I thought the same thing, the ending felt more like a season finale, they left plenty of material to go on. Also, I get that they wanted to end it showing the Byrdes finally admitting they´re bad people, but it felt forced, the way the 4 of them were all on the same page about killing Mel. "Well, guess we´re evil now".
It was so forced that the “dilemma” they were in was just completely fabricated… I’m sure there’ll be someone somewhere who argues this, but Mel, in my estimation, never really had them in a compromised position. “Hi, I am not a cop anymore, and I just illegally broke into, entered and stole from this family’s residence. But get this: I saw a COOKIE JAR! And look! While they were gone, I found this burned up dead body in it! No, I don’t know how he died or where or have *any* proof that *they* knew, had killed him or were even in possession of his dead body… BUT STILL! I committed a crime and am now accusing *them* of one! GOTCHA!” That’s not how chain-of-custody works… You can’t just promise that a family’s cookie jar had a corpse in it because you swear that it did when you broke in and stole the cookie jar. Dumb ending to a good show.
yes the ending was a bit forced should've concluded in a better way but ig it shows how the byrde's rose to power through their dark history like mel mentioned with the kennedy's etc so jonah and charloette realised family over everything
@@christianc.christian5025 This is kind of missing the point. It's not that Mel is going to implicate them with this cookie jar of Ben ashes. The problem is that Mel has them figured out and will never stop hounding them. That night it was the Baphomet-looking cookie jar. The next day will be his investigation into Ruth Langmore's disappearance. He's not stopping so he had to be dealt with. The real point isn't that Mel's got them, it's that they ultimately had to deal with him like a criminal enterprise in a way that finally disregarded any pretense of scruples and implicated their children in the crime.
especially Jonah, his character felt so forced to that final minute of the show, considering what they were trying to do with his development for smth like 10 episodes straight
What? Many people didn't like the ending of Breaking Bad? I watched the finale (and the season 5 second half) live and the ending was universally praised across fanbase. First time I'm hearing that Breaking Bad ending wasn't loved as it felt like the perfect conclusion to Walter's character.
5 หลายเดือนก่อน +19
Yeah I’ve never heard anyone complain about breaking bads ending. It was perfect. Perfect. Right down to the last minute.
The one thing I've always thought about with the ending of the series finale was I figured at least Marty would have been smart enough to explain to Mel that he just broke into their house and illegally obtained evidence against them and that any judge would immediately toss that out leaving Mel with nothing on them again...
Very true, or just tackle him and steal it from his drunk ass, then call his superior and explain a whitewashed version of what he did. No reason for JONAH of all people to kill him.
It was always more about solving the mystery for Mel. Probably why he confronts them instead of, you know, taking what he knows to the police. Maybe at that point the plan was to expose the Byrds and sully their name rather than have them sent to prison. And I also think the reason for killing him wasn't because he was perceived as a threat but because they could.
Just finished the show the other night and I did have to sit on the ending for a bit. Throughout this whole show, I've always seen the Byrdes as some sort of infection or an invasive species. They found a host (the Ozarks) and began taking root by any means they felt necessary. Sure, they would do anything to protect their children and they knew the things they were doing were shitty, but at the end of the day they could truly only care about their own when it really came down to it. Ruth had gotten close to them but never truly entered their family bubble because of her nature of only allowing so much bullshit before she retaliated and because of that, she was always destined to meet her end. I understand the ending feeling "unsatisfying" but in a weird way, I feel like that was the point. The seemingly abrupt ending to me shows that despite all of the shit they went through, wiping out families and relationships in their wake, that this life will never end for them. They're not "out" as they believe and it sort of makes this a tragedy, not for the Byrdes, but for the Ozarks. I felt like this ending was as realistic as it could get, despite the audience wanting things to be okay. It felt like there could be more afterwards but it's like the show was saying "Yeah, it's gunna be the same shit until they die, fam. Nothing's really changed." In the first season, the antagonist was the cartel, then it seemed like that role went to Wendy with all her ambition, then by the end I was just like "Yeap, we've been following the origin story to the true villains." I understand this ending maybe could have been done a bit better, but that bitter ending was pretty spot on within the context of this show. I do really hate how Jonah turned out, though. I think the whole Wendy apologizing was a good scene, but to make it so that Jonah felt that was enough to just forgive her was a bit hard to believe, especially considering how much they've established how much he seems to despise her more and more after Ben's death. Dude, I really wanted Marty to make a move so that Wendy ended up getting stuck in that hospital and he got the kids out safe lol. At the end of the day, despite the few shortcomings at the end of the series, this was one of the most gripping and anxiety inducing shows I've seen in a long time.
They're the starling birds from season 1. The invaders that destroy everything in their paths. So many things could've, would've, should've been better but the show is still an A+.
They weren't collectively portrayed as an infection though - for seasons Marty was shown to be nurturing, forgiving, taking Ruth and Rachel under his wing, Jonah befriended Buddy, etc. Everyone bar Wendy was trying to stay positive and survive an oppressive and crazy predicament, while Wendy just decided to go full heel. The problem is Wendy being portrayed as increasingly malevolent (consistent with her cheating at the start), was completely at odds with the rest of her family - yet they're roped into sticking with her at the expense of seasons worth of characterisation. They ultimately needed to end with Wendy going down for various shit and possibly Marty too in a more tragic way, with Ruth busting loose and maybe taking the kids with her. I think the writers were too scared of being labelled misogynists to do away with Wendy unfortunately.
I think Wendy apologizing to Jonah was the start of it but the accident cemented it. For an instant he thought his mother died not knowing whether or not he loved her.
But how was the ending brutally honest? Wendy's line may have been sure, and it could have been a good final message from the show, but the execution was so laughably awful. It does not correlate with the development of the characters at all, and this mistake is most noticeable when it comes to Marty, why is it that Marty was crying and distraught only a few epsiodes prior because he felt so much guilt and remorse for the horrible things he's done, but then in the final scene he is completely fine with his son killing an innocent man, and he even gives him a smug smile and nod. It just makes absolutely no sense for his character to be content with that, the only character that makes sense within the ending is Wendy because she actually developed into a person that would do awful things as long as it benefitted her, but that doesnt really apply to any of the other characters. So if anything the ending was dishonest, because it disregards all of the characters development and moral stances just for the sake of making a "point". That is just not good writing.
The ending could have been way better. I don’t like the way they turned Ruth into a clueless moron just to get the ending they wanted. No way she sees a car parked in her driveway & gets out of her truck unarmed. I wanted either a shocking ending or a completely free from the Cartel ending. Instead we just get a moron PI willfully turning himself into the Cartel.
Thank you for this. I agree mostly. A couple of additional points. The Minivan crash and the road rage incident were, in my opinion, cheap shots to get compelling action footage for the trailer. Violent rolling car crash? Wendy fighting for her life on the ground? Wow! But in the show both are obviously just filler BS. Wendy having a hissy fit and checking herself into the Crazy House until her kids come home was silly and out of character. And Ruth had been through too much and had become too wise, too smart, too savvy to be caught so dumbly flat footed in her own yard. Her death didn't bother me, it just felt lazy.
Yes. I don’t like the way they turned Ruth into a clueless moron just to get the ending they wanted. No way she sees the known cartel SUV parked in her driveway & gets out of her truck unarmed. I wanted either a shocking ending or a completely free from the Cartel ending. Instead we just get a moron PI willfully turning himself into the Cartel.
Agree 100%. For a few seconds we were like huh so this is how they gonna send off Wendy, possibly creating one last dramatic arc for the family but nope she was back with Navarro next scene
The last episode with the way they walked away from the car crash a d the way they get away with everything is indicative of the whole series... They are basically slippery eels, clocked in plot armour, they never get their comeuppance, they're indestructible and everyone else dies as a consequence
In an interview with the writers they said something like “we wanted the ending to be something you felt weird about after cheering” or something like that, and I thought “well what makes you think we’re cheering in the first place?” Sure Mel was annoying and nosey at first but by the end I started to like him and really wanted him to take them all down. The writers also said they felt Ruth needed to get what she deserved for killing Javi. But why just her? Why not the Byrds? Sure it makes a point about corruption in America, but wasn’t that hammered in anyway? What I love about Breaking Bad is that idea of consequences for your actions. And here there are none. All the set up about Marty standing up against Wendy or the Byrds getting some kind of punishment for their actions has gone to nothing. Jonah does a complete 180 on his character arc in the last second, the car crash meant nothing, and the only reason we had three cartel deals instead of one was to kill Ruth and elongate the show. I genuinely thought Marty would kill Navarro’s sister and save Ruth, redeeming him but forcing him to be the FBI’s new Navarro (which it seemed like they were setting up), Jonah and Charlotte would escape and Wendy would die. Or at least the detective and Maya would cause some mayhem. But there was no build up to anything. There was tension all the way through, sure, but the protagonists made it out with no harm to themselves. Because “this is America.” Idk, I felt like it cared more about making a point than telling a story. That said every other episode was fantastic and the performances were phenomenal. (Also why cut to black? We don’t need a cliffhanger, it’s the end of a show!) Tldr; Marty deserved redemption, Wendy deserved punishment, Ruth and the kids deserved to live free and good. Haven’t been so disappointed by an ending since I watched No Country for Old Men.
@@valentin7693 yeah but doing it in the most unironically plot armored way is frustrating. Every man/woman claiming to be the great king of Kings will eventually fall
@@whatno3145 Key word ‘eventually’ we just didn’t get to see their downfall. The ending made a point about how they’ll never escape the life they’ve entered and the closest they would ever get to a happy ending is temporary peace before shit hits the fan once again and they’ve another mess on their hands. When you’re criminals as efficient as them it either takes an extremely long time to be taken down or you die without ever being taken down. That’s how real life criminals on this scale end up.
Ruth deserved to die, if for no other reason than she killed her uncles. In the end, she deserved to die just as much, if not more, than every other character that got it in this show.
Good god, it was about to be my favorite series of all time. I haven’t felt that betrayed since the GoT finale. All they had to do was switch Ruth & Wendy’s fates.
@@raymondwatt9773 Yeah, but no show without Ruth. I think people forget that we watch this stuff for escape. I already know life can seem pointless, I don't need to pay to see that.
I don’t think a satisfying, redemptive ending was ever in the cards for this show. Ozark is first and foremost a drama about a broken family that tries to reconnect at ALL COST. Even if it means losing their own humanity in the process. And you see them gradually descent into bigger shit at the expense of others just to achieve that goal. Personally I feel the show has the perfect ending - horrifying yet happy. Did the Byrds become evil, immoral and ruthless criminals causing death of basically anyone who stands in their way - sure they did! But as a result they finally become a family again 🙃
@@tricivenola8164 Ain't no way she'll have a happy ending after killing Javi though. Her killing him felt in line with her character but her having no plan afterwards was... eh.
@@tricivenola8164exactly what this last post said ^^ and how many TIMES did Marty and Wendy tell not only Ruth, but Darlene and Wyatt, do not do what you’re doing. You can’t fuck with the cartel. This will end badly. None of them listened, they all made dumb ass decisions, Ruth most of all. And she had multiple chances to run away in the last episode!! Rachel asked her to, Marty said he’d help her disappear. She literally dug her own grave
Well, Breaking Bad was about the conditions it took to change the morals of someone and the consequences of those actions Ozark was about the influence and protection money has, as well as how what you do influences your kids Therefore, the endings are going to be different. We’re not supposed to like the ending of Ozark, but it certainly is realistic. Good people, or even better people, don’t win most of the time. There’s always a compromise of evil
@@chrissantos5580 The only real similarities between the two shows is Jesse and Ruth’s dynamic to the main character and the fact it involves drugs. Otherwise the plots, ending, the characters, and the utilization of such characters are very different
I didn’t think there was much of anything realistic about ‘Ozark’s ending at all. ‘Breaking Bad’ also had the very clear theme that Walt didn’t “turn into” a cold, hard, egotistical man, he just let that side of himself out of its cage.
@@SharkOutOfAir right a mile mannered nerd in a loveless marriage gets involved with a Mexican drug cartel and he survives because of his exceptional intellect The tone of the show is similar the main problem which there are many is Jason Bateman has no edge bryan Cranston does.
I don’t agree. It isn’t satisfying, that we can agree on, but it didn’t “fail”. This is the most realistic outcome. A rich and powerful family gets to where they are by using others. They repeatedly use others and ruin other people’s lives for their own benefit. With Ruth it was prolonged and because of it she suffered the most out of all the characters. They will most likely get out of the Cartel too. Seeing as Camila now worked for the feds. The Byrds won, and everyone lost. That is the point, just like many similar people and families in real life.
I’m sure they exist but I can’t think of *any* white-collar Cartel employees who were discovered and then got out without WitSec. I thought this was incredibly contrived. OC participants who make it either roll over or go into hiding. These people didn’t pay rent to mobsters and try to buddy up to them in their casinos like Cohen described with the Trumps. They ran the entire operation briefly. Camilla letting a potential replacement live was pretty corny.
@@trevbequick It's the fact that the show addresses this and played it off as 'supernatural' or 'luck'. It's also the fact that the whole car thing is to prove a point that the rich always wins or whatever, it's stupid and also forced. The ending is fine. The reasons for it are forced and unrealistic despite the realistic message the show leads up to. That's basically what I'm trying to say.
I didn't mind Ruth getting shot. I never got how we were supposed to root for her. The "Jesse Pinkman" analogy is ok, but not perfect. Unlike Jesse, we meet her because she stole money from the Byrds, and wanted to kill Marty at first, and only used the guise to be taught how to launder. The writers used every trick in the book to make viewers like her, such as befriending a special needs kid, to having an abusive dad, but she brought everything on herself. She was the one who got Ben out of the Mental Hospital, which led to his death, and she never took any blame, and she murdered Javi like a dumbass in front of many witnesses so the cartel could track it back to her. She also double crossed the Bryds by taking the casino, again, knowing full well the consequences of pissing off a drug cartel, having been tortured earlier by the same cartel. Marty offered to get her a new identity for a fresh start, but again she refused. So I was happy she got murdered.
I agree with everything but the havi thing. He was a lose emotional cannon who was to impatient to be a leader. He should have been excited sooner . that was the smartest thing ruth did in the entire show even if it was her down fall.
@@crazychase98 i don't have a problem with her killing Javi, just the way she did it. Its not like she couldn't have planned something to make it not go back to her, or even set up someone else.
