The third season of the American black comedy crime drama television series Fargo, billed as Fargo: Year Three and Fargo: Installment 3, aired on FX from April 19 to June 21, 2017, totaling ten episodes. The series is an anthology about violent crime in the American Midwest, with each season acting as a self-contained story within the show's shared continuity. Year Three takes place in Minnesota between 2010 and 2011, and depicts a sibling rivalry between parole officer Ray Stussy and real estate mogul Emmit that spirals into a series of murders around the area. The situation is further exaserbated by Emmit's involvement with V. M. Varga, a shady businessman who uses his vast resources to exploit the ensuing chaos.
The season was produced by FX Productions and MGM Television, with Noah Hawley serving as showrunner. The writers used their more contemporary setting to explore the Digital Age, the effects of late-stage capitalism, and the spread of disinformation. Like the previous seasons, Year Three was filmed in Calgary, Alberta in early 2017. Ewan McGregor leads the season's main cast in the dual role of Ray and Emmit Stussy, and stars alongside Carrie Coon, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Goran Bogdan, and David Thewlis. Michael Stuhlbarg, Hamish Linklater, Olivia Sandoval, Shea Whigham, Mark Forward, Mary McDonnell, Graham Verchere, Scott Hylands, Linda Kash, Caitlynne Medrek, and Scoot McNairy all make recurring appearances.
Year Three was praised by critics for its social commentary, directing, and performances, particularly from McGregor and Thewlis. It received various accolades, including the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Limited Series, Movie or Special for composer Jeff Russo, and the Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Actor in a Limited Series or Movie and Golden Globe Award for Best Actor â Miniseries or Television Film, both for McGregor.
Billy Bob Thornton, who appeared as Lorne Malvo in Fargo: Year One, narrates Peter and the Wolf in the fourth episode, "The Narrow Escape Problem".
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Ewan McGregor was cast in the male lead dual role as Emmit and Ray Stussy, and Carrie Coon plays the female lead role, Gloria Burgle. In September 2016, Mary Elizabeth Winstead was cast in a major role as Nikki Swango, while Scoot McNairy in a recurring role. In November 2016, it was announced that Jim Gaffigan had joined the main cast in the role of Donny Mashman, Gloria Burgle's partner. However, it was later announced that Gaffigan would not appear in the season due to scheduling conflicts. Mark Forward was later cast to replace him as Mashman, and Mashman's role in the story was reduced. In December 2016, several new actors joined the cast, including David Thewlis, Michael Stuhlbarg, Shea Whigham, Fred Melamed and Thomas Mann.
Filming began in early 2017 in Calgary, Alberta, where the previous two seasons were also filmed.
Regarding filming with Ewan McGregor while he is portraying dual roles, co-star Mary Elizabeth Winstead said, "For some takes, I was standing with Ewan's double and for some takes, I was standing with Ewan." She added, "Watching how the doubles interact with him and have to learn his way of walking and his posture and his way of standing was interesting. They make it feel very natural and grounded and real. They're reading the lines and the scenes are existing as they would regularly, just swapping out the people. Which is somewhat strange, but it still doesn't feel like you're doing a trick of any sort."
As with the previous two seasons, the third season had a visual style, achieved through color grading by removing the blue channel. Noah Hawley described the technique, saying "So you take the blue channel on the digital image and you just dial it out. And what you end up with is a very distinctive look in which colors like red and orange and yellow; they just really pop in a different way. Usually in cold weather you add blue, because blue denotes cold. So it was interesting to take the blue out and see what it did to the image. And once we did that it became clear that it doesn't look at all like any of the other years, which I really liked."
The third season has received acclaim from critics. On Metacritic, it has a score of 89 out of 100 based on 32 reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, it has a 93% rating with an average score of 8.5 out of 10 based on 225 reviews. The site's critical consensus reads: "Thanks in part to a memorable dual performance from Ewan McGregor, Fargo mostly maintains the sly wit and off-kilter sensibility it displayed in its first two seasons."
In addition to the 6 Emmy nominations listed below, the series earned an additional ten nominations in various technical and creative categories.