dream within a dream, which to me seems even more unlikely than the random truck accident. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/155 "2023-12-31T20:52:15Z")
> [@ASL\_v2.0](#): > > now we’ve got a “shit happens” freak car accident that just comes out of nowhere but has major consequences That isn’t unusual for _Fargo_. The rain of fish and the mafia brother randomly tripping and blowing his own head off, for example. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/156 "2023-12-31T21:02:15Z")
> [@Smid](#): > > Well Oz references: Four Lyons (though Dot is a Tiger), One is Wink (Winkies are residents of Oz). Tillman is close to Tinman. Dorothy. Munch(kins). I’m convinced it’s there from those. Whether the Debt stuff is discredited, that’s there too with Indira. Well, maybe. But the silver gold hypothesis is totally wrong. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/157 "2023-12-31T22:47:28Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > That isn’t unusual for _Fargo_. Right. Because it’s not unusual for Coen brothers films (which provide much of the inspiration for _Fargo_) to dabble in themes of nihilism, chaos, and existential crisis. One of those films is _No Country for Old Men_ which, while based on a novel that the brothers had no part in writing, both deals in those same themes, and specifically features a completely random car accident wreaking havoc on a main character. Which is all the more reason to expect that the accident actually happened as presented, and not as just a coma-dream interpretation of an earlier accident that neither the character nor the viewer actually saw happen. Because it’s par for the course within the Coenverse to have that kind of freak accident. Significant dreams also make the occasional appearance. But dreams within dreams? Unnecessary and, absent a clear (textual) statement to the contrary, far less plausible (within the Coenverse at least) than a freak accident that comes out of nowhere and has major consequences for a main character. ETA: FWIW, the rain of fish in season 1 (it was 1, right?) made me think of _A Serious Man_, which itself draws heavily on the Book of Job (which also fits well within the Coens’ “sometimes shit just happens and we mere mortals are fools for thinking we have full control over our own fates” kind of stories they tell). Not that there was a rain of fish in _A Serious Man_, just that it all seemed very… biblical. The slaughter of the first born, seemingly (even if not actually) supernatural events wiping out one’s seed for perceived slights against god, etc. ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/158 "2023-12-31T23:00:43Z")
I’ve always loved _A Serious Man._ It’s not one you see mentioned often when people talk about the Coen brothers. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/159 "2023-12-31T23:15:41Z")
> [@simster](#): > > I’m starting to think the ‘truck’ didn’t happen - that she simply feels she’s been hit by one. > > The actual accident happened at the beginning of the episode when she fell asleep while driving - and ran off the road into some trees, etc. That even ties into her having to go off road to Linda’s place. Either this or the truck accident gets us to the same place, so I guess it doesn’t really matter except thematically. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2023, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228/160 "2023-12-31T23:20:14Z")
But unlike Dumb and Dumber (the two doofuses who let GoT crash and burn as showrunners), Coen brothers media actually does have themes. So if the only difference is that one explanation works better thematically than the other… I’d say that’s a pretty good reason to go with it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fargo-season-5-discussion-starts-21nov2023/993228.md?page=9)