You're completely entitled to your opinion, but I disagree with a lot of what you said here. Mostly with the idea of having a "satisfying" ending and how it relates to the quality of the story, because I just cannot seem to simply correlate "satisfaction" with quality. Of COURSE I didn't want Ruth to die, and I respect the fact that you draw attention to how much sense it made in the context of what was happening, I just think you're looking at it in a micro lens instead of a macro lens. I don't want to write a dissertation on a YT comment but The long and short of it is, Ozark is a huge metaphor for how easy it is for the people who have access to ungodly amounts of money to manipulate the structure and policy of a particular community. Think about what Ruth represents, beyond of who we'd come to love as a character. We have seen, as direct result of the Byrde's involvement, the straight up genocide of the people of Ozark. The ones that were there long before Marty and Wendy even ended up in there. Families. The people that provided identity and context to what kind of place the lakes were pre Byrde. The Snells? gone. Every Langmore but III? Off the damn map in under 5 years. Sheriffs replaced, unseated legislators, and community employers getting their dads murdered and dicks shot off. A systematic erasure of all things resembling a status quo in a community introduced to us in S1 as this flawed place populated by real characters and rich history, and how it too would be subjected to the relentless turning gears of commerce and power until it becomes a mill for the rich to do [insert nefarious intention here] Ruth dying was an unceremonious nail in a coffin. It was watching a friend die. It was watching a ember, hoping for it to be fire again Knowing it couldn't be. Knowing it wouldn't be. Still actively hoping anyway. I saw this coming a mile away and I still cried, and its because of what the whole thing says despite how messy it seems. We don't need to see how this goes, because we already know. We know how capable and insidious Marty is, and we don't actually see him go full "Walter White" until the very last seconds of the show.[Something it never needed in spite of relentless comparisons to BB] That final look is him basically accepting that this is who he is now. The spinning plates are never going to stop spinning, and he is going to maintain this dumb ass beyblade shit because he literally has eroded the capability of his family to be anything else. They can never go back to Chicago and any viewer who believed they were ever going to needs to read a book. They're going to be juggling this for the rest of their existence, and we don't need to see them do it anymore, because we've seen 4 seasons of that, and they're more than capable. It was never Byrde vs Cartel, or Langmore vs Cartel, or FBI vs whoever. It was Money and Power vs The Ozarks, and The Ozarks lost. Ruth was the last one left, the smartest and most resourceful of all the "native" people left there, mercilessly crushed by the machine the Byrdes rode in on. Silent gristle in the fucking mill. It's a cold, bleak ending for a show that began sort of cold and bleak, and I love it all the more for it. Personally, it rings genuine to me because I'm certain this kind of thing happens to communities, albeit to less dramatic ends. I could go on about this more thoroughly but im kinda just rambling at this point. [believe me i know there are flaws in S4] It is not satisfying, but satisfaction doesn't make a good story. Substance does. Context does. Discussion does. This was a story about paving a paradise with a parking lot, and it did it's job telling that I think. Good video
It's not even about a lack of satisfaction, its about incompetent writing, the entire plot and character development throughout the entire show was inexplicably thrown out the window with the ending. It just made no sense, why only a few episodes prior would they show Marty distraught over the bad things hes done but then have him be completely fine with his son murdering an innocent man, even to the point of him having a smirk on his face, that is completely out of character and contradicts the characters moral stances that were displayed literally episodes prior, what is the point of showing that Marty has remorse if theyre just going to show him completely content when his son kills a person. And even on top of that, why would Jonah and Charlotte be okay with it? It all makes no sense, it is incredibly lazy writing. The theme or intended message is irrelevant when it doesn't correlate with the plot or characters development. Every season of this show was the same, introduce a new villain and a couple new characters, kill them off at the end, and then just completely forget about their existence and the corresponding events for the rest of the show with no consequences. It feels lazy, it feels like every season was just a repeat of the last except with "different" characters, and that results in a feeling of no stakes and no meaningful development of the characters, it is just not good.
Completely agree with this one. Redemption and satisfaction are pleasant and welcome aspects of an arc, but they are neither necessary or sufficient. A dissatisfaction for a lack of redemption seems to miss the grim and unforgiving themes of the show, where you wish it didnt have to be and all could be different, but sometimes redemption doesnt come, and satisfaction is far off.
I enjoyed your thoughtful and well-spoken analysis. For the most part your impressions echoed mine, especially Wendy’s ridiculous “redemption” because of a few words spoken in the hospital. Good luck with your channel, and thanks!
Holy crap, this is your first video? Outstanding work, sir! I understand the "point" that the show was going for with this ending, but they could have made that point while also having at least one character find redemption in the process. The word I keep thinking of that describes the finale for me is "unsatisfying". There were way too many dangling threads out there, and the only thing that felt final about it was Ruth's death. It definitely felt more like a season finale than a series finale. I've seen some people claim that Ruth had to die because "it's realistic", but I find that utterly ridiculous. Say what you will about Ozark - I mostly enjoyed the show - but the way things play out in the series is many things, and realistic is definitely not one of them, ha ha. Again, great work on this video!
Thanks! I agree. If the point of the show's ending was, "that's just how the world works," then you need to disregard the utter nonsense that the Byrdes survive from the cartel, the Snells, and the feds.
Yeah Darlene shotgunning a mob boss and facing no repercussions from said mob is the most unrealistic shit. The fact that Frank rolled into Darlenes house with his guard completely down is also just completely ridiculous.
Ozark's biggest problem was that it had no idea how to move events forward naturally, and it showed. "You're gonna have to give me a couple of days on that one" "You have 5 minutes"
I mean, I get what they were going for. The message they were trying to say at the end of Ozark is that the Byrds have become so powerful and corrupt that they are basically untouchable. That families like the Byrds are the ones who actually triumph in this ruthless capitalist world and they are able to get away with anything leaving a complete path of destruction behind them. Ok, I get that. The problem is that I don't think the series finale sells that message very well, mainly because at the end of the series, the Byrds don't seem very powerful to me. They are still subservient to the cartel, a cartel that can kill them at any moment. Worse, now they are working for Camila who is a way more erratic boss than Omar. The last act of the finale just left me perplexed. So are you going to tell me that Camila finds out that Ruth, the Byrds' closest associate, killed her son and that the Byrds didn't know anything about it? Are you really saying that Camila, a mob boss, is going to believe that the Byrds didn't know anything about it and that they didn't even think of Ruth as a suspect when they knew that Javi had killed Ruth's cousin? Come on! It should be obvious for someone like Camila to deduce that the Byrds obviously knew this and they were covering for Ruth. Worst than that, they actually manipulate her to take down Omar by making her believe he was the one who killed Javi. By that scene, Camila should have realized that she can't trust the Byrds, that the Byrds were involved in Javi's death and that she has to get rid of them as well. And let's remember, Camila is not Omar, she doesn't really care about the business, she doesn't care about the deal with the FBI, she mainly cares about avenging her son's death and killing anyone who had something to do with it, so the Byrds are out. By the end of the series, the Byrds should be in the worst danger they have ever been. They should be packing things and being on the run by the final scene. Instead of that, the series tells us: "Oh no, the Byrds are fine. They are actually more powerful than ever". And I'm like: What??? If they actually wanted to sell the message that the Byrds have acquired this royalty-like level of power, the series had to end with them taking over the cartel. That was the ending. They manipulate Camila to take down Omar and then, they take down Camilla themselves and then they take over the cartel. Marty and Wendy have all the connections with the FBI, they know all of the cartel's operations inside out, and it was already shown that Marty could run the cartel and that he already had the respect of the other lieutenants. They could have done it. And with that ending, yeah, the Byrds would answer to no one, they would be rich, they would have so many politicians in their pockets and they would be running the largest cartel in the world, so yes, they would essentially be royalty at that point.
That probably would've happened but doesn't mean we have to see them take over the cartel on screen. Why do people seek for that satisfaction everywhere? The ending left clues and questions and we can work out our own ideas and theories, that's the interesting part to me.
It would have been a much better ending to have Ruth kill Camila after she was shot and to end the show not with Mel confronting the family but instead grim faced FBI agents walking up to the Marty and Wendy at their house as their faces change from happiness of the evening to straight faced as they notice the FBI agents coming to tell them that Camila is dead, we wouldn't see this but we would know it, as the show cuts to black. All that effort and trail of bodies they left for nothing, they would get what they deserve, we don't need to see them in prison, just knowing they're screwed is enough. And that's what the two of them deserve.
To be clear, is this a feeling based on this show and it's themes specifically, or is it built off of a strong dislike towards the idea of any show ending in evil winning?
@@evangelosvasiliades1204 ooh that's actually an interesting way to look at it, I suppose thematically the actual ending works, the Byrds always win no matter what they get through. But I think human nature doesn't want evil to triumph, and personally I think it is a bit far-fetched that all of the Byrds end up fine with no casualties to the 4 of them. So more than anything it's a strong dislike, probably why I accepted the breaking bad finale more than Ozark's, Walter finally gets his comeuppance.
While both shows have some great writing, Breaking Bad is much more multi-layered than Ozark, characters development are so much better and we see the transformation of the story and people from season 1 to season 5, that's also one of the reasons i personally have more desire to rewatch the journey of Breaking Bad. I think Ben's plot in season 3 was a great example of how this series stepped up and started to gain more of that identity it sometimes lacked before, but unfortunately season 4 ended in a quite underwhelming way. I'm not necessarily disappointed with the idea they were trying to show, but the realization was definitely not the best example of what these writers can do. And the funny thing is that the show was known for constant build-up of tension and danger, where character's decision could led to other tens of other characters decisions' and resulted in actions, but in the final episode the climax appears out of sudden, 10 minutes before the credits and the reason behind it was the character who crumbled under the pressure and told the truth
I agree that Ozark's ending wasn't very satisfying, however I woulsn't describe that as a failure. I think it makes the show much stronger. Unfair and unsatisying things are what moved the plot forward up until now, so why would anything change for the ending. I think you said in your video is that Ozark could never have an entirely happy ending. I agree, but I would go a step further and say there couldn't be a happy ending whatsoever. Great vid tho!
"Unsatifysing" in the sense that a simply didn't like the events that took place because they wanted something specific to happen and "unsatisfying" in the sense that it felt incomplete are two separate things. Unfortunately, Ozark's ending ticks both boxes. Wendy should've died and the ending was too rushed.
I think it’s very unsatisfactory because it feels like the first-half of a story. What goes up must come down, and that is specially true when you got involved in both narcotics and politics in this day and age.
Great video! My favorite part of all was when Ruth was at their house and Marty and Wendy were trying to talk her out of going after Javi and she screamed " if you wanna stop me you're gonna have to effin KILLLL MEEEEEE!!!!!". I re-watched that part so many times. And I agree with your synopsis of the show. It was such an unsatisfactory ending!
I like a lot Ozark's ending, because it feels pretty realistic, bad people win, and good people die, that's it. I also enjoyed the open finale, because only in stories we have a good conclusive finale, but in reality life goes on. And if I got to be honest, I think that if the entire family would be death in that car accident that would be the most realist finale of all the time, the best life lesson a TV show could ever give, just my opinion.
But it's a show and not real life. Some people find open finales dissapointing because what is even the point of the show if they're just going to suddenly end it and there was no point?
I liked the ending. It was more like an anti-ending where you don't get what you want. It made the most sense to the real world, it felt grounded and a long time coming for all the characters. Ruth died because she had nothing special about her to the higher powers. She wasn't 'made' in the eyes of the cartel like the Byrde's were. She had made her grave when she shot Javi and when Carmella seized control. The Byrdes got out because they held true power that only they could harness for the cartel. The cartel got away scott free because the war on drugs enables them. In a very similar way to The Wire, the ending is about a systemic failure across the board that facilitates stories like these to carry on and on and on.
Frankly, if there were a 5th season someday I’m not watching it. Ruth’s death ended any interest I had in the show and the writers were wise to make her death happen at the end of the show. I’d literally have quit the whole show halfway through the season if they did it earlier.
It's titled "Ozark", not "The Byrdes". The Byrde family story is just now taking off. Their beginnings in "the Ozarks" has come to an end. It's not like BB where Walt's gone and I'm sure Jessie didn't pick up where he left off and start cooking in Alaska, so his story is pretty much done as well. Ruth chose to kill that gangster. It wasn't self defense or to protect anyone. Her choice caught up with her. Now, the Byrde's choices might eventually catch up with them, but that's another story. I thought that show was dope, beginning to end.
A bit cartoony for its own good, good moments but some ideas were written a little under the bar. I support the "he got caught in the car" theory. Only that way it's justifiable (for its plot). STILL, an A-tier episode, good ending, not perfect. 👍 Pacing, the way Walter took out the nazis (and maybe Walter dying even though I love the symbolism, shots and song) and Jesse's ending needed more direction (while still being open-ended, could've included the Mike talk from El Camino or something). It tied loose ends while not giving enough or in a completely satisfying way (this is why El Camino is a thing which doesn't quite deserve its existence). Okay, all considered a bit messy/on the nose but still satisfying and I love baby blue!
I didn't like the blackout wanna be ending like the Sopranos. The Byrdes are the starlings, the invaders that leave nothing but destruction in their paths. The show is an A+ for me, and the last 7 episodes felt rushed, and introduced characters that didn't need be. No show is perfect, but this is close. Have a great day.
I agree with it all except the idea of Ruth surviving. She starts the season by commuting a rage murder-not a lesser of two evils murder or a gangster doing business murder, a rage murder. It shows she’s not destined to make it out, too much of her own worst enemy.
@@tom_p9075you also really gotta understand, if she were to run, they’d kill three or have him as a hostage and ruth knew that and wanted to keep three safe. Sure she could’ve put up a “fight” and killed camila? but that would just bring more questions and NO CLOSURE.
@@tom_p9075even if she successfully ran away, she would always have to life her life by looking over her shoulder. She dug her grave when she killed Javi(CARTEL BOSS)
Didn't read all the comments yet but for me the problem with the ending is it wasn't a good series ender but it makes for a good SEASON ender. The family's goal of being out of it is gone now and the kids are fully in. So I'm hopeful the show comes back at least for a few episodes 3 or 4 years from now
My wife and I just finished this series. We watched every episode together so we were quite invested. Having watched Breaking Bad also, I initially found the two comparable. But they are vastly different. By the end of the show, I found myself waiting for it to over. Though I enjoyed it, it definitely wasn’t a satisfying ending.
I agree with a lot of this stuff that you’re talking about. However the last scene gets me and makes me like the ending (not more then BB). I have a feeling that it’s supposed to be wrapped up the way it was, the family was supposed to get away with it and by cutting the loose ends it makes a lot of sense imo. This is clear in my mind when Wendy says “since when” in response to “the world doesn’t work like that” (talking about doing horrible things) while I think it could have been more fleshed out, I liked the ending.
Ending was good, it makes sense why it ended where Marty was pretty much head of the cartel with FBI support, so no threat anymore from anywhere as cartel was happy too after Ruth was killed. And what comes to Mel he had nothing which could have power over arrangement and he got chance to get happy end but he ignored it and killing him made clear that their family is now untouchable. perfect ending.
Every series has a set of in-universe rules. One of the rules I noticed in Ozark is you do NOT kill ANYBODY for ANY reason because it will come back on you. That is why Ruth dies. If she hadn’t shot Javi, she wouldn’t have died and I don’t just mean plot-wise, but rule-wise. The entire series is also an extended metaphor for Wendy and Marty’s marriage. The “danger” the cartel represents is actually symbolic of the danger Wendy places her marriage in by cheating. Season 1 focuses on these events from Marty’s perspective, Season 2 from Wendy’s, Season 3 from Charlotte’s, and Season 4 from Jonah’s consecutively. The cartel is just a plot device used to flesh out the story in a more palpable way. The two times Marty is placed in the most dangerous position are when Wendy cheats and then the second time when Marty taps her phone. So for me personally, when watched through this lens, the series ends on a perfect note. The logic of the series is maintained but now we’re left with a never ending cliffhanger because Jonah has shot another person. Per the in-universe rules, is he exempt from them because he was protecting his family’s livelihood or will he be targeted next by the equilibrium of the show’s karma?
I think the in universe rule you brought up is cherry picked. • Marty killed Mason, nothing happened to him. • Wendy had her brother murdered, nothing happened to her. • Rachel murdered Nelson, nothing happened to her. • Darlene murdered Masons wife, Del, her husband, a random driver, and Frank Sr. The only death in this list that came back to haunt her was Del's. None of the other deaths had any ramifications for her.
@@zahubshahid7944 Marty was protecting his wife. The act was in defense of his family and therefore excusable. I should have clarified “for ANY reason” to mean “for ANY temperamental reason.” Wendy was not responsible for her brother’s death, not really. Ben made it impossible to remain protected because he wouldn’t do as he was told. Had he listened to Marty and Wendy, he may have made it out alive. A death sentence for being mentally ill isn’t deserved but I’ll get to Nelson next. Rachel murders Nelson out of self-defense. She stole money, yes, but a death sentence should not be warranted for thievery and, again, her act was out of self-defense. Nelson was killed by Rachel as retribution for Ben’s death (by the internal logic of the show), just as Cade’s death was satisfied by the show’s internal logic for his murdering Officer Petty. Wendy will never get karma for Cade’s death because she was his karma. And Darlene’s punishment was a special kind. Now it could be argued that she murdered Bobby Dean and Mason’s wife to protect her family and puts her in the same position as Marty. There was no clear-cut reason for her to murder Del. Yes, he was disrespectful, but, again, disrespect doesn’t warrant a death penalty. However, killing Del saved countless lives so that’s why she’s allowed to stay around for so long. She killed her husband out of self-defense because she knew he was going to kill her if she didn’t kill him first (like Marty killing Mason). And Frank Sr. was killed one episode before Darlene, which seems to insinuate that his death was the “push” the rules of the show needed to finalize her death.
