"Is he a man railing against an uncaring god? 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.
I really enjoyed that too. I really want to read his fiction but I can't justify reading a non-school text right now (the forum... is something else
). Pizzolatto seems to consciously utilize medium to enhance message. I'm excited about how he might leave the end of this series.
Every episode makes me say 'this was the best episode', but...this was totally the best episode.
I wonder what was up with LeDoux's comment about how "it's time" or "it's happening." I forget how he put it. This was right before he started getting into the time stuff, but it sounded almost like he believed in a prophecy. Made me wonder if it's anything to do with his cult, but it could have just fit in with his whole belief about how everything that happens has happened before.
I think it might give the appearance of something prophetic, but will be revealed (or implied) that everything was very mundane - the powers that be recognized that he was going to find Ledoux, he was made to be a sacrifice ('don't worry, my son, you'll come back around...'), everyone deeply involved is utterly devout, totally manipulated. 'It's time' possibly means he knew that if the detectives found him, the cult is going to take off the gloves and go after them savagely. Maybe they even do try to turn Cohle, thinking a man with nothing left is an easy mark for a cult, but I can't imagine what they do with Marty's family to break him.
I like Trisk's thought embedded in there. I like the practicality of the bold. It really just becomes an issue of which way Pizzolatto is taking it, lovecraftian or mundane.
I will note on the theme of the Yellow King and Carcosa again. Invoking a recognizable association within narrative always seems to leverage two mechanisms. On one hand it's mind-candy for those in the know, who get little shocks of recognition, and revelations for those who seek, but it can be that that particular association is necessary for a "complete reading." On the other, it's a feint something through and through, unreliable or priming inversion.
I'm only learning about this as we watch (though I'd come by Chambers by way of reading about Lovecraft before) but if invoking the Yellow King mirrors the plot then we should see "the Outside leaking in" as it were in this episode and the last. Think of it. EP4 "starts Act II." Cohle bangs a couple speed-balls, finds some coke. Not having pursued much reading yet on it, I will note that by switching from pharmaceuticals to drugs associated with his 'undercover neural network,' Cohle is priming a whole pattern of behaviors connected to that set of drug use alone, probably. But the drugs serve as an easy excuse for the incomprehensible to come.
I read some things that were talking about the show's pressing against the fourth wall. Sci, what's the link?
Sorry, meant to link it when I had a moment. Here it is.
Really enjoyed reading this again after the episode.
It is some quality writing. I really hope more is played off this concept of referencing the audience - in fact, I really hope the end of this series is tied up in the meta-fictional reading he prompts watchers for.
On female characters - this criticism I can better accept. I do think it's unfair to label Hart's daughter as a temptress figure. People who are sexually abused can have complicated relationships with sex. I recall an ex saying she'd previously associated sex with self-degradation. There is a challenge in noting in trying to explore this issue while advocating for sex positive stances but I accept not everything can be done in the limited space....though maybe my lack of concern is a sign of male privilege?
At least you are thinking about it, Sci
.
I think it's kind of messed up that gender isn't being thought about more in this day and age. It should be fairly constantly engaged. And while I don't know that Pizzolatto will spend any time on it - though how can he not, if the daughters become a focus by complicity in darkness?
On the evil evangelical possibility - I've seen this complaint about evangelicals playing with devil worship or whatever, and it grates on me.
The King in Yellow is not a demon serving Lucifer, and to think like that is - IMO - reducing the scope of possible metaphysics to a needlessly Christian-centric worldview.
Lmao. Well, I don't think that person really understands the really strange and fucked up places Pizzolatto might take us.
Shift makes complete sense when you realize that the KiY play drives people mad when they start the second act (which corresponds to episode 4 in TD). 
+1, Wic.
Is
King in Yellow short?
I absolutely 100% believe that Cohle has been working this case off-grid since 2002.
+1 but I think everyone is with you there.
I'm assuming he got pushed out of the force after digging too deep with the Tuttle stuff. I'm not sure if Marty's in on it with Cohle. It's a possibility. I do like the idea of them working this thing together for over a decade.
It is possible. Hart does seem to corroborate too much of Cohle's story for them not to have talked in almost a decade.
Fucking LOVED how the Ledoux "shoot-out" played. When Marty walked out and capped Ledoux...just amazing. Totally unexpected for me. Marty may be a piece of shit in certain areas, but I do think he "means well" (just as Cohle said: The world needs bad men to keep the other bad men from the door).
