'Fargo' recap: You gonna be nice?

Every week on "Aw Jeez: A 'Fargo' podcast," hosts Tracy Mumford and Jay Gabler recap the latest episode, and interview experts about the mayhem, the mob and the Minnesota moments in season two of "Fargo." Listen to the audio for more analysis and speculation on last night's goings on.

The night belonged to Peggy.

Our Minnesota housewife with California dreams finally got the self-actualization pep talk she's been longing for — and it didn't seem to matter that it came from a hallucination. The stress of two dead bodies and a tied-up Gerhardt in your basement is enough to stress anybody's mental faculties, let alone those of hoarding, self-help disciple Peggy.

She imagines the roped-up Dodd as a neat, mustachioed psychoanalyst who gives her just the mantra she needs: "Think or be. You can't do both."

When Ed comes home, fresh from his jailbreak, they pack up Dodd's Lincoln, stow the eldest Gerhardt in the trunk, and set out for the wild woods of South Dakota, where Ed's family has a cabin.

"Road trip!" Peggy cries. Ed, however, is rightfully more skeptical about the odds of them making it through this alive. He wants to broker a deal with what's left of the Gerhardt crime family: Trade Dodd for their safety.

Bear Gerhardt, however, couldn't be less interested in his brother's whereabouts, as we saw last week. Ed's calls to offer up Dodd go ignored and unanswered, leaving Ed, Peggy and Dodd to play house at the cabin.

Trouble, of course, is already on their trail. Hanzee Dent snatched the Lifespring seminar info off the Blumquists' fridge, complete with Peggy's hotel reservation and the name of her co-worker: Constance Heck.

Dent hightails it to South Dakota, where he stops into a Sioux Falls bar. A grim plaque stares him down from the wall, proclaiming 22 Indians were hanged there in the 1800s. The bar patrons' attitude toward Native Americans, it turns out, hasn't evolved much since. Dent's water is served with a garnish of spit, and the bar flies follow him out with every racially-charged taunt they can muster.

For Dent, it's the final straw in a series of episodes that have seen him reduced to stereotypes. He launches his own literal incarnation of Wounded Knee, shooting two of his hecklers right in the joint. Before he's done, he's taken out the bartender and two state troopers, and peeled out in a cloud of dust.

Back at the cabin, Peggy's showing off a violent streak of her own. Left alone with Dodd while Ed makes his calls, she turns wickedly maternal, force-feeding him beans and correcting his manners as he sits tied to a post. When crossed, she isn't afraid to stab him in the chest — twice. (Just flesh wounds. Probably. Maybe a punctured lung.)

"Hun, you gotta stop stabbing him," Ed says when he comes home.

With cabin fever setting in, Peggy uses Ed's next absence to call up Constance at the Sioux Falls hotel where she's staying for the Lifespring seminar. What Peggy doesn't know is that Constance has company: Dent has tracked her down and interrupted what Candace hoped would be a romantic evening, candles and all.

With Dent's breath on her neck, Constance tries everything she can think of to get Peggy to reveal her location. Peggy holds out, however, and says she'll call her when all this blows over. Based on the look Dent gives her as they hang up the phone, I don't think Constance will be taking any calls in the near future. Or ever.

Ed, lingering at the Rushmore Grocery Store rest stop, is equally frustrated by the phone. With the Gerhardts ignoring him, he finds another interested buyer for Dodd: Mike Milligan. The Kansas City hitman is still at the Pearl Hotel, fresh off the kill of the Undertaker and his henchmen. The two arrange to meet in Sioux Falls at 8 the next morning — but making plans on "Fargo" is like that little piggy building a twig house. It's just not going to work out.

At the cabin, Peggy breaks the cardinal rule of kidnapping: She lets Dodd out of her sight. And you can blame Ronald Reagan for that!

A fake film, "Operation Eagle's Nest," proves so engrossing, Peggy forgets to watch what that no-good Gerhardt is up to. Just as a World War II-era couple are rescued on screen from a Nazi by a handsome fake Reagan, Peggy realizes her mistake.

When oblivious Ed comes home, Peggy is knocked out on the floor, and Dodd strings Ed up, hangman-style. He lets him dangle as he espouses his theories on the fairer sex. (Pausing mid-kill to share your personal philosophies is ill-advised in pop culture. Finish what you're doing before you wax philosophical.)

"I think Satan is a woman," Dodd says. "Think about it."

Peggy fulfills his theory for him, regaining consciousness long enough to stab Dodd in the foot, clobber him with a fireplace poker and cut Ed down with an ax. But just as they're hog-tying Dodd once again, they get another house guest: Dent.

Thinking he's been rescued, Dodd unleashes his usual torrent of abuse, calling Dent a "half-breed" as he orders him to shoot the Blumquists. Dent does shoot — but not Peggy and Ed. We're treated to the satisfying splatter of Dodd's brains as Dent takes a stand of his own.

Then, he has a simple request: A haircut. The bruised, broken and traumatized Blumquists are understandably confused as Dent asks for a "professional-looking" haircut. Peggy pulls it together enough to summon her Dazzle salon talent, but just as she grabs the scissors, Minnesota law enforcement finally catches up.

Lou and Hank have arrived for the South Dakota cabin party. Dent fires out the window at them, fending off a scissor attack from Peggy and bumbling blows from Ed. He never gets his haircut — not even a strand.

After Dent flees out the door, Lou and Hank confront the Blumquists once again. With Dodd's dead body bleeding out by the bed, it'll be a little tricky to keep playing dumb.