[Editor\u2019s Note: The following review contains spoilers<\/strong> for \u201cDTF St. Louis\u201d<\/a> Episode 7, \u201cNobody\u2019s Normal. It Just Looks That Way From Across the Street\u201d \u2014 the finale.]<\/em><\/p>\n One of the most revealing moments in the very<\/em> revealing \u201cDTF St. Louis\u201d<\/a> finale is also one of the most forgettable. Early in Episode 7, when it appears the case against local weatherman Clark Forrest (Jason Bateman<\/a>) has stalled out, Detective Homer (Richard Jenkins<\/a>) relays the results of his investigation with Officer Plumb (Joy Sunday) to the district attorney, Bob Dalt (Chris Conrad, who happens to be series creator Steven Conrad\u2019s brother).<\/p>\n \u201cWhat are you saying, detective?\u201d Dalt asks. <\/p>\n <\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe case was sound,\u201d Homer says. \u201cIt\u2019s less sound the more\u2013\u201c<\/p>\n \u201cThe more you believe him?\u201d Dalt says, to which Homer shrugs and nods. \u201cWell, I don\u2019t believe him,\u201d Dalt continues. \u201cForrest gets a prescription for Amphezine, yeah? To help some other guy fuck his girlfriend? Have you ever done a favor for a friend like that?<\/em>\u201c<\/p>\n Homer admits he has not, but it doesn\u2019t change his mind about Clark. He\u2019s done the digging. He\u2019s sat in the room with the suspect. He knows what he knows, and even though he struggles to internalize the logic, he believes Clark didn\u2019t kill Floyd Smernitch (David Harbour<\/a>) because Floyd was Clark\u2019s friend.<\/p>\n In the end, Homer and Dalt\u2019s brief exchange isn\u2019t all that consequential. It isn\u2019t even particularly memorable in the context of so many remarkable moments. It doesn\u2019t compare to Clark and Floyd\u2019s fateful whitey-tighty boogie woogie, or Stephen Queece (Asher Miles Fallica) tenderly explaining why Carol (Linda Cardellini) earned her Umpire of the Year award, or even Homer and Plumb\u2019s skate-park conversation with Richard (Arlan Ruf), when he learns his step-father\u2019s last words weren\u2019t actually \u201crock on.\u201d Those moments are all enlightening illustrations of who our main trio are, at their cores, and each one provides a profound poignancy that ensures \u201cDTF St. Louis<\/a>\u201d will end with a satisfying emotional wallop.<\/p>\n But Homer and Dalt\u2019s back and forth shows how easily things could\u2019ve gone another way. A darker way. A false way. On paper, what happened to Floyd sounds far-fetched, at best. It would be much easier for Dalt\u00a0\u2014 and by extension the courts and the public at large \u2014 to accept that Clark killed his friend in order to run off with his wife. It would be just as easy to believe Carol and Clark collaborated to kill Floyd for the insurance payout, or even that Carol did it on her own. The alternative explanation, which just so happens to be the truth, may be simpler \u2014 that Floyd, after months of depression, shame, and loneliness, took his own life, rather than face further embarrassment \u2014 but it ignores a lot of related information that would certainly raise eyebrows around Twyla, Missouri.<\/p>\n Which brings us back to Dalt. Hearing a heretofore unseen character dismiss the studied, experienced perspective of our lead investigator is enough to turn your stomach. Had Dalt stuck to his dismissive instincts, or if Homer hadn\u2019t opened his mind over the course of all those interviews (with the help of Plumb, his diligent, progressive partner), Clark could\u2019ve been convicted and executed for a crime he didn\u2019t commit. He could\u2019ve been put to death because the people in charge didn\u2019t want to consider any kind of atypical behavior as anything more than evidence of a nefarious mind. He could\u2019ve been killed because he dared to open a door so many of his neighbors prefer to keep slammed shut.<\/p>\n Or, put another way, a man could\u2019ve died because society refuses to believe friends could be that<\/em> close. Because it\u2019s so rare. Or because no one talks about it. Or is it actually<\/em> so rare because<\/em> no one talks about it?<\/p>\n \u201cDTF St. Louis\u201d doesn\u2019t set out to scare viewers or argue that Clark was some sort of hero. The series\u2019 priority isn\u2019t pointing out the human hiccups in our criminal justice system, as much as it\u2019s unpacking the destructive nature of isolation and humiliation, as it applies to the innocent aspects of human nature. That\u2019s why, for as brave and bighearted as Clark\u2019s pool-house gesture was \u2014 trying to boost his buddy\u2019s self-esteem enough to bring him back from the edge of despair, even if it meant lying to Floyd (and himself) \u2014 it\u2019s still fitting that Clark ends up alone.