@@stepha2642 again, the cartel is SYMBOLIC for the danger Wendy put her relationship in. Like the how the zombies in The Walking Dead always show up in a situation that was ALREADY life-or-death BEFORE they arrived. It’s symbolism. It must have “almost killed” Marty to find out Wendy was cheating on him.
@@zahubshahid7944 Yes, it is cherry picked. Coherence is really not important in Ozark. Things happens for no reason other than moving the plot when it is convenient.
Thank you SO much for this. The first time ever, that I've hated the way a beloved show of mine has wrapped things up. The whole last season just felt wrong. It didn't add up. And sometimes felt downright goofy. I mean, damn, did they wait too long, and lost the original feel?! Them killing off Ruth was awful. But then the Jonah thing just infuriated me. They changed that kid's thinking, morals even, right at the last moment. Wtf. I'm 60. And a TV/movie geek. And I've never been this upset, frustrated, by a show's last season or ending. They left their audience with absolutely no good feeling whatsoever.
Ozark not giving the ending that you preferred does not mean the show failed. You also weren’t paying attention if you think the Byrdes’ were still under the control of the cartel. Maybe you need to re-watch and pay attention to the last few episodes. Now as or the story ending with the beginning of a new chapter, uh yes, that is how life works. If you want every story you watch to be wrapped up, with everyone happy, the people you don’t want to die alive, and all conversations had then may i suggest CBS or ABC shows. Most of us are kind, polite and giving. This story has tons of those people. Realistically, again, we don’t get to die doing something righteous. It is extremely unrealistic to wrap up everything, especially the way Breaking Bad did. This show was based on realism, and in life, the end comes for some people. The rest of the story continues and guess what, you don’t get to know what happens. It is one of the best shows ever created. Julia Garner had earned her Emmy and Golden Globe awards, and has a SAG Jason Bateman for Acting and an Emmy for Directing. It was also the creative teams decision to end when they did, not Netflixs’ decision. Sometimes, when you feel you have told enough of a story you just stop. To be completely honest, i think they could’ve stopped right after the 2nd season. That would’ve left people on the perfect semi-cliff.
hm somewhat disagree with some of the points here. jonah finally killing somebody has been teased / foreshadowed since season 1. he carried the future of the byrde family, and him "breaking bad" in a way that there's no going back is kind of the point of the finale about the future of the byrdes. it sure as hell wouldn't have been charlotte holding that rifle. i don't think this was meant as a parallel to the buddy scene in season 1. it was more of a continuation of how marty was proud that his 14 y/o kid learned how to launder money. ruth calling the kids "marty jr and little wendy" is also a nod to this finale. i kind of think that the car crash was tied to the subtle biblical theme in the undercurrent of the ozarks, how navarro's priest warned them that "god is giving them a wake up call" or something along those lines. sure, it was a big clickbait trailer content, but the absurdity of the car crash and them just acting like it's another tuesday in the ozarks somehow fits the whole "byrde family situation", and the fact that it didn't seem to faze them really spoke volumes about how damaged all their characters had been at that point. the realism of having no redemption is actually the point of the finale. we are just so used to seeing our beloved characters get either a happy ending or at least a bittersweet ending. but the byrdes having chosen where they stand really would not yield to a realistic happy ending. i personally think that their fates had been sealed even before jonah became a killer, but way back when ben was killed as a collective result of them being where they are, not just because wendy ok'd the hit. that we don't get to see what happens next after jonah pulls the trigger just means that this is their life now until the fbi and the cartel say so. there was no real escape because they were in too deep to the point where ben who came from nowhere "had to be a collateral damage" to their activities. narrative-wise, it sounds like a good idea for marty to destroy his marriage and choose to protect ruth so that our fave characters could "escape" or get some kind of narrative closure, but this show prefers realism over narrative closure, and for that, i think the show actually succeeded in a way that modern audiences aren't used to seeing. it's not about bittersweet endings with this show. even the way that ben died, it really subtly foreshadowed the ending of the show itself. ben said right before the gunshot, "this is a dream". the bad thing that's coming for the characters are going to happen no matter how much the characters are hoping for a brighter future. it's only a matter of time. the way the show ended gives you the idea that it's also only a matter of time for the byrdes. it's just that they happened to still be useful to more powerful forces. the ending kind of reminds me of how the sopranos ended. they didn't show you exactly what would happen next, but the idea is that tony was going to get what's coming for him, whether it was at that scene in the diner, or some other future event. but it's coming. and the fact that it wasn't a theatrical ending was quite realistic as well. nobody is owed a "satisfying" death. edit: it makes no sense character-wise for "marty and wendy dying for ruth's sake". this is nonsense. sorry. the only acceptable redemption for this show is for the ozarks to cure itself of the byrdes. say, if the P.I. didn't wait for a dramatic convo and just gave the audience a foreshadowing that the remains of ben are being analyzed for dna. this would have been more sensible in terms of narrative closure. that goat cookie jar being missing would have made more for visual suspense. the P.I. should have just left a cryptic voice mail telling them that it's all over or something along those lines.
No I absolutely disagree that it should have ended with Wendy sacrificing herself for Ruth or Marty that's crazy. I mean who is Ruth to Wendy all the crap Ruth pulled do all the seasons and her obnoxiousness and her attitude towards Wendy when he came to the topic of Ben, Ruth thinks she's right and she always does. But I strongly disagree with Ruth and her actions and her thought process I mean she was warned not to touch Javier because of who he was and she did it anyway with Claire as a witness which was her biggest mistake. Despite Marty and Wendy ,she partnered up with Darlene knowing what that meant when it came to competition with the cartel and animosity with the BYRDS !You can't go around thinking you can screw around with the cartel and shoot its leader and think you're going to get away scot-free not to mention Wendy sat her down and told her that Ben needs to go back on his meds because he is bipolar manic depressive and she doesn't know Ben as well as she thinks she does and you become as dangerous and two others and those around him, but did she listen? No and after Ben was totally unhinged at the the birds fundraising Gala he goes and punches Marty runs off gets arrested start blabbing about the cartel and Helen's involvement and to spare him instead of going to jail they had him go into a mental facility to wind down and grab his bearings and get back on his meds but no Ruth goes gets her Darlene to get him out of jail few hours later where he takes a cab to Helen's house and tells Helen's daughter that her mom works for the cartel and she manages people who sells drugs and such and I believe he was completely in the wrong he had no business telling Helen's daughter that and that was a cherry on the cake put Wendy's still went against her better judgement and try to get him out of town but when she saw him blabbing about the cartel to some randoms at a local gas stop and getting a burner phone to call Helen and Ruth Wendy then put her hands up and and realize that she can't save him anymore he'll just dragged her down and she had to do what she did. No it wasn't Wendy's fault it was Ruth's fault for not listening to Wendy when she warned about Ben. And lastly its roots actions that said Javi off to shoot Darlene and Wyatt In Cold Blood because he was angry that they did the sale regardless of how he was trying to hold back the product and when Ruth got Claire the Opium that she needed and no longer needed Harvey well let's just say that was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back forJavi. Not for nothing Carmelo was just avenging her son by shooting Ruth, who can truthfully blame her for doing that? Ruth was in way over her head too many times and killing Javi was the nail in the coffin literally for her but I really felt like it was Karma finally getting around to Ruth because at the end of the day Marty always looked out for her regardless of finding out that she actually was trying to get Marty killed in the first season. But being that she changed your mind and her own uncle's bit the Dust show Marty that she can be loyal she just needed to see that she's doing better with Marty in her life than without and how Mardi became sort of a father figure call Ruth😮
I also think it ended a bit abruptly, but besides that I think it stayed true to what it started as. Hearing the creators mention the metaphor about the Byrdes representing capitalism that comes to this town and destroys every obstacle in order to preveil, I can see what they had in mind. Every person they ever dealed with had their comeuppance at some point in the series.
One thing I never understood about Ozark was Marty's motivation for working for a cartel to begin with. He wasn't ambitious, and didn't seem particularly interested in having expensive things. It seems weird. And he worked for the cartel for years and never had any issues but then all of a sudden it's a dangerous nail-biting ordeal fraught with peril? I don't get it, what did I miss?
Ozark ending is good. It doesn’t have to be satisfying, it was realistic. Ruth had it coming and I didn’t feel bad. Moral of the story…KNOW YOUR PLACE. If the langmore’s didn’t rob Marty, none of them would be dead. I do agree with you that we needed more. I want to see a conclusion for Rachel, the Byrd’s, camila, and Jim. I’m not gonna lie though… sometimes I wonder how a conversation between lalo Salamanca and Wendy byrd would go…
Ozark's biggest curse is it's nihilism The show defied people's common expectations with these shows where we learn into these fantasies that satisfy us Breaking Bad has moments of levity and payoff where Ozark says fuck you this is how life goes. The good guys don't win and the bad guys don't get cool speeches. The only winners won with leverage and nothing else The Byrd's becoming a political dynasty on the backs of 5 dead Langmore's is one of the more realistic endings I've seen in fiction While Breaking Bad leaves you with a smirk or even a smile, Ozark leaves you with the weight of the evils we live under and the people that delegate them
To me the final episode wasn't a bad episode, it was just un satisfying, to many things where left open, all the family where in the exact spot they where basically in season 1. I think the show just needs another season to wrap things up.
Great video! I agree with all your points. Ruth was a shame to lose (and thus sealing off any possibility for an eventual meaningful sequel/one-shot/spin off). I also have the feeling that all these uneasy feelings are intentional. The Byrds are the family of bad choices. And facing uncomfortable consequences. We are along for the ride with them morally, and since we love and forgive the characters, turning a blind eye, our reward for that is losing Ruth. That’s kinda meta :) The after-show special also mentioned that Ruth’s character is essentially the Greek Tragedy element of the story. She was the one who got clean and was about to be out of the game. Layer Cake (with Daniel Craig) had a similar underlying theme.
I think we saw from the start of the show, the approach was different than Breaking Bad, even though there are obvious similarities. But its pretty much about the ending where we see the differences. Because as we saw in the finale of Better Call Saul (Spoilers ahead), They wanted the good to win, even though it felt wrong for us, especially with the ending of Jimmy and Kim. Many people wanted Jimmy to serve 7 years and live his life with Kim. But that wasn't the shows message. Also with Mike and Nacho, two characters nobody ever wanted to die but who did because of their choices, and to show that ultimately these people aren't good and they are held accountable for that. The approach with Ozark though was a different message. In the end, we actually want the bad in the form of the Cartel and also Wendy and Marty to be punished for their actions, but they're not. It's exactly like they say in the final words of the show: Mel:" You don't get to win. You don't get to be the Kochs or The Kennedys or whatever fucking royalty you people think you are. World doesn't work like that." To which Wendy replies: "Since when?" And Mel gets shot. And that is pretty much the message Ozark wants to send. That the world works exactly like that and the wrong people may win. It's also the world in which you die if you kill an upcoming cartel leader. It's the world in which his life is worth more than Ruth's because those people are so mighy, even so mighty that the FBI doesn't take them down but works together with them. It's pretty much the world we live in. And of course that sounds dark but that's what Ozark was about from the start, right? And from this start on I knew we would see an ending we wouldn't like. I didn't expect Marty and Wendy to survive, but I also didn't think I wouldn't want that in the end, and that it would made sense. Sadly, just as you said, it all made sense and therefore it makes me sad. I think that's also why Ozark is a show that I won't watch again, just because truth hurts. Especially with the death of Ruth. From the moment she decided to kill Javi, I knew she would die. I also think it didn't serve the character but the mentioned message. She wouldn't need to kill for revenge but she did. It was completely unnecessary she had everything she wanted, of course except her family. I also think that the Wendy takeover was too much in the end, but it's also important to see that Marty never really had a plan but to do everything he's asked for while Wendy took as he said himself the "driverseat" and somewhat emancipated from that role, even getting their biggest villain killed. They turned it all the way around on Navarro in the end, and I liked seeing that, even though I was kinda sad for Navarro because he actually was one of the people with a heart in this show and I really would've enjoyed to see his flight attempt and killing his sister and taking the Cartel over again. In the end, I really liked the show, I liked the approach and the message, because it's something different and it also is pure, more realistic in a way. But as I said it also is the reason why I probably won't watch it again.
Ozark started out as being a great show but as the seasons dragged on and on and on I really started losing interest. At the end I even got more and more annoyed with Wendy's character. This show never got close to the plottwists, the storyline and the absolute brilliance of Braking Bad.
Great analysis. Ruth’s death didn’t bother me too much because she seemed fated to die. She just had a fatalistic drive to her where she didn’t accept help or seem long for this world. But Jonah killing the guy at the end was so out of character. Like the end of GOT, they had characters doing things that weren’t who they were.
Sorry, but I think you just weren't paying attention. They set up Jonah as capable of murder from the beginning of the show. Like his mother, he will do anything to protect his family. He purchased numerous guns. He had them hidden everywhere. He learned how to shoot. He has the wherewithal to do what he did. Similarly, Dany was set up from the beginning to do what she did at the end of GoT.
Once I started to feel like Marty’s character had a major down fall, I felt like the show got very sloppy. Wendy coming in and making decisions that made no sense with no action from Marty just didn’t feel right. It felt like it was just Wendy’s show and more unnecessary new characters like politicians and donors stole our attention from characters who deserved it. It got redundant and boring.
They should have made everything that happened after the car crash just a figment of imagination for the Byrd family...Then in the last scene go back to the car crash and show the family's tragic death being reported live in the news...
Welp - that's exactly the point. You make it bittersweet and it blurs with the other bittersweets. I am happy with how they've developed and wrapped up the family storyline which was prominent throughout the series. I felt the ending was abrupt too, but on the other hand - it lets your mind wonder on how's it going to go for the Byrdes. And as another user mentioned - impressive quality of the video! It appears as the first on your channel but I'd bet you've done some livestreams elsewhere?
Not really, I'm just a writer with a decent mic and had just enough experience in Premier to learn what I needed to from TH-cam videos haha. I'm glad you liked it!
It won’t go well. Camilla will find out Wendy & Marty were standing by watching while Javi was killed. She will have them killed in no time. Ruth could have easily taken out Camilla when she saw the Cartel parked in her driveway & ended the whole thing. Instead they make her play dumb.
For Ozark to have concluded with a raw sense of justice, for the show to leave behind a digestible theme after a family essentially kills everyone with whom they come into contact throughout four seasons of intense TV- WENDY BYRD HAD TO ⚰️in the end.
Basically the whole show was the Byrds getting in serious trouble numerous times then making a phone call to get out of trouble everytime. Started to become a cycle
It was bad, and Wendy becoming the main focus of the show sucked. It really felt like a bait and switch. Marty was no Walter white, but he was still intriguing. Felt like when the GoT writers no longer knew what to do with Tyrion.
The ending ended the suspension of disbelief. It had already bothered me how the Byrdes behaved under such extreme danger and stress. Sitting at home casually having a meal in a completely open faced house with glass windows and absolutely no security when the Cartels and others could decide to wipe them out in a heartbeat. I've mostly wiped the show from my memory.
The cartel wanted them alive, so they remained alive. Did they ever, at any point, have to show "muscle"? The only thing they could do to survive was to be smart and play the game. The only thing they really luckily survived was that Darlene Snell never up and killed them at any random point (but only after she killed her husband).
I don’t even remember the details of the ozarks finale and it wasn’t that long ago. Breaking Bad was almost a decade ago but I still remember every beat of that episode.
To me the last escene wasn't mimic Buddy killing Gracia, it was Jonah being Jonah. Before Buddy killing Garcia it was the 12 y/o Jonah pointing the gun at him and seriously thinking about killing him. Then he has a conversation with his mom about what would have happened if Buddy hadn't been there and if he had had to kill him. This is the same scene, but Buddy is the picture anymore. And we see Jonah sure about what he has to do because he's lived it before. In addition to that, it is an example of how their parents corrupted the little sense of morality they had left and became a mini Marty and Wendy, as Ruth said. A sad but great ending in my opinion.
