Why Marty And Wendy's Therapist Confuses Ozark Fans

The seedy underbelly of organized crime in the heartland of America rises to the surface in Netflix's Ozark. The show follows the Byrde family as they relocate to central Missouri so that patriarch Marty (Jason Bateman) can continue his money laundering scheme with the Mexican drug cartel. It turns out the cartel's the least of their problems, however, as the family also becomes entangled with local criminals, like the Snell and Langmore families.

It takes a lot of poor decisions (that go beyond neglecting to buckle up in cars) to end up in the situation in which the Byrdes find themselves, but they're not the only ones who have made bad choices over the course of the series. Many fans on a recent Reddit thread have pointed the dumb decisions made by therapist Sue Shelby (Marylouise Burke) in season 3. 

In the most recent season, Marty and Wendy (Laura Linney) begin seeing a therapist to talk about their marital issues, which of course have been exacerbated since they've fallen into the criminal underworld of the Ozarks. Both characters attempt to bribe the therapist so that she'll agree with them and be on their side, but Sue eventually spills the beans that they've both been paying her off. Marty further bribes the therapist so that she'll continue to keep quiet concerning their criminal doings. While Sue doesn't alert the authorities, she ends up spending her ill-gotten money recklessly, and therein lies the problems fans have with her character.

Taking bribes in the first place was an ill-advised move on the character's part. While she kept to her word and never went to the police, she should have known better than to flaunt her ill-gotten wealth around town. She eventually learns the kinds of criminals with which the Byrdes are involved, and it never seems to strike her that by taking the Byrdes' money (and by extension the cartel's money), she was getting herself into a dangerous situation. Redditor u/BakedAsACookie mentions this, saying, "Like it literally never occurred to her that she might be getting herself into some serious **** by taking their bribes."

Sue's definitely not a criminal genius, as anyone else would have sat on the money or laundered it in some way. Instead, she does the worst thing imaginable and buys herself a McLaren, which is about the most conspicuous thing you can do after illegally obtaining large amounts of cash. Other comments in the thread show that it's pretty much universally accepted the character was incredibly negligent doing something so irresponsible, including the zingers, "She was absolutely dumb," and, "She certainly wasn't Dr. Melfi from the Sopranos." 

One Redditor, u/hurtfocker, offers a potential explanation for Sue's behavior by suggesting, "I think of it like Saul faking out the rest of the heist crew in Ocean's 12: 'I want the last check I write to bounce'. She was old and splurging on a [McLaren] is not a bad last page." If Sue wanted to go out with a bang, she certainly got her wish. Still, her choices came across as foolish to many fans who are probably thankful she won't be around when Ozark season 4 comes out.