Canon is the movie Fargo

[prettygoodcop]

Ya know, I'm not sure I quite like this idea of, y'know, bein' inside yer head and all. I'm not gonna say there's anything wrong with it or anything but it is...different, havin' someone else write and control everything I do and say. It looks to me like that Jeremy Brett is pretty popular over here, judging from how much they like Sherlock Holmes. And that one show, what's it called, with the English fella who wears the big scarf and is always on PBS. Can't you do one of those instead?

[Uh, not quite the characters you're thinking of, Marge. Vaguely late eighties setting and all that. And they're not the ones dominating my headspace right now.]

Well, I suppose it isn't my call anyway then. You seem like a nice enough young man. I bet you'll do a pretty good job of it there.

[You betcha.]

Comments

[ofdrumsthesound]

You're from that movie where no one can describe Peter Stormare and Steve Buscemi better than 'kinda funny-looking,' aren't you?

[prettygoodcop]

[Marge nods.]

Yup. Though I also got "looks like the Marlboro Man" for the big one. It's a real problem with eyewitness testimony, y'know. Things happen fast, or ya see someone you don't know is gonna be important down the road, so ya don't remember it so great. If I'd'a talked to those sex workers three days, maybe a week later, I'd'a been lucky to get so much as "kinda funny-lookin'" out of 'em. To them, they were just two more clients.

And fair play to them - they are kinda funny lookin'. Though mind you, I'd rather they'd given me a bit more to go on.

[ofdrumsthesound]

'Sniveling little rat-faced git and big intimidating brute' might've been better, though. Some people just don't have enough creativity.

[prettygoodcop]

Yah, that could do, I guess. "Kinda funny lookin'" ended up being enough, though. They left their tracks in other ways.

[ofdrumsthesound]

Lucky for you that they did, really.

[prettygoodcop]

Luck, some phone records, and a bit of legwork. That and I don't think Mr. Lundegaard thought his whole plan through very much.

[Marge's expression becomes pained. She sighs.]

I just don't understand it. There's not enough money in the whole world that'd get me to do something like that to my Norm. Now five people are dead, all over money. And his poor son, too - what's he gonna do?

[ofdrumsthesound]

Well no, but then he was kind of . . . stupid.

People are strange. They're worse than demons and better than angels--sometimes both at once. I know I have been.

[prettygoodcop]

Didn't come across as too bright when I was talkin' to him.

That's true enough, I suppose. You don't see much of the worst of it up in Brainerd, though. Homicide's somethin' that comes around every few years or so, but not much more than that.

[She gives a last sigh and her expression grows more subtly determined and upbeat. No sense getting beat down about it.]

Heck, maybe I'm just some cowtown yokel who doesn't know anything about anything, but I think people get better, and are gonna keep getting better. We're better than we were 100 years ago, and we'll be better 100 years from now so long as we don't do nothing foolish like blow ourselves up.

I've never much understood pessimism, really. About people or about anything. 'Cause what's the point of livin' if you think the world's just gonna keep bein' awful? How's that gonna do you any good? I didn't become Chief by moanin' and quittin' my way to the top, I'll tell ya that much.

You don't need to edit once per mistake, you know ;)

[ofdrumsthesound]

You can save one life by destroying another. Happens all the time.

There are plenty of beings that stay alive out of sheer spite: their suicide would please too many bastards. I've survived on that principle myself.