I think everyone is forgetting one of the most important question. Why was Peggy driving around Waffle Hut at that time in the first place? Didn’t look like Peggy, or anyone else for that matter took that road often. Matter of fact, it looked like Waffle Hut was located somewhere near the border between Minnesota and South Dakota. It definitely looks that way when we see The judge driving there, as she seems to stop there just to take a brake from her long drive ahead of her (heading back to North Dakota). Also, when Milligan and the Kitchen Brothers get pulled over by the Grand dad, they even say they where just passing by the state and was looking to get some Waffles. Again, I don’t think Peggy takes that road in a daily basis, so what in the world was she doing driving around there? Where was she driving from?
I got Peggy pretty quickly because of my mom's comments about how limited women's life options were even in the 70s, whe she was in her 20s. For a real career, it was either teacher or nurse. Hairdresser, secretary etc. - those are not the same thing in terms of money and status. The expectation was to have kids and keep house, but women were starting to think differently. A lot of women went half crazy, hence the term "Mother's Little Helper" (Valium). Peggy is cracking under the pressure of living in the same house in the same town doing the same thing for the rest of her life with a husband who has no other ambitions and even grew up in that same house. You also have to think of how being in an isolated area was a lot *more* isolating before the Internet and social media. I'm convinced the Internet has helped a lot of people living out in the sticks keep their sanity.
'I'm sick of this life' is the secret Hanzee and Peggy share. Both are warriors against the modern world. Peggy is Justine in "Melancholia" and will bring our world to an end the moment she becomes one with the Alien/Solaris.
The whole Ufo thing was a big metaphor.The moment Peggy said:"Cmon Hon its just a spaceship" showed the audience how even aliens cant stop a war between humans.How they are so obessed with the present problems,that they dont see the new ones.The priorities of people with a goal were more important than a spaceship.
You ppl thinking way to deep. Back in the early 50s a fighter pilot said he saw & got into a "dog fight" w a UFO...in Fargo. After that ppl started saying they see/saw UFOs regularly. Its even in the 1st episode of "project blue book" show.
Lou in episode 9 turns this around by quickly adding up the clues in the gas station to see how Hanzee shot the clerk and stole his car. So did he become a better detective?
+Izahdnb Yes, and that happened after Lou saved by Aliens from Bear Gerhardt. I also think Hanzee do have sense about aliens thats why he didn't give damn about when he spent 2 hours on the road. One thing more - Many people don't notice that Aliens wanted Rey Gerhard to get Hit by Peggy's Car he spent same time lapse as Hanzee did.
About Peggy. I feel like she is so naturally far removed from everyone else, so much on her own level, (in a lot of ways more connected to herself and to life) that she feels like she needs to listen to others tell her how to live, because the way she would do things instinctively aren’t copacetic with everyone else. But later in the season, she starts to feel like maybe she’s not so crazy, and that she is in some respects more advanced and more in tune with the universe at large. Evidenced by her confidence and brushing off the encounter with the ufo as if it was just a normal part of life.
Scene where Peggy and Constance are looking into the mirror has a reflection of a poster on the wall that looks like Hanzee from behind when she is about to cut his hair.
Another thing to note about the aliens’ influence on reality and time is the two scenes where Lou and Betsy get into bed together and say goodnight and the lighting starts to get really creepy as if the aliens are nearby. The scenes are basically perfect mirrors of one another (not entirely sure if it’s the exact same clip played twice, gotta watch again), but one happens in the first episode of the season and the other is the very last scene of the season. It’s almost as if the aliens are kind of restarting this timeline all over again. Personally gives me some Kurt Vonnegut’s Tralfamadorian vibes, like the aliens are existing in the 4th dimension and seeing all of this season happen all at once over and over again.
and the double screen part , is basically the characters pov shot, and hanzee being a good tracker is able to put together exactly what happen off of the few clues off
The aliens were us from the future.. revisiting the past to watch what actually happened in '79... and give poor Betsy a glimpse of the future... eventually being a part of the time cycle. Why the aliens would be interested in this particular events unfolding on planet earth? WE ARE THE ALIENS...oOoOo...oOoOo...