The message of BB was that criminal behavior is corrosive to the soul. The message of Omari is that crime pays if you’re just ruthless enough to not give a shit.
The writers completely wasted the car crash scene by not killing Wendy in it. With Wendy dead, Claire still betrays Ruth and Marty redeems himself by saving Ruth.
I like the ending quite a bit. It was poetic as throughout the series we see Ruth trying to escape the Langmore curse and build something for herself. She was on the very cusp of that before it was taken away by her stupid actions. I also like that the end was conclusive yet open-ended. The Byrds look like they were getting away with it. We were on the edge of our seats the entire time wondering if they would all survive. Will the marriage last? Will the kids stay? Not only did they survive the seemingly impossible ordeal, but they have also become stronger and closer because of it. Sure, I might be cheering on the bad guys. But, damn, what a fun ride!
You briefly touched on it but for me the only issues I had with the show are the last 7 episodes. Specifically how Marty becomes a side character to the story and how it insist on introducing even more plot threads on top of the ones introduced in the first seven episodes of the final season. I feel like the show opted to make a pressure cooker over wrapping up Marty's story
Just like Game of Thrones before it, the ending of this show really boils down to needing more time with its characters, because in it’s current state it is utterly incoherent. Just about every last character ended up acting completely out of character towards the end in order to arrive at the finish line faster: Ruth, who has survived this long because of her brilliance and endurance, got out of her truck and waltzed ignorantly into the blatant trap of the mysterious SUV parked in her driveway (the same kind she encountered Nelson in when she cleverly outwitted him just an episode ago), which led to her anticlimactic death. Marty let it happen, which went against everything he’d worked for throughout the entire show, and would have made for the perfect final stand against Wendy and the cartel in order to give their characters some closure, but instead Wendy suddenly develops a conscience that erases all of her character development and we’re supposed to believe she cares so deeply for Ruth that she was willing to put their family on the line to save her. Because of this sudden change of heart, we’re also supposed to believe that Jonah, who has been at Wendy’s throat for the entire season, is willing to kill an innocent man in order to save her. Speaking of which, Mel, instead of taking the evidence and running, decides to sit and wait in the darkness in order to deliver a monologue about justice that entirely spells out the message of the show to the audience. For me, as the show drew to a close, it lost all the nuance and subtlety that made it brilliant to me in the first place. If you’re happy with the ending and it works for you, more power to you! It just really rubbed me the wrong way :/
I think it depends on what your expectations are from a show. It's worth rewinding the history clock all the way back to Ancient Greece and (arguably) the birthplace of modern drama. The Greeks believed their plays were - first and foremost - a source of moral instruction. Sugar-coating the message for the audience was way, way down the list of priorities. I mean, sure - Breaking Bad provided a more ... shall we say ... satisfying conclusion. But I think the Greek playwrights would have seen that as vanity on the part of the showrunners. Ozark wasn't prepared to pull its punches. And I think that's commendable. The deaths of Mel and Ruth as well as the moral descent of Jonah were logically consistent with the pitch of he show. Despite Marty's delusional belief that he could somehow use that giant super-computer of a brain to calculate a safe and satisfactory way out for his family - they really only had two ways out. Death - or fight their way to the top of the food chain. Wendy - the most clear-sighted individual of them all - saw this from the very beginning. I used to think if they only listened to Marty they'd all be fine. But the truth is his moral dithering only increased the suffering for everyone. I think Mel's mentioning of the "Kochs and the Kennedys" is crucial here (along with the fact that they are living in the house of a hit-man who - it is heavily implied - may well have played a role in at least one of those family's dirty business). I couldn't begin to enumerate the litany of murders and strange deaths which circled the Kennedy family from the days of patriarch Joseph P. Kennedy. Four fatal plane crashes (including the favoured heir and daughter), two sons slain in broad daylight by dubious gunmen, the last remaining son (Teddy) almost killed in another plane crash, a daughter lobotomised by her own father, numerous close family members dying in almost comical circumstances (including choking to death at the dinner table on a bone) and anywhere up to two hundred witnesses, mobsters, union leaders, FBI, CIA, FBN, military intelligence agents shot, strangled, blown up, thrown out of a tenth storey window, crashed, burned alive etc. in a brutal internecine war between 1963 and 1976. The history of the Koch family is equally interesting - especially the story of how one brother managed to claw his way over the top of dozens of bodies to get to the exit of a burning plane. As I said - Wendy was always the most clear sighted of them all. Her constant pleas to Marty to think only of those closest to him fell on deaf ears for most of the show (which increased the suffering of everyone). And yet that was the only route - not to salvation - but survival. It's no co-incidence that the Langmores and the Navarros - two families who were incapable of circling the wagons and fighting solely for each other - wound up roadkill. I take issue with the assertion that the Byrde's ended up working for the Cartel (under different leadership). The truth is they are the Navarros handlers. Whilst the matriarch of the family ostensibly threatened the Byrdes to give up the name of Javi's killer. That was always an empty threat. It's the Byrdes who dictate the terms of that relationship now and at some point in the future you can be sure they'll burn those assets to the ground once they are no longer necessary. One final point - it's a fundamental mistake to believe the primary purpose of shows such as Ozark is to "entertain" the audience. Once again - that's self-delusion. The reality is they are very much a part of the very same blood-soaked structures of power which the Byrdes fought their way to the top of. As the show more than demonstrates - you can't get to the top of Netflix or Amazon or NBC or Disney without having blood on your hands. It's not that these are "bad" people (to even pose such a question is ... well ... ludicrous). They're just trapped in a system whose options are all bad. In such circumstances the best you can hope for is momentary acts of grace before you are swallowed up by the torrent of misery and horror once again. In that respect I think Ozark reflected the cold, hard truth of reality quite well. But keep up the good work.
Yeah, I agree with everything you said. I don’t think protagonist need to face consequences the way real people do. Like within the context of real life I could understand people wanting Walter White to die or the Byrdes to get locked up but within a show, they’ve done honestly nothing wrong. I feel like shows help you see things from a perspective completely outside of your own and seeing things from Walter White or The Byrdes, I understand why they did what they did completely. If people want to watch criminals face consequences all day, just watch Law & Order or Blue Bloods lol.
You’re reading my mind man! Just because something is easier to digest doesn’t mean that it’s better. The show always (through both the airy, elevated cliffs of the Ozarks , and the leverage the characters have) had this sense of suspension to me. And I think this “plot armour” idea-that the Byrdes unrealistically survived- is kind of the point. Not through muscle, strength or intimidation did they survive, but through premeditated calculation and patience. And through this, they get more power. Now instead of using this power for money, or self-assertion, they used it for leverage against the Cartel. They started off as a family who was grasping on to something to survive with, and ended up using the same tactic to earn themselves more power to gain this plot armour. They do have plot armour, but not because they were born into the knighthood. They have it because they assassinated the damn monarch and suited up themselves. Most shows believe in this sense of karma, that bad characters get what they deserve. Truth is, most people don’t. Because some people got leverage.
Thanks for pointing out the parallel between Ruth Langmore and Jessie Pinkman - I hadn't thought of it. Very accurate comparison, and a good explanation of why the BB ending was so much better.
I really enjoyed both shows, and Breaking Bad deserved all of its Emmys. That said, Ozark worked slightly more for me because of the core motivation of its lead characters. Marty was given no choice but to go down to the Ozarks and launder the money or he and his family would be wiped out. Walter White turned down a job and money for his treatment because…his pride? I get it, pride is important to a man, but when he’s given an “out” but still chooses the wrong path to get the money, it’s hard to feel anything for him going forward when all of the consequences of his actions become self inflicted at that point. It would’ve worked much better if cooking meth was his only option to get the money. Secondly, I found it much more interesting how Ozark involved and engaged the entire family to be actively part of what was going on. It became the origin story of how an entire family became the villains of their own story. And it made total sense that Jonah shot the guy at the end, it was a callback to season 1 when Buddy taught him how to shoot. Jonah was no longer a child but an intelligent teenager who “broke bad” himself by that point. I felt in Breaking Bad, especially the first 3 seasons, Walter’s family was only there to react to Walter. They had no agency of their own, especially Walter Jr. who was annoying and whiny at times. But that’s the great thing about the art, it’s totally subjective and hits all of us a different way.
I feel like the “unsatisfying” nature of the finale is what they were trying to do. I think they were trying to show that only the least deserving people make it out alive. It’s about what they had to do and sacrifice to become the powerful family that they are when it’s all over. It’s not about good guys getting what they deserve, its about the idea that being the bad guy is the only way to survive.
Nah they just wrote themselves in a corner and didn’t know how to end it. So the writers can cop out and say that they “intended for it to be unsatisfying”
There's no redemption because there's not supposed to be redemption. The last words Wendy "Isn't it?" are showing that they've accepted what they've sunk to, and they're too deep to let one man step in the way. And Ruth had to die because it's the cost of buying themselves out of death. Every time they were faced with a deadly experience, someone had to die. And again, one person, after 4 years is not gonna stop what they've built right at the end.
writer also need to understand how important a shows ending is, If the ending of a show sucks that show will be forgotten about regardless of how good it was before (E.g. GOFT, Dexter, X files, Merlin)
At its heart its a moral tale about hownpeorr corrupts. The ending is the final event that solidifies the corruption of the family. No need to go further, we know how it ends for everyone.
“On the nosey”. Ruth, up until that scene, had always been a much smarter character, especially in terms of self-preservation. True, she was running out of life lines at that point, but I think one story arc that could have worked would have been a teaming with Frank Jr.. Ruth was never going to live a totally clean life, but within the army of the Kansas City mob, she would have been shielded and allowed to flourish. A Cosgrove/Langmore family blend would have made sense. Other notes: the van crash should have killed someone. It could have been a redemption arc for Marty or Wendy. Or at least kill Charlotte, thereby jolting the rest of the family awake and finally giving Charlotte a purpose. Not wasting time with what a thinly written villain Camilla was, especially considering all the fantastic ones that proceeded her. The cherry on the turd sundae was the smirking approval from both Byrde parents as their son drops the trigger on a guy. Oh well, great first video. Subscribed.
Idk that it’s so much a “bad” ending, but it’s not the redemptive ending that the audience wanted. Maybe they just wanted to show that the Byrdes would truly never get out & they’ll always go back to their criminal ways, digging themselves & their children deeper into the hole.
Agree on everything! Also I was very annoyed by Camilla going forward with wanting to kill Omar even after knowing he had nothing to do with Javi's death. Her believing the Byrdes didn't know it so easily also felt unconvincing. And what about Mel's "great" idea of casually confronting the "cartel people, family murdering" Byrdes, only evidence of their crime in hands, unnarmed, absolutely no worries for his safety... didn't even check the house for guns... that was just inconceivable for me. And the look of a proud father in Marty's face, giving the go ahead for Jonah to murder a guy who they couldn't even argue was a bad person in any way... SO BAD!
This was my biggest problem too. Mel is repeatedly shown to be a competent professional and also to know who the Byrdes are. All I was hoping for out of the ending was for us to see that Mel had documented things and left a "if I disappear, it was Wendy and Marty Byrde" type note that screwed them over. There is just no reason he wouldn't have done that. Grr.
A lot of comments here decrying the lack of redemption in the end. I think that would miss the point entirely. At what point does a person's actions render them irredeemable? How many people did Marty have to kill to keep his family safe? Why were their lives so much more valuable than the lives of everyone else? The Byrdes are like a cashed up first world country that would turn the entire planet into a crater to protect themselves. The ending doesn't show redemption because the story did not lead them on a path to it. It showed the moral bankruptcy of the parents had finally corrupted the children (Jonah shooting the PI) and everyone was cool with it. Self preservation at any cost. For that mindset to do a 180 degree turn in the final scene would make no sense. Great show, Great cast, perfectly acceptable ending. Not everything is a 1950's Disney movie, and Ozark is the kind of cautionary tale we need to remind people that one person's happily ever after is paid for by the blood, sweat and tears of those beneath them.
I feel like the revelation of Javis death being Ruth and the Byrds being aware should've changed the outcome for Navarro. His sister should've changed path when She learned the truth. And we should've seen Navarros revenge.
Killing off Ruth was a missed opportunity. She could have been arrested and put in prison, preserving her character for a spinoff. Marty and Wendy were morally bankrupt by show's end and didn’t deserve to survive.
![Warhammer 40k: Space Marine 2 | เพื่อจักรพรรดิ ! [ตอนเดียวจบ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/4M0ckYMA4-U/mqdefault.jpg)
I thought the same thing, the ending felt more like a season finale, they left plenty of material to go on. Also, I get that they wanted to end it showing the Byrdes finally admitting they´re bad people, but it felt forced, the way the 4 of them were all on the same page about killing Mel. "Well, guess we´re evil now".
It was so forced that the “dilemma” they were in was just completely fabricated…
I’m sure there’ll be someone somewhere who argues this, but Mel, in my estimation, never really had them in a compromised position.
“Hi, I am not a cop anymore, and I just illegally broke into, entered and stole from this family’s residence. But get this: I saw a COOKIE JAR! And look! While they were gone, I found this burned up dead body in it! No, I don’t know how he died or where or have *any* proof that *they* knew, had killed him or were even in possession of his dead body… BUT STILL! I committed a crime and am now accusing *them* of one! GOTCHA!”
That’s not how chain-of-custody works… You can’t just promise that a family’s cookie jar had a corpse in it because you swear that it did when you broke in and stole the cookie jar.
Dumb ending to a good show.
yes the ending was a bit forced should've concluded in a better way but ig it shows how the byrde's rose to power through their dark history like mel mentioned with the kennedy's etc so jonah and charloette realised family over everything
@@christianc.christian5025 phenomenal analysis
@@christianc.christian5025 This is kind of missing the point. It's not that Mel is going to implicate them with this cookie jar of Ben ashes. The problem is that Mel has them figured out and will never stop hounding them. That night it was the Baphomet-looking cookie jar. The next day will be his investigation into Ruth Langmore's disappearance. He's not stopping so he had to be dealt with. The real point isn't that Mel's got them, it's that they ultimately had to deal with him like a criminal enterprise in a way that finally disregarded any pretense of scruples and implicated their children in the crime.
especially Jonah, his character felt so forced to that final minute of the show, considering what they were trying to do with his development for smth like 10 episodes straight
What? Many people didn't like the ending of Breaking Bad?
I watched the finale (and the season 5 second half) live and the ending was universally praised across fanbase. First time I'm hearing that Breaking Bad ending wasn't loved as it felt like the perfect conclusion to Walter's character.
Yeah I’ve never heard anyone complain about breaking bads ending. It was perfect. Perfect. Right down to the last minute.
Na man who said they didn't like bb ending,not just the ending whole show was bull____(Ozark)
@@SharvilSawargaonkar I knew it wasn't going to be on par with BB but at the least it promised something at the start until they ruined it from s3-4.
At the time people thought it was anticlimactic
The one thing I've always thought about with the ending of the series finale was I figured at least Marty would have been smart enough to explain to Mel that he just broke into their house and illegally obtained evidence against them and that any judge would immediately toss that out leaving Mel with nothing on them again...
Very true, or just tackle him and steal it from his drunk ass, then call his superior and explain a whitewashed version of what he did. No reason for JONAH of all people to kill him.
It was always more about solving the mystery for Mel. Probably why he confronts them instead of, you know, taking what he knows to the police. Maybe at that point the plan was to expose the Byrds and sully their name rather than have them sent to prison. And I also think the reason for killing him wasn't because he was perceived as a threat but because they could.
Yup, Fruit of the poisonous tree.
I'm not sure if this could be valid if we are talking about the dead body of a missing person.
@@gabrieleingrassia2703 the rules of evidence don’t change regardless of the seriousness of the crime
Just finished the show the other night and I did have to sit on the ending for a bit.
