Season synopsis
Contains spoilers for this season and earlier seasons.
Insurance salesman Lester Nygaard has spent years being pushed around by his wife, Pearl, and his old bully Sam Hess. After Lester meets hitman Lorne Malvo in a hospital, Malvo kills Hess, and Lester kills Pearl during an argument at home. When police chief Vern Thurman arrives, Malvo shoots him with Lester’s shotgun. Deputy Molly Solverson spots the connection, but Lester knocks himself out and passes as another victim, leaving Molly with a case her new chief, Bill Oswalt, refuses to believe.
Malvo works other jobs, including blackmailing supermarket owner Stavros Milos. Molly follows the clues, while Gus struggles with having let Malvo go in Duluth. Over the next year, Lester remarries, rises at work and becomes less careful about hiding his crimes. Molly and Gus marry. When Malvo returns to Bemidji, Lester and Linda plan to flee. He sends her into the insurance office wearing his red parka to collect their passports and cash. Malvo shoots her as Lester watches from his car.
Lester tries to pass Linda’s death off as a robbery, but Molly sees Linda wore his coat and keeps pressing him. The FBI assigns Budge and Pepper to protect Lester. Malvo cancels their backup and lures them with a car whose salesman is taped to the steering wheel, then shoots them. A bear trap injures Malvo; Gus finds him at a cabin and shoots him dead. Molly recovers Malvo’s recordings, including Lester’s confession to Pearl’s murder. He escapes for two weeks before police catch him snowmobiling in Montana. He flees across a frozen lake and falls through the ice. Back in Bemidji, Molly becomes chief.