Soooo... Season 2 of True Detective on HBO is in the books and I have had a night to digest the season as a whole. I wanted to start writing this article last week, but I thought it best to reserve judgement until the full story was told. If I learned anything from watching various TV shows lately its that: a) a good finale can totally change the trajectory that a show has been on for a whole season and b) the events in the finale might actually make up for any shortcomings that the show may have created for a viewer. I definitely want to give Nic Pizzolato the chance he deserves to tell his own story. Anybody that knows ME or follows us on social media (search CCD.NYC on all media platforms and find us) knows that early on in Season 2 of TD I took the "wait and see what happens" approach before condemning the show. It gave me enough imagery and potential in the first few episodes to spur my interests, and I had high hopes for a second half comeback on the show the way Harrelson & McConaughey came through in the end. But now that it is all over, I am sitting back and shaking my head wondering what "could have/should have" been in the sequel season of the century. So here are my 5 biggest problems with the show, and in my humble opinion the reasons why the show disappointed so many people. Enjoy....
So, before we jump right in to my 5 reasons, let me just preface this with a few facts. The 1st season of TD, which I (among millions of others) loved, was not perfect from beginning to end. Anybody who says that they were 100% on board from the very beginning of the show is lying. My wife actually STOPPED watching it after episode #4 and never cam back. A lot of people were employing the strategy of hanging in and hoping for more... that is a fine assessment to have had. I tried to use this same strategy as I watched this season. Great minds think alike! But it was by no means perfect, especially not week to week. You can look back on the completed season 1 and say you dug it. But you can't tell me around episode 4 or 5 you weren't thinking of abandoning ship. So I am not writing this article just to spew hate on this season, or pile on. Just know that I really, really, REALLY wanted to like this season. The final product just didn't garner that reaction from me, so I gotta at least try and explain what I think went wrong.
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| Shhhhh... Spoilers Ahead!!! |
1) What kind of fucked up casting do we have here?I personally LOVE every single one of the main characters in the show. I have long thought Colin Farrell a great actor who gets a bad rap. Vince Vaughn has been in some of my all time favorite comedy movies. Rachel McAdams? Love her in almost everything I have seen her in (especially the Notebook... don't judge me!). And Taylor Kitsch. Well, lets just say that I have liked a bunch of the projects he has been in but I seem to be in the minority. Most have been lambasted as the "Worst Ever" in the respective categories (Wolverine: Origins - worst X-Men movie, Battleship - worst adaption of a non literary property, and John Carter - Worst ruination of a possible tent pole franchise in movie history). Let's just say it seems like the young actor possess the "Kitsch of Death" (thank you Jeff Bond for this pun), and the streak continues with TD season 2.
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| Scummy at its finest since James Woods... |
Now I must start by saying that I don't particularly mind any of the above actors in the roles they played. I thought they all delivered pretty good performances. But I am curious why Pizzolato would push the envelope so hard to cast THESE actors against type so much. Farrell is the most accurately cast of the bunch. He has made a career of playing angst filled characters that have a scummy appearance yet can be attractive and righteous in the end.
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| Step aside, I'm in charge... |
Everyone else is kind of wildly cast against type. McAdams has always been the pure-hearted character, pure and sun-shiny sweet. Now she is a brooding goth twinged sex addict who has a knife fetish? OK... that is a shake up for sure. If that is the one switchero you want to pull when it comes to casting I can live with it. But then we got Vince Vaughn, gangster crime boss.
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| I am literally more afraid of EVERYONE in this picture than Vince Vaughn |
Wait... what? Huh? Vaughn is a great actor, and I am pretty sure he can play a serious role of asked to. But this? This is a little much to expect from a guy who has been mostly known as a comedic actor. Wedding Crashers, Swingers, Made, Old School, The Breakup... these are comedic classics which Vaughn has killed in. So why make him the supposed "big bad" of the season? When I see his face, I crack up immediately. He is also a very slender 6'4, topping out at around 200 lbs, How is this supposed to inspire fear and a threatening nature? Boo.