Throughout this whole show, I've always seen the Byrdes as some sort of infection or an invasive species. They found a host (the Ozarks) and began taking root by any means they felt necessary. Sure, they would do anything to protect their children and they knew the things they were doing were shitty, but at the end of the day they could truly only care about their own when it really came down to it. Ruth had gotten close to them but never truly entered their family bubble because of her nature of only allowing so much bullshit before she retaliated and because of that, she was always destined to meet her end.
I understand the ending feeling "unsatisfying" but in a weird way, I feel like that was the point. The seemingly abrupt ending to me shows that despite all of the shit they went through, wiping out families and relationships in their wake, that this life will never end for them. They're not "out" as they believe and it sort of makes this a tragedy, not for the Byrdes, but for the Ozarks. I felt like this ending was as realistic as it could get, despite the audience wanting things to be okay. It felt like there could be more afterwards but it's like the show was saying "Yeah, it's gunna be the same shit until they die, fam. Nothing's really changed."
In the first season, the antagonist was the cartel, then it seemed like that role went to Wendy with all her ambition, then by the end I was just like "Yeap, we've been following the origin story to the true villains." I understand this ending maybe could have been done a bit better, but that bitter ending was pretty spot on within the context of this show.
I do really hate how Jonah turned out, though. I think the whole Wendy apologizing was a good scene, but to make it so that Jonah felt that was enough to just forgive her was a bit hard to believe, especially considering how much they've established how much he seems to despise her more and more after Ben's death. Dude, I really wanted Marty to make a move so that Wendy ended up getting stuck in that hospital and he got the kids out safe lol.
At the end of the day, despite the few shortcomings at the end of the series, this was one of the most gripping and anxiety inducing shows I've seen in a long time.
That is what the show runners said. They could have followed the characters through the new reality, but nothing in their reality would really change.
The only thing that bothered me was psycho jonah and ruth dying a dumb death.
The rest was top notch.
They're the starling birds from season 1. The invaders that destroy everything in their paths. So many things could've, would've, should've been better but the show is still an A+.
They weren't collectively portrayed as an infection though - for seasons Marty was shown to be nurturing, forgiving, taking Ruth and Rachel under his wing, Jonah befriended Buddy, etc. Everyone bar Wendy was trying to stay positive and survive an oppressive and crazy predicament, while Wendy just decided to go full heel.
The problem is Wendy being portrayed as increasingly malevolent (consistent with her cheating at the start), was completely at odds with the rest of her family - yet they're roped into sticking with her at the expense of seasons worth of characterisation.
They ultimately needed to end with Wendy going down for various shit and possibly Marty too in a more tragic way, with Ruth busting loose and maybe taking the kids with her. I think the writers were too scared of being labelled misogynists to do away with Wendy unfortunately.
I think Wendy apologizing to Jonah was the start of it but the accident cemented it. For an instant he thought his mother died not knowing whether or not he loved her.
I liked the ending because it stays true to the story. Brutally honest.
But how was the ending brutally honest? Wendy's line may have been sure, and it could have been a good final message from the show, but the execution was so laughably awful. It does not correlate with the development of the characters at all, and this mistake is most noticeable when it comes to Marty, why is it that Marty was crying and distraught only a few epsiodes prior because he felt so much guilt and remorse for the horrible things he's done, but then in the final scene he is completely fine with his son killing an innocent man, and he even gives him a smug smile and nod. It just makes absolutely no sense for his character to be content with that, the only character that makes sense within the ending is Wendy because she actually developed into a person that would do awful things as long as it benefitted her, but that doesnt really apply to any of the other characters. So if anything the ending was dishonest, because it disregards all of the characters development and moral stances just for the sake of making a "point". That is just not good writing.
The ending could have been way better. I don’t like the way they turned Ruth into a clueless moron just to get the ending they wanted. No way she sees a car parked in her driveway & gets out of her truck unarmed. I wanted either a shocking ending or a completely free from the Cartel ending. Instead we just get a moron PI willfully turning himself into the Cartel.
Still one of the Byrds should have died. They flirted with death constantly. Wendy should have been the one dead. Always went against the grain
@@jpeg204 Why do you think everything is so strange just after the car crash? It feels, quite literally, unnatural.
I dislike the ending because it's not an ending.
Thank you for this. I agree mostly. A couple of additional points. The Minivan crash and the road rage incident were, in my opinion, cheap shots to get compelling action footage for the trailer. Violent rolling car crash? Wendy fighting for her life on the ground? Wow! But in the show both are obviously just filler BS. Wendy having a hissy fit and checking herself into the Crazy House until her kids come home was silly and out of character. And Ruth had been through too much and had become too wise, too smart, too savvy to be caught so dumbly flat footed in her own yard. Her death didn't bother me, it just felt lazy.
Yes. I don’t like the way they turned Ruth into a clueless moron just to get the ending they wanted. No way she sees the known cartel SUV parked in her driveway & gets out of her truck unarmed. I wanted either a shocking ending or a completely free from the Cartel ending. Instead we just get a moron PI willfully turning himself into the Cartel.
Agree basically to everything you said but Ruth should've lived. One of the worst endings up there with Game of Thrones and Dexter
I agree with this.
@@staticpiece the ending wasnt that bad. Ruth's death was okay, it just had to be less imbecile.
Jonah psychopath was bullshit
Agree 100%. For a few seconds we were like huh so this is how they gonna send off Wendy, possibly creating one last dramatic arc for the family but nope she was back with Navarro next scene
The last episode with the way they walked away from the car crash a d the way they get away with everything is indicative of the whole series... They are basically slippery eels, clocked in plot armour, they never get their comeuppance, they're indestructible and everyone else dies as a consequence
That's true, but it's all plot armor. Not "realism" as a lot of other people seem to take it.
or as I told my wife "the writers like the Byrdes, so they will win"
In an interview with the writers they said something like “we wanted the ending to be something you felt weird about after cheering” or something like that, and I thought “well what makes you think we’re cheering in the first place?” Sure Mel was annoying and nosey at first but by the end I started to like him and really wanted him to take them all down.
The writers also said they felt Ruth needed to get what she deserved for killing Javi. But why just her? Why not the Byrds? Sure it makes a point about corruption in America, but wasn’t that hammered in anyway?
What I love about Breaking Bad is that idea of consequences for your actions. And here there are none. All the set up about Marty standing up against Wendy or the Byrds getting some kind of punishment for their actions has gone to nothing. Jonah does a complete 180 on his character arc in the last second, the car crash meant nothing, and the only reason we had three cartel deals instead of one was to kill Ruth and elongate the show.
I genuinely thought Marty would kill Navarro’s sister and save Ruth, redeeming him but forcing him to be the FBI’s new Navarro (which it seemed like they were setting up), Jonah and Charlotte would escape and Wendy would die. Or at least the detective and Maya would cause some mayhem. But there was no build up to anything. There was tension all the way through, sure, but the protagonists made it out with no harm to themselves. Because “this is America.”
Idk, I felt like it cared more about making a point than telling a story. That said every other episode was fantastic and the performances were phenomenal.
(Also why cut to black? We don’t need a cliffhanger, it’s the end of a show!)
Tldr; Marty deserved redemption, Wendy deserved punishment, Ruth and the kids deserved to live free and good.
Haven’t been so disappointed by an ending since I watched No Country for Old Men.
So a good ending has to have justice for all? Why is that? I like that they got away, bad guy don't always get caught
@@valentin7693 yeah but doing it in the most unironically plot armored way is frustrating. Every man/woman claiming to be the great king of Kings will eventually fall
@@whatno3145 Key word ‘eventually’ we just didn’t get to see their downfall. The ending made a point about how they’ll never escape the life they’ve entered and the closest they would ever get to a happy ending is temporary peace before shit hits the fan once again and they’ve another mess on their hands. When you’re criminals as efficient as them it either takes an extremely long time to be taken down or you die without ever being taken down. That’s how real life criminals on this scale end up.
Ruth deserved to die, if for no other reason than she killed her uncles. In the end, she deserved to die just as much, if not more, than every other character that got it in this show.
@@CharlieNagoo that's sort of the equivalent of saying Jesse deserved to die. Characters aren't always black and white.
Good god, it was about to be my favorite series of all time. I haven’t felt that betrayed since the GoT finale. All they had to do was switch Ruth & Wendy’s fates.
The GoT finale at least felt like a finale. Ozark not so much. It felt like a season finale at best.
@@raymondwatt9773 Yeah, but no show without Ruth. I think people forget that we watch this stuff for escape. I already know life can seem pointless, I don't need to pay to see that.
@@raymondwatt9773GoT is not good
It felt like surreal seeing both Ruth and Wyatt die. I wouldn’t have been disappointed if they switch Ruth’s death for Wendy’s.
The Ozark ending wasn’t great but GOT was a whole other level of terrible
I don’t think a satisfying, redemptive ending was ever in the cards for this show.
Ozark is first and foremost a drama about a broken family that tries to reconnect at ALL COST. Even if it means losing their own humanity in the process. And you see them gradually descent into bigger shit at the expense of others just to achieve that goal.
Personally I feel the show has the perfect ending - horrifying yet happy. Did the Byrds become evil, immoral and ruthless criminals causing death of basically anyone who stands in their way - sure they did! But as a result they finally become a family again 🙃
Right, family trumps all. Not!
Nobody disagrees that the Byrds became evil. My beef is with Ruth dying. Bad writing.
@@tricivenola8164 Ain't no way she'll have a happy ending after killing Javi though. Her killing him felt in line with her character but her having no plan afterwards was... eh.
@@tricivenola8164exactly what this last post said ^^ and how many TIMES did Marty and Wendy tell not only Ruth, but Darlene and Wyatt, do not do what you’re doing. You can’t fuck with the cartel. This will end badly. None of them listened, they all made dumb ass decisions, Ruth most of all. And she had multiple chances to run away in the last episode!! Rachel asked her to, Marty said he’d help her disappear. She literally dug her own grave
Well, Breaking Bad was about the conditions it took to change the morals of someone and the consequences of those actions
Ozark was about the influence and protection money has, as well as how what you do influences your kids
Therefore, the endings are going to be different. We’re not supposed to like the ending of Ozark, but it certainly is realistic. Good people, or even better people, don’t win most of the time. There’s always a compromise of evil
Ozark was not realistic in anyway it’s was a joke a bad breaking bad rip off
@@chrissantos5580 The only real similarities between the two shows is Jesse and Ruth’s dynamic to the main character and the fact it involves drugs. Otherwise the plots, ending, the characters, and the utilization of such characters are very different
I didn’t think there was much of anything realistic about ‘Ozark’s ending at all.
‘Breaking Bad’ also had the very clear theme that Walt didn’t “turn into” a cold, hard, egotistical man, he just let that side of himself out of its cage.
@@SharkOutOfAir right a mile mannered nerd in a loveless marriage gets involved with a Mexican drug cartel and he survives because of his exceptional intellect
The tone of the show is similar the main problem which there are many is Jason Bateman has no edge bryan Cranston does.
@@chrissantos5580 so basically your one of those breaking bad fan boys that say any show that focuses on the drug world is a breaking bad rip off
100% agree, I had all the same thoughts. Hell, my 75 year old mother was so pissed of at the killing of Ruthie, she complained for weeks after.
Many of the main cast deaths were caused by shity decisions. Marty was always trying too keep the peace and was often ignored.
I don’t agree. It isn’t satisfying, that we can agree on, but it didn’t “fail”. This is the most realistic outcome. A rich and powerful family gets to where they are by using others. They repeatedly use others and ruin other people’s lives for their own benefit. With Ruth it was prolonged and because of it she suffered the most out of all the characters.
They will most likely get out of the Cartel too. Seeing as Camila now worked for the feds. The Byrds won, and everyone lost. That is the point, just like many similar people and families in real life.
I’m sure they exist but I can’t think of *any* white-collar Cartel employees who were discovered and then got out without WitSec.
I thought this was incredibly contrived. OC participants who make it either roll over or go into hiding.
These people didn’t pay rent to mobsters and try to buddy up to them in their casinos like Cohen described with the Trumps. They ran the entire operation briefly.
Camilla letting a potential replacement live was pretty corny.
Ah yes, surviving that car crash basically unscathed is the most realistic outcome as well.
Totally agree! Also I dont think there is a redemption. The Byrdes are evil rich white people and that's it.
@@JMoney_TheGangster It’s not like Breaking Bad didn’t have really dumb things that worked out as well.
@@trevbequick
It's the fact that the show addresses this and played it off as 'supernatural' or 'luck'. It's also the fact that the whole car thing is to prove a point that the rich always wins or whatever, it's stupid and also forced.
The ending is fine. The reasons for it are forced and unrealistic despite the realistic message the show leads up to. That's basically what I'm trying to say.
I didn't mind Ruth getting shot. I never got how we were supposed to root for her. The "Jesse Pinkman" analogy is ok, but not perfect. Unlike Jesse, we meet her because she stole money from the Byrds, and wanted to kill Marty at first, and only used the guise to be taught how to launder. The writers used every trick in the book to make viewers like her, such as befriending a special needs kid, to having an abusive dad, but she brought everything on herself. She was the one who got Ben out of the Mental Hospital, which led to his death, and she never took any blame, and she murdered Javi like a dumbass in front of many witnesses so the cartel could track it back to her. She also double crossed the Bryds by taking the casino, again, knowing full well the consequences of pissing off a drug cartel, having been tortured earlier by the same cartel. Marty offered to get her a new identity for a fresh start, but again she refused. So I was happy she got murdered.
I agree with everything but the havi thing. He was a lose emotional cannon who was to impatient to be a leader. He should have been excited sooner . that was the smartest thing ruth did in the entire show even if it was her down fall.
THANK YOU.
@@crazychase98 i don't have a problem with her killing Javi, just the way she did it. Its not like she couldn't have planned something to make it not go back to her, or even set up someone else.
I agree. She wasn't an "innocent bystander". I did come to like her by the end, but she was not a good guy.
@@katwil89 I agree completely !!!
You're completely entitled to your opinion, but I disagree with a lot of what you said here.
Mostly with the idea of having a "satisfying" ending and how it relates to the quality of the story, because I just cannot seem to simply correlate "satisfaction" with quality.
Of COURSE I didn't want Ruth to die, and I respect the fact that you draw attention to how much sense it made in the context of what was happening, I just think you're looking at it in a micro lens instead of a macro lens.
I don't want to write a dissertation on a YT comment but
The long and short of it is, Ozark is a huge metaphor for how easy it is for the people who have access to ungodly amounts of money to manipulate the structure and policy of a particular community.
Think about what Ruth represents, beyond of who we'd come to love as a character.
We have seen, as direct result of the Byrde's involvement, the straight up genocide of the people of Ozark. The ones that were there long before Marty and Wendy even ended up in there. Families. The people that provided identity and context to what kind of place the lakes were pre Byrde. The Snells? gone. Every Langmore but III? Off the damn map in under 5 years. Sheriffs replaced, unseated legislators, and community employers getting their dads murdered and dicks shot off. A systematic erasure of all things resembling a status quo in a community introduced to us in S1 as this flawed place populated by real characters and rich history, and how it too would be subjected to the relentless turning gears of commerce and power until it becomes a mill for the rich to do [insert nefarious intention here]
Ruth dying was an unceremonious nail in a coffin.
It was watching a friend die.
It was watching a ember, hoping for it to be fire again
Knowing it couldn't be.
Knowing it wouldn't be.
Still actively hoping anyway.
I saw this coming a mile away and I still cried, and its because of what the whole thing says
despite how messy it seems.
We don't need to see how this goes, because we already know.
We know how capable and insidious Marty is, and we don't actually see him go full "Walter White" until the very last seconds of the show.[Something it never needed in spite of relentless comparisons to BB]
That final look is him basically accepting that this is who he is now.
