By Philip Ritchie
Ever since True Detective aired for the first time last year, it has become something of a standard for the cliché crime genre.
And in anticipation of the next instalment, a panel gathered on Thursday night at ACMI to host Talking TV on Investigating True Detective.
Explaining the hidden goodies the first season managed to conceal from its viewer’s naked eyes, their investigation delved into gender politics, origins, plagiarism, religion and philosophy as they offered their insight to the full house.
And no, goodies aren’t what you think they are.
Among the media detectives were Karen Pickering, Dr Rodney Taveira and Associate Professor Terrie Waddell, all of which were hosted and roasted by Jess McGuire.
Pickering was first to speak and brought up some interesting points about the show from a feminist perspective.
“They [women] operate as vehicles to understand things about the male characters,” she said.
“I don’t think it was their intention to portray an anti-feminist world,” and added, “it’s a world seen through their characters’ eyes.”
Pickering went onto discuss the male characters too, as she laughed at the chummy relationship between the season’s two stars, Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson.
“Looking at depictions of masculinity is just as interesting as looking at depictions of femininity,” she said.
Pickering describes them as two sides of the same coin because they represent two sides of masculinity.
“Marty in particular is the classic story of toxic masculinity run rampant because Marty’s violence and destruction is all outward,” and “the times that Marty really loses his shit is when his masculinity is threatened.”
“All of Rust’s violence is visited on himself, it goes inward, which is another kind of, i think, cost of what we expect men to do is be really strange from their emotional life and to not have the luxury of human emotions, like sadness or fear or love, and Rust sort of becomes this shell.”
Her opinions came all in good faith though.
“Just because you love things, doesn’t mean you can’t criticise them,” she laughed, hoping the next season will change the dynamic, especially with the announcement of Rachel McAdams as the new sheriff.
The literary expert, Taveira, spoke mostly on the hidden links between the story and its gothic history, tying them to The King in Yellow by Robert W Chambers, which dots it with excerpts.
“It shot up the amazon best seller list as fans oh HBOs acclaimed television series consulted it to solve the mystery of the serial killer,” he said.
Chambers’ book includes a vague description of Carcosa, a place much like Louisiana, as well as the unmasking of figures that can be paralleled with the show.
The book is not a perfect similarity though, as it’s full of love stories and titbits to keep you digressing from the case at hand.
Taveira went on to explain how the show couldn’t be set anywhere else because it’s the only place where the southern gothic can exist, with its combination of ancient historical evils and suitable settings.
Waddell was last to speak for the panel and found a fascination for the show’s subtle associations with religion, which remains seemingly inexplicable.
“Religion is thrown in, spirituality is thrown in and at the end it’s still quite unconscious, we still don’t really know what it means,” she said.
One of the more obvious examples she gave is the metamorphosis Rust takes on from the first flash-forward.
“It’s almost as if Rust rises quite Christ-like and has seen the light,” she said.
There is nothing to give closure to the assumptions surrounding him, yet he continues on a righteous mission all the while toting a ragged do.
Waddell also pointed out numerous other religious insignia that may have gone unnoticed to most.
From posts and window frames in the shape of a crucifix, to the faces of good and evil between Rust and his nemesis, the show is undoubtedly shrouded in religious connotations.
Fans of the anthology series can expect the next instalment to debut mid-year with an entirely new cast, case and with them, criminal scum.
RAVENOUSCHAN 
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