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| Please stop hating me! |
And then last but not least you have Kitsch, This poor fucking kid can't catch a break... er, actually that is not really true. ALL HE SEEMS TO DO IS CATCH BREAKS. And they never seem to pay off. Cameo role in an X movie as a spin off worthy character? Movie is consider worthless. Leading role in big summer action/alien movie Battleship? Considered one of the worst movies ever. Disney taking a shot a tent pole FRANCHISE in John Carter? Widely panned, mostly for his acting in it. So after such a bad 5 year track record, how exactly does he end up cast in a lead role in season 2 of one of the most anticipated shows in TV HISTORY? I just don't get it. I particularly like the guy and feel as if he has gotten the shaft in the judgement of him. Pizzolato obviously liked him too. But newsflash: EVERYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD SEEMS TO HATE THIS GUY MORE THAN DONALD TRUMP AT A BURRITO FESTIVAL IN MEXICO CITY!!! Sometimes you just can't break a guy into stardom no matter how many chances you give him. This bi sexual PTSD afflicted motorcycle cop certainly did nothing to help change that public view of him.
2) Why all the side bars and plots that don't pay off?
Here is what I don't get. The season is UNREALISTICALLY short. 8 episodes? Huh? 10 is the absolute minimum amount you need to tell such a dense story. 12 is more realistic. But here is the funny thing. The reason why they did it in 8 is because most of the side plots and tangential stories didn't ever factor into the main storyline and never pay the fuck off. Casper and his sex addiction? His sex house and crazy masks? Even though Kitsch has dashboard cam footage of him NOT doing anything wrong to the starlet he pulled over, she somehow can keep coming after him withe hearsay and ruining his career? Why did the guy have to wear the Bird Mask to complete the two murders? McAdams dad being a yogi and running a child molester friendly compound? Farrell's wife being a huge hard ass when she could have found out the paternity of the kid in episode #2? Woodrugh's fucked up momma and his hot piece of baby momma ass being left in that hotel? Vince Vaughn and his red headed beauty of a wife not being able to have kids? Grandpa Velcoro and how Ray is connected to the corrupt cops? The coke addicted mayor of Vinci and his wacky ass family? The drug cartel that pops up mid season and weaves in and out of the story until they help bring it to a close with no real connection to anything? These are just a few...
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| The real Birdman ain't got shit on me... |
Now I know that some of the things I listed above are actually EXPLAINED by the time the show is over. And I am not expecting them all to be explained thoroughly. But one of the only knocks you hear about shows that are universally loved like True Detective season 1 was that a bunch of the story lines are red herrings and macguffins. This is ramped up in season 2. So many of these things are never even justified for occupying screen time, and the ones that are answered are done so in a flippant way that are very matter of fact. Velcoro's cunt of an ex wife holds the child's paternity over his head and uses it as a method to push him out of the kids life. I get how that grinds him as a character. But her... she shouldn't have been finding out about it AFTER he was dead in a "what did I do" moment. If she was really maliciously trying to hang this guy out to dry and drive him away, that paternity test would have been done. But she somehow never took it that far, and then finally does and gets the positive results as we find out he is dead and also is a dad to another kid? We are being forced into painting Velcoro as a full fledged "good guy" even though they spent 7.5 episodes playing him as the anti-hero. That is lazy & hypocritical writing.
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| Why do these guys look like this? |
And as for all the other stuff, the most egregious example is the Mexican drug cartel. They magically are interwoven into the story midway in order to provide a way to find the girl, then they become Frank's drug partners and disappear. They pop up again, and then disappear. Then they are the there, at the very end, to take out Semyon even though he has paid them a huge fee not to? Huh? What? Don't even get me started on the diabolical bobsie twins that are the big bads of the whole season. These two popped up once each in the first 7 episodes and then they are revealed to be behind everything. That is not fair to the viewer. You gotta dangle a few more details in the early eps to make the reveal fair. If not, then its a reveal of all new information and seems like a conclusion that was written to tie up loose ends instead of the conclusion that was always envisioned for the story from jump street. But we will talk more about that stuff in a bit....
