"True Detective" Season 2 Review

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM...YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...

I'm fairly certain that I am one of the few people who managed to miss out on season one of True Detective and while I know I made a terrible mistake in doing so, I think it gave me an advantage watching the show when it came to season two. I was unbiased walking into it, and it allowed me to completely enjoy a season that judging from twitter, disappointed some fans due to its stark contrast from the first year of the show.  

Obviously I plan to revisit season one because I would be a fool not to, but to me this second year of True Detective was engrossing and it impressed the hell out of me. There was a lot to like, and like any show it had its flaws as well so let's take a moment and look back at the good and the bad of the story of Vinci and the mystery of who killed Ben Caspere. 

The Good: Let's start with the absolute best part of the show this year...the cast, specifically Vince Vaughn and Colin Farrell. These two men were absolutely spectacular as Frank Semyon and Ray Velcoro, playing a pair of characters haunted by their past and lost completely in lives that they thought would turn out better and if you ask me, both men deserve at the least an Emmy Nomination for their work on the show this year. Their powerhouse performances were central to a complex plot that drew me in as we dealt with something I had never seen when it came to a show like this...a grand conspiracy of corruption.

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It gave the show a classic noir style in a modern and sanitized Los Angeles all while adding a paranoid feel to the show. You didn't feel safe for the characters because well...they weren't. They were always pawns in the affairs of these rich and disgusting men and I loved that. Plus it was amazing to see characters that we thought were anti heroes turn out to be good folks after all when they discovered that the establishment they were working for was filled to the brim with killers and criminals. 

The Bad: I really had only one complaint about this season of the show, the fact that at times it went super over the top when it came to dialogue. For the most part the writing was outstanding, with the characters having some choice lines and observations about the messed up world of Vinci and the messed up world they were living in. But here and there, often times after a big moment in the show, things got super hammy or super cheesy. The only actor that could pull off some of the show's more out of place lines was Vince Vaughn, whose wordsmith of a character made it work. Otherwise, dialogue like Paul's "these documents are full of signatures" line left you cringing and took you out of the moment. Hopefully next year there's a little more care put into this.  

The Verdict: All in all, I was a huge fan of this year's tale. It was dark, brooding, and oddly enough dystopian. This was our world, yet at the same time it was a grand nightmare with evil surrounding our characters at every turn and you so rarely see that in police serials these days. It made for wonderful television that often left me on the edge of my seat and it left me hungry for more. While I fully understand each year will feature a different cast and a different story, that won't stop my excitement to see what the show has in store for us next. Until next time.

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