Peggy's an alien - that's why most human worries don't make much sense to her. Now, seriously, I didn't catch the clues and the ufo scene on episode 9 took me completely by surprise - but I thought, well, maybe ufo sightings are part of that region's culture, folklore or whatever it is that one wants to call it. I thought it a little odd in a series that, up to that specific scene, seemed to portray scenes supposedly based on a true story shot in a very realistic way - but, hey, it was somehow interesting to watch.
Well, the series already had a vague supernatural quality to it in Season 1 when it's heavily implied that Malvo is literally the serpent in the garden.
Honestly I feel like this how aliens would react to seeing us, just one look and "eh... These people are boring." and they just leave, forget we exist.
I think that the split screen is just a technique made popular by 70's filmmakers, and feels emblematic of that time (See Brian DePalma as a prominent example).
You are correct. That’s precisely what the director said. He developed it while editing the film and it simultaneously is an homage and reference to 1970s filmmaking.
The shadows would move due to the alien light source shifting above the trees, would they not? So it's not a total given that this represents moving time.
the thing with hanzee watch is, the clock in the dinnar had stopped i think , keeping it at the time hanzee see it at, he goes outside and see/image the ufo in the sky as to why rye would stand there, then he checks his watch and notices it is about 2-3 hours ahead of the time given inside , i think the clocks inside the dinner stopped working because the second doesnt move when we see it inside
+nick SOULE No, Clock didn't stop because when Rey Gerhardt killed people in the Restaurant it was 8:10pm and i think that clock didn't have Second Hand in the first place.
crazy idea: the aliens enjoyed all the carnage they triggered and manipulated Hanzee into running amok. after all, they spent a lot of time with him...
I just finished watching season 2. First thoughts are the UFO is in Peggy's head and we are seeing the story from her insane perspective. Everyone else really didn't see it. Peggy talks at the end saying she could never get her act together though she tried and she randomly said she would need like 37 hours in a day to do everything. Maybe to her in order to make sense of her going to jail and her losing her husband and dreams, she sees the UFO as a force causing her to go down an unfortunate road. At the end when Solverson and his father in law mention the UFO, I think they are just referring to what Peggy said from her perspective.
No, it is entirely real and drives the plot at two of its most critical points, and more importantly Bear Gerhardt, see it, causing the death of one and the survival of the other. It is completely real in the world of this story, and the writer said in an interview that he intentionally included them because UFOs were both a cultural touchstone of the 1970s and because there was an actual UFO incident in North Dakota by Deputy Sheriff Val Johnson in 1979, the year in which the story occurs.
@@christophernash8166, thanks for your reply. Yes, I had the benefit of having recently finished the first season, watching the episodes in relatively fast succession (two or three every couple of days) and then looking up things I was unclear about or wanted more information for. The inclusion of the UFOs in the episode was one of them. You are absolutely correct. In addition to Stanley Kubrick’s films, if anything bears watching more than once, it is Cohen Brother movies or this Cohen Brothers-inspired television series. They are packed and layered far more than the average bear such as myself can possibly perceive or comprehend in one sitting.
Peggy is a covert narcissist. She is not "everywoman" like some misogynists like to say. Mostly all she thinks about is herself. She secretly takes birth controls pills, draws her husband into a deadly mess, and steals toilet paper from work... She simply has no regard for her husband's wellbeing or heartfelt desires at all. The reason she doesn't care about the space ship is it that in her mind it has nothing to do with furthering her personal goals. Contrast her with Detective Solverson's wife, or grown up Molly, or Marge from the movie, women who have higher goals of family, justice, work, and love. Two of them struggle to balance work with family and in the end, put their families as the highest priority while somehow doing an excellent job at work. Betsy Solverson puts on a brave front while dealing with cancer, doing her best to support her husband and support his work and be a good no-nonsense mom to Molly.
