CRIME MOVES WAY SOUTH OF CHICAGO

CHARACTERS STRUGGLE TO MAINTAIN FAMILY AMONG CRIMINAL CHAOS

By PETER THOMAS BUSCH

A clever investment advisor enters into a business partnership with the aim of capitalizing on the limitless opportunities available in Chicago’s real estate market.

The deal goes sideways though when the drug cartel financing the business discovers that one of them has been skimming profits off the top of the deals.

Jason Bateman stars and directs several episodes of the Netflix Streaming Series Ozark (2017-2022).

This four season, 44 episode streaming series also stars Laura Linney, Sofia Hublitz and Skylar Gaertner as one streaming television family, the Byrdes, and Julia Garner, Charlie Tahan and Marc Menchaca as a dysfunctional trailer park family, the Langmores, living beside Lake Ozark in Missouri as second streaming television family.

Bateman’s character, Marty Byrde, must relocate his family from Chicago big city living to the rural Ozarks to appease a drug lord who uses Chicago as a hub for drug trafficking operations.

Marty figures the Ozarks would be easy pickings for his money laundering done on behalf of the Navarro Mexican drug cartel.

Felix Solis plays Mexican crime boss Omar Navarro. 

The Byrdes, with two young children, Charlotte and Jonah, have difficulty adjusting to the country life of Missouri as Wendy Byrde, played by Laura Linney, must first find a suitable home that matches a cash strapped family budget.

Several initial episodes deal with Wendy looking for a home and Marty looking for businesses that will allow him to invest the drug money. Marty initially believes that the country bumpkins will be grateful for the cash infusion in their rundown Missouri businesses, but most potential investment partners are sophisticated enough to suspect Marty is more interested in laundering money than helping them along.

Marty is a bit frantic the first season because the ruthless Navarro has promised to wipe out the Byrde family if Marty does not meet the money laundering quota by the end of the summer. 

The money laundering operation gets a bit easier after a strip club owner is killed, clearing the way for Marty to buy the club with the drug money and begin one of his first big money laundering ventures in the Ozarks. Marty also invests into a money losing hotel, marina and pub operation.

Unfortunately, Navarro continually ups the ante, and more people must die to keep the money laundering operations running smoothly. 

What was to be a summer trip to Missouri for the Byrdes becomes an all-out gang war as the Mexican drug cartel uses a lot of muscle (hit men) to shore up their interests.

More people die until killing and murder become easy solutions, but things always go sideways even after the United States Federal Bureau of Investigations gets a piece of the narrative, and more people must die to keep the streaming series going.

The script illustrates how a civilian family gradually adjusts to a life of crime, especially with the two children, Charlotte and Jonah, initially being oblivious to the criminal activity, but then as they mature over the seasons, they get entangled into a life of crime.

Marty and Wendy also have their difficulties after agreeing to live together but separate and apart after Wendy has an affair. Marty has proof of the adultery via a lude video of Wendy and her lover taken at the scene of the sex act in Chicago.

Wendy cannot argue with him with that undisputed evidence, but she also has to keep up appearances for the drug cartel and for the sake of the children, and so she reluctantly moves to Missouri with Marty and the kids.

The series has the two main narratives of the Byrdes and the Langmores that gradually intertwine, especially after Ruth Langmore, played by Julia Garner, takes a job running the strip club.

Ruth is initially just a dirty trailer park girl doing minor crimes to appease her father languishing in prison. But Marty mentors Ruth and gives her more and more responsibilities until she becomes a sophisticated businesswoman.

Ruth keeps her dirty mouth and her family loyalties, so the audience never knows where she will end up, but Ruth’s role becomes more and more prevalent, and that is enough to keep the series going, as a result.

Wendy too gets absorbed into the criminal world. 

Initially, Wendy is nest building for her two young children, but then as she experiences more and more first-hand how the cartel operates, and the amount of cash in the millions flowing through the money laundering operation, she develops into a keener investment advisor than Marty.

Story creator Bill Dubuque also develops sub plots that spin off from each main narrative, usually involving a love interest.

The Ozarks do have at least one drug growing operation involving heroin poppies that throws in an additional dynamic. 

Lisa Emery plays Darlene Snell, and Peter Mullan plays Jacob Snell, owners of a large piece of waterfront property that has been in the Ozark family for a long time. Marty convinces the Snells to let him operate a riverboat casino on their land, which becomes the main money laundering operation.

Several interesting characters come and go as people become casualties of the drug war. And the series leaves no mistake about the ruthlessness of the drug cartels laundering millions of dollars of drug money through established businesses.

The taste for killing touches many of the main characters, but their victims are just replaced by other equally suspicious targets.

Ozark provides an interesting perspective into human nature as the Byrdes continually resist the lure of the criminal underworld, but the entire family becomes drawn deeper and deeper into the drug cartel operations, anyway.