True Detective
“Night Finds You”
(HBO)
B
As Vince Vaughn’s Frank Semyon lay in bed, staring at two watermarks on his bedroom’s ceiling and recalling being locked in a basement for days as a child, you virtually had to crank the volume full blast in order to catch every mumbled word. He recounts running out of food, maneuvering in the dark, and smashing the rats that nibbled at his fingers into “goo,” offering further testimony to those watermarks, his frailty, and how a life can be destroyed like papier-mâché.
This episode does well to show us why that’s so true. Semyon obsesses over getting his investment back from whoever stole it after killing Caspere, proving to be a better investigator than the show’s detectives. But he hits the classic brick wall when working with his associates, and in turn threatens to tear down the foundation of every secret in order to get to the bottom of this betrayal. Unlike season two’s first outing, “Night Finds You” suggests a plot to destroy the railway before a train ever touches it. Semyon’s not just vulnerable at this point; he might already be dead. But while it may have had more interesting things to say about its characters and their vulnerabilities (Woodrugh’s newly revealed curiosity, Bezzerides’ apparent porn fetish), their investigation — which consumed a good chunk of the episode — lacks the ominous gloom of its counterpart season. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, though; such slow-building developments are necessary to involve its audience in the mystery as much as its characters are (or are not). Also, we finally got some nostalgic driver-and-passenger philosophizing between Bezzerides and Velcoro (though nowhere near the level of the Mconologues).
Not until the episode’s final moments, when Velcoro breaks into Caspere’s second home (thank you, Semyon) and is shot by the raven-masked killer, are you encouraged to analyze the past hour. Is Velcoro dead? Probably not. The scene had no blood and he took on body shots. Granted, one was at close range, but this is a cop show. Cops wear vests. I love the idea of pulling the old Janet Leigh trick and offing a main character early on, but getting rid of the most interesting and fully realized character at this juncture just won’t fly. It’d be great for shock value, proving that Nic Pizzolotto is still capable of surprise, but unless they filmed extra scenes with Colin Farrell for the season two trailer, Velcoro is only wounded at best.
Which leads us to that last scene. Why was our masked killer waiting at what appeared to be Caspere’s murder scene? Why did he have a camera set up as if he was expecting company? Why did a detective holster his gun after seeing a puddle of blood on the floor? And why would our killer want the camera to catch Velcoro being shot (as it would have, based off positioning)? This is starting to feel like a deeper mystery, one we actually ought to care about. Because whether it’s his wife or Velcoro or both, someone is playing Semyon here, and they’re molding these events like papier-mâché.
