From the current trend of movie-to-TV adaptations,Fargois one of the more successful attempts. Based on the Coen brothers’ movie of the same name, the series won two Golden Globes out of its 8 nominations over the course of two seasons, in addition to three Emmy wins. Though the producers and writers created their own thing separate from the source material, there are undoubtedly some similarities, which have been highlighted in a handy supercut.
Vimeo userArnau Orengograbbed various scenes from both the series and the original movie from 1996. As he wrote in the video’s description, some of the shared aspects include “the snowy Minnesota location, a lot of blood, dark humor, some characters (and even their surnames), some events and even one that sets the series in the same universe as the film.”
Watch the video (viaThe Playlist) below.
Some of the more obvious similarities, even before watching this video analysis, are the characters.Martin Freeman’s role shares a similar function to that ofWilliam H. Macy’s Jerry Lundegaard in the Coens’ film, whileAllison Tolmanfills the role of a smart, unrelenting Midwestern cop a laFrances McDormand.
As it turns out,JoelandEthan Coenmay never fully appreciate these nuances as they aren’t all that interested in the TV series. In an interview withRadio Times, the former said:
“We’re just not very interested. I mean, we’re perfectly happy with it. We have no problem with it. It just feels divorced from our film somehow…Here’s the thing. We work short. Our longest movie is two hours, two minutes [No Country for Old Men]. It’s just not how we think about stories. I mean, after two hours with a character we feel we’re pretty much done with them.”
Showrunner of FX’sFargoNoah Hawleytold us that wewon’t be seeing season 3 until spring of next year, so perhaps now’s as best a time as any to re-watch and find more of these similarities — even if the Coens pay them no mind.
