On the flip side, Marge Gunderson is arguably one of the best protagonists in film. She solves the mystery and ends the hunt despite being pregnant. She sees a ton of traumatic and graphic things including a man being chopped up in a wood chipper but holds steady and doesn't snap from the strain and horror of it all. Rather than berate the killer at then end she just shakes her head and says she doesn't get it. She just shakes off all the trauma she just went through and ends up going home to comfort her husband when he gets upset about not winning his stamp competition. One would expect her to snap at him and belittle him like "NORM you have *no idea* what I went through today!" but she just comforts him and doesn't trouble him with the ugliness of her job. She is so based it's almost unreal.
I think the two are a wonderful pairing. After the day she had, talking about something as normal and mundane as a stamp competition would help keep her sane. I don’t know any officers personally, but I’d imagine you have to be completely optimistic or completely cynical to do that job. Marge is the former, bless her, and no doubt her child will be, too.
Jerry Lundegaard behaves almost like how a kid would after flunking a test and would go out of their way to hide the report card from their parents. His arrest at the end of the two officers literally having to drag Jerry kicking and screaming to jail, proves how spineless he is. Now because of Jerry, several people including his wife and father-in-law are dead, his son will possibly have to go to foster care, he's facing several criminal charges and his financial problems will likely worsen if the victim's families decide to sue him. And all because he just wanted a little bit of money too.
Yup. What happens to Scotty? You have to think he has a miserable life. I know it's a fiction, but you have to assume he probably becomes a criminal and or a addict/alcoholic.
Sue him? Is that how it works? You can suffer both a life sentence in prison plus have to compensate the victims. I mean, they don't pay you in prison right?
The two arrest scenes at the end mirror earlier scenes in the movie and suggest a kind of "poetic justice" for the two surviving conspirators of the kidnapping scheme. When Gaear is shot in the leg by Marge while trying to flee though a snowy field, we are reminded the earlier scene when Gaear shot and murdered a witness who was also attempting to run away from him across a snowy field. Likewise, Jerry's absurd and pitiful attempt to escape arrest by crawling out of the bathroom window of his motel room mirrors Jean's failed attempt to escape her kidnapping when she is cornered in the upstairs bathroom of her house.
Fargo is a great look at pathetic evil. Evil that comes from cutting corners, not thinking things through, and trying not to think about the consequences.
This is part of what I love about Fargo. If you're a true crime fan you've seen tons and tons of real life crime plots that were bungled, ill-conceived and poorly-executed, and this gives Fargo a sense of realism that a lot of crime movie plots don't quite have. This feels like it could be based on a true story - hell, the opening credits even say as much, even though we know that's not true.
@@matthewsmith5104yes i feel the same. It's more akin to true real world evil. Most aren't actually some cigar smoking maniacal laughing criminal mastermind, it's just slimy people doing haphazard plans that lead to evil out of their uncare and desperation
I love your videos very much and I wanted to try my luck in asking you if you can do an Analysing Evil video with Franklin Saint from the FX series Snowfall and also Jamie, Scully and Dushane from the Netflix London series called Top Boy. Goated shows and I would like to hear your intellect on your analysis of them. Especially Franklin since Snowfall recently ended after 6 seasons. I personally placed this character as a second to Walter "Heisenberg" White.
Marge's speech in the cop car at the end of the movie feels like it was directed at Jerry, not the homicidal killer in the backseat. That's why he looks so confused and nonplussed at her advice. She extols the virtues of enjoying the life you have, appreciating all that your blessed with and how she can't comprehend why someone would risk so much for a little bit of money. Words that Jerry needed to hear more than anyone since he threw away his family, his job, his freedom, is in financial ruin and is the cause of several deaths...all for some money.
I recently learned that "nonplussed" has a different meaning than what is conventionally used, as in, so overwhelmed with emotion you kinda blank out. Did you mean it in that sense, or like "indifferent"?
Jerry, Carl, and Gary all did this dumb crap for a little bit of money. He looks indifferent all the time nothing phases him in the entire movie. Marge is essentially like “you put a man in a wood chipper and killed multiple people for $20k?”
Jerry Lundegaard is one of the best-written villains in cinema (and perfectly portrayed by William H. Macy). He is not all-powerful, or violent, or maliciously cunning. No - his evil stems from a mixture of cravenness, cowardice and stupidity. And that combination of horrible traits is what makes his villainy not only so memorable, but uncomfortably relatable because in the end, he's all too human.
I think Jerry suffers from avoidance. He avoids confronting things head on and being honest, in the hopes that lying and deflecting will allow him to escape reality and that he will never have to account for his mistakes.
Notice when he is finally caught in the Motel he screams like a child. He avoided confronting his problems and finally he couldn’t do it anymore. If he had confronted them early he would only have been embarrassed but his wife would probably have stayed by her side and FIL would have reluctantly paid off his debt. Now he’s going to jail and the press be a legendary scoundrel.
Fargo is kind’ve a parody of the “Chekhov’s Gun” writing principle. Instead of everything in the movie having some sort of payoff, there are so many plot elements that are present in the film without having any real bearing to the story. Marge’s pregnancy, for example, is included, and one might expect a main character’s pregnancy having some payoff, especially in dangerous situations, but instead, it’s just there, and there’s no payoff. The Coen brothers even tease this, by showing her hunch over in one of her first scenes, only for her to dismiss it as morning sickness. It’s a movie that knowingly subverts every expectation and norm in filmmaking. Case in point, most of the movie takes place in Minnesota, with only a few minutes of the film happening in Fargo.
I mean let's be realistic, no lady's going to be kicking ass while heavily pregnant. That's just gonna look ridiculous. I'm glad the Coen Bros went the more realistic angle and had Marge only doing more investigative work, but when she did need to stop the bad guys, it' not like some guns blazing shootout in you're usual action movie.
I think her pregnancy was just a way to bring more tension to her scenes since nobody wants to see a pregnant lady get hurt. It may have some deeper meaning but I don’t really think that’s it
@@Skinnyjewjew I feel its perfected in The Big Lebowski. My favorite scene in the whole movie is when hes telling that guy about what's going on he writes down on a notepad and walks away. The Dude runs over like a noir detective and reverse sketches on the pad to see what he wrote...and its a sketch of a dude with a big dick lol....
@@robbob5302 I disagree, the sheriff has shown to be fairly competent at her job. Her mistake was underestimating Jerry at first, but in her defense, everyone’s guilty of that in this movie.
@@jerrie1533 She realizes how she too could be fooled, when she learns about how the asian guy lied to her about his dead wife to make her feel sorry for him.
Oh for Pete's sake, nobody's laughin'! Whenever they raise the postage people need the little stamps, when they're stuck with a bunch of the old ones. Norm's stamp is terrific!
The reason I love Coen brothers’ movies is the fact that they understand how stupid people can be and how their stupidity leads them - and us - into increasingly chaotic and darkly humorous consequences. Ordinary people just using their brains correctly tend to be the heroes. Brilliant!
I love your videos very much and I wanted to try my luck in asking you if you can do an Analysing Evil video with Franklin Saint from the FX series Snowfall and also Jamie, Scully and Dushane from the Netflix London series called Top Boy. Goated shows and I would like to hear your intellect on your analysis of them. Especially Franklin since Snowfall recently ended after 6 seasons. I personally placed this character as a second to Walter "Heisenberg" White.
Burn After Reading is another great example of stupidity, especially of people who think they're smart. I love the ending lines (paraphrased): What'd we learn? Not to do it again. And what did we do? No effing idea!
I was too young to watch this on the big screen when it came out, but I saw it on the anniversary at the Warner theater in DC, and William H Macy was there in person to answer questions for a pretty generous amount of time
I heard Peter Stormare in an interview talk about how surprised he was to hear some folks in Minnesota still speaking a Swedish that Stormare had only heard the old folks in the old country speak when he was a little boy.
Stormare also admitted that the first time he read the script, he thought Grimsrud's line "Where is pancakes house?" was a typo, only for the Coens to pull him aside and tell him "We don't make typos." Supposedly, that's the literal translation of how you'd ask that question in Swedish, which really shows how much research the Coens put into this screenplay.
For that matter, there are also a lot of "American" English words and pronunciations that came over with the Brits at the time of colonization. Then the language on their island evolved while ours didn't.
William H Macy is a seriously underrated actor with insane range. A conniving slime bag in Fargo, a selfish drunk in Shameless, a meek but well-meaning nerd in Wild Hogs, the list goes on. The man is a genius at his craft
A car dealer's cars on the lot are owned by GMAC. The dealer has to pay GMC for the vehicles, and any interest incurred, when the car is sold. That is why they GMAC guy on the phone is asking for the VIN number's. Jerry kept the $$$ the customers paid for their cars not financed (by the customer) through GMAC. A VIN checker shows up once a month to find the unsold VINs on the lot. It's called being out of trust with GMAC if the lot inventory does not match the VIN list.
I came from a car dealership background, and I wondered if people understood what being “out of trust” is. I think a lot of people believe dealerships own the cars they’re selling. As you know, no, they certainly don’t. I know two guys who went down hard for this. One served jail time. The other lost his franchises, paid a fortune, and has been shunned from owning other dealerships. Actually, he was like Jerry in that way, only it was his dad who started the company. He was a son who ran two branches into the ground. The other son was a jerk, but clean. He played by the rules as far as I know. The bank will always find out, folks.
