They became his angels." As fans of Chambers know, people exposed to the play are driven insane as they discover incomprehensible and depraved truths about the universe.īut it's the climax of episode four that takes True Detective to another level, making it more than just a brilliant and brooding drama. "I closed my eyes and saw the King in Yellow moving through the forest," says Cohle in episode two, reading aloud from the journal of Dora Lange, a murdered prostitute. The King In Yellow, a fictional play frequently mentioned in the weird short stories of Robert W Chambers, crops up repeatedly. Wrapped in supernatural elements, the narrative is scattered with references to something bigger than that which is on Earth. The script comes courtesy of Nic Pizzolatto, whose pitch-black prose gives the show its chillingly dark underbelly. Harrelson's Marty Hart is much more straight-down-the-line: a heavy-drinking cop with a brow that remains furrowed whether he's scratching around for answers, shaking off the last of a hangover or enduring many a long car journey with Cohle, listening to his theory that the world is "one ghetto – a giant gutter in outer space". "Everything we've ever done," he adds blankly, "or will do, we're gonna do over and over again." Such nihilistic stuff could seem pretentious in the mouth of a lesser actor, but McConaughey's portrayal of a man broken by his search for the truth is spellbinding. The intensity in his eyes gives a steely edge to Cohle's mumbled soliloquies as we see the bedraggled, haunted-looking man he has become, opining that "time is a flat circle" as he plays with the beer cans he has drunk dry while talking to the police.
The show, which aired earlier this year on Sky Atlantic in the UK, where it has just been released on box set, not only garnered rave reviews but also contributed to McConaughey's career revival.
Viewers see the pair working on the case in 1995 and the effect it has had on them – both professionally and personally – years down the line, when the investigation is reopened and they are brought in for questioning.
TRUE DETECTIVE SEASON 1 SCRIPT SERIAL
Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson are Rust Cohle and Marty Hart, two Louisiana police officers hunting the serial killer responsible for this ritualistic murder.
It's a striking image, the first of many disturbing scenes in this eight-episode mini-series that for once lived up to the considerable hype.īoasting impeccable performances and more than a hint of darkness, True Detective switches between the present and scenes set 17 years earlier. A symbol has been painted on her back and she wears a "crown" of deer antlers.
TRUE DETECTIVE SEASON 1 SCRIPT TV
Q uite possibly the most acclaimed TV show of the year so far, True Detective starts with the discovery of a woman's body in a field of burned crops.