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The W - Movies & TV - #Fargo 2x8: “Loplop”
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Mr Shh
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Since: 9.1.02
From: Monmouth County, NJ

Since last post: 1295 days
Last activity: 1294 days
#1 Posted on | Instant Rating: 7.02
Loplop is the name given to a birdlike creature created by surrealist painter Max Ernst. Loplop takes many forms throughout Ernst’s body of work. Ernst identified Loplop as his alter-ego. Loplop’s origin was likely borne from the death of Ernst’s childhood pet bird, an event which occurred practically simultaneously with the birth of his sister. These coinciding events caused Ernst to believe that his sister (a controlling human) stole the life of his bird (a symbol of true freedom).

Throughout this season, Peggy Blomquist has been coming to terms with her own Loplop-esque alter ego. She sees her husband as the controlling human stealing her true freedom. But it’s not that Ed is doing it deliberately. It’s the homebound life represented by Ed that is stealing Peggy’s lifeforce. She has been trying to breakthrough and self-actualize for a while now, and certain triggering events have been pushing the process forward, breathing new life into her struggle. The first that we witnessed was Peggy hitting Rye Gerhardt with her car. The latest is Peggy incapacitating Dodd Gerhardt with a cattle prod and tying him up in a chair. Following this event, Peggy has a conversation with a hallucination of (presumably) the head of the Lifespring self-help seminar that she is supposed to be attending in Sioux Falls. Her hallucination provides the words that finally gets Peggy to the place she’s been looking for – don’t think, just be. It’s the central theme of the season: abandon reason in a life devoid of reason and embrace the absurd.

Of course, Peggy was actually talking to a tied-up Dodd, whose reaction is the first of many top-notch comedic interactions in this episode. Ed arrives home after running away from Lou and Hank, and the Blomquists hit the road with Dodd in the trunk. And Hanzee is right there, hiding in the shadows, ready to follow. During the car ride, Peggy is beaming because now she is who she was always meant to me. Her Loplop is Positive Peggy. This epiphany allows Peggy to no longer view Ed as a cinder block tied to her leg. They’re in it together from now on, although Ed’s thoughts on next steps are slightly more practical than Peggy’s: Ed’s plan is to hide out in Ed’s uncle’s cabin in Sioux Falls and use Dodd as leverage to get the pursuing Gerhardts off their backs.

The majority of this episode runs parallel to the last, as we witness Ed’s multiple failed attempts to get anyone at the Gerhardt house to care that Dodd has been taken hostage. We also get to watch Jeffrey Donovan, Kirsten Dunst and Jesse Plemmons steal the show while holed up in the cabin (though overall, Kirsten was magnificent). Ed and Peggy are chillingly competent dealing with their prisoner, the heir apparent to a crime family. At one point, Peggy, without flinching or a second thought, gave Dodd two flesh wounds with a kitchen knife to shut up his misogynistic ranting. And then, when finally Ed reaches out to Mike Milligan at the Pearl Hotel, he carries himself almost flawlessly, as if he’s been doing this for years. Throughout the season, we have watched Ed morph into his own Loplop alter ego, the Butcher of Luverne. Ed and Mike agree to meet in Sioux Falls tomorrow morning to exchange Dodd Gerhardt for Milligan’s protection.

The episode also followed Hanzee as he tried to locate the Blomquists’ hiding spot. Zahn McClarnon does his fair share of stealing the show this week as well. Hanzee’s mission, ordered by his controllers, the Gerhardts, is to take out the Butcher of Luverne. He works towards that end, but along the way, he is beginning to think about the meaning of his own life. His first stop is a bar where an outside plaque commemorates the hanging of 22 Sioux...the ground underneath the plaque is covered in vomit. Inside the bar, he is forced to deal with the racist barkeep who spits in his water and doesn’t care that Hanzee did three tours in Vietnam and earned a Purple Heart and Bronze Star. Outside the bar, three patrons taunt him with slurs. Hanzee, just as chillingly as Peggy stabbing Dodd, Wounds the Knees of two of the patrons, goes back in the bar to shoot the bartender who called the cops, then shoot the two cops who arrive on the scene.