Lol - as soon as I saw Hart's face and we didn't see what he saw, I knew Ledoux was going to die.
Personally, I think that the whole Tuttle school-system is built around raising/conditioning kids to eventually become a part of this cult in some fashion -- victims and/or members. One Tuttle school has already been revealed to have connections to the cult (Lawnmower Man as Green-Eyed Spaghetti Monster, plus all the shit Cohle found at the end of the episode). The final shot showed black stars drawn on the window. I think the "black stars" may be the children conditioned by this cult. I also think Aubrey, Hart's daughter, has been a part of this without her knowing -- I even suspect she may have been molested when she was young, thus the bizarre Barbie doll scene, and the sexual drawings, and the drawing of a spiral.
I have the same sort of issues with this grand conspiracy angle as I read in reviews - it's complicated for eight episodes. One cult with variable power in Louisiana that have slipped notice due to scale is more believable than government coordinated abductions.
I will note that we don't know
when those tokens were left in the Tuttle school. We also don't know what happened to Guy Francis
off camera. Those cops in particular might have done or said some to him and he really might have had a call from his lawyer.
I just don't know where to gauge the scale. Plus the goddamn episode by episode interviews are another way for Pizzolatto to prime and influence the audience and
he knows it.
Ultimately, I think this show is basically supposed to be a "what-if" version of the crazy Satanic-cult urban legends from the late-eighties and early-nineties. These urban myths were just that -- mostly bullshit. But this show is telling the story of it actually happening.
That isn't a bad take, though again, I share the concept echoed around that we will encounter some kind of "evil" that is incomprehensible as it exists.
All of this brings me back to the opening shot of the first episode. A man running through a dark forest, breathing heavily. Cut to a line of fire on the horizon. Originally, I had thought this was a shot from the much talked about "hero shout", when Marty and Cohle save kids from the woods after a gunfight. Now, I think it's about the actual end of the series -- in 2013, when Cohle (and maybe Hart) track down the actual cult.
I didn't remember that until you reminded me, FB. I actually won't rewatch the episodes until I can rewatch the first season in a marathon. I know that there are clues, etc, layered in everywhere. I did rewatch the first five minutes though - it could almost be two people crouching and walking slowly, FB.
In thinking about how this series is framed, I wonder if at the point Gilbough and Papania are interviewing Hart and Cohle it's after they've already done the deed. Perhaps.
Overall, I'm not sure where I stand. I want to plant a flag somewhere on this super/natural divide but I can't bring myself to. It's definitely a self-conscious series but self-consciously fiction or self-consciously anachronism, I can't decide.
The most interesting piece of the puzzle remains for me Ledoux's lines to Cohle. Just spent a couple minutes listening to the lines from the show because apparently you shouldn't trust what makes it online. The line I was going to quote doesn't exist - elsewhere I read it mentioned that Ledoux calls Cohle a priest but these are all the lines that Reggie says before he dies.
"It's time, isn't it? The black stars."
"Black stars rise."
"I know what happens next. I saw you in my dream. You're in Carcosa now. With me. He sees you."
"You'll do this again. Time is a flat circle."
"Sonsciniscent (?). Black God (?). Twin (?)" (these lines are whispered by Reggie as Cohle tells Dewall to freeze and are mostly indecipherable - best I could do; they could be electronically tampered with.)
"Black stars."
"(Three Indecipherable Words)" (these lines are also whispered by Reggie as Hart walks out of the building to cap him - last words Reggie says).
What does it mean?!
Lol - to give insight into Madness here are some of the more interesting tabs I have open after reading through and responding to this post:
True Detective Review: "The Secret Fate of All Life" (Episode 1.05) [PASTE mag]
True Detective Season 1: Inside the Episode #5 (HBO) [Pizzolatto actually confirms the connection of
King in Yellow - I really feel like I should watch more of these]
True Detective: The Psychology of Hart and Cohle [Psychology Today mag - EP1,2,3 spoilers]
True Detective: A Psychological Analysis [Psychology Today mag - EP4,5 spoilers]
EDIT: Oh, and FB, good catch on the black stars in the school.
Another thought. Don't Cohle and Hart get a call over the radio almost moments before they might have explored the school in E3? Someone is keeping close tabs.
