Father Son Holy Gore

FX’s Fargo
Season 1, Episode 9: “A Fox, a Rabbit, and a Cabbage”
Directed by Matt Shakman
Written by Noah Hawley

* For a review of the previous episode, “The Heap” – click here
* For a review of the Season 1 finale, “Morton’s Fork” – click here

After jumping a year down the line, Noah Hawley brings us into the penultimate Season 1 episode “A Fox, a Rabbit, and a Cabbage”.
We begin on the new identity of Lorne Malvo (Billy Bob Thornton) as a dentist. He talks a patient through things while checking his teeth and finishing off a procedure. This new blonde-haired Malvo, obviously under a new pseudonym, is a slick one. Did he really go to dental school? Or what’s going on here? Either way, I love it. He and Burt Canton (Stephen Root) are friendly, so no matter what’s going on Lorne has carved out a nice little niche for himself in which to lounge.
For now.
Lorne still has his recordings, listening to them over and over. The evil in Malvo sits right below the surface. He relives his past transgressions, as if basking in them.

Lorne: “Aces!”

 

Now, we end up back where we last saw Lorne, a woman next to him and across the table are Burt and his lady. Across the room sits Lester Nygaard (Martin Freeman) in the blurry periphery of the frame, as Lorne jokes and makes things light. While Burt talks about their upcoming excitement, Lester shows up to talk with Lorne who pretends they’ve never met before. An awkward moment ensues, but before Lorne leaves he tells Lester in a serious tone: “Walk away.”
Not satisfied with this slight, Lester heads into the elevator to confront Malvo. “The old Lester woulda let that slide – not this guy,” he tells Lorne and the others. But then an old Western style situation emerges: “Lester, is this what you want?” asks Lorne. Everyone seems confused. Once Lester replies yes, things change. Drastically. Out comes a silenced, silver pistol, and Lorne kills everyone in the elevator; except for Lester. “That‘s on you,” says Lorne.
Turns out Malvo was looking for $100,000 bounty, working for a whole six months on Burt. Lorne tries to get Lester in on helping to hide the bodies, but Nygaard cracks him one in the back of the head with his Salesman of the Year award, running off into the dark basement of the hotel. Upstairs, he starts to pack things. Time to head back home, you betcha.

 

FBI Agents Pepper and Budge (Keegan Michael Key & Jordan Peele) are still wasting away in the file room. All of a sudden, someone comes looking for the Syndicate file regarding the Fargo mob. Deputy Molly Solverson (Allison Tolman) in Bemidji says, naturally, she knows who did the deed.
In Bemidji, Lou Solverson (Keith Carradine) has his daughter, husband Gus (Colin Hanks) and new granddaughter Greta (Joey King) at the diner for a hearty breakfast. Nice to see this big family together: “You‘re the granddaughter I always wanted but was afraid to buy online,” Lou tells Greta after she kisses him on the forehead.
Finishing her meal, Molly gets a call about the elevator murders, and then she asks what the witness’ name is – I’m sure the name must be Mr. Lester Nygaard.
Meanwhile, Lester’s rushing to get home, head on a swivel looking behind him for a car or any vehicle following him. The new Lester doesn’t seem present anymore. We’re back to the jittery, nervous Lester Nygaard, not the Insurance Salesman of the Year. He wants to go on a big vacation to make it up to Linda (Susan Park): immediately. Yet he can’t seem to move a step without looking every which way first. At home getting ready, Lester looks through some of his brother’s things, hunting gear and the like. The box also contains a gun. He picks up his old orange-red winter jacket from off a nearby rack. Molly shows up at the door to throw him off even further.

 

While out on his mail route, Gus sees a car drive by and the driver inside looks terribly familiar. Though, he shakes it off. In the car was, in fact, Lorne Malvo. He arrives at Lester’s old place where someone new is now living. Getting the new information on his old buddy Nygaard, the evil Lorne drops the history of the house on the new owners, his children. What a rough dude. At the same time, darkly hilarious.
There’s no rest for the wicked, and this certainly applies to Malvo. He is always doing something. Even if it’s making little kids scared, or killing people, there is constantly, consistently a malicious presence in him.
Deputy Molly talks over the night in question with Lester, about his supposed witnessing the elevator murders. Without being prompted, Linda helps Lester out with part of his alibi and their sudden switched flight.

 

A scene at the diner sees Lorne sit down across from Lou for coffee and a bit of pie. Although, Malvo tells him: “No good ever came from a piece of cherry pie.” They get into a talk about Lou’s history as a State Trooper for a couple decades. Malvo also asks about Lester, but Lou isn’t exactly keen on giving out another man’s home address and so on. The ever vigilant Lorne spies the Gus-Molly wedding picture, asking about them, making more observations as he so often does. There’s a bit of an ominous feel to the scene as it goes on, cutting occasionally to Molly, then back to Lorne across from Lou in a very stand-off-type way. Lou talks about a case “back in ’79” most likely the infamous Sioux Falls Massacre: “I‘d call it animal except animals only kill for food. This was… Sioux Falls – ever been?” Right as Deputy Molly comes into the diner, Lorne is leaving after making a wonderfully snaky comment. Perfect scene.
Molly meets Agents Pepper and Budge, who are more than excited to see her and hear about what she’s got to say re: the Syndicate shooting. She shows them the big whiteboard full of connections, faces, events and so on. Late to the meeting, Chief Bill Oswalt (Bob Odenkirk) arrives and tries to apologize for Molly, as if there’s something for which to be sorry. Clearly there’s no sense in Bill, whose intelligence doesn’t exactly rival that of her own deputy. Nevertheless, Pepper and Budge want to stay in town, they’re impressed with Molly’s “tremendous work” and plan on moving ahead with questioning Lester some more.

Lorne: “I haven‘t had pie like that since the Garden of Eden”

At their home, Gus stares into the board of connections Molly made concerning the Nygaard case. We cut to the red car coming down the road, the BMW driven by Lorne, as Gus sees him from the mail truck. Poor Grimly is just constantly driven nuts by the entire situation, starting from his first mistake right to the present.
In other news, Lester is getting things ready to fly off and leave his problems behind. The tickets are ready, Acapulco apparently, and Lester is rushing Linda off into the car, whisking her towards the airport. Only there’s more trouble ahead.
Stopping in at Nygaard Insurance, inside the office Lester looks long and hard, wondering if Malvo might be lurking. He further gives Linda his distinctive winter jacket to put on. Is Lester sending her in there to die, possibly? Seems so, don’t ya think? He even asks her to put the hood up.
And when Linda goes inside, after a moment appears Lorne to make the kill with one silenced shot to her head. Lester watches on in semi-horror, semi-relief. Obviously, Lorne checks to see who it is and looks out the window, almost as if right at Lester.

 

Has everything come to bear finally on Lester Nygaard? The murder coming full circle? You can be sure.
Excited to review the final episode of Season 1, “Morton’s Fork”. Stay tuned and I’ll have another review/recap finished soon enough. Cheers.