TRUE DETECTIVE on hbo - matthew mcconaughey, woody harrelson, michelle monaghan, fukunaga, pizzolatto

LOL yeah, especially with the off-camera gunshot to kill the raging maniac right before he gets the good guys.

Reading over this thread and various analysis, it seems like people really read too much into the wrong things, and were upset that the ending didn't feed into that. The mythology the cult members were following was lifted completely from Victorian-era fiction, which is good stuff, but more or less fanfiction versions of the occult. No real underlying history to the stuff, just fabricated by horror/fantasy/satire writers who were writing to an audience living for the first time in a post-religious world, a world of industrialization and romanticizing recently colonized faraway lands, trying to top "1001 Arabian Nights".

Early in the series Rust is convinced there is reasoning behind invoking the imagery, that there is a history behind it, but he doesn't really mention it much past episode 4. The Yellow King and Carcosa are just masks, red herrings, textures to hide the perpetrators of these very real crimes. Just as the good upstanding Christian community is a mask for the horrible stuff they do.

In the end there was no greater force controlling these bad bad people, they were all responsible for their own actions.

Well, no greater force except LSD and meth. Which explains a LOT.

http://i.imgur.com/jci5zU5.jpg

So should I watch S2? Seems most people were kinda lukewarm about it

no it's terrible

genuinely awful

that's what i heard so i skipped it too

http://i.imgur.com/RzoQZKl.gif

now you've seen the good part

it makes it abundantly clear that what was good in the first season was due to Harrelson/McConaughey and Fukunaga

Farrell tried hard but he had nothing to work with

rachel mcadams is attractive

I started this a couple of nights ago--just finished episode 3. Still getting a feel for it, but "There's a monster at the end of it" and Reggie Ledoux was a great closing image.

I just watched both series back to back for the first time. Not gonna wade through over 2400 messages to find out what the ILX take on this is, but I would certainly agree that while S1 was way better than S2, S2 still had a lot going for it and kept me watching till the end. I couldn't work out the plot at all but (as per lag∞n above) Rachel McAdams lit up the screen and I loved the corruption angle.

i liked what i think someone here said about vv's performance being so singularly bad it became transcendent

Got through the rest of season one today. I liked a lot of it, and watched the climactic showdown through my fingers, but I don't know--McConaughey really hammered away at the rhetorical riddles and mystical mumbo-jumbo from beginning to end. Harrelson was really good. I will watch the second season, though I don't think I saw it on the rental shelf.

just finished this (s1, will probably avoid s2 indefinitely), and wow what a monster thread. not to be mr. cynical but i'm a little surprised y'all were so taken w/ this! it definitely hooked me but idk...

good stuff:

the supporting cast -- usually the best thing about hbo shows and cop shows and no different here, even really minor parts were all inhabited so well

the leads -- yeah they were great.

the landscape -- really loved this. i've driven thru this part of the country, once, but on the freeways, which are usually totally elevated, like you're just skimming over a huge mess; it's more like flying really. flood-blasted, refinery-scarred, simultaneously abandoned and teeming. love the vibe that every corner of a river or dirt road has a whole secret life in it, a meth lab, a church, etc

the hallucinatory stuff -- i always like elements that, when introduced into the middle of something, recolor everything you have already been shown. the idea that rust is moving through a space that is m/l at warp speed is shocking and sad.

the lying -- the biker/shootout episode was tremendous; the high pt of the show i think. the layering of their fabrication of events, and how R & M stuck to their story even through their hatred of each other, great stuff

bad stuff:

the women -- nic pizzolato is 15 years old i guess? "woman in trouble throws herself at detective" is an ancient trope but come on. by like the 6th use of the term "crazy pussy" my respect for proceedings was about zero

the conspiracy -- reminded me a lot of the Red Riding adaps. as much as i enjoyed all the pulpy mystical stuff -- the symbology, the hints at various methed-out weirdos being inducted into a pseudo-religion serving unaccountable, rapacious elites -- having it all boil down to a pedo ring was sort of... deflating, idk. texas chainsaw + eyes wide shut ehhhhh. i guess i'm grateful there wasn't a stupid 90s style twist ending where one of the foreground characters was behind it all along.