@@Mossaab-kg3cj5hc5s Let’s say your friend gave you a diamond necklace. Your friend says “hey, I want to sell this jewelry, but I know I’m going to lose it. Tell you what. Sell it for me. But when you do, I want $5000. Whatever you can get extra is yours.” Now you go out and sell it for $5500. Nice $500 profit for you. You’re supposed to give your friend back the $5000, right? Well, he didn’t. He pocketed the whole $5500 and told his friend (the bank) he’s still looking for a buyer. Then he went and spent all of the cash. Now your friend wants to know where the necklace is. In his case, his friend is the bank. They’re looking for the cars, not to have them back, but to make sure he didn’t do *exactly* what he did. They do that by periodically showing up and scanning the lot. They check off every VIN (vehicle identification number). Each car has a unique 17 letter/number combination. So now he sets up a fake kidnapping of his wife to get his father-in-law to cough up a bunch of money. Parts of it goes to the hired goons, and the rest will be used to tell the bank he sold the cars and pay them back. But of course, it didn’t work out like he planned.
I think Jerry sold cars to customers but didn't officiate the sale and pocketed all the money. (Car dealerships don't own the cars, they sell them from the manufacturer and make a small cut of the profit). A VIN checker would notice a discrepancy between the number of unsold cars and the cars on the lot and alert a car manufacturer/tax agency/etc. to fraud.
Has everyone forgotten about Scotty??? In a week or so of time, his mom was kidnapped and murdered, his grandfather was murdered, the people that did it killed four other people (three in Brainard and the garage attendant) before one of them killed the other and all of that was set in motion by his own father! If that kid doesn’t have some serious PTSD…
"Pretty unfriendly actually. But it's the way you're unfriendly, how you're so polite about it. Like you're doing me a favor." Mike Milligan in Fargo Season 2 summarizing Minessota friendly demeanor.
A great showcase of how while politeness is important you need to drop it on certain situations For a better result. Plus the effort of maintaining the facade will eventually get to you. You need to be more open with your emotions and problems so that others may be able to help you.
William H Macy's performance as Jerry Lundegaard is some of the best acting I've watched. It's difficult to pull off the weasel/coward role, and Macy knocked it out of the park!
You could argue that Jerry’s plan to take out 80k out of the million he was bilking Wade out wasn’t stupid. The problem is that Jerry is absolutely spineless. He made it clear that the kidnappers were only dealing with him, and he should have put his foot down and said no when Wade wanted to intervene, citing that it could compromise Wade’s daughters safety should he be the one to handover the money. But Jerry barely raised his voice when Wade and Stan basically said he would muck up the handoff. Poor Scotty 😢
@@lizd2943 you still push back in that situation if you actually believe your wife's life in danger. unless you don't actually care about her wellbeing.
@@lizd2943 Wade was the root of this whole problem from the start. The reason Jerry had all the debt he did, was because Wade was a domineering force who intentionally undermined Jerry as the man of his own household. He makes a very clear implication that he wants Jerry not to be there, when he says that "His daughter and Scottie will be taken care of." Leaving out Jerry from that makes it very, very apparent that he doesn't want the man around. And there's absolutely no way he didn't know, or highly suspect that Jerry was "mistaken" about the deal they were going to make. He knows the man. Wade is supposed to be family. He treats him like an adversarial business partner and takes advantage of Jerry's misunderstanding. Wade owns the dealership Jerry works at. Jerry's debts are a result of him desperate to gain wealth that rivals Wade's. It's obvious that if Jerry's fraud was discovered, his marriage would be over. He'd be going to prison. Everything he had, would come crumbling down around him. That's why he ends up desperate enough to hire two men to stage a ransom. And ultimately, Wade's microscopic opinion of Jerry ends up being what keeps him from suspecting anything about his involvement with the ransom. He doesn't even begin to put two and two together. And it was absolutely not a smart idea to just ignore Jerry. He put his daughter's life in added danger, and got zeroed at the meeting sight, because he wouldn't let Jerry handle it. Jerry is obviously the bad guy in this story, there's no question, but the story makes it pretty clear that Wade's fate was one entirely of his own making. He did not recognize what Jerry was capable of, and how desperate he made him to wrestle back control of his family.
The film is absolutely 'Shakespearean' in that one tragic character flaw and one bad decision - would cascade into a torrential flood of misery, suffering and pain.
Law of Jante has definitely become more contentious these days. I can understand that, it reads as something very repressive. Mostly, I think it's about the common good. But being too draconian about what the common good is, or expecting all individuals to conform to those ideas, usually leads to a lot of suffering that frankly is so spread across different levels of a society, that it becomes hard to pinpoint. See: Japan and its history of collectivist practices and attitudes. Beauty and horror in all of it. It boils down to this for me... who should say what the common good is for all? One person? A commission? Or perhaps each and every person that common good is meant to serve? Obviously, I prefer option C. If common people must perpetually bend and break themselves to meet notions of common good, is real 'good' really common anymore?
Macy played the spineless weasel to perfection. Such a great film. One awesome aspect of it in my opinion is Marge's character development. It's subtle, but after her encounter with Mike Yanagita she gets more assertive when dealing with Jerry and the other criminals, yet never becomes jaded.
I’m sure you know this but in case you don’t the whole point of Mike in the film is to demonstrate to Marge that seemingly harmless people can lie and scheme for very little reason. Mike concocted and acted out an entirely false backstory just to try to get with Marge. She realizes that Jerry might be doing the same which turns out to be true, and as she puts it the entire scheme and events related to Jerry were all just for a “little bit of money”. This channel did a really good video talking about the “banality of evil” and how people can do really awful things for seemingly mundane reasons, it’s an idea that is not only really interesting to think and read about but also shockingly common
@@jasongiovanni6332 Agreed. Law-abiding folk tend to assume that someone must have a good (or at least large) reason to break the law, especially for such heinous crimes as kidnapping and murder. But the truth is that some people will risk a lot for very little, with no care for the harm it causes others. One of my friends was at a charity store and saw that they had shirts selling for $2 that had anti-theft devices on them. She laughed and said to her friend, "Why would anyone rob a charity store?" Her friend looked her dead in the eye and said "To save two bucks."
He played a spineless weasel in Boogie Nights, too. Poor Bill Macy, always playing a weakling. I’ve seen some of shameless where he plays a pathetic alcoholic.
@@jasongiovanni6332 those kinds of people are the worst, they have no self control and hurt themselves and others around them with their selfish actions
To me, Fargo always portrays what we today call "toxic masculinity". The best exsample is the elevator scene in Season 1. Martin Freemans character could have just minded his own business, but since he's convinced himself that he's some kind of alpha male now, he gets himself (and his wife) into trouble for no reason at all.
There is a line, just after the kidnaping. Wade asked Jerry "now what about your son?" Jerry looks confused, he clearly has had no thought about the effect of the crime on his son.
Season 2 of Fargo is one of the best good vs evil. The other examples are people that either compromise their moral compass or commit “necessary evil.”
I think every season of the show could easily be made into a video, especially the last one. Roy Tillman as the living embodiment of libertarianism made a great villain, a big baby who wants all the freedom with none of the responsibility.
I was just wondering if the guy is paying for someone else to read his scripts now. I liked his less AI sounding voice he used to use for his channel tbh. This was kind of hard to get through an I honestly cant see sticking around to listen to these.
Great episode. I actually just re-watched Fargo this week. The scary thing about Jerry is that there are a lot, and I mean A LOT of real life true crime stories that start out with people like him. Some horrific crimes in history start out with an everyman or woman just trying to get some money for some mundane reason.
I heard a very well respected clinical psychologist explain once how about 4% of the general population are sociopaths and about 1% are psychopaths, which is about 1in20 individuals are capable of truly evil things. And while many do not act on their lack of empathy for others, many do. It's a truly disturbing statistic to apply in real life.
Look at Chandler Halderson. Killed his parents to avoid having to tell them he went to great lengths to not have a job or go to college. Also happened in Wisconsin, culturally similar to Minnesota.
I actually think Jerry’s biggest motive in his actions is exactly what you say around 20:00. His pride and the fact that he is unwilling to share his troubles with his family, in fear of judgement. His greed and stupidity are only supplementary to that motive.
I live in the City Fargo. And that means I have a weird relationship with this movie. Because of this movie, people think we have that accent, and most don't, and I get a lot of Woodchipper jokes. But the movie is so freaking good that I can't hate it.
The Upper Midwestern accent variant that you find in Minnesota, some of the Dakotas, much of Wisconsin, and the UP of MI, varies widely in strength not just from one region to another but also basically from one person to another, even if they grew up in the same area and went to the same schools.
I was born in Brainerd MN. And live in ether MN or Fargo my entire life, and I could count on one hand how many times I've heard that accent as strong as in the movie.
You absolutely do, it's just because you hear it constantly you don't notice it. I'm from Michigan and never thought we had one until I left Michigan and people thought I was from Canada.