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t know what I\u2019m doing in here, I don\u2019t know what I\u2019m doing in life,\u201d Clark says, hugging Floyd and crying in his arms. \u201cI think I fucked everything up this summer.\u201d He certainly did with his family \u2014 with Eimy (Wynn Everett), who became a casualty of Clark\u2019s ennui, and with his daughters, who aged out of his focused devotion. None of them became meaningful parts of the narrative because they weren\u2019t meaningful parts of Clark\u2019s summer. But leaving him in the dust, without so much as a goodbye note, emphasizes their autonomy, just as it emphasizes Clark\u2019s neglect. \u201cI\u2019ve mattered to them for 12 years,\u201d Clark says, by way of explaining why his wife and kids aren\u2019t enough for him anymore. \u201cI want to matter to someone else.\u201d<\/p>\n These are clich\u00e9d excuses, and \u201cDTF St. Louis\u201d isn\u2019t pretending otherwise. \u201cThat\u2019s middle-age talking,\u201d Floyd says, trying to dismiss Clark\u2019s feelings as a familiar phase everyone goes through. But what the show does so well is the opposite of dismissive: It hears Clark and Floyd\u2019s complaints and pays attention to them. It scrutinizes their mid-life crises with the same ample consideration they feel they deserve. Even then, when Clark is admitting to selfish feelings Floyd would never<\/em> share, Floyd doesn\u2019t judge him for it. He accepts him. After all, when a friend is in a spiral, telling them they\u2019re in a spiral usually isn\u2019t enough to pull them out of it. You have to sit, listen, and acknowledge what, to them, feels unique, specific, and harrowing.<\/p>\n That\u2019s friendship, and perhaps the ultimate tragedy of Conrad\u2019s extraordinary limited series is that Clark and Floyd don\u2019t recognize the value of friendship when it\u2019s staring them plain in the face. They share a deep, intense connection, but they ultimately don\u2019t know what to do with it. Each man tries to explain to the other how lonesome they are and how insignificant they feel. Each one goes to various extremes to be there for the other, and each one sees the other\u2019s value so clearly and easily, even when they can\u2019t see it in themselves. Yet they still look past each other for something more when it matters most. Clark even convinces himself he has to be sexually aroused by Floyd \u2014\u00a0and show it to him<\/em> \u2014 in order to make Floyd feel better. And Floyd goes along with it! Because he needs it, too.<\/p>\n Or he thinks he does. \u201cDTF St. Louis\u201d could be insufficiently summarized as an intricate examination of the male loneliness epidemic. (How it utilizes the murder-mystery genre \u2014 without retreating to its popular conventions or betraying the natural satisfaction of piecing together who dun it \u2014 is an essay for a different time.) Beat by sensitive beat, Conrad pores over why his two leads feel so alienated, even when living what appear to be the same kind of lives everyone else seems to find so fulfilling.<\/p>\n But therein lies the rub: We don\u2019t know how fulfilled anyone else feels; we only know what they\u2019ll tell us. The rest is assumption, and assumption isn\u2019t a reliable path to the truth. (Take it from Homer.) We have to be honest with each other, and just as vital, we have to be open to each other\u2019s honesty.<\/p>\n \u201cSummers\u2019 over, feels like,\u201d Clark says.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah,\u201d Floyd replies, \u201cand all I\u2019ve got to show for it is a little color.\u201d<\/p>\n But that\u2019s not all he has to show for it. He has Clark. He made a friend \u2014 a friend who sees him for who he really is\u00a0\u2014 and that\u2019s a big deal. Despite making choices that would bring traditional dudes to blows, these two forged a real connection, a real trust, a real relationship. Clark believes in Floyd, and Floyd believes in Clark. Instead of putting up walls, they opened doors. Instead of retreating into themselves, they reached out for each other. The world needs more of that \u2014\u00a0more connection, more vulnerability, more acceptance \u2014 or there\u2019s going to be a lot more people like Clark who fuck up their lives without knowing why. Or a lot more people, like Floyd, who die alone.<\/p>\n \u201cDTF St. Louis\u201d is available on HBO<\/a> and HBO Max.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"Sydney](\"https:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/sydney-sweeney.jpg?w=300&h=168&crop=1\")
<\/div>\n![\"Linda](\"https:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/DTF-St-Louis-Episode-7-Linda-Cardellini-Arlan-Ruf.jpg?w=650\")
Grade: A<\/h2>\n