A few more episodes in... I'm nearing the end of the first season and I haven't gotten bored yet; I'm still curious about what'll happen with the characters.
The show stumbles a bit in places with the pacing; at times it seems to drag and I think it probably could've been trimmed down to, say, 8 episodes as opposed to 10. Episode 8 is a backstory/flashback episode depicting the initial events from 10 years ago that led the characters to end up in their current situation. While I think it was useful to shed light on this backstory, I think it might've worked better had various bits been incorporated into at least some of the preceding episodes of the season, rather than putting it all in a single episode, nearly at the end of the season.
In episode 7 (I think? Maybe it was 6), there's a scene where Marty is riding a bike, which is somewhat reminiscent of Michael Bluth biking in Arrested Development. However, somehow in AD Michael actually looks sort of cool when he bikes, yet in Ozark, Marty looks kinda dorky while doing it. In AD, Michael rides an 80s Schwinn road bike. In Ozark, Marty rides a contemporary Specialized hybrid-esque looking bike. At least I think it said Specialized. In AD, Michael rides for transportation purposes; in Ozark, Marty rides seemingly for recreation.
Seeing this scene of another character of Jason Bateman's riding a bike made me wonder if there's something about him and bikes, so I had to look it up. I could only find one or two interviews that mentioned it briefly; apparently he's an avid cyclist. So I wonder if Michael biking in AD was his idea, or if the writers came up with it on their own. Seeing as he's a producer on Ozark, I'm guessing perhaps it was indeed his idea there to have a scene with Marty biking.
I can't believe there hasn't even been a short/portion of an interview of Jason Bateman specifically about biking...
We'll see how the rest of the show goes. At its best moments, it's pretty riveting, although at times it does feel a bit slow and/or slightly poorly thought-out. What's interesting about watching this after being very familiar with Jason Bateman's performance in AD is that he's capable of doing quite a bit of depth with a character, which you just don't really tend to get in a comedy.
ETA: Episode 9: definitely one of the better ones as the show builds up to what presumably will be the season's climax during the final episode. There was a cool song played over the end credits of this episode too. There was one scene that brought to mind "There's always money in the banana stand!" from Arrested Development... pacing/plotting still stumbles slightly in places; sometimes a particular plot point will skip an episode and then after that, the show comes back to it, which makes for a slightly disjointed/hampered viewing experience.
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