I was born and raised in Seattle, WA, but my extended family is from Minnesota. Every time I would go out there it was like going to a different world. Very surreal. I remember being shocked when we went there in the late 80's and all the skater punks were wearing penny loafers.
Love the part where you were basically like “now that we’ve established how stupid Jerry is, let’s talk some more about that.” Haha. Also would love to see some videos on Jojo villains, especially Yoshikage Kira.
Thanks for this episode, what a wonderful film. There’s a lot of fascinating villains in the Fargo series, like: Lorne Malvo (s1), Hanzee Dent (s2), V.M. Varga (s3), Odis Weff (s4), and Ole Munch (s5), and they would probably provide the basis for some delicious episodes of Analyzing Evil. There’s plenty more interesting evil characters, in there, too. Here’s another set: Lester Nygaard (s1), The Gerhardts (s2), Yuri Gurka (s3), Orietta Mayflower (s4), Roy Tillman (s5). What a wonderful show. What the hell, one more: Wrench and Numbers (s1), Mike Milligan (s2), the brothers Stussy (s3), Loy Cannon (s4), Gator Tillman (s5). Honorable mention goes to: Rabbi Milligan (s4), Zelmare and Swanee (s4), the brothers Fadda (s4) and Captain Theodore Roach (s4). I don’t understand why many didn’t like season 4. If you like to analyze evil, and I do, there’s a lot to chew on in there.
As a person from the West Coast, most of what I learned about “Minnesota Nice/Politeness/Passive-Aggressiveness” came from Mystery Science Theater 3000. Which is expected as the show originated in Minnesota with most of the cast and crew being from Minnesota. They definitely made a lot of Fargo references in the later seasons; especially the famous “wood chipper” scene.
Whenever I watch this film I always feel bad for scotty. Not only does his mum get killed but his dad gets sent to jail and I always wonder what would happen to him
I literally just spent the last 5 months living in Detroit Lakes, MN. I’m born and raised from Kentucky. Minnesota nice is absolutely real. I just had to move back to KY abruptly and it’s the biggest culture shock I’ve ever felt. Living in Minnesota is like being constantly surrounded by the most seemingly emotionally mature people ever.
Well, I’m not sure if I’m even all that familiar with southern hospitality or I might just be a bit biased but honestly, I’ve never felt anything like the Minnesota Nice vibe before. I was only there for about 5 months but as soon as I had a steady job and interacted with the public regularly, I was just taken aback by how nice and polite 99% of people are up there. It’s just a whole vibe. You can feel it in the air.
@@thedopegod1134 Sounds like a good vibe! I think KY is an interesting state because there’s a distinct mix of American subcultures here, western KY is very midwestern and the Appalachians are more similar to the south; I lived in Lexington for six years and it’s like a clash of south and north (my experience of northern states only extending to Indiana and Ohio). I wouldn’t say you could feel our hospitality in the air though. I’d love to visit MN and experience it myself!
I like to imagine Jerry is a gambling addict, who let his attitude of “It’ll all be alright as long as I score big, no matter the cost” cross over from his gambling into his real life. And was too unaware/self-centered and addicted to realize when he started putting other people’s money, then other people’s lives on the line.
Not only would I recommend a video on Lorne, but maybe a video on every Fargo season, with Hanzee and Varga as well. They all deserve their flowers and have great material for analysis. Great video!
Toriyama's legacy is incredibly important for manga as a whole, but it's also important to acknowledge that the vast majority of Dragon Ball is poorly written, and this is coming from someone who genuinely loves the series since my formative years. Other than the Saiyan arc and the Namek arc (which are still not perfect stories, despite their quality), the series is not known for quality writing, and that gets more true with age and continued canonical events. It's fun, but not well-written on the whole. All this is to say that Cell is a bad villain in a bad arc. Not an interesting video topic.
Marge also can’t risk a physical altercation with these characters. No only because she’s pregnant, and not because she’s a woman, but because she’s alone during this whole investigation. The only one she really has is with Grimsmud at the end and fortunately she surprises him and she already has her gun out. She has to kill em with kindness.
It's interesting to me that even though Gaear is by far the most dangerous of the main villainous trio, I get more easily enraged by Jerry and Carl, especially Jerry - I guess as a viewer I'm more tuned to be frustrated with someone being pathetic than them being directly evil.
As Vile points out, it’s also Carl’s fault Gaear even got involved in the first place, and Jerry’s for going along with it. If it weren’t for them, Gaear would be terrorizing someone else instead.
Pathetic is often evil. Weak, cowardly and stupid people can instigate really terrible harm and never give a thought to their own responsibility for it.
Due to "Fargo", every time I see or hear a wood chipper, ...It's impossible not to think of Steve Buscemi. How he met his end with an ax whack, then into the wood chipper. Rather like listening to "Stuck in the Middle With You" ...Now I picture the cop getting his ear cut off in "Reservoir Dogs" :) That Michael Madsen sure has some anger management issues. Got him killed in this movie, and "Kill Bill: Volume 2", too :)
I also think of Helle Crafts; real life woodchipper/ homicide victim, one of my first True Crime shows from the Crime night('90s) on Discovery before it became a faux reality channel. She was Danish, as I am and it is hard to believe how such a person using a Woodchipper to dispose of a body. Which gets me thinking the of documentary "This is a True Story" (available on youtube) about the story of Takako Konishi which was reported wrongly as being associated with the film. This Film is a masterpiece and has some very interesting stories associated with it.
Same here on both counts; totally ruined the song for me but kinda worth it, to me. Buscemi once noted his characters bodies getting progressively smaller with each movie😂😂
My family is from Minnesota. While my parents were in Florida they ran into a British man that said they sounded like the people in Fargo and asked if they were from MN, I asked my parents if they said "yeah" and they told me "yeah".
My wife is from Japan, so she doesn't speak English fluently, ans had never watched this movie until we picked up at a rental store (they are still popular today in Japan) Watching her react to this film, as she was not ready for it to be so hilarious, was PRICELESS.
Funny enough they actually made a movie about a Japanese woman who watches Fargo, except in the movie she thinks its a real story and hunts for the briefcase.
Thank you so much, VileEye! This is a great movie to analyze. (A. A. Gill wrote a brilliant article for Vanity Fair back April, 2012 called "Nordic Exposure". He briefly touches on how the 'ego' is viewed in Scandinavian culture).
"Minnesota nice" cannot come full circle until they realize that in conflict situations, there is no greater authority than leaving a politely written angry note where the intended recipient might stumble upon it.
It always struck me when I first saw this movie how even though Jerry is pathetic, his actions led to the death of 7 people. Which I think is higher body count than what you see from other characters that are inherently more evil
4:29 I was born and raised in Northern Minnesota in a family that came to this region shortly after the Civil War. I used to think that "Minnesota Nice" wasn't real, that it was an undeserved stereotype. Not long after hitting 30, I got myself into a career that took me all over the nation and it didn't take me long to realize that Americans everywhere were rude and mean. Yup, Minnesota Nice is an actual real concept.
I'm a life long Minnesotan and yeah, I get it. And Fargo (especially McDormand's character) had plenty of comedic relief. But I have known some in-your-face pricks here too. And some women who took "bitch" to a whole new level.
If you're interested in Minnesota Nice, you should come down to Saskatchewan. We're like Minnesota Nice evolved. I work in tourism and the number of times people from other countries, mainly the US are just dumbfounded by how polite, friendly, and outgoing we are is kinda hilarious. You get some people who seem to genuinely believe they've walked into a Twin Peaks dream sequence or something.
I love that kind of culture shock. A similar thing happened when McDonald's first came to Russia, and customers were suspicious of how friendly the staff were acting, because they don't do that there. Business places are for business; friends are for friendliness.
It's a perfect storm of stupidity, miscommunication, greed, violence, cowardly actions, blunders, and pure evil. It's a great piece of cinema that is classic gold ...
After living in PA all my life and moving to MPLS at 25, I can attest to this "politeness". It is often more genuine then ppl think it is, like the gentleman code of Victorian England, it is a form of discipline designed to make those around you more comfortable. A sacrifice, small yes, but a sacrifice of self for the larger social group. I moved from MPLS to Honolulu another place where ppl are incredibly kind, though I'll say, in Hawaii, it is not an act, but perhaps a form of geographic psychology born of being born in a physical (if not mental) paradise. Living now in Baltimore I can tell you, passive aggressive or not, it's far preferable to the feral lack of social consideration on display here every day
It’s a values thing. Discipline and sacrifice like you said, are values found in people from places all over the world that know human community is more important than material wealth. They will act more friendly out of genuine care for others. The Hawaii thing for example isn’t just about the nice environment itself, those people have a rich history where survival depends on cooperation but even still the kindness isn’t just for their own selfish benefit it’s for empathy of knowing how others struggle as well. That attitude plays into recognizing other humans as your own and treating them as such and the culture reflects that. In a lot of places in America it’s “a dog eat dog world” culture of individualism where everyone feels like they’re responsible for their own resources so they treat others like an enemy. There’s a severe lack of values like discipline, sacrifice and respect here because people are taught that the things they have are more important than other humans.
