Ozark – Why, why why?

“…this drama series stars Jason Bateman as Marty Byrde, a financial planner who relocates his family from Chicago to a summer resort community in the Ozarks. With wife Wendy and their two kids in tow, Marty is on the move after a money-laundering scheme goes wrong, forcing him to pay off a substantial debt to a Mexican drug lord in order to keep his family safe. While the Byrdes’ fate hangs in the balance, the dire circumstances force the fractured family to reconnect.”

Rotten Tomatoes

Whilst backpacking through Europe on a shoestring budget many moons ago, we shared a flat in Edinburgh with Susan and her boy-husband. She was the pretty American that needed a visa, he was the local Scotsman who could supply the visa.

They were young and beautiful and irreverent. They were also an alcohol-fuelled trainwreck obviously heading for such heartache, perhaps even tragedy. Until they reached that destination, these two flatmates were onboard for the melodrama at every stop – the cooing, the raucous fights, comic-style make-up sex (the typical headboard scenario), her locking him out, him ringing the bell at 2am, one moving out, then moving back in, and of course money squabbles.

One of their last altercations led to Susan wailing ‘Why, why, why?’ throughout the night. I suspect visa-boy cheated and Susan somehow felt wronged. To this day if the wife and I encounter something ridiculous, something funny yet tragic, but utterly entertaining, we quote Susan. One quick incantation of ‘Why, why, why?’ and we are back in that Edinburg lounge watching Susan pour another glass of cheap red wine and taking aim at visa-boy watching soccer.

Like these two doomed lovers, Ozark is a freight train heading down a bumpy track at a breakneck speed. Destination? Cheap Thrills, Missouri. So, why, why, why do I find the show so entertaining? Why do I care about the Byrde family? Why do I hate Darleen? And Omar? Is it the subject matter? The characters? The tension? All the above?

We watched the Byrde parentals morphing into baddies in the first three seasons, and in the fourth, we are witnessing the Byrde kids morphing into baddies. No real surprise there.

And sure, spitfires Laura Linney and Julia Garner going off the rails is entertaining, especially next to Jason Bateman’s very calm, collected Marty.

The contrast between the Byrde’s drug dealing, murdering, and money laundering ways, and their stock standard parenting tactics, old family cars and Marty’s one singular anorak he wears is definitively interesting.

Also, dicks are shot off. All very entertaining.

But when do we get off the train? Like we got off the Susan and visa-boy’s train the moment we could afford it? Even though Ozark is entertaining, it is also rather seedy and amping up the shock value. When do we want more than formulaic, shocking, but ultimately empty TV? I don’t know about you, but I am in until that white ‘Next episode´ button is no longer there.