The spinning plates are never going to stop spinning, and he is going to maintain this dumb ass beyblade shit because he literally has eroded the capability of his family to be anything else. They can never go back to Chicago and any viewer who believed they were ever going to needs to read a book. They're going to be juggling this for the rest of their existence, and we don't need to see them do it anymore, because we've seen 4 seasons of that, and they're more than capable.
It was never Byrde vs Cartel, or Langmore vs Cartel, or FBI vs whoever.
It was Money and Power vs The Ozarks, and The Ozarks lost.
Ruth was the last one left, the smartest and most resourceful of all the "native" people left there, mercilessly crushed by the machine the Byrdes rode in on. Silent gristle in the fucking mill. It's a cold, bleak ending for a show that began sort of cold and bleak, and I love it all the more for it. Personally, it rings genuine to me because I'm certain this kind of thing happens to communities, albeit to less dramatic ends. I could go on about this more thoroughly but im kinda just rambling at this point. [believe me i know there are flaws in S4]
It is not satisfying, but satisfaction doesn't make a good story. Substance does. Context does. Discussion does. This was a story about paving a paradise with a parking lot, and it did it's job telling that I think.
Good video
It's not even about a lack of satisfaction, its about incompetent writing, the entire plot and character development throughout the entire show was inexplicably thrown out the window with the ending. It just made no sense, why only a few episodes prior would they show Marty distraught over the bad things hes done but then have him be completely fine with his son murdering an innocent man, even to the point of him having a smirk on his face, that is completely out of character and contradicts the characters moral stances that were displayed literally episodes prior, what is the point of showing that Marty has remorse if theyre just going to show him completely content when his son kills a person. And even on top of that, why would Jonah and Charlotte be okay with it? It all makes no sense, it is incredibly lazy writing. The theme or intended message is irrelevant when it doesn't correlate with the plot or characters development. Every season of this show was the same, introduce a new villain and a couple new characters, kill them off at the end, and then just completely forget about their existence and the corresponding events for the rest of the show with no consequences. It feels lazy, it feels like every season was just a repeat of the last except with "different" characters, and that results in a feeling of no stakes and no meaningful development of the characters, it is just not good.
Your last paragraph is 💯
@@jpeg204 and yet, u (presumably) watched the entire thing.
Completely agree with this one. Redemption and satisfaction are pleasant and welcome aspects of an arc, but they are neither necessary or sufficient. A dissatisfaction for a lack of redemption seems to miss the grim and unforgiving themes of the show, where you wish it didnt have to be and all could be different, but sometimes redemption doesnt come, and satisfaction is far off.
@@tshay7 Well...yea, they would have to watch the entire thing to comment on that said thing......
Still in Middle-school I assume?
I enjoyed your thoughtful and well-spoken analysis. For the most part your impressions echoed mine, especially Wendy’s ridiculous “redemption” because of a few words spoken in the hospital.
Good luck with your channel, and thanks!
Holy crap, this is your first video? Outstanding work, sir!
I understand the "point" that the show was going for with this ending, but they could have made that point while also having at least one character find redemption in the process. The word I keep thinking of that describes the finale for me is "unsatisfying". There were way too many dangling threads out there, and the only thing that felt final about it was Ruth's death. It definitely felt more like a season finale than a series finale.
I've seen some people claim that Ruth had to die because "it's realistic", but I find that utterly ridiculous. Say what you will about Ozark - I mostly enjoyed the show - but the way things play out in the series is many things, and realistic is definitely not one of them, ha ha.
Again, great work on this video!
Thanks!
I agree. If the point of the show's ending was, "that's just how the world works," then you need to disregard the utter nonsense that the Byrdes survive from the cartel, the Snells, and the feds.
Yeah Darlene shotgunning a mob boss and facing no repercussions from said mob is the most unrealistic shit. The fact that Frank rolled into Darlenes house with his guard completely down is also just completely ridiculous.
I loved the ending the super rich got away with everything just like real life
So the Brydes were the real villains.
Ozark's biggest problem was that it had no idea how to move events forward naturally, and it showed.
"You're gonna have to give me a couple of days on that one"
"You have 5 minutes"
I mean, I get what they were going for. The message they were trying to say at the end of Ozark is that the Byrds have become so powerful and corrupt that they are basically untouchable. That families like the Byrds are the ones who actually triumph in this ruthless capitalist world and they are able to get away with anything leaving a complete path of destruction behind them. Ok, I get that. The problem is that I don't think the series finale sells that message very well, mainly because at the end of the series, the Byrds don't seem very powerful to me.
They are still subservient to the cartel, a cartel that can kill them at any moment. Worse, now they are working for Camila who is a way more erratic boss than Omar. The last act of the finale just left me perplexed. So are you going to tell me that Camila finds out that Ruth, the Byrds' closest associate, killed her son and that the Byrds didn't know anything about it? Are you really saying that Camila, a mob boss, is going to believe that the Byrds didn't know anything about it and that they didn't even think of Ruth as a suspect when they knew that Javi had killed Ruth's cousin? Come on! It should be obvious for someone like Camila to deduce that the Byrds obviously knew this and they were covering for Ruth. Worst than that, they actually manipulate her to take down Omar by making her believe he was the one who killed Javi.
By that scene, Camila should have realized that she can't trust the Byrds, that the Byrds were involved in Javi's death and that she has to get rid of them as well. And let's remember, Camila is not Omar, she doesn't really care about the business, she doesn't care about the deal with the FBI, she mainly cares about avenging her son's death and killing anyone who had something to do with it, so the Byrds are out.
By the end of the series, the Byrds should be in the worst danger they have ever been. They should be packing things and being on the run by the final scene. Instead of that, the series tells us: "Oh no, the Byrds are fine. They are actually more powerful than ever". And I'm like: What???
If they actually wanted to sell the message that the Byrds have acquired this royalty-like level of power, the series had to end with them taking over the cartel. That was the ending. They manipulate Camila to take down Omar and then, they take down Camilla themselves and then they take over the cartel. Marty and Wendy have all the connections with the FBI, they know all of the cartel's operations inside out, and it was already shown that Marty could run the cartel and that he already had the respect of the other lieutenants. They could have done it. And with that ending, yeah, the Byrds would answer to no one, they would be rich, they would have so many politicians in their pockets and they would be running the largest cartel in the world, so yes, they would essentially be royalty at that point.
Ruthless lol
That probably would've happened but doesn't mean we have to see them take over the cartel on screen. Why do people seek for that satisfaction everywhere?
The ending left clues and questions and we can work out our own ideas and theories, that's the interesting part to me.
I agree with you and this is actually a great idea. They should have gone that way
It would have been a much better ending to have Ruth kill Camila after she was shot and to end the show not with Mel confronting the family but instead grim faced FBI agents walking up to the Marty and Wendy at their house as their faces change from happiness of the evening to straight faced as they notice the FBI agents coming to tell them that Camila is dead, we wouldn't see this but we would know it, as the show cuts to black. All that effort and trail of bodies they left for nothing, they would get what they deserve, we don't need to see them in prison, just knowing they're screwed is enough. And that's what the two of them deserve.
To be clear, is this a feeling based on this show and it's themes specifically, or is it built off of a strong dislike towards the idea of any show ending in evil winning?
@@evangelosvasiliades1204 ooh that's actually an interesting way to look at it, I suppose thematically the actual ending works, the Byrds always win no matter what they get through. But I think human nature doesn't want evil to triumph, and personally I think it is a bit far-fetched that all of the Byrds end up fine with no casualties to the 4 of them. So more than anything it's a strong dislike, probably why I accepted the breaking bad finale more than Ozark's, Walter finally gets his comeuppance.
While both shows have some great writing, Breaking Bad is much more multi-layered than Ozark, characters development are so much better and we see the transformation of the story and people from season 1 to season 5, that's also one of the reasons i personally have more desire to rewatch the journey of Breaking Bad. I think Ben's plot in season 3 was a great example of how this series stepped up and started to gain more of that identity it sometimes lacked before, but unfortunately season 4 ended in a quite underwhelming way. I'm not necessarily disappointed with the idea they were trying to show, but the realization was definitely not the best example of what these writers can do. And the funny thing is that the show was known for constant build-up of tension and danger, where character's decision could led to other tens of other characters decisions' and resulted in actions, but in the final episode the climax appears out of sudden, 10 minutes before the credits and the reason behind it was the character who crumbled under the pressure and told the truth
I agree that Ozark's ending wasn't very satisfying, however I woulsn't describe that as a failure. I think it makes the show much stronger. Unfair and unsatisying things are what moved the plot forward up until now, so why would anything change for the ending. I think you said in your video is that Ozark could never have an entirely happy ending. I agree, but I would go a step further and say there couldn't be a happy ending whatsoever.
Great vid tho!
"Unsatifysing" in the sense that a simply didn't like the events that took place because they wanted something specific to happen and "unsatisfying" in the sense that it felt incomplete are two separate things.
Unfortunately, Ozark's ending ticks both boxes. Wendy should've died and the ending was too rushed.
100%
I think it’s very unsatisfactory because it feels like the first-half of a story. What goes up must come down, and that is specially true when you got involved in both narcotics and politics in this day and age.
Great video! My favorite part of all was when Ruth was at their house and Marty and Wendy were trying to talk her out of going after Javi and she screamed " if you wanna stop me you're gonna have to effin KILLLL MEEEEEE!!!!!". I re-watched that part so many times. And I agree with your synopsis of the show. It was such an unsatisfactory ending!
I like a lot Ozark's ending, because it feels pretty realistic, bad people win, and good people die, that's it. I also enjoyed the open finale, because only in stories we have a good conclusive finale, but in reality life goes on. And if I got to be honest, I think that if the entire family would be death in that car accident that would be the most realist finale of all the time, the best life lesson a TV show could ever give, just my opinion.
But it's a show and not real life. Some people find open finales dissapointing because what is even the point of the show if they're just going to suddenly end it and there was no point?
I agree completely, they are corrupted from the first point the cartel enters there life and subsequently corrupt everything they touch
Its not realistic its nihlistic
God i've never been so disapointed in a finale before, I haaaated this ending. I see how GOT fans feel now. Atleast this show only ran half as long.
I liked the ending. It was more like an anti-ending where you don't get what you want. It made the most sense to the real world, it felt grounded and a long time coming for all the characters. Ruth died because she had nothing special about her to the higher powers. She wasn't 'made' in the eyes of the cartel like the Byrde's were. She had made her grave when she shot Javi and when Carmella seized control. The Byrdes got out because they held true power that only they could harness for the cartel. The cartel got away scott free because the war on drugs enables them.
In a very similar way to The Wire, the ending is about a systemic failure across the board that facilitates stories like these to carry on and on and on.
Frankly, if there were a 5th season someday I’m not watching it. Ruth’s death ended any interest I had in the show and the writers were wise to make her death happen at the end of the show. I’d literally have quit the whole show halfway through the season if they did it earlier.
It's titled "Ozark", not "The Byrdes". The Byrde family story is just now taking off. Their beginnings in "the Ozarks" has come to an end. It's not like BB where Walt's gone and I'm sure Jessie didn't pick up where he left off and start cooking in Alaska, so his story is pretty much done as well. Ruth chose to kill that gangster. It wasn't self defense or to protect anyone. Her choice caught up with her. Now, the Byrde's choices might eventually catch up with them, but that's another story. I thought that show was dope, beginning to end.
Perfectly put.
No, Breaking Bad’s ending was perfect. It’s the most complete, satisfying and justifiable ending in TV history. IMHO.
What is this man talking about. The ending of breaking bad is perfection.
A bit cartoony for its own good, good moments but some ideas were written a little under the bar. I support the "he got caught in the car" theory. Only that way it's justifiable (for its plot). STILL, an A-tier episode, good ending, not perfect. 👍
Pacing, the way Walter took out the nazis (and maybe Walter dying even though I love the symbolism, shots and song) and Jesse's ending needed more direction (while still being open-ended, could've included the Mike talk from El Camino or something). It tied loose ends while not giving enough or in a completely satisfying way (this is why El Camino is a thing which doesn't quite deserve its existence). Okay, all considered a bit messy/on the nose but still satisfying and I love baby blue!
Great video, however I disagree that it was a "failed" ending.
The blue filter of the show and constant depression drove me away in the first few episodes
I didn't like the blackout wanna be ending like the Sopranos. The Byrdes are the starlings, the invaders that leave nothing but destruction in their paths. The show is an A+ for me, and the last 7 episodes felt rushed, and introduced characters that didn't need be. No show is perfect, but this is close. Have a great day.
I agree with it all except the idea of Ruth surviving. She starts the season by commuting a rage murder-not a lesser of two evils murder or a gangster doing business murder, a rage murder. It shows she’s not destined to make it out, too much of her own worst enemy.
Yeah but they could put her on the run. Death was forced at this point.
@@tom_p9075 Ruth made ridiculous decisions from season 1, and succumbed to the langmore curse. Her death wasn’t forced, it was written
@@tshay7 what I mean it should happen earlier if so. Killing one of main characters in last scene was lame and at this Point no suprising at all.
@@tom_p9075you also really gotta understand, if she were to run, they’d kill three or have him as a hostage and ruth knew that and wanted to keep three safe. Sure she could’ve put up a “fight” and killed camila? but that would just bring more questions and NO CLOSURE.
@@tom_p9075even if she successfully ran away, she would always have to life her life by looking over her shoulder. She dug her grave when she killed Javi(CARTEL BOSS)
Didn't read all the comments yet but for me the problem with the ending is it wasn't a good series ender but it makes for a good SEASON ender. The family's goal of being out of it is gone now and the kids are fully in. So I'm hopeful the show comes back at least for a few episodes 3 or 4 years from now
My wife and I just finished this series. We watched every episode together so we were quite invested. Having watched Breaking Bad also, I initially found the two comparable. But they are vastly different. By the end of the show, I found myself waiting for it to over. Though I enjoyed it, it definitely wasn’t a satisfying ending.
They made Jonah look like a disturbed kid in the first two seasons toned it down the last two seasons.
I agree with a lot of this stuff that you’re talking about. However the last scene gets me and makes me like the ending (not more then BB). I have a feeling that it’s supposed to be wrapped up the way it was, the family was supposed to get away with it and by cutting the loose ends it makes a lot of sense imo.
This is clear in my mind when Wendy says “since when” in response to “the world doesn’t work like that” (talking about doing horrible things) while I think it could have been more fleshed out, I liked the ending.
Ending was good, it makes sense why it ended where Marty was pretty much head of the cartel with FBI support, so no threat anymore from anywhere as cartel was happy too after Ruth was killed. And what comes to Mel he had nothing which could have power over arrangement and he got chance to get happy end but he ignored it and killing him made clear that their family is now untouchable.
perfect ending.
Every series has a set of in-universe rules. One of the rules I noticed in Ozark is you do NOT kill ANYBODY for ANY reason because it will come back on you. That is why Ruth dies. If she hadn’t shot Javi, she wouldn’t have died and I don’t just mean plot-wise, but rule-wise.
The entire series is also an extended metaphor for Wendy and Marty’s marriage. The “danger” the cartel represents is actually symbolic of the danger Wendy places her marriage in by cheating. Season 1 focuses on these events from Marty’s perspective, Season 2 from Wendy’s, Season 3 from Charlotte’s, and Season 4 from Jonah’s consecutively. The cartel is just a plot device used to flesh out the story in a more palpable way. The two times Marty is placed in the most dangerous position are when Wendy cheats and then the second time when Marty taps her phone.
So for me personally, when watched through this lens, the series ends on a perfect note. The logic of the series is maintained but now we’re left with a never ending cliffhanger because Jonah has shot another person. Per the in-universe rules, is he exempt from them because he was protecting his family’s livelihood or will he be targeted next by the equilibrium of the show’s karma?
I think the in universe rule you brought up is cherry picked.
• Marty killed Mason, nothing happened to him. • Wendy had her brother murdered, nothing happened to her.
• Rachel murdered Nelson, nothing happened to her.
• Darlene murdered Masons wife, Del, her husband, a random driver, and Frank Sr. The only death in this list that came back to haunt her was Del's. None of the other deaths had any ramifications for her.