Minnesota Nice absolutely has a passive-aggressive undercurrent, and I say this as a Minnesotan. While Fargo exaggerates it for effect, it very much exists.
As a Norwegian. This is really spot on. And i kinda like it here, where talking to strangers on public transport is seen as something only crazies and drunks do. Unless you have a damn good reason, like a question or a plead for assistance. Oh, and if we ever ask how you're doing, it's not an invitation to talk about your personal life. We don't EVER do that to people we haven't known for 10+ years or reeeeeaaaaaaally have a deep relationship with. And even then we'll ask specifics. "How are you" had two accepted answers; I'm good or I'm ok.
My god, that question, "How are you," is one of the worst sides of our culture. Say "Hei. Hva skjer?" or something instead of posing a question you don’t want the answer to.
I've always wondered why the son doesn't look anything like either parent. For me, that somehow adds to the "not all is right under the surface" theme.
I'm from North Dakota and I live in Minnesota. I think when Fargo came out, it got up our noses because it felt like we were being made fun of by a bunch of Hollywood people. But you know, many of us DO talk like that and I can tell you MN nice is real. We have thing I call the Minnesota Standoff: four people at a four way stop, motioning for the other to go ahead, starting a little bit and then realizing the other person was already going, stopping laughing, motioning, etc. on to infinity...I had a boyfriend in College whose father got their family so massively in debt that he liquidated all my boyfriend's college fund, got a 2nd mortgage on the house and then still had to declare bankruptcy. He was almost half a million in debt by the end. It was all credit card debt. He just kept rolling it over and over. They were living massively above their income for like five years with nothing really tangible to note. You know vacations and eating out and stuff like that all the time, with never paying bills fully and carrying interest. He just liked to be the big shot that paid for stuff and it made people like him and helped his ego. It was weird. He was very mild mannered, never had any gambling debt or anything. He was a lot like Jerry actually...
Thanks for vid; it helped me understand the movie better. The whole time I watched Fargo, I was like, “This guy is so stupid. What’s the point of this story?” And that’s kinda it. His evil is stupid, and he didn’t think out the details, and it cost him and many others.
The Coen brothers have made many amazing films, but even so, this one, imo, remains far and away their best to date. Excellent job covering this, Vile Eye!
DBZ has so many iconic villains. Toriyama was such a talented writer and artist. He made some of the most memorable, well-designed villains in all of pop culture. It's time to cover Frieza, one of the most beloved villains in all of anime and manga.
Minnesotan here, thank you for calling it what it actually is, MN Passive Aggression. Makes for great storytelling for sure. And yes, the accents are largely on point.
An eleventh rule recognized, "the penal code of Jante" is: Perhaps you don't think we know a few things about you? That describes my Norwegian family to a tee!😂
Jerry’s car loan scam with GMAC was based on a real guy who did the same thing on the east coast. He got loans for van conversions but no vans were converted. He spent the cash on real estate and some other stuff.
On the flip side, Marge Gunderson is arguably one of the best protagonists in film. She solves the mystery and ends the hunt despite being pregnant. She sees a ton of traumatic and graphic things including a man being chopped up in a wood chipper but holds steady and doesn't snap from the strain and horror of it all. Rather than berate the killer at then end she just shakes her head and says she doesn't get it. She just shakes off all the trauma she just went through and ends up going home to comfort her husband when he gets upset about not winning his stamp competition. One would expect her to snap at him and belittle him like "NORM you have *no idea* what I went through today!" but she just comforts him and doesn't trouble him with the ugliness of her job. She is so based it's almost unreal.
I think the two are a wonderful pairing. After the day she had, talking about something as normal and mundane as a stamp competition would help keep her sane. I don’t know any officers personally, but I’d imagine you have to be completely optimistic or completely cynical to do that job. Marge is the former, bless her, and no doubt her child will be, too.
That doesn't mean she isn't deeply affected by what she's seen, though. It could just be more "Minnesota nice". @@nealwhaley63
It's always nice to see John Carroll Lynch not play the killer.
I think we may need an Analyzing Good channel.
Yeah. She’s one of like 1000 protagonists who meet everything you said despite being pregnant
Jerry Lundegaard behaves almost like how a kid would after flunking a test and would go out of their way to hide the report card from their parents. His arrest at the end of the two officers literally having to drag Jerry kicking and screaming to jail, proves how spineless he is.
Now because of Jerry, several people including his wife and father-in-law are dead, his son will possibly have to go to foster care, he's facing several criminal charges and his financial problems will likely worsen if the victim's families decide to sue him. And all because he just wanted a little bit of money too.
Yup. What happens to Scotty? You have to think he has a miserable life. I know it's a fiction, but you have to assume he probably becomes a criminal and or a addict/alcoholic.
Sue him? Is that how it works? You can suffer both a life sentence in prison plus have to compensate the victims. I mean, they don't pay you in prison right?
@@osmanyousif7849 Yeah, I don't know about that. He has no money anyway
The two arrest scenes at the end mirror earlier scenes in the movie and suggest a kind of "poetic justice" for the two surviving conspirators of the kidnapping scheme.
When Gaear is shot in the leg by Marge while trying to flee though a snowy field, we are reminded the earlier scene when Gaear shot and murdered a witness who was also attempting to run away from him across a snowy field.
Likewise, Jerry's absurd and pitiful attempt to escape arrest by crawling out of the bathroom window of his motel room mirrors Jean's failed attempt to escape her kidnapping when she is cornered in the upstairs bathroom of her house.
Why would you assume Scotty becomes a criminal? Baseless.
Fargo is a great look at pathetic evil. Evil that comes from cutting corners, not thinking things through, and trying not to think about the consequences.
The banality of evil
Great comment
This is part of what I love about Fargo. If you're a true crime fan you've seen tons and tons of real life crime plots that were bungled, ill-conceived and poorly-executed, and this gives Fargo a sense of realism that a lot of crime movie plots don't quite have. This feels like it could be based on a true story - hell, the opening credits even say as much, even though we know that's not true.
@@matthewsmith5104yes i feel the same. It's more akin to true real world evil. Most aren't actually some cigar smoking maniacal laughing criminal mastermind, it's just slimy people doing haphazard plans that lead to evil out of their uncare and desperation
I love your videos very much and I wanted to try my luck in asking you if you can do an Analysing Evil video with Franklin Saint from the FX series Snowfall and also Jamie, Scully and Dushane from the Netflix London series called Top Boy. Goated shows and I would like to hear your intellect on your analysis of them. Especially Franklin since Snowfall recently ended after 6 seasons. I personally placed this character as a second to Walter "Heisenberg" White.
Marge's speech in the cop car at the end of the movie feels like it was directed at Jerry, not the homicidal killer in the backseat. That's why he looks so confused and nonplussed at her advice. She extols the virtues of enjoying the life you have, appreciating all that your blessed with and how she can't comprehend why someone would risk so much for a little bit of money. Words that Jerry needed to hear more than anyone since he threw away his family, his job, his freedom, is in financial ruin and is the cause of several deaths...all for some money.
I recently learned that "nonplussed" has a different meaning than what is conventionally used, as in, so overwhelmed with emotion you kinda blank out. Did you mean it in that sense, or like "indifferent"?
@@heidigreen8468Indifferent.
Jerry, Carl, and Gary all did this dumb crap for a little bit of money. He looks indifferent all the time nothing phases him in the entire movie.
Marge is essentially like “you put a man in a wood chipper and killed multiple people for $20k?”
Modern day shakespearean tragedy, everybody dies at the end
Since gratitude is a virtue and Marge embodies this virtue, then selfishness is the evil Jerry embodies.
Jerry Lundegaard is one of the best-written villains in cinema (and perfectly portrayed by William H. Macy). He is not all-powerful, or violent, or maliciously cunning. No - his evil stems from a mixture of cravenness, cowardice and stupidity. And that combination of horrible traits is what makes his villainy not only so memorable, but uncomfortably relatable because in the end, he's all too human.
what is it with jerry's and always being so pathetic?
What does craven mean?
"Craven" is a synonym for "cowardly"
@@reidparker1848 poor Wes :(
Agreed
I think Jerry suffers from avoidance. He avoids confronting things head on and being honest, in the hopes that lying and deflecting will allow him to escape reality and that he will never have to account for his mistakes.
very Scandinavian of him
Notice when he is finally caught in the Motel he screams like a child. He avoided confronting his problems and finally he couldn’t do it anymore.
If he had confronted them early he would only have been embarrassed but his wife would probably have stayed by her side and FIL would have reluctantly paid off his debt.
Now he’s going to jail and the press be a legendary scoundrel.
Fargo is kind’ve a parody of the “Chekhov’s Gun” writing principle. Instead of everything in the movie having some sort of payoff, there are so many plot elements that are present in the film without having any real bearing to the story. Marge’s pregnancy, for example, is included, and one might expect a main character’s pregnancy having some payoff, especially in dangerous situations, but instead, it’s just there, and there’s no payoff. The Coen brothers even tease this, by showing her hunch over in one of her first scenes, only for her to dismiss it as morning sickness. It’s a movie that knowingly subverts every expectation and norm in filmmaking. Case in point, most of the movie takes place in Minnesota, with only a few minutes of the film happening in Fargo.
