As i mentioned before, I found this show on accident and frustration because for some damn reason the NYC market does not have Fargo as an option in Netflix. However, i quite like Jason Bateman and it was on the first page so i figured I'd give it a go. I am up to episode 8 now. I've done my best to avoid spoilers but if you like to go into a series blind I will stop you now and say this one is very much worth watching.

Crime Drama show?

I don't know if you can classify it as that but it is what i am going with. There is very little in the way of comedy in this show so people who have gotten accustomed to Bateman's roles lately in film might be a bit disappointed. Basically he is a financial advisor that through various twists in his life became someone deeply involved in money laundering and he doesn't really want to be but must for .... reasons i can't say here.

By the way the symbols for the letters in OZARK (such as above) represent images of something that happens in the particular episode. This was an intersting idea but many times i feel as though the particular item in question isn't really relevant to the story or it is forced into the story in a pretty dumb way.

Anyway, Jason Bateman's brilliance in this series isn't just because he is in his 50's but maintains incredibly youthful qualities. He quite easily transitions from comedy to drama - I have a lot of respect for him as an actor because of this show. It should come as no surprise that he directs a few of the ep's and is also a producers.

The Byrd family (Bateman's family) are not really cut out for criminality and that is where this show kind of looks like Breaking Bad but without the meth. He is thrust into this position and seems to be taking increasingly nefarious steps to protect his family along the way, very similar to Walter White.
I gave the series a near perfect score for the parts that I watched which was episodes 1-3 (it may have been 4) and the episodes I watched after that carry on in a similar fashion. I might argue TOO MUCH of a similar fashion.

Additional characters are introduced to try to keep things fresh and interesting but here I am, 7 episodes in, and it seems like we have a pretty cyclical pattern of

• Byrd family gets a bit ahead
• something happens to eff that up
• Byrd family has to come up with new plan

And then various family squabbles about how much they miss living in Chicago will occur for 10 minutes per episode. It just starts to feel like filler. One of the episodes is a flashback episode that was meant to take place 10 years prior and i feel as though the entire episode was unnecessary to the story. I suppose we have to fill up 10 episodes with something.

Don't get me wrong, I still think this is a great show and is definitely better than a majority of other options out there. I just think the overall story and production value has diminished a bit since the first 3 episodes.

So if you are keeping count

Phase 1 (ep 1-3) : 9 / 10

Phase 2 (ep 4-7): 7 / 10

Overall Score

8 / 10