True Detective

Abefroman_sl said:

Holy shit, Lost and Shamalamadingdong have people totally fucked in the head now when watching shows. For now on I guess a writer has to fucking put disclaimers on everything and can't do anything visually creative so people don't think they are being tricked.

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Who gives a shit? Everyone thinks this show is so highbrow because McConaughey discusses some rudimentary philosophical concepts, yet it's so full of nebulous details that the writers can't even connect the dots.

Taking people to ask over some of these theories is laughable considering half the people in this thread have misinterpreted the "time is a flat circle" bullshit.

Without the ending of the show or the writers comments I never once thought Rust/Marty could be connected at all. There was a lot of people in the thread disagreeing with the dumb ass theories and pointed out lawnmower man was the main baddy. I took it all as a grain of salt with Marty seeing the Dolls, or Rust staging the cans figured they always had this fucked up case on their minds. Alot of people said this wasnt some Lost bullshit and the others thought it was, one side was wrong and cant fucking get over it. Obviously the story wasnt that difficult if there was so many people able to put it together without throwing out tons of stupid theories

ZyyzYzzy_sl said:

OK lithose. I didn't post in the thread until the fourth episode because I didnt even start watching the series until the fourth episode. Totally means I just read the writers interviews (by the way I still haven't read any shit articles about the show, just some random quotes people have posted).

You again just show you are over analyzing information you have. You should just get a jump to conclusion mat.

As for red herrings, there were none, just people creation their own. I'm sorry you are incapable of watching a TV show (pure entertainment) without comety over analyzing every scene.

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So you were able to begin offering your opinions with 4 episodes of information available. I'm sorry you can't see how more information clearly biases your opinion, and gives it an advantage. The interviews posted here, even the small snipets like where he talked about the audience running afield, were not posted until after Episode 3--when many of these theories had already come out. (Like I said, even the writer himself said those who could watch it in blocks would have interpreted things very differently).

Like I said, hind sight is a hell of a high horse with which to cast judgement down upon. But how about you just let the people willing to offer their opinionsWITHOUTthe protection of hind sight, the chance to do so and have some fun? Without having some nostrodouche cast dispersions on them? (Because, again, I agree with your interpretation--I'm just saying no one here is an asshole for making up some theories, the symbolism in the first few episodes was pretty strong in a lot of directions.)

Oh, I also get a lot of enjoyment from watching people build myths and opinions around shows. It's one of the best parts of shows for me. Hell, the whole Cthulu mythos itself was built up by shit like this among authors; because everyone's interpretation of a work can be very different. But at the end of the day, I like being challenged with how I view the world; the need to be "correct" is far less substantial for me than the desire to expose myself to many view points, and try to think about things in different ways.

Sorry you can't enjoy that aspect of entertainment. Luckily for me though, analyzing the scenes, and thinking of different views, doesn't really detract from the material; I still enjoyed the show a great deal (As I said, many times). And I can form opinions, like thinking the symbolism was a red herring,withoutit spoiling the show. (Amazing how it's not a binary outcome, isn't it?)

ZyyzYzzy_sl said:

By the way lithose, you try to make some insane arguments, such as the positions of the dolls was in Marty's head when recalling the events to the cops. Nothing in film allows for that conclusion without explicit narration or dialogue. Film is completely different than written works in that regard. An Arthur can give the reader much more information without having a character or narrator explicitly state it.

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chaos_sl said:

She didn't pose the fucking dolls, dude. Do you need Nick Pizzaface to come and personally explain that to you?

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Are you seriously saying there's never been a case in film where there are hallucinations without dialogue? Really? Have you ever seen a Kubrick movie? (And I'm not saying the dolls were in his head, it's another thing I'm iffy on. I think it could have just been a production mistake, but then again, Hart being the anal prude he was, makes it hard to believe he doesn't tell his wife. But this statement you made? It's just silly. TONS of films have had clear imaginary scenes without them being explained.)

Alex_sl said:

As Lithose mentioned, I think he just didn't consider episodic content delivery when taking parts from the book.

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This I think is the biggest thing. If he writes like a book author, he probably has the mindset that the whole story will even out certain pieces of imagery. I think he might have just not anticipated what dumping that symbolism into the first few episodes and then letting people run with it for weeks, did to the theories people had.

From an overall perspective? Once we have the whole 8 hours in our heads? The dolls, the sex images ect--all seem pretty minor. And things that obviously fit into the overall narrative of Marty being a shitty dad and missing "circular" signs right under his nose (In this case, the signs being how he was affecting his daughter). But when we only had 3-4 episodes to go on, and no author interviews? That stuff felt a lot more weighty.

So it wasn't hard for me to see why people ran afield with theories. Some of them were pretty plausible, I think. They just became less and less plausible and the show moved on.

chaos_sl said:

When I first saw the dolls I was not certain if it was real or some kind of symbolism, but I was certain it was connected directly to the cult and was looking for other representations of the 5 men in the show. But more and more it just didn't seem right to me. Rewatching it, and getting a broader context, really sealed it for me that this was about Marty and not the murders. I don't think you need the author's comments to get there, but you do need to take the show in as a whole, and for that reason think they should have just left all that shit out. It doesn't add to the show and creates confusion.