3) Why the hell didn't the story end up being about any of the main characters?
In the end, the story really wasn't about the main 4 characters. Bottom Line. The beginning of the story involves a whole bunch of corrupt cops from 1992 that robbed a jewelry store during the riots that created a pair of orphan twins (which we only get small tidbits of until the final episode), the middle of the story is about a massive land deal be brokered by a sexual deviant who dies in one of the opening scenes of the season, and the finale of the story is about the shady land deal actually going through and the possibility that they may get exposed in the future. Maybe. Wait... what? The whole beginning, middle and end of this story has very little to do with our main 4 characters.
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| Your remember these guys right? The main characters.... |
The beginning can only be tangentially to the core 4 through the tie in of Velcoro's dad with the old cops. That is a generational tie in. That is the only real thing tying in the 4 characters to the 92 jewelry heist/murder. I guess Semyon is tied in because he was a low level street criminal back then, and McAdams/Kitsch because they are now cops 20+ years later. But there are no hard connections other than these to the base of the story.
The middle sees the core 4 characters kind of affect the whole story, but not really. Semyon is a criminal who is used as a mark by bigger crooks then him (the Russian mob, Caspere, etc) as they scam him into believing he is more important to the project than he is. They are just going to back stab him and steal his money, Semyon is probably just one of many "marks" this bigger crime syndicate has lined up. Velcoro is Semyon's self created "cop on the take", a one man wrecking crew that helps Frank get stuff done. But again, that his only real connection to the Land Deal Syndicate. Ani is just a female cop who happened to be sexually abused as a kid and her now sexual deviant nature allows her to infiltrate and expose the sex ring that conveniently houses all the PAPER RECORDS of the Land Deal Syndicate and can tie Caspere to the bad guys. And Kitsch is drawn into this whole story as a guy with a death wish joyriding his motorcycle in a slight suicide attempt who happens upon Caspere's dead body. Really? WTF...
And in the final moments, we see a united front of Seymon's wife and Ani in Mexico with all of the incriminating "paperwork" and a new Velcoro baby (they did only have sex once, right? Damn super sperm strikes again!) ready to blow the lid off of the Land Syndicate and their deal. Wait... didn't Frank send his boy and his wife to Oregon? And wasn't Ani sent to Mexico? So when Velcoro and Semyon don't show up to meet their girls, these chicks just happen to link up? How? Frank wanted his lady AWAY from everyone who could tie her to him. Hence the exile to OREGON. Velcoro wanted to protect Ani, hence the exile to Mexico. Yet they are able to track each other down and meet up, throw on floppy hats, and mount up to take down the Land Deal Syndicate?
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| Boss Bitches.... |
Ok... and you wack out Kitsch, Semyon and Velcoro by the end of the show, and all in weird ways. Why would Kitsch go to that meeting ALONE? Why would the Mexicans kill Frank after getting a higher pay off than they were entitled to? And the worst has to be Velcoro, who knows that he is about to be followed via transponder and gets back in the car anyhow to drive to out of the city where he is at his sons school to a nice isolated wooded area to be killed. Huh? Why not drive to the police station, turn yourself in, and leak your info that you got on everyone? Nope... let me get to a desolate place so that my murder can be easily covered up by renegade cops!
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| Message Not Uploaded... probably not a great idea to drive up into the mountains/forest |
And in the end, the real estate deal still goes down. All of the criminal enterprises that ran through the season are still viable and presumably running again, and our best hopes of any justice for the martyred characters & taking down the Land Deal Syndicate lie in a pairing of an arm candy wife and the most psychologically damaged character of the core 4 with the SAME PAPERWORK THEY HAD FOR THREE EPISODES AND DID NOTHING WITH!!!! Great....