The alien thing seems to be in parallel with the whole 'empire building in the static world' theme reflected in the various rise to power stories of the Gerhart family, Mike Mulligan, and even Lorn Malvo on the bleak backdrop of Minnesota, a world that for cinematic purposes does not change all that much. The aliens could represent another dimension of this empire-building struggle among families, organizations, and individuals in that they represent all and none of the human entities in a 4th wall presence that serves mostly to add mystery and to underscore both the pettiness of the human will to power. We're not supposed to figure it out. We're supposed to understand that there are forces that cannot be understood and that, whatever they are, they may be stronger than the simple forces of violence, greed, and cunning that drive humans to do terrible things for reasons that shouldn't make sense but do because they are the only context we know.
what an agrádabl converseishon! one thought After the young saintly cop declares his judgement against greed, when talking about capitalism and wheelbarrels, The cool and wordy black dude, who was the last one to arrive after the Gerthard's (or samzing laik dat), the butchers, the hairdressers, the police, and the indians he said he was not going anywhere he said he was the future and said something else about the past like when the new bussiness way puts the others out of work or like the clash of civilizations between conquerors and natives or like when some newly evolved species develops el jabberwookie, un mounstruo de otro planeta ¿no serà un extraterrestre el negro, no? Mike Mulligan is Alien!
There's a comparable finger in the butt scene either in The Wire, second season, or possibly True Detective.Can't remember which one at the moment, but it's one of the cops saying a co-ed's roommate came up quietly behind him as he was doing the co-ed and stuck her finger in his ass. The worst thing about it, he says (telling the story in the bar) is that the experience spoiled him. Now he can't come without it. Hmm. Wonder which one of the two shows it was?
Biggest stereotype indians are good hunters and footstep tracers in the world but hanzee uses car, gun, and the he sees ufo uses watch to trace car tires angles (tire direction dead body directions) and glass shade, also mayor of Fargo in last standoff between corporation and gerhardts uses bow and arrow and was killed in third eye by sniper scope hanzee also uses gun with scope and last technology in last episode he uses is phone. Biggest moment is the hanzee decided to betrayal gerhrds they showed all scenarios my guess then he sees rabbit pulled from magician hat, he laso hunted and deguted one rabbit in series.
Okay. I don't know why you would categorize Hanzee as a detective? As if detectives are the only people capable of reinacting or recreating a past situation to extract information.
The claim of this series was that it was based on real events. If they put the UFOs in as metaphors then shame of them (the directors) for inserting untruths into a real life story. It just fucks up the narrative. It annoyed me.
it's not really based of a true story u know that right. Its a nod to the original film by the same name that had the text "based on a true story" and in the late 70s there were a lot of reported alien abductions so it would only makes sense given the time the show took place that they would put them in there as a little side plot.
I think everyone is forgetting one of the most important question.
Why was Peggy driving around Waffle Hut at that time in the first place?
Didn’t look like Peggy, or anyone else for that matter took that road often.
Matter of fact, it looked like Waffle Hut was located somewhere near the border between Minnesota and South Dakota.
It definitely looks that way when we see The judge driving there, as she seems to stop there just to take a brake from her long drive ahead of her (heading back to North Dakota).
Also, when Milligan and the Kitchen Brothers get pulled over by the Grand dad, they even say they where just passing by the state and was looking to get some Waffles.
Again, I don’t think Peggy takes that road in a daily basis, so what in the world was she doing driving around there?
Where was she driving from?
Presumably from work to home.
On her way home from work
fargo is so fucking good
I got Peggy pretty quickly because of my mom's comments about how limited women's life options were even in the 70s, whe she was in her 20s. For a real career, it was either teacher or nurse. Hairdresser, secretary etc. - those are not the same thing in terms of money and status.
The expectation was to have kids and keep house, but women were starting to think differently. A lot of women went half crazy, hence the term "Mother's Little Helper" (Valium). Peggy is cracking under the pressure of living in the same house in the same town doing the same thing for the rest of her life with a husband who has no other ambitions and even grew up in that same house.
You also have to think of how being in an isolated area was a lot *more* isolating before the Internet and social media. I'm convinced the Internet has helped a lot of people living out in the sticks keep their sanity.
'I'm sick of this life' is the secret Hanzee and Peggy share. Both are warriors against the modern world. Peggy is Justine in "Melancholia" and will bring our world to an end the moment she becomes one with the Alien/Solaris.