I mean let's be realistic, no lady's going to be kicking ass while heavily pregnant. That's just gonna look ridiculous. I'm glad the Coen Bros went the more realistic angle and had Marge only doing more investigative work, but when she did need to stop the bad guys, it' not like some guns blazing shootout in you're usual action movie.
I think her pregnancy was just a way to bring more tension to her scenes since nobody wants to see a pregnant lady get hurt. It may have some deeper meaning but I don’t really think that’s it
That’s actually most of their movies.
Agreed! I think the Big Lebowski takes this to an even more extreme degree.
@@Skinnyjewjew I feel its perfected in The Big Lebowski. My favorite scene in the whole movie is when hes telling that guy about what's going on he writes down on a notepad and walks away. The Dude runs over like a noir detective and reverse sketches on the pad to see what he wrote...and its a sketch of a dude with a big dick lol....
I love how every bad guy here is equally stupid and incompetent, just in different ways
Yes.
The Sheriff wasn’t too bright. But luckily, with the criminals in that town, she didn’t need to be.
@@robbob5302 I disagree, the sheriff has shown to be fairly competent at her job. Her mistake was underestimating Jerry at first, but in her defense, everyone’s guilty of that in this movie.
@@jerrie1533 She realizes how she too could be fooled, when she learns about how the asian guy lied to her about his dead wife to make her feel sorry for him.
She was well above most small town sherrifs. She immediately figured out the logistics of the massacre on the highway. @@robbob5302
@@BadenBattleBaseShe had leukemia, you know.
What do “No Country For Old Men” & “Fargo” have in common?
That briefcase of money.
Many simply equate No Country as "Fargo, but set south of the border" anyway.
And Pulp Fiction lol …. Although its hotly debated what is in that briefcase
No really, they are the same prop re-used
Anton Chigurh is, arguably, the kind of sociopathic hired gun Grimsrud WISHES he could be.
The Big Lebowski had a briefcase too.
The real evil in Fargo is the Minnesota postal service. How dare they relegate Norm's masterpiece to the 3¢ stamp?
You’re laughing. Hartman’s blue-winged teal got the twenty nine cent stamp and you’re laughing?
Oh for Pete's sake, nobody's laughin'! Whenever they raise the postage people need the little stamps, when they're stuck with a bunch of the old ones. Norm's stamp is terrific!
Tree cent
A Win's a win, and getting your work reproduced in a few dozen million copies is still a win.
Tragic
The reason I love Coen brothers’ movies is the fact that they understand how stupid people can be and how their stupidity leads them - and us - into increasingly chaotic and darkly humorous consequences.
Ordinary people just using their brains correctly tend to be the heroes.
Brilliant!
The problem with that sentiment is that there are far too many of the stupid ones thinking they're "ordinary people using their brains correctly".
I love your videos very much and I wanted to try my luck in asking you if you can do an Analysing Evil video with Franklin Saint from the FX series Snowfall and also Jamie, Scully and Dushane from the Netflix London series called Top Boy. Goated shows and I would like to hear your intellect on your analysis of them. Especially Franklin since Snowfall recently ended after 6 seasons. I personally placed this character as a second to Walter "Heisenberg" White.
Burn After Reading is another great example of stupidity, especially of people who think they're smart. I love the ending lines (paraphrased): What'd we learn? Not to do it again. And what did we do? No effing idea!
@@MelissaBlue I was literally just about to mention Burn After Reading but you beat me to it lol
I was too young to watch this on the big screen when it came out, but I saw it on the anniversary at the Warner theater in DC, and William H Macy was there in person to answer questions for a pretty generous amount of time
I loved the craziness of the villains in this movie, especially Steve Buscemi.
I always loved the scene where the Native American man beats him up, justly, with his belt. 😂
Steve and Peter also deserved Oscar’s for being the dumbest crooks ever!
@@perturbedxtirade7428Also, when Wade shoots him in the face and when Gaear axes him, all justly.
@@nickchang5293Agreed. Carl and Randall Boggs are among Buscemi's most despicable characters.
Same
I heard Peter Stormare in an interview talk about how surprised he was to hear some folks in Minnesota still speaking a Swedish that Stormare had only heard the old folks in the old country speak when he was a little boy.
Wow!
Funny how linguistics develop around 2 isolated groups speaking the same language over many generations
Stormare also admitted that the first time he read the script, he thought Grimsrud's line "Where is pancakes house?" was a typo, only for the Coens to pull him aside and tell him "We don't make typos." Supposedly, that's the literal translation of how you'd ask that question in Swedish, which really shows how much research the Coens put into this screenplay.
@gelchert that's awesome!
For that matter, there are also a lot of "American" English words and pronunciations that came over with the Brits at the time of colonization. Then the language on their island evolved while ours didn't.
This movie is one of the best showcases of the difference between being nice and being kind.
William H Macy is a seriously underrated actor with insane range. A conniving slime bag in Fargo, a selfish drunk in Shameless, a meek but well-meaning nerd in Wild Hogs, the list goes on. The man is a genius at his craft
I know it's silly, but I always love him as the Shoveler in Mystery Men. "God gave me a gift. I shovel well; I shovel very well!"
@@owenatkinson5744 never seen that tbh, I’ll have to take a look
@@owenatkinson5744thanks for mentioning that part, mate. love him in that role
A skilled shovel warrior in Mystery Men
He's also on Jurassic park 3 as a very similar character to Fargo
A car dealer's cars on the lot are owned by GMAC. The dealer has to pay GMC for the vehicles, and any interest incurred, when the car is sold. That is why they GMAC guy on the phone is asking for the VIN number's. Jerry kept the $$$ the customers paid for their cars not financed (by the customer) through GMAC. A VIN checker shows up once a month to find the unsold VINs on the lot. It's called being out of trust with GMAC if the lot inventory does not match the VIN list.
That’s a great quick explanation for those of us who don’t know anything about car dealerships. Thank you.
I came from a car dealership background, and I wondered if people understood what being “out of trust” is. I think a lot of people believe dealerships own the cars they’re selling. As you know, no, they certainly don’t.
I know two guys who went down hard for this. One served jail time. The other lost his franchises, paid a fortune, and has been shunned from owning other dealerships. Actually, he was like Jerry in that way, only it was his dad who started the company. He was a son who ran two branches into the ground. The other son was a jerk, but clean. He played by the rules as far as I know.
The bank will always find out, folks.
Oh darn , Can you try wording that better if you do not mind 😊
@@Mossaab-kg3cj5hc5s
Let’s say your friend gave you a diamond necklace. Your friend says “hey, I want to sell this jewelry, but I know I’m going to lose it. Tell you what. Sell it for me. But when you do, I want $5000. Whatever you can get extra is yours.”
Now you go out and sell it for $5500. Nice $500 profit for you.
You’re supposed to give your friend back the $5000, right? Well, he didn’t. He pocketed the whole $5500 and told his friend (the bank) he’s still looking for a buyer.
Then he went and spent all of the cash.
Now your friend wants to know where the necklace is. In his case, his friend is the bank. They’re looking for the cars, not to have them back, but to make sure he didn’t do *exactly* what he did. They do that by periodically showing up and scanning the lot. They check off every VIN (vehicle identification number). Each car has a unique 17 letter/number combination.
So now he sets up a fake kidnapping of his wife to get his father-in-law to cough up a bunch of money. Parts of it goes to the hired goons, and the rest will be used to tell the bank he sold the cars and pay them back.
But of course, it didn’t work out like he planned.
I think Jerry sold cars to customers but didn't officiate the sale and pocketed all the money. (Car dealerships don't own the cars, they sell them from the manufacturer and make a small cut of the profit). A VIN checker would notice a discrepancy between the number of unsold cars and the cars on the lot and alert a car manufacturer/tax agency/etc. to fraud.
Has everyone forgotten about Scotty??? In a week or so of time, his mom was kidnapped and murdered, his grandfather was murdered, the people that did it killed four other people (three in Brainard and the garage attendant) before one of them killed the other and all of that was set in motion by his own father! If that kid doesn’t have some serious PTSD…
I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up becoming some hardened criminal himself with all that trauma.
@@capncake8837 Or a politician.
It's actually not based on a true story. The Coen brother's did that on purpose. It's based on a murder, but nothing like the movie.
Jeez, Scotty!
Um, did you WATCH the whole video? He talks about Scotty losing both his parents and his grandfather.
"Pretty unfriendly actually. But it's the way you're unfriendly, how you're so polite about it. Like you're doing me a favor."
Mike Milligan in Fargo Season 2 summarizing Minessota friendly demeanor.
Jerry’s plan was so stupid. It was doomed to fail and I love how Carl and Gaer even said right from the getgo that the plan doesn’t make any sense
right from opening scene, the meeting time was messed up. Jerry didn't even plan when to meet at the bar correctly.
@@mynameispeachesShep told him 8:30.
@@randycunningham7318Well, that’s a mistake then.
A great showcase of how while politeness is important you need to drop it on certain situations For a better result. Plus the effort of maintaining the facade will eventually get to you. You need to be more open with your emotions and problems so that others may be able to help you.
