The setting allows the ensemble cast a deeper exploration of sticky moral quandaries. In the previous two versions of Fargo this was taken to Old Testament lengths: a primordial struggle between good and evil. With the lens of Season 2 looking all the way back to 1979, Hawley turns a sharp eye to the moral turmoil of a nation—then and now. The aftermath of war bleeds into every corner of Fargo Season 2. Almost every character pauses at some point or another to tell an anecdote from Vietnam, Korea, or the Western Front.
“The war references—both Vietnam and World War II—the oil crisis, Reagan coming in,” star Patrick Wilson told me, “that is the benefit of the 70s to play in. It was such a strange time.”
Hawley said that military conflict isn’t the only war that marks Fargo Season 2. “A lot of it had to do with my desire to try to dramatize the American identity in that moment at a time where the positive revolutionary 60s would turn into this violent radical 70s. It seemed like all the disenfranchised groups, the American Indian movement and the Black Panther Party and second-wave feminism, it just seemed like everyone was going to fight and finally get their seat at the table.”
And it’s there that Fargo Season 2 leans forward from the 70s to have a dialogue with 2015.