REVIEW: Season 4 Of Ozark

After four seasons, Netflix's Ozark series is finished and we have conflicting feelings. On the one hand, we are glad that it was created and that the creators managed to finish it (Netflix cancels one series after another), on the other hand, we are not completely satisfied with how it happened. 

Ruth is determined to kill Javi for killing her cousin Wyatt, although it complicates everything and puts her in danger. On the other hand, there are Marty and Wendy Byrd, who are solving one problem after another and hope to be able to escape from this situation alive.

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It's nice that the series is coming to an end, because it's starting to be a bit stereotypical and repetitive. Something goes wrong and the Byrds spend the whole season fixing it. Fortunately, the ways in which they do so still quite interesting, so we were not bored at all. 

Repetitive storyline is accompanied by another negative, which we have been complaining about for some time. We are talking about the character of Marty Byrd, who continues the established trend of submissive character. Marty constantly gives in to his wife Wendy, even though he knows that Wendy is making bad, even dangerous decisions.

Once the most intelligent man in the room now can't even manage to get ready for a simple family trial. Marty is only a shadow of his self from the first two seasons, while the storyline focuses primarily on the character Wendy, who continues to work on the basis of her "power trip".

So she is far too ambitious and acts under the impression that she has everything under control, although this is not true at all and her surroundings have made her aware of it many times. Thus, the screenplay also fails to develop the characters. It happens despite the fact that the story creates ideal conditions for it.

In reality, one would change their behavior based on external stimuli, but this does not happen in the story. In an average Hollywood movie, that wouldn't be a big hassle, but in a series that focuses so precisely on the characters and their personalities, it's a an issue.

The viewer will not receive any satisfaction in terms of the development of the characters. The creators quickly "cleaned up" the storyline with Jonah, who rebelled against his parents, but in the final it led absolutely nowhere, or it did not cause anything significant.

It's a bit of an overall problem for the series, as the events and actions of the characters almost never have significant consequences. As spectators, we have become accustomed to the fact that the Byrds will "solve everything" anyway, so you don't really have to worry about anything.

The series for the entire four series failed to depict the story of his sister Charlotte, who has nothing to do in the fourth series. Ozark is essentially a character study of people living in extreme conditions who are trying to survive from day to day. In the final series, however, it fails in an important aspects of storytelling and the final culmination of events seemed surprisingly insignificant to us.

In each series, some main characters die, and given the end of the series, it probably won't surprise anyone that the final season didn't abandon this trend. However, the scenes seem flat and could not evoke any emotions in us, which we did not expect, as some of the characters in this series have grown on us. We liked how the series ended and who didn't survive, but the way it was filmed and presented seemed very weak.

The final episode seemed rushed and not very well directed. It is a pity, as the rest of the fourth series was successful in this regard. But when we're talking about directing or camera, Ozark still ranks among the top-notch series in almost the entire fourth season, and the story can really lean on high-quality acting performances.

Actress Laura Linney, in particular, stars as a woman who falls "into the dark" uncontrollably. However, Jason Bateman as Marty and the actors playing their children or, of course, Felix Solis playing Omar Navarra are also excellent. 

The creators work with sound and music really well, and they end episodes in a way, that doesn't look like cheap cliffhangers, but like the natural culmination of given storylines. We have criticized the screenplay in some respects, but it is far from bad. The creators made the story very attractive and constantly fought for the viewer's attention. The whole series was accompanied by excellently written and enacted dialogues.

After the first three seasons, we expected a better final one, but we still liked Ozark overall and still rank it as one of the best series from Netflix. Unfortunately, the fourth season did not fully reach its potential, nor did it fulfil our expectations. Nevertheless, you will devour it within a few days and you will most likely be satisfied, though you may not be completely excited.