The whole Ufo thing was a big metaphor.The moment Peggy said:"Cmon Hon its just a spaceship" showed the audience how even aliens cant stop a war between humans.How they are so obessed with the present problems,that they dont see the new ones.The priorities of people with a goal were more important than a spaceship.
Was he the Gerhardt distracted by it so that the cop could shoot him?
But hanzee and the gerhardt and ed all stopped and cared
john r All people are different. Clearly they were awestruck while everyone else was focused on survival, thus why he died.
You ppl thinking way to deep. Back in the early 50s a fighter pilot said he saw & got into a "dog fight" w a UFO...in Fargo. After that ppl started saying they see/saw UFOs regularly. Its even in the 1st episode of "project blue book" show.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Val_Johnson_incident
Lou in episode 9 turns this around by quickly adding up the clues in the gas station to see how Hanzee shot the clerk and stole his car. So did he become a better detective?
+Izahdnb Yes, and that happened after Lou saved by Aliens from Bear Gerhardt. I also think Hanzee do have sense about aliens thats why he didn't give damn about when he spent 2 hours on the road. One thing more - Many people don't notice that Aliens wanted Rey Gerhard to get Hit by Peggy's Car he spent same time lapse as Hanzee did.
It’s also a little implied that he knew who malvo really was when he talked to him when he ordered coffee in season 1
About Peggy. I feel like she is so naturally far removed from everyone else, so much on her own level, (in a lot of ways more connected to herself and to life) that she feels like she needs to listen to others tell her how to live, because the way she would do things instinctively aren’t copacetic with everyone else. But later in the season, she starts to feel like maybe she’s not so crazy, and that she is in some respects more advanced and more in tune with the universe at large. Evidenced by her confidence and brushing off the encounter with the ufo as if it was just a normal part of life.
Scene where Peggy and Constance are looking into the mirror has a reflection of a poster on the wall that looks like Hanzee from behind when she is about to cut his hair.
“It's just a flying saucer....”
Honestly I think this is a wink at the audience to not think too deeply about the UFO xD
Another thing to note about the aliens’ influence on reality and time is the two scenes where Lou and Betsy get into bed together and say goodnight and the lighting starts to get really creepy as if the aliens are nearby. The scenes are basically perfect mirrors of one another (not entirely sure if it’s the exact same clip played twice, gotta watch again), but one happens in the first episode of the season and the other is the very last scene of the season. It’s almost as if the aliens are kind of restarting this timeline all over again. Personally gives me some Kurt Vonnegut’s Tralfamadorian vibes, like the aliens are existing in the 4th dimension and seeing all of this season happen all at once over and over again.
The Alien gave Hanzee a complete insight into what happened at the Waffle Hut.
and the double screen part , is basically the characters pov shot, and hanzee being a good tracker is able to put together exactly what happen off of the few clues off
The aliens were us from the future.. revisiting the past to watch what actually happened in '79... and give poor Betsy a glimpse of the future... eventually being a part of the time cycle. Why the aliens would be interested in this particular events unfolding on planet earth? WE ARE THE ALIENS...oOoOo...oOoOo...
Great analysis guys. Good job!
Hanzee's time in Vietnam gave him the edge in deducing clues
Peggy's an alien - that's why most human worries don't make much sense to her.
Now, seriously, I didn't catch the clues and the ufo scene on episode 9 took me completely by surprise - but I thought, well, maybe ufo sightings are part of that region's culture, folklore or whatever it is that one wants to call it.
I thought it a little odd in a series that, up to that specific scene, seemed to portray scenes supposedly based on a true story shot in a very realistic way - but, hey, it was somehow interesting to watch.
Well, the series already had a vague supernatural quality to it in Season 1 when it's heavily implied that Malvo is literally the serpent in the garden.
Never been across this channel before this video, but subbing off this :)
Honestly I feel like this how aliens would react to seeing us, just one look and "eh... These people are boring." and they just leave, forget we exist.
Really interesting commentary thanks
I think since Hanzi is a killer he has more of an ability to visualize a crime scene. Or he has psychic abilities because he's an alien. Or a shaman.
