True Detective
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And, with chilling insistence, theres the vanishing line between the living and the dead.
Are all these ghosts real?
As Liz might say, thats the wrong question.
The right question is, Why are ghosts appearing?
Liz would disdain the notion, and yet that character may turn out to be the most haunted.
Theres the foreboding sense that the root cause of Lizs irritability isnt rottenness but grief.
When the episode opens, police havent made much progress separating the scientists from the tundra.
Only onNight Countrycould a cop accidentally breaking off a victims frozen forearm feel like comic relief.
And really, I should say they were taking selfies among thealmost-dead.
Later, we learn hes in an induced coma, about to have surgery to amputate a leg.
If there was a crime committed on the ice that night, Lund might be the only witness.
Now, there are physical challenges to transporting a group of seven men frozen into a pyramid.
Its an awkward ask because Liz slept with Kates husband back when he was still Kates husband.
In fact, one effective way to organize this review would be according to Lizs body count.
Walked onto the ice?
What exactly did happen to those men?
We know that Lund was found with a spiral symbol on his forehead.
Similarly, digging into Tsalals financials produces inconclusive results.
Like Adam, who calls the scientists mad men, the women dont paint a flattering portrait.
Lund was testy and obsessive; he never spoke to the women except to correct their work.
One lady remembers Clark as a loner, crying in his room while the others ignored him.
None report seeing Annie or her tattoo reminiscent of the spirals in previous series ofTrue Detective at the station.
Pete fares a little better with the supply guy, who was the first to discover Tsalal was abandoned.
The supply guy has seen the spiral symbol before, in the form of a tattoo on Clarks chest.
Clarks credit card records lead Liz to call a Fairbanks tattoo parlor.
She learns Clark cried when he got the tattoo a few days after Annies death.
This is the kind of police work Liz prefers: methodical, Socratic.
Ask the right questions notwhydid Raymond get the spiral tattoo butwhen and the answers link up like falling dominoes.
Pete may be a disloyal son and a rookie cop, but hes also got that Gen-Z savvy.
Exhibit A.
Undeterred by Lizs hostility, Navarro keeps digging into her cold-case file.
Its why she cant give up the search for Annies killer either.
Liz and Evangeline didnt just work together.
Liz is capable of friendship.
And man, could she use an ally right now.
Her other body count, as it stands by the end of episode two: Hank despises her.
So do Kate and Adam.
Pete doesnt hate Liz, but its easy to imagine it heading in that direction.
For all their shared toughness, though, Navarro can still be astonishingly gentle.
She takes her little sister shopping and sends her a voice note when Wannabe comes on the radio.
Rose seems to have adopted her as a lost daughter.
She lets her guard down with Qaavik just a little.
She lets him get to know her a bit, which means getting to know Annies case.
Why do you hide a romance?
How do you hide a romance?
Annies phone is there, alongside a makeshift, life-size stuffed mannequin wearing Annies clothes.
The spiral motif that adorned Annies back and Clarks chest is drawn into the ceiling.
Is this place an altar?
Is it a crime scene?
What drove Clark so insane?
No, wrong question.
What was this insane man capable of?
No, wrong again, it seems.
The question isnt whatwashe capable of, but whatishe capable of.
Hes still out there, somewhere, on the same ice he devoted his life to digging up.