I love the couple that are buying the car and they know they're being ripped off but they buy it anyway because they're so darned nice 😄
"You're a liar, you're a..... (Awkward blink) FUCKING LIAR"
"You're Darn Tootin"🗣🗣🗣📢📢📢🥶🥶🥶🔥🔥🔥
"Ohh yea?"
Yaaaa. Sure sounds like we're in a pickle there now.
@@A.Radwick Oh yaaaaa....
@@Christrulesall2 don't cha know
Minnesotaaaaa😂
William H Macy's performance as Jerry Lundegaard is some of the best acting I've watched. It's difficult to pull off the weasel/coward role, and Macy knocked it out of the park!
When he’s trying to scrape the windscreen 👌🏽
You could argue that Jerry’s plan to take out 80k out of the million he was bilking Wade out wasn’t stupid. The problem is that Jerry is absolutely spineless. He made it clear that the kidnappers were only dealing with him, and he should have put his foot down and said no when Wade wanted to intervene, citing that it could compromise Wade’s daughters safety should he be the one to handover the money. But Jerry barely raised his voice when Wade and Stan basically said he would muck up the handoff.
Poor Scotty 😢
True but Wade was the one who had the money and he would have ignored Jerry no matter what.
@@lizd2943 you still push back in that situation if you actually believe your wife's life in danger. unless you don't actually care about her wellbeing.
Yes, I'm just saying Wade wouldn't have listened no matter what because he had no respect for Jerry at all.@@saml302
@@saml302 even if he didn’t care for her wellbeing he certainly cared about the money! He needed time to split the 80k from the rest of the million!
@@lizd2943 Wade was the root of this whole problem from the start. The reason Jerry had all the debt he did, was because Wade was a domineering force who intentionally undermined Jerry as the man of his own household. He makes a very clear implication that he wants Jerry not to be there, when he says that "His daughter and Scottie will be taken care of." Leaving out Jerry from that makes it very, very apparent that he doesn't want the man around.
And there's absolutely no way he didn't know, or highly suspect that Jerry was "mistaken" about the deal they were going to make. He knows the man. Wade is supposed to be family. He treats him like an adversarial business partner and takes advantage of Jerry's misunderstanding.
Wade owns the dealership Jerry works at. Jerry's debts are a result of him desperate to gain wealth that rivals Wade's. It's obvious that if Jerry's fraud was discovered, his marriage would be over. He'd be going to prison. Everything he had, would come crumbling down around him. That's why he ends up desperate enough to hire two men to stage a ransom.
And ultimately, Wade's microscopic opinion of Jerry ends up being what keeps him from suspecting anything about his involvement with the ransom. He doesn't even begin to put two and two together.
And it was absolutely not a smart idea to just ignore Jerry. He put his daughter's life in added danger, and got zeroed at the meeting sight, because he wouldn't let Jerry handle it. Jerry is obviously the bad guy in this story, there's no question, but the story makes it pretty clear that Wade's fate was one entirely of his own making. He did not recognize what Jerry was capable of, and how desperate he made him to wrestle back control of his family.
The film is absolutely 'Shakespearean' in that one tragic character flaw and one bad decision - would cascade into a torrential flood of misery, suffering and pain.
The law of Yanta reads like a dystopian law .
Law of Jante has definitely become more contentious these days. I can understand that, it reads as something very repressive.
Mostly, I think it's about the common good. But being too draconian about what the common good is, or expecting all individuals to conform to those ideas, usually leads to a lot of suffering that frankly is so spread across different levels of a society, that it becomes hard to pinpoint. See: Japan and its history of collectivist practices and attitudes. Beauty and horror in all of it.
It boils down to this for me... who should say what the common good is for all? One person? A commission? Or perhaps each and every person that common good is meant to serve? Obviously, I prefer option C. If common people must perpetually bend and break themselves to meet notions of common good, is real 'good' really common anymore?
@@differentbutsimilar7893 Basically, it just read like someone an Ayn Rand protang would have to fight against.
I’m guessing Dennis with his sob story lying doesn’t go by those principles😆
Sounds like it came from narcissistic people..
Its the culture I grew up with in Norway
Macy played the spineless weasel to perfection. Such a great film. One awesome aspect of it in my opinion is Marge's character development. It's subtle, but after her encounter with Mike Yanagita she gets more assertive when dealing with Jerry and the other criminals, yet never becomes jaded.
I’m sure you know this but in case you don’t the whole point of Mike in the film is to demonstrate to Marge that seemingly harmless people can lie and scheme for very little reason. Mike concocted and acted out an entirely false backstory just to try to get with Marge. She realizes that Jerry might be doing the same which turns out to be true, and as she puts it the entire scheme and events related to Jerry were all just for a “little bit of money”. This channel did a really good video talking about the “banality of evil” and how people can do really awful things for seemingly mundane reasons, it’s an idea that is not only really interesting to think and read about but also shockingly common
@@jasongiovanni6332 Agreed. Law-abiding folk tend to assume that someone must have a good (or at least large) reason to break the law, especially for such heinous crimes as kidnapping and murder. But the truth is that some people will risk a lot for very little, with no care for the harm it causes others. One of my friends was at a charity store and saw that they had shirts selling for $2 that had anti-theft devices on them. She laughed and said to her friend, "Why would anyone rob a charity store?" Her friend looked her dead in the eye and said "To save two bucks."
He played a spineless weasel in Boogie Nights, too. Poor Bill Macy, always playing a weakling. I’ve seen some of shameless where he plays a pathetic alcoholic.
@@jasongiovanni6332 those kinds of people are the worst, they have no self control and hurt themselves and others around them with their selfish actions
GREED and Stupidity do not mix...
Well said
At best, you'll get a segment on Jey Leno's "Stupid criminals" Headlines bit (remember those), at worst you'll get this, or "Pain & Gain".
It’s often how it comes
To me, Fargo always portrays what we today call "toxic masculinity".
The best exsample is the elevator scene in Season 1. Martin Freemans character could have just minded his own business, but since he's convinced himself that he's some kind of alpha male now, he gets himself (and his wife) into trouble for no reason at all.
@@theblocksays*JAY*
There is a line, just after the kidnaping. Wade asked Jerry "now what about your son?" Jerry looks confused, he clearly has had no thought about the effect of the crime on his son.
Season 2 of Fargo is one of the best good vs evil. The other examples are people that either compromise their moral compass or commit “necessary evil.”
also by the end of s2 pretty much everyone lost something regardless of their sides
I think every season of the show could easily be made into a video, especially the last one. Roy Tillman as the living embodiment of libertarianism made a great villain, a big baby who wants all the freedom with none of the responsibility.
I'm sorry but the UFO thing kinda killed it.
@@darksideofevil13they only did that because it was a play on there being more reported UFO sightings in that area at that time.
@@alswearengine4867 I'm not sure if that makes it better. It just completely sucked me out of it. But maybe I'm taking it too seriously I dunno.
The seeing you actually talk in your narrative voice for your videos is kinda mind blowing
Right? I thought he was an AI for months
These face reveals never fail to blow our minds. The man behind the voice is NEVER what we think. Appearance wise anyway.
I was just wondering if the guy is paying for someone else to read his scripts now. I liked his less AI sounding voice he used to use for his channel tbh. This was kind of hard to get through an I honestly cant see sticking around to listen to these.
@@buddstep Lol, of course its an AI ! What now, AI can't do video?!
@@aquacruisedb yup totally fake
Great episode. I actually just re-watched Fargo this week. The scary thing about Jerry is that there are a lot, and I mean A LOT of real life true crime stories that start out with people like him. Some horrific crimes in history start out with an everyman or woman just trying to get some money for some mundane reason.
Bruh, I'm a CO. I can tell you from personal experience that most criminals are exactly like Jerry. Dumb, greedy, and short-sighted.
I heard a very well respected clinical psychologist explain once how about 4% of the general population are sociopaths and about 1% are psychopaths, which is about 1in20 individuals are capable of truly evil things. And while many do not act on their lack of empathy for others, many do. It's a truly disturbing statistic to apply in real life.
Look at Chandler Halderson. Killed his parents to avoid having to tell them he went to great lengths to not have a job or go to college. Also happened in Wisconsin, culturally similar to Minnesota.
I actually think Jerry’s biggest motive in his actions is exactly what you say around 20:00. His pride and the fact that he is unwilling to share his troubles with his family, in fear of judgement. His greed and stupidity are only supplementary to that motive.
Peter Stormare was probably one of the best depiction of a psychopath on film!
He plays a mean nihilist too 😉
@@Beardwhipholy fuck!!! I know I recognised him from somewhere!!
He also is very fond of Pancakes.
Until he gets eaten by little dinosaurs. 😂
@@carolann811 He played a psychopath there too😂
Jerry is if Ned Flanders was greedy.
See also Walter White
REALLY loved steve buscemi on this! My favorite role of his alongside tony b.
He's great in whatever he's in. Fantastic actor.
That animal, Blundetto?
Analyzing Evil: that dude who made grilled cheese with a radiator
@@NickOleksiakMusicJean Lundegaard, whateva happened there
that animal blundetto. You know he killed a 47-year-old kid right?
