If "Fargo" Season 5, Episode 3 left us in a trance, Episode 4 breaks that hypnosis with real plot moves. Titled "Insolubilia," this week's installment was written, as ever, by series creator Noah Hawley and directed by Donald Murphy. It picks up with another entertaining home invasion sequence — and, this time, the consequences are dire. After three episodes of cat-and-mouse, Dot (Juno Temple) and her former stepson Gator (Joe Keery) finally come face-to-face. Read on for a rundown of all the illuminating details you might have missed in "Fargo" Episode 4.
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Warning: Spoilers ahead for "Fargo" Season 5, Episode 4.
It's Halloween and Gator's goons break into Dot's home wearing "The Nightmare Before Christmas" character masks. She smartly sets off the fire alarm, which guarantees the cops will arrive soon. When she finally comes out of hiding, she swings at Gator but misses. He takes his mask off and says, "Jesus, Nadine." She scolds him: "Shame on you, Gator. There's a baby in this house."
It's clear that Dot isn't afraid of Gator, but of Roy. We know he's not a "winner" like his dad, and Dot probably knows it, too. Besides, he was around 10 years old when she last saw him. There seems to be some residual warmth between them, evident in the way Gator tenderly grabs her family photo. The question is whether he'd ever disobey his father's orders.
Wayne Is Hospitalized
Michelle Faye/FX
Wayne (David Rysdahl) is baffled by the home invasion, ignoring Dot's warning not to touch the electrified window sill. He's zapped unconscious and the curtains catch fire. Dot rolls him off the roof and makes it across the street safely with Scotty (Sienna King). Gator's injured crew (Dot's sledgehammer trap actually killed one intruder) escape just as the cops pull up to the burning house.
We cut to Roy (Jon Hamm) in his chapel asking God (his "old friend") to aid him in his "hour of need." He once saw "Beelzebub himself" whispering in the ear of a man who had just slaughtered his wife and children, and he expects to meet some evil again. He goes home to find that Ole Munch has painted an occult symbol in blood above his twin daughters' beds.
The next morning, Dot and Scotty are in the hospital awaiting Wayne's recovery. She swears her daughter to secrecy: Faulty wiring electrocuted Wayne and ignited the blaze, and there was no break-in. "If we talk about those men, they come back. They hear you talking and they come back," Dot instructs her. She adds that the truth must be that simple because bad things don't happen to good people. "If you follow the rules and think only good thoughts, the kingdom of heaven will be the reward," she says.
It's the first time we've heard Dot talk about religion, but it's difficult to tell whether she's saying it sincerely or as a demonstration to Scotty of the lie they must tell themselves and others to survive.
Roy's First Wife Disappeared, Too
Michelle Faye/FX
Meanwhile, Witt (Lamorne Morris) shows Indira (Richa Moorjani) the footage of Dot at the Gas-N-Go. There's no video of Munch — either because the lights went out or because he's a "ghost" or "something else," Witt suggests. When they learn that Dot's house burned down overnight, they book it to the hospital. Witt tells Dot he's glad to see her again, and she continues her ruse, saying, "That's not accurate." Lorraine (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is baffled and angry at Dot, but eager to keep the police out of it. "We've got our own reality," Danish (Dave Foley) tells Witt and Indira.
Witt starts asking more pointed questions about what Dot's kidnappers wanted, but she's saved by the news that Wayne is awake. She goes to his hospital room and it's clear he's suffering from some kind of amnesia — if not brain damage. He calls her Nadine, and she corrects him. She instructs him on their story (faulty wiring, no foul play) and promises she's going to fix everything: "We'll build a new house and we'll live just like the fairytale says" — that is, happily ever after. If it wasn't evident in the first three episodes, it's clear now that Dot really does love Wayne.
Back in North Dakota, FBI Agents Joaquin (Nick Gomez) and Meyer (Jessica Phly) urge a judge to sign off on going after Roy. We learn that both his previous wives—Gator's mother and Dot/Nadine—went missing. They also have intel that Roy indeed funneled weapons into his father-in-law Oden Little's militia, which we caught a glimpse of in Episode 3. But the judge refuses to go to war with the most powerful sheriff in North Dakota who's also connected to the most powerful militia in the upper Midwest. Joaquin and Meyer then get word about Dot/Nadine's prints popping up in the system and resolve to go after Roy anyways.
Ole Munch Speaks!
Michelle Faye/FX
Munch (Sam Spruell) is in the bathtub soaking off the previous night's blood and mud, monologuing about how freedom used to mean simply 'freedom from hunger' or 'freedom from death.' It was a zero-sum game about survival: "To free himself, the man ate first so others could not. He killed before he was killed. He wanted nothing more because only kings had the freedom to want." Now, everyone fancies himself a king. If they don't get what they want, "they say they are not free." What's more, Munch says, nobody understands that the cost of freedom "is always death. Life for life. Me or you."
The camera pans to the old woman standing in the bathroom, scared and confused. She asks Munch what he wants and he says simply, "pancakes." It's what Dot wants, too, in a way: To return to the safety and freedom she had as a wife and mother, symbolized by the pancakes she makes for Scotty.
Finally, Roy checks in (as promised) on the abusive husband Joshua and his wife Lenore from Episode 2. He spots a new bruise on Lenore's wrist, sighs ("I tried") and purposely provokes Joshua: "You're what we call a waste of skin. Defective. Eating our food, breathing our air. Wasting precious resources." Joshua pulls a gun but Roy shoots him in the neck, leaving him to bleed out slowly. That's when Gator busts in with the news that he failed to capture Dot/Nadine again. Roy plans to pin Munch's murder of the deputy on Joshua and pay off Lenore for her silence. The episode ends with Roy riding off into the sunset to "clear [his] head."
New episodes of "Fargo" premiere Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET on FX and stream the following day on Hulu.
