The Ozark Season 4 Detail That Could Mean More Than You Think
This article contains spoilers for "Ozark" Season 4
The hotly anticipated first part of "Ozark" Season 4 is finally here, and not surprisingly, it was the top series on Netflix in its first week of release with more than 77 million hours viewed by streaming audiences, according to Business Insider. After all, the explosive ending to Season 3 that showed the execution of Helen Pierce (Janet McTeer), as she stood by cartel money launderer Marty Byrde (Jason Bateman) and his wife-slash-partner-in-crime, Wendy (Laura Linney), made for a tantalizing cliffhanger.
Of course, Marty and Wendy got away from Helen's shooting relatively unscathed — apart from heaping amounts of blood and brain matter all over them — but the scene set up the couple's uncertain future for Season 4. For the uninitiated, "Ozark" Season 1, the Byrdes were forced to flee from Chicago with their two teen children to the Missouri Ozarks so Marty could survive and launder money for drug kingpin Omar Navarro (Felix Solis). Over the course of the series, several new criminals including Ruth Langmore (Julia Garner), Darlene Snell (Lisa Emery), and Javi Elizonndro (Alfonso Herrera) have entered the Byrdes' orbit, increasing the odds that either Marty and-or Wendy could die by the time the series wraps up.
Luckily, both Marty and Wendy survived Season 4 Part 1, but fans on Reddit are already speculating which character will die once the final seven episodes of the series drop later in 2022. Some fans on Reddit are even buzzing about not only if but where the Byrdes could meet their fate.
Fans believe all those windows in the Byrdes' home endanger them
Since the very beginning of "Ozark" in 2017, the Byrdes have lived in a remote home on a lake with plenty of windows to enjoy their view. Of course, all those windows mean outsiders can see too much of the Byrdes, which is especially a problem since Marty and his family have had targets on their backs from day one. The window detail is not lost on commenters in the Reddit thread for "Ozark" Season 4 Episode 2, and some fear the room with a view will ultimately be the place where someone will be taken out.
The suggestion by users is that somebody will die by means of sniper fire. As such, Reddit user u/trianglepolaroids commented, "Their big windows all over the house give me so much anxiety," which as of this writing has received over 400 upvotes. Replying to the comment, user u/SilasX said the potential danger has already been acknowledged on the show, writing, "Haha, yeah in the season 3 episode where they're worried about being followed, Wendy made a note of it when asking Marty not to sleep in the living room — 'we live in a house made of windows.'" Fellow Reddit users agreed with u/SilasX's observation, giving the comment over 120 upvotes.
Ozark's showrunner reveals the real reason the house was chosen for the series
In a Q&A with The Hollywood Reporter after the debut of Season 4, Part 1, "Ozark" showrunner Chris Mundy said the purpose of the house wasn't selected to provoke any feelings of danger, even though that danger (as u/SilasX pointed out on Reddit) was acknowledged in the series eventually: "We referenced that at one point, [a character saying] 'We're literally in a house of nothing but windows.' But no. It wasn't really a metaphor in terms of danger or anything," Mundy told THR. "But it does make you feel the water so that you feel that you're in that location. One of the things that's unique about the show is that it's set on the lake."
As such, the house and all of its windows, as well as other settings in the series, were more chosen for their aesthetic quality, Mundy said. Luckily, he added, the Byrdes' house presented more creative opportunities as the series unfolded.
"So, in the first two seasons, we had the Blue Cat, where you could feel the water; the Byrdes' house, where you could feel the water; and at the Langmore trailers, where you're on the water. For us, that was the beauty of it. And that house just gave and gave and gave to us. It was the best location," Mundy explained to THR. "As many times as we shot there, every director managed to find another way to shoot it because of those windows and its weird angles. I will love that house forever."
All seven episodes of "Ozark" Season 4, Part 1 are streaming exclusively on Netflix.