Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Unlike similar anthology series, FX has made it very clear that every installation of the Fargo universe is connected. The Season Two finale revealed that Gerhardt righthand man turned revenge seeker, Hanzee Dent (Zahn McClarnon), later becomes the Season One crime boss, Mr. Tripoli, through extensive reconstructive surgery. Mr. Tripoli was later officially killed by Lorne Malvo (Billy Bob Thornton) in Season One, but could Malvo be responsible for murdering Season Two’s other main killer, Mike Milligan?
Season Two, which is set in 1979, resigns the poetry-quoting criminal Mike Milligan (Bokeem Woodbine) to perhaps the saddest death of all, permanently working in accounting for the corporation he was previously killing for, which controls the Kansas City crime syndicate. In those last few moments when Milligan is being told of his fate, you can see his disappointment and pain.
However, in Season One, Lorne Malvo storms into a certain office building and kills Moses Tripoli, Mr. Carlyle, and 19 other unnamed members of the Fargo mob. It’s a terrifying and memorable scene:
Though the building that Milligan works in and the one Malvo enters is not the same building, it would make sense with Fargo’s meticulous focus on continuity and themes that these deaths could be related. Overall, there are only three office-centered scenes that are memorable: the Kansas City corporate heads being killed by the Gerhardt gang, Mike Milligan’s transition to office life, and Lorne Malvo’s storming of the Fargo office. Here are the two buildings: Milligan’s is on the left, and Malvo’s is on the right.
It’s a bit of a stretch, but not impossible. Here’s what we know: Mr. Tripoli (fomrerly Hanzee Dent) goes on to establish a Fargo-based crime syndicate that operates in the northern midwest. It’s assumed that this crime syndicate either pushed out the Kansas City corporation that conquered the crime region from the Gerhardt clan. Knowing how businesses operate, how opportunistic and morally flexible Milligan is, and the important information Milligan would know, it’s entirely possible that he switched to working for the Fargo-based crime syndicate Mr. Tripoli/Dent established. He would especially be seen as an asset since Mr. Tripoli/Dent knows firsthand just how powerful and valuable Milligan is.
This would possibly place Milligan in the office that Lorne Malvo (Billy Bob Thornton) shot up in Season One, making him one of Malvo’s 19 murders. It’s definitely a plausible theory as well as a relief to anyone who thought Mike Milligan got off too easily (*raises hand*). I guess we’ll have to wait until 2017 before we know for sure.
You can stream Fargo on FXNOW and Hulu. Season Two is also available for purchase on Amazon.