I live in the City Fargo. And that means I have a weird relationship with this movie. Because of this movie, people think we have that accent, and most don't, and I get a lot of Woodchipper jokes. But the movie is so freaking good that I can't hate it.
The Upper Midwestern accent variant that you find in Minnesota, some of the Dakotas, much of Wisconsin, and the UP of MI, varies widely in strength not just from one region to another but also basically from one person to another, even if they grew up in the same area and went to the same schools.
I was born in Brainerd MN. And live in ether MN or Fargo my entire life, and I could count on one hand how many times I've heard that accent as strong as in the movie.
Hell yeah brother. I’m from the better Dakota and Fargo has always been my favorite movie
@@taco4242 They did exaggerate it. But if you get out in the more deeply rural areas, it's not actually too far off.
You absolutely do, it's just because you hear it constantly you don't notice it. I'm from Michigan and never thought we had one until I left Michigan and people thought I was from Canada.
This film is a masterpiece. And the show taking place after (and before) this film is equally a masterpiece.
"BLOOD HAS BEEN SHED JERRY!"
-Animal Blundetto
What ever happened there
@@conservativemillennial1493 WHATEVER HAPPENED THERE?!
WHATEVER HAPPENED THERE??!!!
@@XanderShiller TAKE IT EASY…..
We're not making a western here.
I was born and raised in Seattle, WA, but my extended family is from Minnesota. Every time I would go out there it was like going to a different world. Very surreal. I remember being shocked when we went there in the late 80's and all the skater punks were wearing penny loafers.
I love when Mike Milligan calls out the Sheriff for being nice. He gets it lol.
Love the part where you were basically like “now that we’ve established how stupid Jerry is, let’s talk some more about that.” Haha.
Also would love to see some videos on Jojo villains, especially Yoshikage Kira.
Thanks for this episode, what a wonderful film. There’s a lot of fascinating villains in the Fargo series, like: Lorne Malvo (s1), Hanzee Dent (s2), V.M. Varga (s3), Odis Weff (s4), and Ole Munch (s5), and they would probably provide the basis for some delicious episodes of Analyzing Evil. There’s plenty more interesting evil characters, in there, too. Here’s another set: Lester Nygaard (s1), The Gerhardts (s2), Yuri Gurka (s3), Orietta Mayflower (s4), Roy Tillman (s5). What a wonderful show. What the hell, one more: Wrench and Numbers (s1), Mike Milligan (s2), the brothers Stussy (s3), Loy Cannon (s4), Gator Tillman (s5). Honorable mention goes to: Rabbi Milligan (s4), Zelmare and Swanee (s4), the brothers Fadda (s4) and Captain Theodore Roach (s4). I don’t understand why many didn’t like season 4. If you like to analyze evil, and I do, there’s a lot to chew on in there.
As a person from the West Coast, most of what I learned about “Minnesota Nice/Politeness/Passive-Aggressiveness” came from Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Which is expected as the show originated in Minnesota with most of the cast and crew being from Minnesota.
They definitely made a lot of Fargo references in the later seasons; especially the famous “wood chipper” scene.
i live in Fargo an am there right now lol
Whenever I watch this film I always feel bad for scotty. Not only does his mum get killed but his dad gets sent to jail and I always wonder what would happen to him
“Oh yeah….Scotty….”
Worst dad ever lol
And his grandad. Poor Scotty.
He will be traumatised for sure. At least he is going to inherit his granddad's wealth.
@@chutspe That could be more of a burden than a blessing. The poor kid!
I literally just spent the last 5 months living in Detroit Lakes, MN. I’m born and raised from Kentucky. Minnesota nice is absolutely real. I just had to move back to KY abruptly and it’s the biggest culture shock I’ve ever felt. Living in Minnesota is like being constantly surrounded by the most seemingly emotionally mature people ever.
I’m from southeastern KY and was wondering how “Minnesota Nice” compares to “southern hospitality”.
Well, I’m not sure if I’m even all that familiar with southern hospitality or I might just be a bit biased but honestly, I’ve never felt anything like the Minnesota Nice vibe before. I was only there for about 5 months but as soon as I had a steady job and interacted with the public regularly, I was just taken aback by how nice and polite 99% of people are up there. It’s just a whole vibe. You can feel it in the air.
@@thedopegod1134 Sounds like a good vibe! I think KY is an interesting state because there’s a distinct mix of American subcultures here, western KY is very midwestern and the Appalachians are more similar to the south; I lived in Lexington for six years and it’s like a clash of south and north (my experience of northern states only extending to Indiana and Ohio). I wouldn’t say you could feel our hospitality in the air though. I’d love to visit MN and experience it myself!
I’m from western KY and there’s definitely more of a midwestern vibe here for sure.
I like to imagine Jerry is a gambling addict, who let his attitude of “It’ll all be alright as long as I score big, no matter the cost” cross over from his gambling into his real life. And was too unaware/self-centered and addicted to realize when he started putting other people’s money, then other people’s lives on the line.
I've always had a good laugh at him trying to jump out the window in his boxer shorts😂
yeah that Jerry Lundegaard ...dumber than a pound of sh*t
Into the North Dakota winter, no less
Boxer shorts! 400 Oak Street. K-Mart. 😵
Not only would I recommend a video on Lorne, but maybe a video on every Fargo season, with Hanzee and Varga as well. They all deserve their flowers and have great material for analysis. Great video!
One of the greatest left us. Akira Toriyama will never be forgotten. Please do cell
This comment needs more likes boys, assemble!
@@heavybreim a woman, but I'm here for it
For real! Rip dear Kame Toriyama, the true Turtle Hermit Sage
Why cell?
Toriyama's legacy is incredibly important for manga as a whole, but it's also important to acknowledge that the vast majority of Dragon Ball is poorly written, and this is coming from someone who genuinely loves the series since my formative years. Other than the Saiyan arc and the Namek arc (which are still not perfect stories, despite their quality), the series is not known for quality writing, and that gets more true with age and continued canonical events. It's fun, but not well-written on the whole.
All this is to say that Cell is a bad villain in a bad arc. Not an interesting video topic.
Marge also can’t risk a physical altercation with these characters. No only because she’s pregnant, and not because she’s a woman, but because she’s alone during this whole investigation. The only one she really has is with Grimsmud at the end and fortunately she surprises him and she already has her gun out.
She has to kill em with kindness.
Why this big, aggressive lunatic let himself be arrested by Marg is beyond me. And he got into the aunt's car like a child.
@ well he did have a bullet in his leg
@@morimo11 And the little lady knew how to use that gun.
It's interesting to me that even though Gaear is by far the most dangerous of the main villainous trio, I get more easily enraged by Jerry and Carl, especially Jerry - I guess as a viewer I'm more tuned to be frustrated with someone being pathetic than them being directly evil.
As Vile points out, it’s also Carl’s fault Gaear even got involved in the first place, and Jerry’s for going along with it. If it weren’t for them, Gaear would be terrorizing someone else instead.
Pathetic is often evil. Weak, cowardly and stupid people can instigate really terrible harm and never give a thought to their own responsibility for it.
“Jerry Lundegaard is, above all else, a moron.” I died laughing about 4 times before I could move on with the video.
Covering one of the best movies I've seen in the last year on the day I turn 26. Happy birthday to me!!
🙏🙏🙏🌟
It’s one of the best movies made! Period. Lots of masterpieces out there, enjoy!
Fargo is a masterpiece. This was the role that WHM was born to play.
That's likely why he aggressively went after the role. And aced it.
And let's not forget, little snot nose Scotty has to be raised by Jerry's parents now.
Neurotic, Cowardly, Nervous AND Impulsive
Sounds like the perfect combination of someone who accidentally has a bad day...everyday
Due to "Fargo", every time I see or hear a wood chipper,
...It's impossible not to think of Steve Buscemi.
How he met his end with an ax whack, then into the wood chipper.
Rather like listening to "Stuck in the Middle With You"
...Now I picture the cop getting his ear cut off in "Reservoir Dogs" :)
That Michael Madsen sure has some anger management issues.
Got him killed in this movie, and "Kill Bill: Volume 2", too :)
I also think of Helle Crafts; real life woodchipper/ homicide victim, one of my first True Crime shows from the Crime night('90s) on Discovery before it became a faux reality channel. She was Danish, as I am and it is hard to believe how such a person using a Woodchipper to dispose of a body. Which gets me thinking the of documentary "This is a True Story" (available on youtube) about the story of Takako Konishi which was reported wrongly as being associated with the film. This Film is a masterpiece and has some very interesting stories associated with it.
I also think of Tucker And Dale vs. Evil. College kids just throwing themselves in the woodchipper! 😂
Damn....that's been on the watch list :)@@Transform-u2q
Same here on both counts; totally ruined the song for me but kinda worth it, to me. Buscemi once noted his characters bodies getting progressively smaller with each movie😂😂
Buscemi put his best foot forward with that role
My family is from Minnesota. While my parents were in Florida they ran into a British man that said they sounded like the people in Fargo and asked if they were from MN, I asked my parents if they said "yeah" and they told me "yeah".
Ya.
Oh yaaa? You betcha yaaa.😅😅
This is one of those films I watch over and over and can't find any faults
One of my favorite aspects is the film score. The theme is beautiful.