4) Why make the main villains of the story and the whole real problem of Season 2 take place in 1992 and not be part of the story the whole season?
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| Remember this scene? The only time you meet "Lenny" in the whole show prior to the Finale! |
God damn those two kids. We never even heard about this jewelry heist/execution till almost half way through the season. Then we get tidbit after tidbit about these "kids" that may have witnessed it. And the boy kid figured all this shit out, killed a big shot like Caspere, and is literally responsible for this whole shit show of a TV season? Oh, and when Velcoro finally figures it out and confronts the boy he talks some sense into him.,,, only to have the maniac jump over the seats and attack Holloway in a PUBLIC PLACE FILLED WITH COPS. AND WITH A GODDAMN KNIFE!!!! Huh? WTF are you saying. This putz, Lenny, who has only been onscreen in Episode #3 for a quick second and hasn't been back on the show AT ALL is the main bad that started all this shit by killing Capsere and has continued to keep it rolling it along behind the scenes. This guy... really? Huh? Come on now. We have arch criminals like Semyon, dirty cops (both the 92 crew of rogue cops and Velcoro) aplenty, Russian gangsters, Crooked politicians, Mexican drug cartels, sex ring operators and the whole LAND DEAL SYNDICATE and this is the guy responsible for this whole series of events. This orphaned kid who grew up mad cause he witnessed his parents death? Weak sauce....
This reminded me a lot of last season how they "miraculously" concluded that Errol Childress, was the killer. A dude that before episode #8 of lasts season only appeared in a few scenes in TWO EPISODES. And then there he was, the big bad. There was literally NO WAY that anyone could have REMOTELY connected him to the storyline being played out by the writers up until that point. Same hold true here. Lenny comes out of the cobwebs of just ONE EPISODE as the whole catalyst for everything. C'mon. Don't make it so EASY that I solve it, but make it a bit more than having me have to Goggle who the fucking character actually is that makes the whole story work!
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| Remember me? The bad guy no one saw coming in Season 1 |
5) You just had to make it "supernatural but not really supernatural"... didn't you?
This last thing ticked me off. One of the biggest disappoints of last years show was the conclusion that most of the supernatural occurrences that happened throughout the show ended up being more allegorical and in the characters minds than it seemed. These spiritual occurrences seem to be more aberrations than fact, and the existence of an actual killer (Errol Childress) instead of a dark, maleficent force being behind the whole thing really pissed off some people as they were waiting for a dark forces payoff in the reveal. But I liked the way Pizzolato used the supernatural stuff to forward the story and ultimately chalk it up to mostly Rust being batshit crazy. That and the possibility of a cult that Childress was loosely part of... maybe. They have steered CLEAR of all that wacky muckity muck this season, giving us a police procedural show with a dense story... until the very end.
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| Add ghosts of tormentors past here.... |
Then they just HAD to add in the bit of the ghosts talking to Frank as he plodded through the desert to his death from the stab wound. All the people who doubted him, made him develop into the bad guy he became. And then culminating in him seeing his "not dead" wife and realizing that he "is dead" and has dropped 15 feet prior! Grrrrr.... why? If his wife was "dead", then this scene would kind of make sense. He was "joining her on the other side... the better side" away from all the tragedy of this world. But SHE IS NOT DEAD! And if we are getting real, why the fuck should a creep criminal murderer/drug dealer/general piece of shit like him get a happy ending, even in his own mind? Weird and forced, seems like it was only added to make the show more "spiritual" like Season 1.
So that is that. I'm not saying I hated Season 2 of TD, but it certainly fell very short of my expectations. They can't all be winners, and I am willing to wait it out to the end. But ultimately, this show was a little to convoluted and not enough was paid off in the end. You disagree? Feel free to blast off in the comments sections below....
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| Cheers to the haters like Mike D! |