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Exactly my thoughts. As the show moved on, those "signs" felt more and more flimsy. So with a long view? Yeah, they don't seem like Red Herrings. But in that time from Week 4-5? They certainly felt like it. And that's why I thought they were kind of obtuse.

symbolism is fine. and it doesnt ruin the enjoyment of tv shows, but in a supposed mystery where the vaguest of hand gestures could be a major break in the story, those dolls could not be ignored and add that with the drawings and the tulips and its the beginning of a hypothesis. that hypothesis turned out to be completely wrong, but it doesnt negate the existence of the contributors to that hypothesis.

dunno if anyone watched Columbo back in the 70s or later on in syndication, but they had a unique way of showing the crime and the murderer at the beginning of the show. then we get to enjoy columbo doing his "just one more thing" routine with the suspect as he toys with them and solves the case. the mystery was what particular thing set columbo onto their trail and ultimately caught them. this show had to hit you over the head with the identity of the killer because all their clues were bullshit. yeah, we saw lawnmower man early on, but so what? he was just as prominent as a half dozen other characters we could easily have taken to be behind all this. some people have said the last episode or last 2 episodes felt rushed, i dunno about that, but it did feel like a lot was left out. i dunno if thats the director's fault or HBO's fault for only letting this be 8 episodes.

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Maester Chuk_sl said:

the information was misleading and almost none of it lead to the murderer. sure it made good tv, but at the last second, hey look at this. green house is green? wait another second. green house, green ears? killer! lets check tax records and catch our man. thats not compiling. thats jumping to conclusions.

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The green house thing was a little out of place for it to be the missing piece, but breaks happen in cases all the time, I was fine with it. The whole story was about Marty and Rust, with the case just the vehicle to their journey and trials from how they were back then to how they are now. The info wasn't misleading most of the time, it was just meant to be flavor for their personal stories.

The more I think about it, the more I think the theme behind the series is the Detective's Curse. You have Rust who appears to be the smart one with his philosophy and books and you have Marty who appears to be the stupid one. Rust is always leaping to conclusions and making connections that just aren't there. Just like a lot of viewers did. Marty would often say things like "that might not be the case" or "it might just be what it appears to be", I don't remember his exact words. It wasn't spaghetti monster with green ears, etc. The theme of the series is exactly what is going on in this topic.

Except Rust wasn't wrong. Reverend Tuttle was involved. And the fact he was murdered shortly after that evidence was stolen shows that the connection went deeper.

I think people had every reason to expect a twist. I did. In the end it proved to be simply a character drama, but a fucking good one. Both guys were brilliantly written and acted. I felt a little let down that it was a straightforward find-bad-guy kill-bad-guy conclusion to the mystery, but that cements it: Marty and Rust were the story. Viewed through that lens, the last scenes at the hospital that some are calling out of place were required to complete their story.

"What's scented meat?"

Alex_sl said:

Except Rust wasn't wrong. Reverend Tuttle was involved. And the fact he was murdered shortly after that evidence was stolen shows that the connection went deeper.

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Alternative theory about the reverend. There were complaints at the church schools. He or church officials investigated and gathered evidence. One of those pieces of evidence was the tape. Rust stole the tape and the reverend killed himself because of the scandal that would happen when the tape was released.

Rust blamed god for the death of his child and was very biased when it came to Tuttle. He would think the worst.

Besides the Dolls scene there's also this :






At this point it's quite obvious the daughter angle got cut during post production, probably because after test screening people would have emphasized too much on Hart's family. It's so obvious there's a specific line during season finale that seemed to have slipped from editing, when Marty visits his ex-wife and she says their daughter is on / off her meds and implied it affects her mood. You don't take that kind of meds just because you had a high school car threesome. There's clearly something missing there.

I loved True Detective and I don't really have problems with loose ends or missing pieces as long as it's not so blatant (LOST). The journey was great. Some scenes were really awesome (ep 4 sequence shot, some Rust scenes), some were less good. Now just because people want 100% closure and got into mad rage if they're not being spoon fed story / plot wise, the show's going through deep CSI-like analysis. Every scene is being dissected for symbolism speleology. You should see r/TrueDetective, it's a hivemind of stupid people pretending to be smart fishing for atheist / philosophical stuff in every goddamn scene.

Nowadays after Breaking Bad craziness, people like to call "symbolism" on anything, but sometimes it's just a 9/10 tv show gone through harsh editing. It's like watching The Shining and pretend Kubrick wanted to take a stand about man versus nature showing the helicopter's shadow.

I think all those clues about the daughter were just to get us views to draw false conclusions like Rust.

Bro, people take meds all the time. This is America. You are beyond reaching if you think that because his daughter is taking meds she had to have more to her story. A girl drawing the pictures isn't all that crazy. The other pictures, I don't understand that. I understand how they could overlook a spiral in the production design with all the kids art. But the big mural is kind of a glaring thing. But still, not sure how that translates to Marty's family being involved with the Carcosa cult people.

Maester Chuk_sl said:

hey look at this. green house is green? wait another second. green house, green ears? killer!

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This was really the only thing (and it's a small thing at that) that sorta bothered me about the ending. The guy paints shit for a living and he can't paint a house without getting paint all over his ears? I know he wasn't exactly a neat freak but come on.

Fingz_sl said:

Alternative theory about the reverend. There were complaints at the church schools. He or church officials investigated and gathered evidence. One of those pieces of evidence was the tape. Rust stole the tape and the reverend killed himself because of the scandal that would happen when the tape was released.

Rust blamed god for the death of his child and was very biased when it came to Tuttle. He would think the worst.

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