OT- True Detective Season 2
I like this season. I think the writing and acting on this show is top notch. Really don't understand all the hate S2 has been getting.
Should I start watching the show? I haven't ever seen an episode
Watch Season 1 and save yourself the annoyance of watching Season 2. It's just a generic NBC cop show that happens to be on HBO. And the casting was a sham.
Season 2 is not very good. I almost turned it off Sunday to catch up on Game of Thrones.
I predict that, much like the fourth episode in the first season, this next episode will blow the show wide open and make it a must watch from here on out.
We're at the halfway mark after all, so it's now or never; although, I haven't had a problem with what I've seen so far. Like Kitsch's character the most.
He has the most unanswered questions so far character wise. Sure he's brooding a lot, but there's a lot of places his character can go. That's pretty interesting.
SPOILERS AHEAD... DO NOT READ IF NOT THROUGH EPISODE 3
I only am considering watching another episode to see if it gets to the point where it's worth it. Don't know if I will. The copout of the two shotgun blasts to the chest cliffhanger being just birdshot... Put it this way, if they kill off a main character 2 episodes in it gets more interesting. Didn't see that coming. As it is, I can't trust that a single thing they do on the show means a damn thing. They managed to take a couple of snoozer episodes that made me wonder why I spent my time watching, (oh yeah, season 1 was fantastic so season 2 has to be comparable, right?) end the episode with something that makes you pay attention, then wash that away witin two minutes of the beginning of ep 3.
Sorry TD, but if this had been season 1 there would never have been a season 2.
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You both missed an important clue. Maybe go rewatch that scene. It wasn't birdshot. It was riot shot. Velcoro tellingly said, "you know the kind that cops use". hmmm making sense now? Cops use those type of non lethal shells to suppress unruly mobs without killing people. Do you really think the showrunners originally wrote that Velcoro gets unceremoniously killed in episode 2, film it and then said nahhh let's bring him back. Maybe this show is over your heads.
Jeez, people acting like they have to pay a thousand bucks to watch each episode or something. It's an hour of TV on a Sunday night - it's not a chore.
Seriously. Like, what would you rather see? Do they even know what they'd rather be seeing to consider the show "good"? More gun fights? Car chases with polich cruisers tumbling through the air? I think Bad Boys 2 is on TNT sometime this week.
It seems like people have gotten so judgy with TV shows and movies lately. Every review seems to be IT WASN'T THE GREATEST PIECE OF MEDIA IN OUR LIFETIMES, SO ITS TOTAL DOGSHIT. DO NOT LIKE.
I mean, fuck, its entertainment people. Not every show or episode can be the pinnacle of the art form. Be happy we still have content like this to watch and its not all reality TV.
This is what I don't get with all of the season to season comparisions -- we're a total of 3 episodes in. You can't compare season 1 as a whole with 3 epsiodes of season two yet. And if you're comparing 3 episodes to 3 episodes, you're forgetting what those first three episodes of season 1 were actually like.
In the first season, all you had 3 episodes in was an occult murder scene, awkard car rides with Cohle and Hart, a bunch of interview scenes with Cohle and Hart, a lot of poltiics with the task force, and a lot of relationship drama with Hart. There were plenty of places for the story to go -- much like the current season -- but that was it. Season 1 didn't take off until the big shootout in episode 4 with Reggie Ledoux.
With the guy who had the same injury but didn't die, they 100% telegraphed that the shotgun wounds wouldnt be fateful no matter how it looked in the episode. I was 0% surprised when he survived, but I didn't mind either because I guessed it pretty quickly.
Francis Ford Coppola, who was nearly fired in the early weeks of its filming, wouldn't have directed Godfather !!, which was completely different in its telling from the first.
This season can't even be compared to last year. The plot lines are completely different. The locales are different, and the story centers on a corrupt community outside LA that is encilrcled by the tentacles of shifting interests and power structures which the repeated shots of the freeway with bypassing traffic moving oblivious to the turmoil is meant to reflect.
The ugly milleu of Vinci, with its power plant setting and strip mall stucco casino, plays backdrop to three compromised and emotionallly spent and tortured cops seeking clues to an occult-based killing of a mysterous and debauched city manager who was running a spiderweb of criminal activity.
All that plus natural audience expectations make establishing new challenges with unfamiliar characters playing against type a tough proposition to accept. You gotta admit having your lead actot shotgunned at the end of second episode a massively effective cliffhanger even if near-death is foreshadowed in the bar scene seduction with the waitress. That's some good writing.
The bosses don't want the case solved, they just want it to go away so life goes on as before. It seems like a lot of folks here feel the same way about this season.
What is true about True Detective is that it's the story that sucks you in even when you doubt the possibilites and where its headed. That is the way most crime investigations go.
