Fargo Review: FX's Crime Anthology Gets Back To Basics With A Stunning Season 5
We've been enduring a serious drought in quality TV programming this fall... but thankfully, Noah Hawley is ready to put an end to all that. Fargo's creator and showrunner is back with Season 5 of FX's darkly humorous crime anthology — premiering Tuesday, Nov. 21 at 10/9c; I've seen the first six episodes — and he seems reinvigorated here, delivering what might be the best Fargo season since at least Season 2. Armed with a top-notch cast and jaw-dropping action sequences, Fargo's fifth season is a lean and mean, back-to-basics thrill ride packed with laughs and frights that, in its own small way, helps us remember why we love television so much.
After several seasons set in the past, Fargo heads back to the present day (well, 2019) in Season 5, jettisoning many of the stylized quirks that bogged down previous installments. Ted Lasso's Juno Temple takes center stage as Dot, a meek Minnesota housewife who finds herself caught in a complicated — and violent — web of crime and punishment. Only she's not as innocent as she seems, which we learn from her hostile encounters with her filthy rich mother-in-law Lorraine (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and her frantic efforts to escape the pursuit of swaggering sheriff Roy Tillman (Jon Hamm) and enigmatic gunman Ole Munch (Sam Spruell). Actually, Season 5 might be the closest match yet, plot-wise, to the original Fargo movie: a kidnapped housewife, a wealthy yet cold family, a terse Nordic gunman.
It also matches the signature tone of the Coen brothers, with gallows humor and agonizing tension sandwiched right next to each other — lively verbal sparring punctuated by bursts of bone-dry humor. But Hawley is really hitting on all cylinders here as a writer and filmmaker (he directs the season premiere as well), patiently unfurling his story with a cool self-assurance. Season 5 is more violent and action-packed than usual as well, with the pressure ratcheting up considerably as the noose tightens around Dot's neck. We're treated to a number of dazzlingly staged action sequences that top anything the series has done to date, from a bullet-riddled siege in a dirt-road gas station to a heart-pounding home invasion with Dot setting up a Home Alone-esque gauntlet of handmade booby traps to fend off intruders.
The cast is so good, it almost seems unfair to pick out anyone as a favorite. There are stellar performances everywhere you look. Temple trades in her native UK accent for a squeaky Minnesota Nice twang and dives headfirst into the role of Dot, fashioning her into a plucky anti-heroine. Leigh fully embraces her heel turn as Lorraine in a clever echo of her iconic performance in the Coens' The Hudsucker Proxy. Richa Moorjani, from Never Have I Ever, fills the familiar Marge Gunderson cop role as detective Indira Olmstead, but she brings a newfound inner fire to the archetype that sets her apart. Plus, it's always fun to see Kids in the Hall great Dave Foley in deadpan mode as Lorraine's fantastically named lawyer Danish Graves — and the eyepatch is a nice touch.
But the standout here might actually be Hamm, whose Roy Tillman is a walking, talking Marlboro Man. Old-school to a fault, Roy only enforces the laws he likes and dispenses justice as he sees fit, brazenly declaring: "I am the law of the land." Hawley uses him to interrogate the myth of the American cowboy, boldly exposing Roy's glaring flaws and making great use of Hamm's inherent gravitas. This may be Hamm's meatiest role since Don Draper, equal parts compelling and terrifying.
Hawley shoots so high here that he's bound to fall short at times. Some characters verge on too broad, like Joe Keery's vaping and vapid deputy Gator, and an ill-fitting political narrative flirts with a third rail that's best left untouched. Plus, Hawley just can't resist indulging in a few wildly ambitious narrative flourishes. One scene even flashes back to "500 Years Earlier" (!!!). But Hawley mostly keeps those impulses in check this time around, delivering a vintage Fargo fastball straight down the middle. It's a welcome sight, too. So much of what we see on TV these days feels half-hearted, or overly calculated, or a copy of a copy of something we used to like. Fargo's latest season is a nice reminder, then, that TV can still surprise and challenge and delight us.
THE TVLINE BOTTOM LINE: Fargo is back with a throwback season packed with excellent performances and jaw-dropping action scenes.