ugly family dynamics -- cop life and patriarchy are hard on people its true but this all felt p rote to me. when marty spots his daughter's dolls arranged in some kind of ritual sex thing i busted out laughing.

the initial murder -- i enjoyed this enough that i plan on watching it again at some pt, but, what was this even for, from the murderer's perspective? the rest of the killings were untraceable but this one was theatrical? did i miss something obvious here

the rest of the killings were untraceable but this one was theatrical?

haha yeah this is totally glossed over

i'm a little surprised y'all were so taken w/ this!

i'll defend this on the merits all day but you gotta take into account most of us watched it in real time. i can still pretty vividly remember--especially after the twists and turns of the first half of the season--thinking the show could go just about anywhere. it was really exciting in a zeitgeisty kind of way, a real pop cultural "event" of the sort that doesn't seem to happen all that often anymore.

yeah i can see that.

nb i got hbo-now a couple months ago so i'm grinding thru a bunch of the "event" shit of the past like 15 years. i'll invite you to engage with my critical carnivale takes in due course.

https://thefilmstage.com/news/cary-fukunaga-confirmed-to-direct-stanley-kubricks-unfinished-six-hour-project-napoleon/

not gonna lie, am v into this idea

it'll definitely look nice. probably best to avoid someone more explicitly invested in a "kubrickian" style (like, maybe, latter day PTA).

fukunaga's jane eyre is ridic beautiful

i would love to see what he could do with a huge battlefield full of smoke and blood & cannons & horses

yeah i hope they throw a lot of money at this.

the hack portentous cack this guy does is not even fit to mentioned in the same sentence as Kubrick.

Sorry but I really hate him.

best not to think of it as a kubrick movie even in the way that AI is, but as a lavish HBO historical miniseries with a talented (imo) stylist at the helm. could be good!

not that the publicity wont be "kubrick kubrick kubrick" for 3 months leading up to it.

Michelle Monaghan is so much better in The Path (show about a cult, exclusively on Hulu) than she was in this. She plays a true believer mom, and she's terrifying.

The Path is v bad and silly tho

i rescreened s1e5 the projects robbery scene is still so fucking tight, also lol @ the 90s rave cohle goes to and someone gets wheeled by him in a wheelbarrow

sry rave that rust goes to not cohle

After being off-the-air for two years — and following and plenty of speculation about its future — HBO’s True Detective is making some progress behind the scenes toward a new season.

EW has exclusively learned that creator Nic Pizzolatto has penned at least the first two episodes for a potential third edition of the acclaimed anthology crime drama.

We have also learned that Emmy-winning writer-producer David Milch — the mind behind dramas such as Deadwood and NYPD Blue — is coming on board to work with Pizzolatto.

The extent of Pizzolatto and Milch’s collaboration is still early days and not yet formalized. Obviously, Milch’s experience as a writer will be a key component, but for the record he’s not expected to serve as the True Detective showrunner (at this stage, there is no specified season 3 showrunner). Also keep in mind a third season has also not yet been greenlit, so new episodes are far from certain.

http://ew.com/tv/2017/03/27/true-detective-season-3-david-milch/

Went to buy 3 at the bootleg place on the weekend; not there yet, so I rewatched 1. I think I liked it even more this time: the one thing that initially wore me down, McConaughey's one-note, relentless nihilism, wasn't a big problem this time. Would I rather he lightened up now and again, made a joke, did some McConaughey-like stuff ("Alright, alright, alright, I think we got our guy...")? Yes, that'd still be my preference. But his character seemed more valid to me, and I mostly felt like I was watching two great actors carrying everything along. I thought the timeline--'95/02/present--was juggled really well. (Emily Nussbaum makes a fair point about the way the main female characters are sometimes just props in service of the story: http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-disappointing-finale-of-true-detective.)

the finale of the third season will be on the 24th of this month

good lord this made me laugh but I still 100% stand by it with the exception that I also include film these days. Actually, I'm a little confused as to why I made the effort to exclude it in the first place.

