Ozark season 1 recap: what you need to remember before watching season 2

• When is Ozark season 2 released on Netflix? Who is in the cast? What is going to happen?
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Over the course of the season, things went from bad to worse and then worse again, as he attempted to repay his debt to the cartel by filtering millions of dirty dollars through newly acquired businesses in the town (including a strip joint, a resort and a funeral parlour).

But, pretty much everything went belly up, and he looks set to begin season 2 in a worse bind.

Get a refresher on Ozark season 1 below.

What happened with Marty & the cartel?

Everything kicked off when it was revealed in episode 1 that Marty’s business partner Bruce had been skimming money off the top of the cash piles they had been laundering for the cartel.

Bruce and his girlfriend were murdered, and Marty was next to go - but, quick thinker that he is, he managed to talk his way out of it with a plan to wash 5 million dollars out in Missouri as an act of contrition.

This was all going pretty well, until Marty became ensnared with Jacob and Darlene Snell (Peter Mullan and Lisa Emery), a scary hillbilly couple who run the town’s heroin trade. They had been covertly dealing out on the lakes during Pastor Mason Young’s (Michael Mosley) boatside sermons, and this operation was threatened by Marty’s plans to build a church and thus inadvertently shut down their means of distribution (more on Pastor Young and the church later).

Marty then came up with a plan to appease both the cartel and the Snells, brokering a deal which would see the cartel distributing the Snell's heroin. But things fell quickly apart when Darlene Snell decided to blow the scary cartel man’s head off in the closing moments of the finale - leaving Marty with a lot of explaining to do - and a mountain to climb as he tries to keep his family alive.

Who are the Langmores?

The Langmores are made up of 19-year-old matriarch Ruth (Julia Garner), her two teenage cousins (one of whom, Wyatt, became friendly with Marty’s daughter Charlotte), her two uncles Russ and Boyd, and her incarcerated father, Cade.

They are a gang of rednecks who, underestimating Marty’s criminal undertakings, attempted to rob him of a significant chunk of the cartel’s money early on in season 1.

After Marty explains the situation, they treaded carefully around him, throwing the odd side-eye at him whenever possible.

Ruth was then taken under Marty’s wing to help him run his strip club and take care of nitty gritty jobs.

Russ, a closeted homosexual, began a relationship with undercover police agent Roy Petty (Jason Butler Harner). Though, it later transpired, Petty was just sleeping with him to blackmail him into bringing down Marty.

In moronic defiance, he decided instead to kill Marty and run off with his cash, only for Ruth to rig the dock to electrocute both him and Boyd in order to save Marty’s life.

Did Pastor Mason Young try to kill his son?

The grimmest bit of plotting in Ozark season 1 saw Marty drag the Pastor and his pregnant wife into his dodgy dealings, after deciding that a church was another good business through which to funnel drug money.

He got the young couple all excited by telling them he would build them a church, only to pull the rug out when the Snells told him to back off. Worse, he spilled the beans to the pastor about the Snell’s drug operation at his sermon’s, sending him into a moral tailspin which ended in him refusing to preach while the drug deals were going on.

The Snells, being batsh*t and all, then murdered his wife shortly after she gave birth to his child, in retribution.

In the finale, it looked as if the Pastor, who had endured a crisis of faith, was going to drown his newborn son, lowering him into the lake and holding him under for an uncomfortably long period of time. Thankfully though, he raised him out, which clarified that it was a baptism rather than an execution.

Are Marty and Wendy still together out of love or for necessity?

In the beginning of season 1, Marty discovered that Wendy (Laura Linney) was cheating on him with an older man, whom she was about to run away with. Then, the cartel sh*tstorm kicked off, and her lover was murdered in the crossfire.

All love between them appeared to have dissipated in the first half of the season, but they grew closer together as their time in the Ozarks wore on, with Wendy appearing to get a kick out of behaving badly.

There may yet be hope that the two can patch things up conclusively, after Wendy and the kids passed on the opportunity to flee to Canada and leave Marty behind to clean up his mess on his own.

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Where has Rachel gone?

Marty became chummy with Rachel (Jordana Spiro), the owner of a dockside resort, after he took over her business. However, when she discovered that he was using her to launder money, she fled with £100,000 that he had hidden in the walls, heading god knows where...

What’s up with Jonah?

It’s not looking good for the little fellow, is it? Already a bit weird before discovering his parents’ nefarious activities, he seems to have three potential routes ahead of him - to become a dodgy businessman like his father (he begged Marty to teach him to wash cash in season 1), become a serial killer (he was doing that sociopathic maiming animals thing) or, well, something else... but it probably won't be good.

Ozark season 2 arrives on Netflix UK on Friday 31 August 2018