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| Moments before they kiss. |
Warning: The following review has mild spoilers in it if you are a human. Read at your own risk.
There comes a time and a place where everybody that watches a decent bit of television sits back and contemplates what the best show they've ever seen is. Is it The Wire? Is it Breaking Bad? Or is it something else? Whatever the case, there are only a few shows out there that come close to perfection from a technical, and a story-telling standpoint. While it can be argued that people drastically differ in opinions when it comes to "favorite" television show, there is no refuting that some shows exhibit a quality of excellence that is not found in others. True Detective is one of these shows.
What makes True Detective so fantastic? A large majority of it is the acting. Matthew McConaughey does a superb job as Rust Cohle, a mentally odd, yet genius detective. The character of Cohle is so complex and multifaceted, I could write an entire post just on him; McConaughey consistently surprised me throughout the entire series. Two major standouts for me were the long-take found at the end of the fourth episode (up there with some of the best I have seen in large budget Hollywood films) and the final minutes of the finale. Woody Harrelson is great as Detective Hart, a by-the-book cop whose darkness is slowly unraveled throughout the show, including him cheating on his wife with various young girls and highlighting his rampant alcoholism.
From a plot standpoint, the show was very good, and kept viewers interested until the finale. While I feel the finale lacked the touch it needed to be excellent, it still proved to be rather good. I walked away on a bit of a sour note, since the show kept building up all of this evidence, only to have it somewhat fall flat in the end. In retrospect, the entirety of the show was fantastic, so the elements I feel were lacking in the finale to provide a better resolution to the show were trivial. Many shows hailed as excellent do not have perfect endings, as expectations from fans outweigh what the writers can come up with...not everyone can be satisfied by the same ending.
With the news that the second season of True Detective is going to star different characters, I was instantaneously saddened. Hart and Cohle were great characters established over the few eight episodes we had with them and elements of "why" they are exactly how they are still remain unclear. I would love to see more of Harrelson and McConaughey reprising their respective roles, without it growing too tiresome. Perhaps the next season will not feature these characters for exactly this reason...to prevent the show from becoming stale and repetitive. The next leads are going to have a difficult time surpassing what Harrelson and McConaughey brought to the plate; an excellent crime drama with fantastic acting and a great story.
Overall Rating:
9/10
(9 out of 10)
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