I can't wait for the next "Polite Fight" about Better Call Saul! You're doing an amazing job guys, Thank you.
I think that the split screen is just a technique made popular by 70's filmmakers, and feels emblematic of that time (See Brian DePalma as a prominent example).
You are correct. That’s precisely what the director said. He developed it while editing the film and it simultaneously is an homage and reference to 1970s filmmaking.
Peggy is NO mystery.
She's EVERYWOMAN.
The shadows would move due to the alien light source shifting above the trees, would they not? So it's not a total given that this represents moving time.
the thing with hanzee watch is, the clock in the dinnar had stopped i think , keeping it at the time hanzee see it at, he goes outside and see/image the ufo in the sky as to why rye would stand there, then he checks his watch and notices it is about 2-3 hours ahead of the time given inside , i think the clocks inside the dinner stopped working because the second doesnt move when we see it inside
+nick SOULE No, Clock didn't stop because when Rey Gerhardt killed people in the Restaurant it was 8:10pm and i think that clock didn't have Second Hand in the first place.
also how would u explain the trees shadows moving which indicates time going forward.
Interesting in the mirror scene, Constance looks like a coneheaded alien because of the head scarf.
crazy idea: the aliens enjoyed all the carnage they triggered and manipulated Hanzee into running amok.
after all, they spent a lot of time with him...
very interesting, never thought of it that way before. So Hanzee got captured by aliens who turned him into a betrayal machine.
I just finished watching season 2. First thoughts are the UFO is in Peggy's head and we are seeing the story from her insane perspective. Everyone else really didn't see it. Peggy talks at the end saying she could never get her act together though she tried and she randomly said she would need like 37 hours in a day to do everything. Maybe to her in order to make sense of her going to jail and her losing her husband and dreams, she sees the UFO as a force causing her to go down an unfortunate road. At the end when Solverson and his father in law mention the UFO, I think they are just referring to what Peggy said from her perspective.
No, it is entirely real and drives the plot at two of its most critical points, and more importantly Bear Gerhardt, see it, causing the death of one and the survival of the other.
It is completely real in the world of this story, and the writer said in an interview that he intentionally included them because UFOs were both a cultural touchstone of the 1970s and because there was an actual UFO incident in North Dakota by Deputy Sheriff Val Johnson in 1979, the year in which the story occurs.
@@inkyguy I have to rewatch it. Haven't seen it in a year. Second viewings are best with these kind of shows.
@@christophernash8166, thanks for your reply. Yes, I had the benefit of having recently finished the first season, watching the episodes in relatively fast succession (two or three every couple of days) and then looking up things I was unclear about or wanted more information for. The inclusion of the UFOs in the episode was one of them.
You are absolutely correct. In addition to Stanley Kubrick’s films, if anything bears watching more than once, it is Cohen Brother movies or this Cohen Brothers-inspired television series. They are packed and layered far more than the average bear such as myself can possibly perceive or comprehend in one sitting.
hanzee dent is Moses Tripoli who comes in s1 e6 who is eating food like a crime boss
WHAT
True. However, how did he go from Native to .. Jewish?
Sugar E He wanted a whole new life.
I think it's just a shoutout to Twin Peaks.
So, Hahnzee got abducted?
Peggy is a covert narcissist. She is not "everywoman" like some misogynists like to say. Mostly all she thinks about is herself. She secretly takes birth controls pills, draws her husband into a deadly mess, and steals toilet paper from work... She simply has no regard for her husband's wellbeing or heartfelt desires at all. The reason she doesn't care about the space ship is it that in her mind it has nothing to do with furthering her personal goals. Contrast her with Detective Solverson's wife, or grown up Molly, or Marge from the movie, women who have higher goals of family, justice, work, and love. Two of them struggle to balance work with family and in the end, put their families as the highest priority while somehow doing an excellent job at work. Betsy Solverson puts on a brave front while dealing with cancer, doing her best to support her husband and support his work and be a good no-nonsense mom to Molly.
nice
Are these nice fellows Canadian?
They are polite enough to obtain immediate citizenship.
