The Horror Of Netflix’s Ozark Season 4 Part 1

As terrifying as any slasher or demon, Marty and Wendy Byrde are the modern-day Boogeymen complete with silver tongues and ordinary faces in Ozark Season 4 Part 1.

Spoilers for Ozark Season 4 Part 1 below

Part 1 of Netflix’s Ozark Season 4 dropped over the weekend and quickly filled the void left behind by Showtime’s Yellowjackets finale. Ozark Season 4 is the final season and consists of fourteen episodes split into two parts. After countless nominations and Emmy awards, the show is coming to a close. It has always been an exciting thriller filled with deceit, double-dealings, and danger. While no one would describe it as traditional horror, there was certainly enough murdering going on to rank it alongside even higher body count slashers.

Grief and pain as horror has always been hottly debated. The devastating infanticide of Nightgale and the debilitating rage of Old Boy are iltra violent and painful to watch. Torture porn is its own subgenre because some people just want to be abused. Noone would argue Ozark is on par with those but in a quieter equally impactful way it is horrific.

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We watched as Marty and Wendy Byrde moved their two children to the Missouri Ozarks to escape law enforcement and generate a new stream of laundering opportunities for the Navarro cartel. Fearing for his life, he picked up what he could and ran where he thought he could start over. Trouble followed him, however, and he was backed into a corner where his only choice was to keep paddling.

Along the way, he met enterprising Ruth Langmore, the incomparable Julia Garner, a couple of powerful heroin farmers, the KC mob, and multiple members of the Navarro drug cartel, to name just the highlights. But, regardless of what Marty did, he could not get out from under things. When his wife Wendy got involved, she lent a calculating mind to his schemes, but her Machiavellian manipulations rarely saved them. At the end of Ozark Season 3, the Byrdes had jumped out the frying pan and into the fire, Ruth had broke from them to join Wyatt and Darlene Snell, and the family was fracturing.

Always deceptively calm, Marty’s facade is starting to slip. Omar Navarro killed his lawyer Helen right in front of them, splattering brain matter and blood across them. The opening scene of episode 1 picks up right after that event, and Wendy’s hair is covered in brain matter. The bulk of Ozark Season 4 Part 1 deals with the Byrde’s problems with Felix, Maya, the FBI agent, and Javi Navarro, the heir apparent to the cartel. Unlike Omar, Javi has zero patience or tolerance. He also is reactionary and deadly when crossed.

It would be easy to ascribe the horror element of Ozark to him. He did kill a fair number of people in seven episodes—most of them with very little provocation or warning. The KC mob run by Frank Senior killed fewer people by a mile. For all the shooting and cold-blooded killing Javi did and continues to threaten to do, including the shocking deaths of Darlene and Wyatt, the biggest horror of Ozark stems from the Byrdes themselves. They are corrupt and taint everyone around them.

Despite believing they are only trying to protect themselves and their family, Wendy and Marty are destroyers. They are as monstrous as any demon and just as destructive. Marty was always laundering cartel money. Greed warped him into something rotten and selfish. Even worse is Wendy. Her mentally ill brother Ben’s (Tom Pelphrey) appearance last season revealed the truth about Wendy. She is a narcissistic sociopath willing to sacrifice anyone to save herself. Even the things she does to keep her children safe are just designed to keep them close to her. They are possessions and reflections of her rather than human beings to be nurtured and protected. As a result, the Byrdes have ruined every life they touch, including Ruth and their children.

The Byrdes left a wake of dead bodies over the years. Some of them kind of deserved it,, but others were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Poor Zeke’s biological parents, Pastor Mason Young and Grace, never intended on becoming criminals. The man of God legitimately believed he was providing a service on the water before Marty duped him into his deal with the Snells, which eventually got him and Grace killed. Rachel Garrison, who Marty went into business with at the Blue Cat Lodge, managed to escape the FBI and the cartel, but the stress of that experience and her substance abuse problem caught up with her, and she was poisoned by tainted drugs. Business partners, lawyers, billionaires are all affected by Marty and Wendy eventually.

The real horror of Ozark is what happened to Ruth, Wyatt, Jonah, and Charlotte. They are children. They didn’t deserve to be dragged into this mess. Charlotte(Sophia Hublitz) has become a clone of her mother. Hubritz does a remarkable job channeling Laura Linney’s mannerisms and vocal tone. She gaslights with the best of them now, and Wendy loves it. Charlotte is no longer thinking about college or boyfriends. Instead, she is focused on entrenching herself even further in the family business. Every nuanced word she speaks is designed to curry favor with her mother.

Jonah(Skylar Gaertner) has become a fledgling money launderer for Ruth and Darlene. He is a brilliant kid full of potential, but after being dragged away from Chicago and subjected to the family’s drama instead of cared for, he is leaning into crime rather than away from it. Instead, his mother would turn him into the police rather than lose him. she isn’t trying to save him. Instead, she is trying to keep him from leaving her.

The biggest tragedy belongs to Ruth and sweet Wyatt, though. By the end of the seven Part 1 episodes, Wyatt is dead, having been shot in the head by Javi and Darlene. Ruth, who recognized that things were spiraling out of control, tried to get him to run with her, but he chose to stay and marry Darlene sealing his fate. Ruth initially thinks Frank Jr. did it in retaliation for Darlene killing his father but later turns to Wendy, who she knows is capable of anything. Although the Byrdes did not directly kill Wyatt, they are as culpable as Javi, who pulled the trigger. Her gut-wrenching final scenes will undoubtedly guarantee to Garner another Emmy and haunt my dreams. The pixie with an attitude will never be the same, and the Byrdes are to blame.

Is Ozark’s traditional horror filled with power tools, ghosts, and demons? No, but it is a new brand of terror that forces us to look at the worst of humanity. Like murder porn or true crime documentaries, this series has morphed into a glimpse inside the making of monsters and the destruction of innocence.

Can the Byrdes be redeemed? It’s doubtful. Marty has a soft spot for her, and he doesn’t appear to be as far gone as Wendy. Even if Marty and Wendy sacrifice themselves to save their children, they can’t ever scrub the blood off of their hands, though. Who knows what Ozark Season 4 Part 2 looks like. The family is fractured, and Ruth has been broken. Only FBI Agent Maya has clean hands. Ruth isn’t cut from the same cloth as her former employer. But, she may be the lone person to escape from the Byrde’s reign of terror. I know I will be rooting for her. I would love to see a final shot of her, Jonah, and Three riding off into the sunset, where they can finally find some peace. Although the car crash at the beginning of Part 1 makes that look bleak.

Netflix has not released a date for Ozark Season 4 Part 2’s debut.