The whole season 2 is just a snooze fest to me. I'm not sure I'll continue watching.
Truly disappointed. VINCE VAUGHN as some sort of high-brow racketeer? Please, let me show myself out while I laugh at the casting director's sheer audacity and Vaughn's obvious ploy to resurrect his "laugh-a-minute" career which was only bolstered by Owen Wilson's actual acting acumen. Go back to making Wedding Crashes and Old School, Vince.
And a "turn in your badge, you're off the case" cop drama set in (wow, how unique) LA, with a drunk asshole and a strong female cop trying to prove herself able to break traditional gender roles! What a unique storyline. I've only seen six or seven shows with the exact same plot on NBC in the past two years.
The unique storyline and awesome writing of season 1 has been completely eviscerated in favor of the "safe" storyline Hollywood loves. HBO should be ashamed.
Oh, and Colin Farrell's chacter surviving two point blank shotgun blasts to the chest, of any type of ammunition, is just comical. I swear these aren't the same writers, and if they are, they have been completely co-opted by studio execs playing it safe.
Save yourselves the pain. Re-watch Season 1, it'll be a hell of a lot more enjoyable. Or watch Judge Judy, at least there is some original storywriting still alive on that show.
Then, in my opinion, the studio executives should have had the guts to call it something else. I, and I imagine most, viewers went in expecting something resembling the first season and we got zilch. They rested their laurels on the success of the first season and played it safe with Season 2, while simply grabbing a few mismatched big names to fill generic character roles.
Vince Vaughn will never be cast in another serious role. Rachel McAdams needs to stick to being a pretty face. Colin Farrell is at least a believable drunk asshole, but then again, he probably isn't even acting.
I'm conflicted about season 2 so far because if you compare this to just about anything else on tv right now, I'd have to guess it would compare pretty favorably. The problem is that the first season was so great that I can't help but expect more than what I've seen so far.
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You seem pretty passionate about this. As I pointed out above the show pretty clearly stated the shotgun shells used were non-lethal rounds that cops use on rioters. i.e. can only be acquired by law enforcement. Pretty big clue there.
The stories are intentionally meant to be different. There were lots of dull moments in season one, guessing why two cops are being interrogated the entire season with various flashbacks serving as backdrop for action. I mean the structure of the drama in the two seasons is completely different. One is told almost entirely in flashback and the other is straight narrative.
The first season cast a guy best known for romantic leads in chick flicks and the lead performer in Magic Mike as a burnt-out cop without morals or direction as one of two investigators in an occult-based murder. The other lead character is a guy best known for early work in a barroom sticom and sometime dramatic roles in mostly light comedies or drama. In short, the casting of Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson was also based on going against career typecasting. The actors took the roles because of that.
And they are executive producers for this season which means at they very least they are associated with the production values of this year's season which has been written by the same guy, the creator of True Detective, who has been a screen writer and literary professor for the past 20 years.
Not every episode or season of Sopranos was epic either. And that show also cast a little known character actor as its primary star. And that was the very reason why he was cast.
...that kinda felt like a cheap-o Twin Peaks homage, to me, despite the fact that I was admittedly amused by it. But yeah, that was some straight-up Lynchian shit right there.
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quite like the first season's. However, I think some of the elements are still there (the characters are interesting, the cinematography is fantastic, and the acting is pretty consistent) to make this season good. I guess I just don't care about a missing city manager from a working class LA suburb that much. Plus, Vince Vaughn (whose work I typically love) is a bit of a snoozer.
The first episode was decent, the second was fantastic (and not just for the ending), but the third felt stagnant.
Just my thoughts.
that makes this season not as dynamic is the cast is too large. The simplicity of the juxtaposition of Rust and Marty was the heartbeat to the first season. This season is missing that "pull" or whatever you want to call it.
I agree. Here, we have three cop figures, plus Vince, plus Vince's entourage...it's just too much. When they found Vince's dude in the hole, I had to think first, "OK, who is THAT GUY?" and secondly, "Why should I care?"
"As for Vince Vaughn, I think they're really pushing the idea of him returning to his thug roots"
This is one of the main problems with this season. Try to read that sentence without giggling internally. This is a man who most often starts opposite Jennifer Anniston and Owen Wilson in simple rom-coms and beer-guzzling manly comedies. Not at all believable.
McAdams feels the same way. Trying too hard to break into a new genre and it just doesn't work. Keep flashing your toosh at the camera Rachel, because you aren't going to win any Emmys.
IMO the seasons is a big disappointment and borderline disaster. The only redeeming things so far is Colin Farrell has been pretty good and the cinematography is amazing on that show.
BTW I used to work in the city of Vernon, CA a couple of years ago...total corrupt, industrial shithole and is the town that they are basing Vinci, CA on.
Do yourself a favor and DON'T watch The Brink.