Eventually, Hanzee locates the cabin, with some help from Peggy’s Lifespring companion Constance and a local shop owner. Throughout the episode, Hanzee’s face is stoic and his voice is calm - neither betray what is going on in his head. But when he enters the cabin to find Ed, Peggy and Dodd (who freed himself while Peggy was *really* immersed in Ronald Reagan’s movie “Operation: Eagles Nest” on the TV), he...asks professional hair stylist Peggy Blomquist for a haircut. Dodd, dealing with a knife-applied hole in his foot, is understandably angry that Hanzee won’t shoot the Blomquists. Dodd being Dodd, uses some derogatory language towards Hanzee, and that causes Hanzee to put a bullet into Dodd’s head. In the midst of this chaos, which has frozen Ed and Peggy, Hanzee still wants the haircut, done professionally – he’s “tired of this life.” In a brilliant scene, just before Peggy could make the first cut of Hanzee’s hair, Ed spots Lou and Hank approaching the cabin, Hanzee spots Ed spotting Lou and Hank, Hanzee fires out the window at Lou and Hank, Peggy stabs Hanzee with the scissors, and Hanzee flees.

With that first snip of the scissors, Hanzee would have taken the first step to becoming his own Loplop alter ego (perhaps it would be called Hophop after the bunny from Hanzee’s childhood). But that will have to wait a bit. There is a little unfinished business to take care of. The cops are here and Mike Milligan is on his way for a now-deceased Dodd Gerhardt. The Fox, the Rabbit (Hanzee, obviously) and the Cabbage are converging on Sioux Falls, and there’s one last Massacre to be had.




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EddieBurkett
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Since: 3.1.02
From: GA in person, NJ in heart

Since last post: 63 days
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#2 Posted on | Instant Rating: 7.85
Mr Shh, your insight into the episode titles is amazing. Are you some sort of scholar or are you doing research before each of your recaps?

Poor Hanzee. From dealing with the assholes at the bar (which sounded like a way bigger deal when Hank described it last week) to almost getting out (at least, I think that's what he was asking for with his haircut.) He's going to be stuck living this bad ass life for at least another episode or two. I wonder if he's going to pass his spirit onto a wolf at Sioux Falls, and then maybe we'll see the wolf pass the spirit onto a little boy.

If anything, maybe the aliens come down, abduct Hanzee and Milligan, and then morph them into a young Lee Malvo.

Do we know that Kansas City wins this fight? I mean, Fargo is down to just Lloyd and Bear at this point. I suppose its in play that Peggy and The Butcher wind up in control of everything. Outside of letting Dodd escape and nearly hanging Ed, they did a pretty good job as kidnappers. I did NOT see Peggy's meanstreak with the knife coming. I also didn't understand why she settled for stabbing Dodd in the foot, but given that the handle came off, that worked well.

The roach on the tv. Wasn't that what Peter Stomare was watching on tv at the cabin in the movie?

Was Hank concussed when he had to be stretchered out? I didn't quite catch what happened to him.

Can't wait for the next two episodes.



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Mr Shh
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Since: 9.1.02
From: Monmouth County, NJ

Since last post: 1295 days
Last activity: 1294 days
#3 Posted on | Instant Rating: 7.02
    Originally posted by EddieBurkett
    Are you some sort of scholar or are you doing research before each of your recaps?

Really appreciate it, thanks. I'm a wannabe scholar. The show makes me want to read up on philosophy the way Lost made me want to learn quantum physics. Honestly, the only reference I knew on my own was "The Gift of the Magi." I look up the reference then apply it to the characters. And I really think I'm making connections that professionals should be making but don't. Maybe the connections aren't legit, but it's clear every title is very carefully chosen. But the recaps are like, oh yeah, Loplop is a bird.


    Do we know that Kansas City wins this fight? I mean, Fargo is down to just Lloyd and Bear at this point. I suppose its in play that Peggy and The Butcher wind up in control of everything.

There's an organized crime presence in "present-day" Fargo. Like, office-building organized. It's leaning towards K.C.


    Outside of letting Dodd escape and nearly hanging Ed, they did a pretty good job as kidnappers.

Like, really good. Too good. Everything's in play, right? So, I say Ed and Peggy are former crime-family soldiers who got kidnapped by aliens and had their memories erased.


    Was Hank concussed when he had to be stretchered out? I didn't quite catch what happened to him.

He's still suffering the effects of Hanzee knocking him in the head with a gun, and the level of activity he's keeping up is making things worse. The thing that really bothers me a lot is that he left the Blomquist house without checking back inside for Peggy. Unless he was just too shaken up by the injury to think straight.



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