Ozark’s finale is bound to include the series’ most heartbreaking death yet. If Jonah continues on his current path, he could end up like Ben.
Warning: the following contains SPOILERS for Ozark.
Ozark season 4 part 2 could end with Jonah Byrde (Skylar Gaertner) ending up like his uncle Ben Davis (Tom Pelphrey). Ozark is coming to an end. Jonah’s sister Charlotte (Sofia Hublitz) has become resigned to the fact that she has no choice but to help her parents Marty (Jason Bateman) and Wendy (Laura Linney) and somehow contribute to the family business. Meanwhile, for Jonah, it is the complete opposite, which means that he could suffer the same fate as Ben sometime during the final 7 episodes of Ozark.
As a young boy, after finding out that his parents are money launderers for a Mexican drug cartel, Jonah was actually quite supportive of the family business. Marty even teaches the basics of money laundering to Jonah, who soaks up criminal knowledge like a sponge. However, later, when Jonah interrogates Navarro cartel lawyer Helen Pierce (Janet McTeer) at gunpoint, Jonah finds out that the execution of his uncle Ben was green-lit by Wendy herself. This is what pushes Jonah over the edge and prompts him to repeatedly attempt to sabotage his own parents and the Navarro cartel. Jonah even uses the money laundering skills passed on to him by his father in order to launder money for Darlene Snell (Lisa Emery) and Ruth Langmore (Julia Garner). Disillusioned by what his family has turned into, Jonah tries his hardest to become the biggest threat to the Byrdes.
Ozark season 4 part 1 sees Jonah walking a path that is fast becoming dangerously similar to Ben Davis’ downward spiral. In many ways, Jonah is even more dangerous than his uncle. Ben, who had bipolar disorder, really only started being perceived as a liability when he stopped taking his psychiatric medication. Ben was also shocked by the sudden realization that his sister Wendy has become a money launderer for a mass-murdering Mexican cartel. In contrast, Jonah, who doesn’t seem to suffer from any psychiatric condition, has had all of Ozark season 1 to 3 to digest this information. Jonah may just be a teenager, but he’s also one of the smartest characters on the show, and his formative years were spent learning about the fundamentals of the money laundering business, including how dangerous heroin dealers can be. In short, while Ben couldn’t do much about being a liability – which is why Marty didn’t want Ben to stay – Jonah has commercially decided to become a liability to his family, fully aware of the consequences that it brings. If Jonah keeps this up, he’ll soon become as much of an obstacle as Ben was to the Byrdes and the Navarro cartel.
Moreover, just like his uncle, Jonah won’t go down without a fight. This spells real trouble for the Navarro cartel. While Ben became too dangerous to be allowed to live simply because he was spilling cartel secrets, Jonah actually has the skills to attack the Navarro cartel’s accounts. Should Jonah decide to take more violent action, he only needs to point Ruth in the right direction, which Jonah already started when he told Ruth that it was Javi (Alfonso Herrera) who killed Darlene and Wyatt (Charlie Tahan). Furthermore, without the leadership of the highly intelligent Omar (Felix Solis), Jonah poses a real threat to the cartel – if Javi doesn’t kill him first. As Omar stresses to Marty and Wendy in Ozark season 4 part 1, episode 7 “Sanctified,” he doesn’t threaten nor kill children. This could be Omar’s way of telling them that Javi, who is not like Omar at all, will be more than willing to take out Jonah if necessary.
Ozark season 4 part 2 is likely to end with Jonah getting crossed off the cartel’s hit list alongside his uncle Ben. That being said, this might only happen after Jonah draws first blood and does something that actually sabotages not just his parents, but the Navarro cartel itself. As the unpredictable Javi takes the reins of the Navarro cartel while Wendy goes full Heisenberg, things are bound to get much darker in the last 7 episodes of Ozark.
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