"Ozark" Season 3 is a marriage story with high stakes

With the third season of the Netflix original series Ozark, however, the conflict is turned inward. Season 1 began as th...

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With the third season of the Netflix original series Ozark, however, the conflict is turned inward. Season 1 began as the story of a man forcing his family on the run while telling them the bare minimum about his criminal dealings.There’s a point in most long-running serialized dramas where the writers are stretching to find some new external pressure to put on its central characters. Maybe this necessitates a location change. Maybe you get a recognizable actor to play the Big Bad for a season. Or maybe you just keep doing the same thing over and over again and hope no one will notice.Season 2 found Marty (Jason Bateman) bringing his family in fully on his money laundering empire; and Season 3 now explores what happens when the heads of that empire—Marty and his wife Wendy (Laura Linney)—are at odds over how to proceed, and begin actively undermining one another.The result is a fresh source of drama and character conflict dripping with deep-rooted emotion, which also in turn ups the stakes of the series significantly. In short, Ozark Season 3 bets big on itself and wins.The new season of Ozark picks up pretty soon after Season 2 ended. The Byrdes have successfully opened their riverboat casino and things are going quite well. Or so it seems. Marty feels uneasy about laundering through the casino without knowing for sure that he’s not being watched, while Wendy advocates aggressive expansion.