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TV: True Detective, Ep. 5

I continue to enjoy True Detective, but there's this lingering 10-25% of my mind that remains suspicious of the show -- like I'm being sold a fake painting or something.  I don't know why.  Maybe it's the prestige and the HBO-ness, or the internet re-caps proclaiming brilliance and "best-show-on-television."  Or maybe it's Cohle digressing about "membrane" theory and the 4th dimension, the type of discussion one might overhear brainy 16-year-olds having instead of working up the courage to talk to girls. (spoken from experience)

That said, I really look forward to watching the show.  I found the last couple of episodes quite creepy and enjoyed the time jump to 2002.  Thought the mystery beats hit really well, especially the quick reveal LaDoux might not be the killer.  Don't really care for this notion that Cohle is being investigated.  It sounds clever on paper, but I don't think the audience buys for a moment that Cohle could be behind the killings.  It wouldn't make any sense.

On a side note, I somewhat enjoy reading recaps and listening to people talk about this show.  And in that way, True Detective is a great show for this era of twitter, blogs, and the need to be talking about something online.

Random notes on this commentary:

1.  Is it just me or is the biggest cliche any can say about a mystery genre is "the show isn't really about the mystery, it's about the characters?"  Cue ohhs and ahhhs from freshman literature students.  If I have to read this once more as if it were insight, I'm going to vomit.  I don't see why critics who write about these shows are so dismissive about the "whodunnit" aspect.  First of all, mysteries are never just whodunnit -- they are whydunnit.  That's why we enjoy mysteries.  It is also why most mysteries fail and why most mysteries about "characters" end up being deeply disappointing in the end (see any adaptation of a Dennis Lehane book).

The move for mysteries that works pretty well is disguising a 2nd mystery within the primary mystery.  The classic case being Chinatown with the incest storyline intertwined with the murder storyline.  Same with Lonestar (again, an incest storyline).  And with Top of the Lake (again, incest).  Actually, maybe the lesson is just to introduce an incest plot.

2.  Fanboys are annoying no matter what the subject.  See this.

Or is he a character in a TV show railing against his audience? Aren't we the creatures of that higher dimension? The creatures who can see the totality of his world? After all, we get to see all eight episodes of his life. On a flat screen. And we can watch him live that same life over and over again, the exact same way." 

The thought was dizzying. Sure, True Detective is a page-turning crime yarn. But at least according to its creator, it's also a meta-page-turning crime yarn—a story about storytelling. Pizzolatto had transformed m-theory into a metaphor for television—and television, perhaps, into a metaphor for existence itself.

Que?  Am I the only one overhearing the squeaky sounds of someone jerking themselves off with lube?  Metafiction?  What are we even talking about?  Who isn't aware they're watching a tv show?  Or making a tv show?  I feel like if you get a boner for metafiction, the genre you really want to explore is the sitcom with a live audience.  But a story about storytelling.  Huh?  Aren't all stories about storytelling?  I dunno.  I'm staring to bore myself to death thinking about it.