The alien thing seems to be in parallel with the whole 'empire building in the static world' theme reflected in the various rise to power stories of the Gerhart family, Mike Mulligan, and even Lorn Malvo on the bleak backdrop of Minnesota, a world that for cinematic purposes does not change all that much. The aliens could represent another dimension of this empire-building struggle among families, organizations, and individuals in that they represent all and none of the human entities in a 4th wall presence that serves mostly to add mystery and to underscore both the pettiness of the human will to power. We're not supposed to figure it out. We're supposed to understand that there are forces that cannot be understood and that, whatever they are, they may be stronger than the simple forces of violence, greed, and cunning that drive humans to do terrible things for reasons that shouldn't make sense but do because they are the only context we know.
ACES
The ufo just completely took me out of it. Didn't like it at all
That Bum Jake no one gives a fuck
but it's the ufo that caused all of the things to happen
@@youngurbangod1156 when I watched it he was on drugs during the dinner shootout so I thought he was just seeing the spaceship cause he wuz on drugs
@@bobsandwich3431the pentagon recently announced that UFOs are real so this isnt farfetched anymore.
what an agrádabl converseishon!
one thought
After the young saintly cop declares his judgement against greed,
when talking about capitalism and wheelbarrels,
The cool and wordy black dude,
who was the last one to arrive
after the Gerthard's (or samzing laik dat),
the butchers, the hairdressers, the police,
and the indians
he said he was not going anywhere
he said he was the future
and said something else about the past
like when the new bussiness way puts the others out of work
or like the clash of civilizations between conquerors and natives
or like when some newly evolved species develops
el jabberwookie, un mounstruo de otro planeta
¿no serà un extraterrestre el negro, no?
Mike Mulligan is Alien!
What?
yay more polite fight. Gus why aren't you on twitter? missing some great discussion. Teti knows.
It was aliens
There's a comparable finger in the butt scene either in The Wire, second season, or possibly True Detective.Can't remember which one at the moment, but it's one of the cops saying a co-ed's roommate came up quietly behind him as he was doing the co-ed and stuck her finger in his ass. The worst thing about it, he says (telling the story in the bar) is that the experience spoiled him. Now he can't come without it. Hmm. Wonder which one of the two shows it was?
I believe it was detective bunk on the wire
Do you really HAVE to flame so much? Jesus, there are fire laws, you know. . .
The passage of time or sync is purely visual , but IMO the UFO is us , the viewer .
Jesus..
Biggest stereotype indians are good hunters and footstep tracers in the world but hanzee uses car, gun, and the he sees ufo uses watch to trace car tires angles (tire direction dead body directions) and glass shade, also mayor of Fargo in last standoff between corporation and gerhardts uses bow and arrow and was killed in third eye by sniper scope hanzee also uses gun with scope and last technology in last episode he uses is phone. Biggest moment is the hanzee decided to betrayal gerhrds they showed all scenarios my guess then he sees rabbit pulled from magician hat, he laso hunted and deguted one rabbit in series.
acces
Okay. I don't know why you would categorize Hanzee as a detective? As if detectives are the only people capable of reinacting or recreating a past situation to extract information.
Is hanzee an alien?
An Indian...alien in USA
Peggy is a lesbian. How the f@*k do you miss that?!
The claim of this series was that it was based on real events. If they put the UFOs in as metaphors then shame of them (the directors) for inserting untruths into a real life story. It just fucks up the narrative. It annoyed me.
it's not really based of a true story u know that right. Its a nod to the original film by the same name that had the text "based on a true story" and in the late 70s there were a lot of reported alien abductions so it would only makes sense given the time the show took place that they would put them in there as a little side plot.
It´s so weird when Americans play "intellectual".
fuck off mate
+coryboy345 lol!
+Blitzpunk de I see the bigotry hasn't been bombed out of you yet.
Cory says the guy from a country that commits genocide against the native people and enslaved millions of blacks because they are too lazy.
+Duane Elliott May I ask what country you hail from that makes you so fucking perfect, friend-o?
To me, Peggy is just like any other woman: incorrigible, irrational, and incapable of critical thinking.
Obvious troll is obvious.