@@zahubshahid7944 Marty was protecting his wife. The act was in defense of his family and therefore excusable. I should have clarified “for ANY reason” to mean “for ANY temperamental reason.” Wendy was not responsible for her brother’s death, not really. Ben made it impossible to remain protected because he wouldn’t do as he was told. Had he listened to Marty and Wendy, he may have made it out alive. A death sentence for being mentally ill isn’t deserved but I’ll get to Nelson next. Rachel murders Nelson out of self-defense. She stole money, yes, but a death sentence should not be warranted for thievery and, again, her act was out of self-defense. Nelson was killed by Rachel as retribution for Ben’s death (by the internal logic of the show), just as Cade’s death was satisfied by the show’s internal logic for his murdering Officer Petty. Wendy will never get karma for Cade’s death because she was his karma. And Darlene’s punishment was a special kind. Now it could be argued that she murdered Bobby Dean and Mason’s wife to protect her family and puts her in the same position as Marty. There was no clear-cut reason for her to murder Del. Yes, he was disrespectful, but, again, disrespect doesn’t warrant a death penalty. However, killing Del saved countless lives so that’s why she’s allowed to stay around for so long. She killed her husband out of self-defense because she knew he was going to kill her if she didn’t kill him first (like Marty killing Mason). And Frank Sr. was killed one episode before Darlene, which seems to insinuate that his death was the “push” the rules of the show needed to finalize her death.
Cheating wasn't what put them in danger. She kept pushing things. She is pure evil.
@@stepha2642 again, the cartel is SYMBOLIC for the danger Wendy put her relationship in. Like the how the zombies in The Walking Dead always show up in a situation that was ALREADY life-or-death BEFORE they arrived. It’s symbolism. It must have “almost killed” Marty to find out Wendy was cheating on him.
@@zahubshahid7944 Yes, it is cherry picked. Coherence is really not important in Ozark. Things happens for no reason other than moving the plot when it is convenient.
8:52 The ONLY character involved that deserves to live is Ruth? What about the daughter, Charlotte? She never killed anyone.
Thank you SO much for this.
The first time ever, that I've hated the way a beloved show of mine has wrapped things up. The whole last season just felt wrong. It didn't add up. And sometimes felt downright goofy. I mean, damn, did they wait too long, and lost the original feel?!
Them killing off Ruth was awful. But then the Jonah thing just infuriated me. They changed that kid's thinking, morals even, right at the last moment. Wtf.
I'm 60. And a TV/movie geek. And I've never been this upset, frustrated, by a show's last season or ending. They left their audience with absolutely no good feeling whatsoever.
Breaking Bad is a handmade lace mantilla and Ozarks is a dirty tee shirt.
Only thing I didn't like about Ozark is that whenever they were done with a character they just killed them off and another one would take its place
Ozark not giving the ending that you preferred does not mean the show failed. You also weren’t paying attention if you think the Byrdes’ were still under the control of the cartel. Maybe you need to re-watch and pay attention to the last few episodes. Now as or the story ending with the beginning of a new chapter, uh yes, that is how life works. If you want every story you watch to be wrapped up, with everyone happy, the people you don’t want to die alive, and all conversations had then may i suggest CBS or ABC shows. Most of us are kind, polite and giving. This story has tons of those people. Realistically, again, we don’t get to die doing something righteous. It is extremely unrealistic to wrap up everything, especially the way Breaking Bad did. This show was based on realism, and in life, the end comes for some people. The rest of the story continues and guess what, you don’t get to know what happens. It is one of the best shows ever created. Julia Garner had earned her Emmy and Golden Globe awards, and has a SAG Jason Bateman for Acting and an Emmy for Directing. It was also the creative teams decision to end when they did, not Netflixs’ decision. Sometimes, when you feel you have told enough of a story you just stop. To be completely honest, i think they could’ve stopped right after the 2nd season. That would’ve left people on the perfect semi-cliff.
hm somewhat disagree with some of the points here.
jonah finally killing somebody has been teased / foreshadowed since season 1. he carried the future of the byrde family, and him "breaking bad" in a way that there's no going back is kind of the point of the finale about the future of the byrdes. it sure as hell wouldn't have been charlotte holding that rifle. i don't think this was meant as a parallel to the buddy scene in season 1. it was more of a continuation of how marty was proud that his 14 y/o kid learned how to launder money. ruth calling the kids "marty jr and little wendy" is also a nod to this finale.
i kind of think that the car crash was tied to the subtle biblical theme in the undercurrent of the ozarks, how navarro's priest warned them that "god is giving them a wake up call" or something along those lines. sure, it was a big clickbait trailer content, but the absurdity of the car crash and them just acting like it's another tuesday in the ozarks somehow fits the whole "byrde family situation", and the fact that it didn't seem to faze them really spoke volumes about how damaged all their characters had been at that point.
the realism of having no redemption is actually the point of the finale. we are just so used to seeing our beloved characters get either a happy ending or at least a bittersweet ending. but the byrdes having chosen where they stand really would not yield to a realistic happy ending. i personally think that their fates had been sealed even before jonah became a killer, but way back when ben was killed as a collective result of them being where they are, not just because wendy ok'd the hit. that we don't get to see what happens next after jonah pulls the trigger just means that this is their life now until the fbi and the cartel say so. there was no real escape because they were in too deep to the point where ben who came from nowhere "had to be a collateral damage" to their activities.
narrative-wise, it sounds like a good idea for marty to destroy his marriage and choose to protect ruth so that our fave characters could "escape" or get some kind of narrative closure, but this show prefers realism over narrative closure, and for that, i think the show actually succeeded in a way that modern audiences aren't used to seeing. it's not about bittersweet endings with this show. even the way that ben died, it really subtly foreshadowed the ending of the show itself. ben said right before the gunshot, "this is a dream". the bad thing that's coming for the characters are going to happen no matter how much the characters are hoping for a brighter future. it's only a matter of time. the way the show ended gives you the idea that it's also only a matter of time for the byrdes. it's just that they happened to still be useful to more powerful forces.
the ending kind of reminds me of how the sopranos ended. they didn't show you exactly what would happen next, but the idea is that tony was going to get what's coming for him, whether it was at that scene in the diner, or some other future event. but it's coming. and the fact that it wasn't a theatrical ending was quite realistic as well. nobody is owed a "satisfying" death.
edit:
it makes no sense character-wise for "marty and wendy dying for ruth's sake". this is nonsense. sorry. the only acceptable redemption for this show is for the ozarks to cure itself of the byrdes. say, if the P.I. didn't wait for a dramatic convo and just gave the audience a foreshadowing that the remains of ben are being analyzed for dna. this would have been more sensible in terms of narrative closure. that goat cookie jar being missing would have made more for visual suspense. the P.I. should have just left a cryptic voice mail telling them that it's all over or something along those lines.
No I absolutely disagree that it should have ended with Wendy sacrificing herself for Ruth or Marty that's crazy. I mean who is Ruth to Wendy all the crap Ruth pulled do all the seasons and her obnoxiousness and her attitude towards Wendy when he came to the topic of Ben, Ruth thinks she's right and she always does. But I strongly disagree with Ruth and her actions and her thought process I mean she was warned not to touch Javier because of who he was and she did it anyway with Claire as a witness which was her biggest mistake. Despite Marty and Wendy ,she partnered up with Darlene knowing what that meant when it came to competition with the cartel and animosity with the BYRDS !You can't go around thinking you can screw around with the cartel and shoot its leader and think you're going to get away scot-free not to mention Wendy sat her down and told her that Ben needs to go back on his meds because he is bipolar manic depressive and she doesn't know Ben as well as she thinks she does and you become as dangerous and two others and those around him, but did she listen? No and after Ben was totally unhinged at the the birds fundraising Gala he goes and punches Marty runs off gets arrested start blabbing about the cartel and Helen's involvement and to spare him instead of going to jail they had him go into a mental facility to wind down and grab his bearings and get back on his meds but no Ruth goes gets her Darlene to get him out of jail few hours later where he takes a cab to Helen's house and tells Helen's daughter that her mom works for the cartel and she manages people who sells drugs and such and I believe he was completely in the wrong he had no business telling Helen's daughter that and that was a cherry on the cake put Wendy's still went against her better judgement and try to get him out of town but when she saw him blabbing about the cartel to some randoms at a local gas stop and getting a burner phone to call Helen and Ruth Wendy then put her hands up and and realize that she can't save him anymore he'll just dragged her down and she had to do what she did. No it wasn't Wendy's fault it was Ruth's fault for not listening to Wendy when she warned about Ben. And lastly its roots actions that said Javi off to shoot Darlene and Wyatt In Cold Blood because he was angry that they did the sale regardless of how he was trying to hold back the product and when Ruth got Claire the Opium that she needed and no longer needed Harvey well let's just say that was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back forJavi. Not for nothing Carmelo was just avenging her son by shooting Ruth, who can truthfully blame her for doing that? Ruth was in way over her head too many times and killing Javi was the nail in the coffin literally for her but I really felt like it was Karma finally getting around to Ruth because at the end of the day Marty always looked out for her regardless of finding out that she actually was trying to get Marty killed in the first season. But being that she changed your mind and her own uncle's bit the Dust show Marty that she can be loyal she just needed to see that she's doing better with Marty in her life than without and how Mardi became sort of a father figure call Ruth😮
I also think it ended a bit abruptly, but besides that I think it stayed true to what it started as. Hearing the creators mention the metaphor about the Byrdes representing capitalism that comes to this town and destroys every obstacle in order to preveil, I can see what they had in mind. Every person they ever dealed with had their comeuppance at some point in the series.
One thing I never understood about Ozark was Marty's motivation for working for a cartel to begin with. He wasn't ambitious, and didn't seem particularly interested in having expensive things. It seems weird. And he worked for the cartel for years and never had any issues but then all of a sudden it's a dangerous nail-biting ordeal fraught with peril? I don't get it, what did I miss?
It would be an interesting topic to explore, but my gut reaction is it was all for Wendy
Ozark ending is good. It doesn’t have to be satisfying, it was realistic. Ruth had it coming and I didn’t feel bad. Moral of the story…KNOW YOUR PLACE. If the langmore’s didn’t rob Marty, none of them would be dead. I do agree with you that we needed more. I want to see a conclusion for Rachel, the Byrd’s, camila, and Jim. I’m not gonna lie though… sometimes I wonder how a conversation between lalo Salamanca and Wendy byrd would go…
"We don't get to see where it lands" that was clever
Ozark's biggest curse is it's nihilism
The show defied people's common expectations with these shows where we learn into these fantasies that satisfy us
Breaking Bad has moments of levity and payoff where Ozark says fuck you this is how life goes. The good guys don't win and the bad guys don't get cool speeches. The only winners won with leverage and nothing else
The Byrd's becoming a political dynasty on the backs of 5 dead Langmore's is one of the more realistic endings I've seen in fiction
While Breaking Bad leaves you with a smirk or even a smile, Ozark leaves you with the weight of the evils we live under and the people that delegate them
To me the final episode wasn't a bad episode, it was just un satisfying, to many things where left open, all the family where in the exact spot they where basically in season 1. I think the show just needs another season to wrap things up.
The writers dropped the ball on the whole final season. Marty and Wendy both we're completely acting out of character
Great video! I agree with all your points. Ruth was a shame to lose (and thus sealing off any possibility for an eventual meaningful sequel/one-shot/spin off). I also have the feeling that all these uneasy feelings are intentional. The Byrds are the family of bad choices. And facing uncomfortable consequences. We are along for the ride with them morally, and since we love and forgive the characters, turning a blind eye, our reward for that is losing Ruth. That’s kinda meta :)
The after-show special also mentioned that Ruth’s character is essentially the Greek Tragedy element of the story. She was the one who got clean and was about to be out of the game. Layer Cake (with Daniel Craig) had a similar underlying theme.
I think we saw from the start of the show, the approach was different than Breaking Bad, even though there are obvious similarities. But its pretty much about the ending where we see the differences. Because as we saw in the finale of Better Call Saul (Spoilers ahead),
They wanted the good to win, even though it felt wrong for us, especially with the ending of Jimmy and Kim. Many people wanted Jimmy to serve 7 years and live his life with Kim. But that wasn't the shows message. Also with Mike and Nacho, two characters nobody ever wanted to die but who did because of their choices, and to show that ultimately these people aren't good and they are held accountable for that.
The approach with Ozark though was a different message. In the end, we actually want the bad in the form of the Cartel and also Wendy and Marty to be punished for their actions, but they're not.
It's exactly like they say in the final words of the show:
Mel:" You don't get to win. You don't get to be the Kochs or The Kennedys or whatever fucking royalty you people think you are.
World doesn't work like that."
To which Wendy replies: "Since when?"
And Mel gets shot. And that is pretty much the message Ozark wants to send. That the world works exactly like that and the wrong people may win. It's also the world in which you die if you kill an upcoming cartel leader. It's the world in which his life is worth more than Ruth's because those people are so mighy, even so mighty that the FBI doesn't take them down but works together with them. It's pretty much the world we live in. And of course that sounds dark but that's what Ozark was about from the start, right? And from this start on I knew we would see an ending we wouldn't like. I didn't expect Marty and Wendy to survive, but I also didn't think I wouldn't want that in the end, and that it would made sense. Sadly, just as you said, it all made sense and therefore it makes me sad. I think that's also why Ozark is a show that I won't watch again, just because truth hurts.
Especially with the death of Ruth. From the moment she decided to kill Javi, I knew she would die. I also think it didn't serve the character but the mentioned message. She wouldn't need to kill for revenge but she did. It was completely unnecessary she had everything she wanted, of course except her family.
I also think that the Wendy takeover was too much in the end, but it's also important to see that Marty never really had a plan but to do everything he's asked for while Wendy took as he said himself the "driverseat" and somewhat emancipated from that role, even getting their biggest villain killed. They turned it all the way around on Navarro in the end, and I liked seeing that, even though I was kinda sad for Navarro because he actually was one of the people with a heart in this show and I really would've enjoyed to see his flight attempt and killing his sister and taking the Cartel over again.
In the end, I really liked the show, I liked the approach and the message, because it's something different and it also is pure, more realistic in a way. But as I said it also is the reason why I probably won't watch it again.
It was realistic. At that point they all embraced the life style. Not all bad people get what they deserve. Some get away with it.
Ozark started out as being a great show but as the seasons dragged on and on and on I really started losing interest. At the end I even got more and more annoyed with Wendy's character. This show never got close to the plottwists, the storyline and the absolute brilliance of Braking Bad.
Agreed BB flowed so well got more intense with every season …ozark felt stagnant…and Wendy was very annoying
Breaking Bad was just better written than Ozark. With Ozark sometimes it felt like they were just making stuff up to make it more interesting.
Apples and oranges. There you got your thumbnail/title-bait engagement.
Great analysis. Ruth’s death didn’t bother me too much because she seemed fated to die. She just had a fatalistic drive to her where she didn’t accept help or seem long for this world. But Jonah killing the guy at the end was so out of character. Like the end of GOT, they had characters doing things that weren’t who they were.
Sorry, but I think you just weren't paying attention. They set up Jonah as capable of murder from the beginning of the show. Like his mother, he will do anything to protect his family. He purchased numerous guns. He had them hidden everywhere. He learned how to shoot. He has the wherewithal to do what he did. Similarly, Dany was set up from the beginning to do what she did at the end of GoT.
Jonah even killed a deer. I remember the Snells and Agent Petty@@CharlieNagoo
I'd like an Ozark film like there was El Camino for Breaking Bad
Once I started to feel like Marty’s character had a major down fall, I felt like the show got very sloppy. Wendy coming in and making decisions that made no sense with no action from Marty just didn’t feel right. It felt like it was just Wendy’s show and more unnecessary new characters like politicians and donors stole our attention from characters who deserved it. It got redundant and boring.
They should have made everything that happened after the car crash just a figment of imagination for the Byrd family...Then in the last scene go back to the car crash and show the family's tragic death being reported live in the news...
if they all or a few of them died in the car crash that would have actually been pretty brave and interesting
Ozark needs a sequel movie like Breaking Bad's Elcemino, showing the psychology of Joana being a murderer.
