‘Barry’ Is Back. Here’s What You Need to Know. (Published 2022) (2024)

Because HBO’s Emmy-winning drama “Barry” has been on a pandemic-related hiatus for three full years, even the show’s devoted fans may not remember where the story left off at the end of Season 2, back in May 2019. So here is a quick refresher on how that finale ended: The ex-Marine and contract killer Barry Berkman slaughtered dozens of gangsters from various foreign mobs, while trying and failing to murder a man who betrayed him. Oh, and he might be on the verge of becoming a movie star.

Created by Alec Berg and Bill Hader (who also plays the title character), “Barry” has so far been a twisted tale of redemption, about a hit man trying to chase away the ghosts of his violent past by starting over in Los Angeles as an actor. The show is a blood-soaked crime drama and a knowing showbiz satire, poking fun at the personas people adopt in Hollywood.

In Barry’s case, his painful past lends depth and authenticity to his performances — even though he had hoped to escape those shadows in sunny California. These internal contradictions have led to external complications, affecting nearly everyone Barry knows and raising tough questions about what their futures hold.

Here are few of those questions, left to be resolved as we head into Season 3 of “Barry,” debuting this Sunday night.

What does Barry do now?

Throughout the show’s first two seasons, Barry has often tried to kill his way out of trouble, hoping each assassination will sever his ties to the underworld and allow him to pursue an acting career. In the Season 2 finale he went on a spree, clearing out a nest of mobsters in a monastery while aiming to exterminate his former mentor and business manager Monroe Fuches (Stephen Root). Fuches escaped, but Barry proved again that he’s capable of devastating mayhem.

Meanwhile, thanks to some lucky breaks — aided by his off-and-on girlfriend, the promising actress Sally Reed (Sarah Goldberg) — Barry has performed in theatrical showcases where his dangerous intensity has captured the attention of agents and producers. When last we left him, Barry had a genuine shot at a long-term relationship with Sally and a career as an edgy character actor — without having to strangle or shoot anyone, ever again.

But those glimmers of hope likely won’t get much brighter. Our man remains a tortured soul, plagued by guilt, doubt and PTSD. And given that he’s angered Chechen, Bolivian and Burmese criminals during his time in Los Angeles, he is unlikely to be left undisturbed for long. Also, he still has unfinished business with Fuches, the old family friend who first recruited him to be a hit man … and then sold him out.

Where’s Fuches?

Season 2 began with Fuches seemingly out of the Barry-handling business, working back in his Cleveland hometown. He was compelled to return to Los Angeles when an unstable L.A.P.D. detective named John Loach — the former partner of Janice Moss, a cop Barry killed in the Season 1 finale — extorted Fuches into helping with a scheme to ensnare the assassin. Loach was killed midseason, and since then Fuches has been adrift. He is estranged from the man he once treated like a son, and the many different factions that want to take Barry down see Fuches as little more than a pawn, easily disposable.

It is unclear where Fuches disappeared to after Barry’s monastery massacre, but wherever he is, it is unlikely we have seen the last of him. The chemistry between Root and Hader is essential to what “Barry” is about, capturing the gnarled personal connections that keep this antihero so confused and so emotionally guarded.

Plus, Fuches was responsible for one of last season’s biggest plot twists, when he told Barry’s acting coach, Gene Cousineau (Henry Winkler), that Barry killed Detective Moss, whom Gene had been dating. The ramifications of that revelation have yet to play out.

Can Gene forgive Barry?

Next to Fuches, Gene has been Barry’s biggest father figure — and their relationship is every bit as warped. Gene inspired Barry to try acting, and to confront some of his darkest memories. But this teacher can also be manipulative and self-centered; he has a habit of ignoring what his students need and forcing them into borderline abusive acting exercises.

Winkler is giving one of the best performances of his career as Gene, a man equal parts ridiculous, adorable, charismatic and pathetic. In Season 2 we saw more of why he has been teaching for so long instead of acting: Gene’s vanity and insensitivity have rubbed a lot of people in Hollywood the wrong way.

The news about Barry and Detective Moss could be a turning point for him. Does Gene take his close contact with a killer as a cue to get his personal life in order, or does he try to find some way to turn this strange situation to his advantage, careerwise?

Is Sally a rising star?

It’s not too much of a stretch to say that “Barry” has two protagonists: the title character and Sally, the woman with whom he’s infatuated. In Season 1, Sally was the darling of Gene’s class, as one of the few who regularly booked acting work (albeit in bit parts). In Season 2, her life got both more complicated and more exciting, as a scene she wrote and performed — fictionalizing her experiences with an abusive ex-husband — became a minor sensation, convincing producers that she could be a viable dramatic lead.

As Season 2 ended, Sally learned to her dismay that these producers expect her to play roles like the one in her showcase: a victim who stands up to her victimizer. Since she fudged her autobiography for that scene, she doesn’t feel connected to those kinds of characters. Sally has wanted to be a famous actress for most of her adult life. Now she is wondering how much she will have to compromise to realize that dream.

Will the cops get a clue?

Since Season 1, the men and women of law enforcement have always been a few steps behind Barry — if they are on his trail at all. His involvement with the death of a fellow acting student is what got him in trouble with Moss in the first place, and led to him killing her to keep her quiet. Moss’s death then pushed Loach to target Barry. And now Loach’s death has brought another detective into the picture: Mae Dunn (Sarah Burns), who toward the end of Season 2 was misdirected into arresting a stunned Gene for Moss’s murder. (He was later released.)

None of these people has been able to pin anything on Barry — yet. In Season 3, perhaps Detective Dunn will be the one to put all the pieces together.

Can NoHo Hank find happiness?

The overall tone of “Barry” — wryly comic and unflinchingly dark — suggests that Hader and Berg may not have a happy ending in mind for their title character. And given that he’s a violent and emotionally disturbed man who has killed many, many people, it’s hard to argue that Barry deserves one.

So fans may have to pin their hopes on NoHo Hank, the Chechen crime lord who, over the course of this series, has been both Barry’s nemesis and an ally. An upbeat fellow, Hank has taken to the Los Angeles lifestyle even more than Barry has. (The “NoHo” nickname is short for “North Hollywood.”) His cheery demeanor and preference for defusing conflicts rather than escalating them has gotten him into trouble with his bosses back home, who want him to eliminate his rivals, not make new friends. Yet he keeps surviving and even thriving, as his colleagues fall.

At the end of Season 2, Hank tipped off Barry about Fuches’s monastery hide-out. In the resulting melee, a lot of Hank’s associates were killed. This unexpectedly boosted his status within his own organization — though it also likely ended his truce with the Bolivian and Burmese gangs. Plus, Hank may soon have trouble with the law, given that Barry planted evidence with Moss’s body to implicate the Chechen mob.

Still, if anyone can make the most of a no-win scenario, it’s our NoHo Hank. And it says something about how wonderfully co*ckeyed “Barry” is that even though Hank is just as evil as anyone else on this show, his pleasant disposition has made him our primary rooting interest — almost by default.