Anyway, imagine worrying about spoilers? Maybe worry about missing 99% of the point of what you're watching.

Guys, this is TV, not film. The ending doesn't mean shit and I say this as a lifelong fan of tv.

― get up in this twerk cypher (sunny successor), Thursday, May 22, 2014

what are you even talking about

Season 4! Jodie Foster!

Meet your new True Detectives.
The darkness of the Arctic falls heavy upon #NightCountry. The new season of the HBO Original #TrueDetective, starring Jodie Foster and Kali Reis, is coming soon. #NightCountryHBO pic.twitter.com/max4kpK15p

— True Detective (@TrueDetective) February 15, 2023

Rewatched S1 over the last week or so and found it overwhelming. The first time I watched it, I was hung up on the ending; I found the redemptive arc unnecessary or over-coded. This time, I was moved to the point where I had to pause it and pull myself together. Maybe it's age. I even dug the overt 'Jesus' reference in the reflected shot of Rust in the hospital window.

Thinking on the Jesus reference, made me wonder if Rust's seemingly foolish act on tackling Carcosa alone was all part of his 'meditation on the crucifixion' motif that was set running in E02 (I think?): Rust was looking for a way to sacrifice himself.

Here's a weird thing. I've had the final act of episode 5 in my head for years but could never place which series it was from and I certainly didn't remember it as part of TD. It was only halfway through the episode that I was like 'shit, it's the single-take scene!'. I love it as a piece of stand-alone telly but I don't think it fits the whole season at all. I think it's a 'kill your darlings' moment and the season could easily stand without it (with, admittedly, a different solution for finding Ledoux).

Also, one of my favourite things: watching a season that has a long-ass ILX thread to follow along with. SO much better than hot-take Onion/NYT watch along bullshit.

Whenever a thread like this is revived with enthusiasm, I immediately want to rewatch. Which I will, shortly.

i was hoping we had a debut date for season 4 announced...bah

Held up by the strike?

i think it's already finished so I would guess not, but maybe

Recently rewatched The Wolf Of Wall Street and immediately thought of rewatching S1 for more bonkers McConaughey.

Chinaski otm - the two parter thread for Twin Peaks The Return is ILX at its finest.

I read *Galveston* this week and enjoyed it. Like others have said, it is essentially an exercise in cliche but that's part of the point and comfort of noir, right? I really like his sense of place and this is a love letter to Galveston as much as a hardbitten crime story. Galveston (the place) is lit up with the light of memory and sadness.

The book supports the idea that he can't write women (female characters are either sex workers, carers or sentimentalised children), but the existential agony of the central character is well portrayed.

I looked for TD stuff, obviously, but location aside, and a pointed bit where the central character cuts figures out of Lone Star cans, there isn't much there beyond a generalised ambient savagery.

Rewatched S1 for at least the second time (I post about it just above in 2019). I won't open the whole massive thread to see what I wrote the first time, but I think I have the same very minor quibble: that they do such a great job leading up to the final episode, it's slightly anticlimactic when Errol Childress and his half-sister turn out to be sort of conventional backwoods monsters (or at least their maze-like lair seems familiar). I don't know what I was waiting for, but something that really lived up to the unspeakable horror of the VHS tape. Which they do a great job with--you can just barely see what's going on in dim outline, and the rest is conveyed through the horrified reaction of whoever's watching it. I do love how Errol turns up halfway through the season, and Cole thinks back to that encounter in the final episode.

I need to watch this again.

Isn't it kind of a noir trope that the true Big Bad always slips away while our Hero gets at best a smaller victory, sometimes none at all?

i think you're too easy on the wrap up there clem

its *hugely* disappointing that the gothic horror we've been chasing is a bumfuck on a tractor

one of the hardest nose dives in tv history