Welp - that's exactly the point. You make it bittersweet and it blurs with the other bittersweets. I am happy with how they've developed and wrapped up the family storyline which was prominent throughout the series. I felt the ending was abrupt too, but on the other hand - it lets your mind wonder on how's it going to go for the Byrdes.
And as another user mentioned - impressive quality of the video! It appears as the first on your channel but I'd bet you've done some livestreams elsewhere?
Not really, I'm just a writer with a decent mic and had just enough experience in Premier to learn what I needed to from TH-cam videos haha. I'm glad you liked it!
It won’t go well. Camilla will find out Wendy & Marty were standing by watching while Javi was killed. She will have them killed in no time. Ruth could have easily taken out Camilla when she saw the Cartel parked in her driveway & ended the whole thing. Instead they make her play dumb.
At least Jesse doesn't fucking die in the most ANTI-CLIMATIC way possible. The season can be somed up in 1 word. Anti-climactic.
Ruth chose her path. Again and again and again.
Watching the last series was like listening to a radio play. Virtually black screen. 😱
For Ozark to have concluded with a raw sense of justice, for the show to leave behind a digestible theme after a family essentially kills everyone with whom they come into contact throughout four seasons of intense TV-
WENDY BYRD HAD TO ⚰️in the end.
Basically the whole show was the Byrds getting in serious trouble numerous times then making a phone call to get out of trouble everytime. Started to become a cycle
It was bad, and Wendy becoming the main focus of the show sucked. It really felt like a bait and switch. Marty was no Walter white, but he was still intriguing. Felt like when the GoT writers no longer knew what to do with Tyrion.
The ending ended the suspension of disbelief. It had already bothered me how the Byrdes behaved under such extreme danger and stress. Sitting at home casually having a meal in a completely open faced house with glass windows and absolutely no security when the Cartels and others could decide to wipe them out in a heartbeat. I've mostly wiped the show from my memory.
The cartel wanted them alive, so they remained alive. Did they ever, at any point, have to show "muscle"? The only thing they could do to survive was to be smart and play the game. The only thing they really luckily survived was that Darlene Snell never up and killed them at any random point (but only after she killed her husband).
First of all… Ozark didn’t fail.
I liked the ending for the simple reason that bad guys usually win. And they spelled that out for us lmao
I don’t even remember the details of the ozarks finale and it wasn’t that long ago. Breaking Bad was almost a decade ago but I still remember every beat of that episode.
To me the last escene wasn't mimic Buddy killing Gracia, it was Jonah being Jonah.
Before Buddy killing Garcia it was the 12 y/o Jonah pointing the gun at him and seriously thinking about killing him. Then he has a conversation with his mom about what would have happened if Buddy hadn't been there and if he had had to kill him.
This is the same scene, but Buddy is the picture anymore. And we see Jonah sure about what he has to do because he's lived it before.
In addition to that, it is an example of how their parents corrupted the little sense of morality they had left and became a mini Marty and Wendy, as Ruth said.
A sad but great ending in my opinion.
Nothing will ever beat Breaking Bad in TV success awards etc in history.
The message of BB was that criminal behavior is corrosive to the soul. The message of Omari is that crime pays if you’re just ruthless enough to not give a shit.
The writers completely wasted the car crash scene by not killing Wendy in it. With Wendy dead, Claire still betrays Ruth and Marty redeems himself by saving Ruth.
I like the ending quite a bit. It was poetic as throughout the series we see Ruth trying to escape the Langmore curse and build something for herself. She was on the very cusp of that before it was taken away by her stupid actions. I also like that the end was conclusive yet open-ended. The Byrds look like they were getting away with it. We were on the edge of our seats the entire time wondering if they would all survive. Will the marriage last? Will the kids stay? Not only did they survive the seemingly impossible ordeal, but they have also become stronger and closer because of it. Sure, I might be cheering on the bad guys. But, damn, what a fun ride!
I agree fully. I think most people are just too emotional and seek closure and some form full circle from every show or movie they see.
agreed, man
You briefly touched on it but for me the only issues I had with the show are the last 7 episodes. Specifically how Marty becomes a side character to the story and how it insist on introducing even more plot threads on top of the ones introduced in the first seven episodes of the final season. I feel like the show opted to make a pressure cooker over wrapping up Marty's story
I liked the ending because it was true to real life. People good or bad don't always get what they deserve.
Just like Game of Thrones before it, the ending of this show really boils down to needing more time with its characters, because in it’s current state it is utterly incoherent. Just about every last character ended up acting completely out of character towards the end in order to arrive at the finish line faster: Ruth, who has survived this long because of her brilliance and endurance, got out of her truck and waltzed ignorantly into the blatant trap of the mysterious SUV parked in her driveway (the same kind she encountered Nelson in when she cleverly outwitted him just an episode ago), which led to her anticlimactic death. Marty let it happen, which went against everything he’d worked for throughout the entire show, and would have made for the perfect final stand against Wendy and the cartel in order to give their characters some closure, but instead Wendy suddenly develops a conscience that erases all of her character development and we’re supposed to believe she cares so deeply for Ruth that she was willing to put their family on the line to save her. Because of this sudden change of heart, we’re also supposed to believe that Jonah, who has been at Wendy’s throat for the entire season, is willing to kill an innocent man in order to save her. Speaking of which, Mel, instead of taking the evidence and running, decides to sit and wait in the darkness in order to deliver a monologue about justice that entirely spells out the message of the show to the audience. For me, as the show drew to a close, it lost all the nuance and subtlety that made it brilliant to me in the first place. If you’re happy with the ending and it works for you, more power to you! It just really rubbed me the wrong way :/
I think it depends on what your expectations are from a show. It's worth rewinding the history clock all the way back to Ancient Greece and (arguably) the birthplace of modern drama. The Greeks believed their plays were - first and foremost - a source of moral instruction. Sugar-coating the message for the audience was way, way down the list of priorities. I mean, sure - Breaking Bad provided a more ... shall we say ... satisfying conclusion. But I think the Greek playwrights would have seen that as vanity on the part of the showrunners. Ozark wasn't prepared to pull its punches. And I think that's commendable.
The deaths of Mel and Ruth as well as the moral descent of Jonah were logically consistent with the pitch of he show. Despite Marty's delusional belief that he could somehow use that giant super-computer of a brain to calculate a safe and satisfactory way out for his family - they really only had two ways out. Death - or fight their way to the top of the food chain. Wendy - the most clear-sighted individual of them all - saw this from the very beginning. I used to think if they only listened to Marty they'd all be fine. But the truth is his moral dithering only increased the suffering for everyone.
I think Mel's mentioning of the "Kochs and the Kennedys" is crucial here (along with the fact that they are living in the house of a hit-man who - it is heavily implied - may well have played a role in at least one of those family's dirty business). I couldn't begin to enumerate the litany of murders and strange deaths which circled the Kennedy family from the days of patriarch Joseph P. Kennedy. Four fatal plane crashes (including the favoured heir and daughter), two sons slain in broad daylight by dubious gunmen, the last remaining son (Teddy) almost killed in another plane crash, a daughter lobotomised by her own father, numerous close family members dying in almost comical circumstances (including choking to death at the dinner table on a bone) and anywhere up to two hundred witnesses, mobsters, union leaders, FBI, CIA, FBN, military intelligence agents shot, strangled, blown up, thrown out of a tenth storey window, crashed, burned alive etc. in a brutal internecine war between 1963 and 1976. The history of the Koch family is equally interesting - especially the story of how one brother managed to claw his way over the top of dozens of bodies to get to the exit of a burning plane.
As I said - Wendy was always the most clear sighted of them all. Her constant pleas to Marty to think only of those closest to him fell on deaf ears for most of the show (which increased the suffering of everyone). And yet that was the only route - not to salvation - but survival. It's no co-incidence that the Langmores and the Navarros - two families who were incapable of circling the wagons and fighting solely for each other - wound up roadkill.
I take issue with the assertion that the Byrde's ended up working for the Cartel (under different leadership). The truth is they are the Navarros handlers. Whilst the matriarch of the family ostensibly threatened the Byrdes to give up the name of Javi's killer. That was always an empty threat. It's the Byrdes who dictate the terms of that relationship now and at some point in the future you can be sure they'll burn those assets to the ground once they are no longer necessary.
One final point - it's a fundamental mistake to believe the primary purpose of shows such as Ozark is to "entertain" the audience. Once again - that's self-delusion. The reality is they are very much a part of the very same blood-soaked structures of power which the Byrdes fought their way to the top of. As the show more than demonstrates - you can't get to the top of Netflix or Amazon or NBC or Disney without having blood on your hands. It's not that these are "bad" people (to even pose such a question is ... well ... ludicrous). They're just trapped in a system whose options are all bad. In such circumstances the best you can hope for is momentary acts of grace before you are swallowed up by the torrent of misery and horror once again. In that respect I think Ozark reflected the cold, hard truth of reality quite well.
But keep up the good work.
Yeah, I agree with everything you said. I don’t think protagonist need to face consequences the way real people do.
Like within the context of real life I could understand people wanting Walter White to die or the Byrdes to get locked up but within a show, they’ve done honestly nothing wrong.
I feel like shows help you see things from a perspective completely outside of your own and seeing things from Walter White or The Byrdes, I understand why they did what they did completely.
If people want to watch criminals face consequences all day, just watch Law & Order or Blue Bloods lol.
You’re reading my mind man! Just because something is easier to digest doesn’t mean that it’s better. The show always (through both the airy, elevated cliffs of the Ozarks , and the leverage the characters have) had this sense of suspension to me. And I think this “plot armour” idea-that the Byrdes unrealistically survived- is kind of the point.
Not through muscle, strength or intimidation did they survive, but through premeditated calculation and patience. And through this, they get more power. Now instead of using this power for money, or self-assertion, they used it for leverage against the Cartel. They started off as a family who was grasping on to something to survive with, and ended up using the same tactic to earn themselves more power to gain this plot armour. They do have plot armour, but not because they were born into the knighthood. They have it because they assassinated the damn monarch and suited up themselves.
Most shows believe in this sense of karma, that bad characters get what they deserve. Truth is, most people don’t. Because some people got leverage.
Thanks for pointing out the parallel between Ruth Langmore and Jessie Pinkman - I hadn't thought of it. Very accurate comparison, and a good explanation of why the BB ending was so much better.
I really enjoyed both shows, and Breaking Bad deserved all of its Emmys. That said, Ozark worked slightly more for me because of the core motivation of its lead characters. Marty was given no choice but to go down to the Ozarks and launder the money or he and his family would be wiped out. Walter White turned down a job and money for his treatment because…his pride? I get it, pride is important to a man, but when he’s given an “out” but still chooses the wrong path to get the money, it’s hard to feel anything for him going forward when all of the consequences of his actions become self inflicted at that point. It would’ve worked much better if cooking meth was his only option to get the money. Secondly, I found it much more interesting how Ozark involved and engaged the entire family to be actively part of what was going on. It became the origin story of how an entire family became the villains of their own story. And it made total sense that Jonah shot the guy at the end, it was a callback to season 1 when Buddy taught him how to shoot. Jonah was no longer a child but an intelligent teenager who “broke bad” himself by that point. I felt in Breaking Bad, especially the first 3 seasons, Walter’s family was only there to react to Walter. They had no agency of their own, especially Walter Jr. who was annoying and whiny at times. But that’s the great thing about the art, it’s totally subjective and hits all of us a different way.
I feel like the “unsatisfying” nature of the finale is what they were trying to do. I think they were trying to show that only the least deserving people make it out alive. It’s about what they had to do and sacrifice to become the powerful family that they are when it’s all over. It’s not about good guys getting what they deserve, its about the idea that being the bad guy is the only way to survive.
Nah they just wrote themselves in a corner and didn’t know how to end it. So the writers can cop out and say that they “intended for it to be unsatisfying”
I live between Branson and Ozark Missouri. Any of the lake stuff looked right. I could see this happening here.
There's no redemption because there's not supposed to be redemption. The last words Wendy "Isn't it?" are showing that they've accepted what they've sunk to, and they're too deep to let one man step in the way. And Ruth had to die because it's the cost of buying themselves out of death. Every time they were faced with a deadly experience, someone had to die. And again, one person, after 4 years is not gonna stop what they've built right at the end.
writer also need to understand how important a shows ending is, If the ending of a show sucks that show will be forgotten about regardless of how good it was before (E.g. GOFT, Dexter, X files, Merlin)
At its heart its a moral tale about hownpeorr corrupts. The ending is the final event that solidifies the corruption of the family. No need to go further, we know how it ends for everyone.
“On the nosey”. Ruth, up until that scene, had always been a much smarter character, especially in terms of self-preservation. True, she was running out of life lines at that point, but I think one story arc that could have worked would have been a teaming with Frank Jr.. Ruth was never going to live a totally clean life, but within the army of the Kansas City mob, she would have been shielded and allowed to flourish. A Cosgrove/Langmore family blend would have made sense. Other notes: the van crash should have killed someone. It could have been a redemption arc for Marty or Wendy. Or at least kill Charlotte, thereby jolting the rest of the family awake and finally giving Charlotte a purpose. Not wasting time with what a thinly written villain Camilla was, especially considering all the fantastic ones that proceeded her. The cherry on the turd sundae was the smirking approval from both Byrde parents as their son drops the trigger on a guy. Oh well, great first video. Subscribed.
the ending didnt show the aftermath. Im really surprised by jonah at the end too.
Idk that it’s so much a “bad” ending, but it’s not the redemptive ending that the audience wanted. Maybe they just wanted to show that the Byrdes would truly never get out & they’ll always go back to their criminal ways, digging themselves & their children deeper into the hole.
Agree on everything! Also I was very annoyed by Camilla going forward with wanting to kill Omar even after knowing he had nothing to do with Javi's death. Her believing the Byrdes didn't know it so easily also felt unconvincing.
And what about Mel's "great" idea of casually confronting the "cartel people, family murdering" Byrdes, only evidence of their crime in hands, unnarmed, absolutely no worries for his safety... didn't even check the house for guns... that was just inconceivable for me. And the look of a proud father in Marty's face, giving the go ahead for Jonah to murder a guy who they couldn't even argue was a bad person in any way... SO BAD!
Terrible take
@@rileysevern1968 yea?
Mel was an unnecessary character.
This was my biggest problem too. Mel is repeatedly shown to be a competent professional and also to know who the Byrdes are. All I was hoping for out of the ending was for us to see that Mel had documented things and left a "if I disappear, it was Wendy and Marty Byrde" type note that screwed them over. There is just no reason he wouldn't have done that. Grr.
A lot of comments here decrying the lack of redemption in the end. I think that would miss the point entirely. At what point does a person's actions render them irredeemable? How many people did Marty have to kill to keep his family safe? Why were their lives so much more valuable than the lives of everyone else? The Byrdes are like a cashed up first world country that would turn the entire planet into a crater to protect themselves.
The ending doesn't show redemption because the story did not lead them on a path to it. It showed the moral bankruptcy of the parents had finally corrupted the children (Jonah shooting the PI) and everyone was cool with it. Self preservation at any cost. For that mindset to do a 180 degree turn in the final scene would make no sense.
Great show, Great cast, perfectly acceptable ending. Not everything is a 1950's Disney movie, and Ozark is the kind of cautionary tale we need to remind people that one person's happily ever after is paid for by the blood, sweat and tears of those beneath them.
I feel like the revelation of Javis death being Ruth and the Byrds being aware should've changed the outcome for Navarro.
His sister should've changed path when She learned the truth.
And we should've seen Navarros revenge.
Killing off Ruth was a missed opportunity. She could have been arrested and put in prison, preserving her character for a spinoff. Marty and Wendy were morally bankrupt by show's end and didn’t deserve to survive.
Ain’t no way Ruth was pure lmao, she made her own choices-that’s why the bob cats showed up before she killed Javi