Fargo has filled two big roles for season 2. Kirsten Dunst (Spider-Manfranchise, Melancholia) and Jesse Plemons (Breaking Bad, Friday Night Lights) have landed series regular roles in FX’s Emmy-winning crime thriller.
In addition, FX announced the second season won’t premiere until next fall and will once again consist of 10 episodes.
Dunst will play Peggy Blomquist, “a small town beautician with big city dreams who is trying to figure out who she really is and what she really wants as she struggles with traditional societal expectations. She shares her home with her husband Ed (Plemons), a butcher’s assistant, who wants to be supportive of his wife’s self-discovery, even if he doesn’t quite understand it.”
Fargo surprised skeptics with a thoughtful and witty crime story that arguably managed to improve upon the Oscar-winning 1996 Coen brothers film that served as its inspiration. The show was nominated for 18 Emmy Awards and won the prize for outstanding miniseries.
Like HBO’s crime anthology True Detective, a show that’s often perceived as Fargo‘s rival, season 2 will tell a completely different story with a new cast. Unlike True Detective, however, Fargo‘s setting is expected to be somewhat similar and the crimes will have a direct connection to the first season.
Season 2 is essentially a prequel and is set in 1979 in Sioux Falls, S.D., and Luverne, Minn. The story will focus on a young Lou Solverson (not yet cast) who recently returned from the Vietnam War. Solverson was played by Keith Carradine in the first season, and he repeated teased to a harrowing case he experienced while working as a state police officer in Sioux Falls.
“He thought he left the war behind, but he came back and here it is, it’s domestic,” showrunner Noah Hawley told EW in July. “We will meet Molly’s mother, who was not a character in season 1 … and we’ll learn what happened to her. There were a lot of clues left in the first season and we’ll do our best to hit those.”
Other major open roles include Solverson’s wife, Betsy, their 4-year-old daughter, Molly, and fellow officer, Ben Schmidt.
Here’s Hawley giving more season 2 details.
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