Let’s not forget the fact that he also bribed a college admissions office.
" We're Not Just Going To Give You $750,000! We're Not A Bank, Jerry."
My wife is from Japan, so she doesn't speak English fluently, ans had never watched this movie until we picked up at a rental store (they are still popular today in Japan) Watching her react to this film, as she was not ready for it to be so hilarious, was PRICELESS.
Funny enough they actually made a movie about a Japanese woman who watches Fargo, except in the movie she thinks its a real story and hunts for the briefcase.
Some suggestions:
- Analyzing Evil: Park Yeon-jin from The Glory
- Analyzing Evil: Thor "The Swede" Gundersen from Hell on Wheels
"I'll do a damn lot count! Right now. You're darn tootin'!"
Thank you so much, VileEye! This is a great movie to analyze.
(A. A. Gill wrote a brilliant article for Vanity Fair back April, 2012 called "Nordic Exposure". He briefly touches on how the 'ego' is viewed in Scandinavian culture).
"Minnesota nice" cannot come full circle until they realize that in conflict situations, there is no greater authority than leaving a politely written angry note where the intended recipient might stumble upon it.
It always struck me when I first saw this movie how even though Jerry is pathetic, his actions led to the death of 7 people. Which I think is higher body count than what you see from other characters that are inherently more evil
I suppose clumsiness and mismanagement can sometimes be even more destructive than intentional harm. The latter is at least controlled to some extent.
4:29 I was born and raised in Northern Minnesota in a family that came to this region shortly after the Civil War. I used to think that "Minnesota Nice" wasn't real, that it was an undeserved stereotype. Not long after hitting 30, I got myself into a career that took me all over the nation and it didn't take me long to realize that Americans everywhere were rude and mean. Yup, Minnesota Nice is an actual real concept.
Peter Stomare is so menacing in this great film .
The Coen brothers love the “one mistake and you pay dearly for it” trope. It’s usually a through line in all of their films.
I'm a life long Minnesotan and yeah, I get it. And Fargo (especially McDormand's character) had plenty of comedic relief. But I have known some in-your-face pricks here too. And some women who took "bitch" to a whole new level.
If you're interested in Minnesota Nice, you should come down to Saskatchewan. We're like Minnesota Nice evolved. I work in tourism and the number of times people from other countries, mainly the US are just dumbfounded by how polite, friendly, and outgoing we are is kinda hilarious. You get some people who seem to genuinely believe they've walked into a Twin Peaks dream sequence or something.
I love that kind of culture shock. A similar thing happened when McDonald's first came to Russia, and customers were suspicious of how friendly the staff were acting, because they don't do that there. Business places are for business; friends are for friendliness.
To anyone reading this; Save yourself, do not go to Saskatchewan.
Nice people and such, yea. Also, NOTHING to see. And next to nothing to do.
As a resident of Saskatchewan for 25 years, I can confirm. Insane politeness, nothing to do.
I can’t believe my favorite UA-cam channel has finally covered my favorite movie.
The bad karma runs rampant in this amazing movie.
It's a perfect storm of stupidity, miscommunication, greed, violence, cowardly actions, blunders, and pure evil. It's a great piece of cinema that is classic gold ...
ANALYSISING EVIL TIGHTEN FROM MEGAMIND
Twin cities public television has a show called "How to speak Minnesotan." For more information.😂
Margie's husband wasn't the only one that loved her. Fargo was a great movie, and Frances McDormand was just so great in it.
The only thing better than her performance in the film was her strut across the stage while accepting her Oscar for it.
"Let's keep discussing Jerry's stupidity." OK! 😂
After living in PA all my life and moving to MPLS at 25, I can attest to this "politeness". It is often more genuine then ppl think it is, like the gentleman code of Victorian England, it is a form of discipline designed to make those around you more comfortable. A sacrifice, small yes, but a sacrifice of self for the larger social group.
I moved from MPLS to Honolulu another place where ppl are incredibly kind, though I'll say, in Hawaii, it is not an act, but perhaps a form of geographic psychology born of being born in a physical (if not mental) paradise.
Living now in Baltimore I can tell you, passive aggressive or not, it's far preferable to the feral lack of social consideration on display here every day
It’s a values thing. Discipline and sacrifice like you said, are values found in people from places all over the world that know human community is more important than material wealth. They will act more friendly out of genuine care for others. The Hawaii thing for example isn’t just about the nice environment itself, those people have a rich history where survival depends on cooperation but even still the kindness isn’t just for their own selfish benefit it’s for empathy of knowing how others struggle as well.
That attitude plays into recognizing other humans as your own and treating them as such and the culture reflects that. In a lot of places in America it’s “a dog eat dog world” culture of individualism where everyone feels like they’re responsible for their own resources so they treat others like an enemy. There’s a severe lack of values like discipline, sacrifice and respect here because people are taught that the things they have are more important than other humans.
Minnesota Nice absolutely has a passive-aggressive undercurrent, and I say this as a Minnesotan. While Fargo exaggerates it for effect, it very much exists.
Oh yah?
As a Norwegian. This is really spot on.
And i kinda like it here, where talking to strangers on public transport is seen as something only crazies and drunks do. Unless you have a damn good reason, like a question or a plead for assistance.
Oh, and if we ever ask how you're doing, it's not an invitation to talk about your personal life. We don't EVER do that to people we haven't known for 10+ years or reeeeeaaaaaaally have a deep relationship with. And even then we'll ask specifics.
"How are you" had two accepted answers; I'm good or I'm ok.
My god, that question, "How are you," is one of the worst sides of our culture.
Say "Hei. Hva skjer?" or something instead of posing a question you don’t want the answer to.
The only answer to How are you, in the usa, is also 'how are you'. Its not unique to Norway.
I've always wondered why the son doesn't look anything like either parent. For me, that somehow adds to the "not all is right under the surface" theme.
It's a movie.
I'm from North Dakota and I live in Minnesota. I think when Fargo came out, it got up our noses because it felt like we were being made fun of by a bunch of Hollywood people. But you know, many of us DO talk like that and I can tell you MN nice is real. We have thing I call the Minnesota Standoff: four people at a four way stop, motioning for the other to go ahead, starting a little bit and then realizing the other person was already going, stopping laughing, motioning, etc. on to infinity...I had a boyfriend in College whose father got their family so massively in debt that he liquidated all my boyfriend's college fund, got a 2nd mortgage on the house and then still had to declare bankruptcy. He was almost half a million in debt by the end. It was all credit card debt. He just kept rolling it over and over. They were living massively above their income for like five years with nothing really tangible to note. You know vacations and eating out and stuff like that all the time, with never paying bills fully and carrying interest. He just liked to be the big shot that paid for stuff and it made people like him and helped his ego. It was weird. He was very mild mannered, never had any gambling debt or anything. He was a lot like Jerry actually...
Thanks for vid; it helped me understand the movie better. The whole time I watched Fargo, I was like, “This guy is so stupid. What’s the point of this story?” And that’s kinda it. His evil is stupid, and he didn’t think out the details, and it cost him and many others.
Shep truly steals all the scenes he’s in.
The Coen brothers have made many amazing films, but even so, this one, imo, remains far and away their best to date. Excellent job covering this, Vile Eye!
RIP akira Toriyama. Please do frieza
DBZ has so many iconic villains. Toriyama was such a talented writer and artist. He made some of the most memorable, well-designed villains in all of pop culture. It's time to cover Frieza, one of the most beloved villains in all of anime and manga.
Cry me a river
Piccolo Piccolo Piccolo!!!! From demon king to junior
"Justttttt a sec", Justtttttt a sec" 🤣🤣
Lorne Malvo is a must
Everytime I hear Carl mimic Jerry’s “What dya mean!” in reference to those “3 poor souls in Brainerd” I can’t stop chuckling.
Very few films reach this level of mastery.
Isn't that almost every Coen Brothers masterpiece? Especially no country
@@Lisa_LouWho when you're right, you're right. Them boys don't miss
@papabird4425 they really don't. Ooh Barton Fink
props to you for filming your 0:06 - 0:52 intro segment outside in the snow wearing only a t-shirt and slacks. that's some real discipline
Minnesotan here, thank you for calling it what it actually is, MN Passive Aggression. Makes for great storytelling for sure. And yes, the accents are largely on point.
I've traveled a bit and I can assure you, passive aggressive isn't unique to Minnesota. Try any of the states. Or England some time.
An eleventh rule recognized, "the penal code of Jante" is:
Perhaps you don't think we know a few things about you?
That describes my Norwegian family to a tee!😂
This is one of your best Analyzing Evil videos and certainly one of the most pivotally best films in history. Thanks so much for sharing.
As a Minnesotan, that was the most accurate breakdown of Minnesota Nice/Passive Aggressive I've heard on a youtube video.
Jerry’s car loan scam with GMAC was based on a real guy who did the same thing on the east coast.
He got loans for van conversions but no vans were converted. He spent the cash on real estate and some other stuff.
Know what happened to him?
@@BillyButcher90I don’t remember, he did serve some jail time. He just had the loans and not the kidnapping.
Love that bad decisions and general incompetence lead to all the chaos and destruction in this movie. It all feels very real