Who Goes There? - True Detective

Episode Four
"Who Goes There?"

First half, Marty. Second half, COHLE!  Really really Cohle.

After a Super Bowl hiatus and then an excruciating extension to the hiatus as I get my cable hooked up, here we are.

Based on the end to episode three, I thought we were heading straight into the showdown in the woods, with the sirens blaring and back up being called, but there's some in between action.

1995
Marty and Rust interrogate Dora's ex, as he is an associate/housemate of Ledoux.  After some prodding, they get a lead on Ledoux who is cooking meth wholesale for a single client (a biker gang), beating Walter White to the punch by fifteen years.

They need to track down Reggie so through a investigative chain of events it goes Reggie -> Jay Z -> Tupac and Biggie -> Andre from Outkast -> Jada -> Kurupt -> Nas and then me.

Actually, it goes Reggie -> housemate/in jail Charlie -> stripper girlfriend -> guy at a rave* with an onomatopoetic name of Weebs or something like that -> Biker gang

* When are raves not great in a crime story?  Today, it's what an illegal casino would be in a Dashiell Hammet.  See Community's “Basic Intergluteal Numismatics”


It's apparent they are not going to get close to Ledoux/biker gang through conventional methods (Marty's ways) so Rust re-assumes his undercover identity.  Rust has spoken of his UC work before but when we see it in action, it's jarring.  Rust meets his old contacts under the auspices of trading coke for crank and gets pulled into a stash house robbery, which of course goes terribly wrong (as if it could go right) and results in a riot throughout the projects.  Rust has to blow his cover but manages to kidnap his contact and will no doubt coerce him into connecting them with Ledoux.

In the episode's first, less interesting, half, Marty's life falls apart when he's tesitifying in another case and has a run in with Lisa, who tries to make a scene.  Marty tries to put space between them but she's still upset about him wacking around the guy she was with.  Lisa goes to see Maggie and is like "Guess what?!" , resulting in Maggie leaving Marty.  Marty goes to pieces, stalking her at work and shacking up with Cohle.

Wait, Lisa and Maggie?

2012
It's apparent that the detectives are looking into Cohle for something related to this case.  He's suspicious.  They've looked into his absence when he was supposedly seeing his sick dad, and there are no hospital records to back up his alibi.  Because Cohle's UC work was off the books, only Marty knew about it apparently.  So it all looks very uncool.  Actually, the fact that they looked into it in the first place is a dead giveaway they are liking Cohle for this or other murders.

Past Questions

• Will the show stick with this format, telling the story entirely through interviews with Marty and Rust?
• So far, but if we wrap up the old case next week I wouldn't be surprised if there's a shift afterwards.
• Would not be surprised is Marty walks out of the interview.  He seems more uneasy with everything.  Cohle seems to be more at peace and willing to stick to his story, even as they catch some lies, willing to accept whatever consequences come his way...even though he's the one they're looking at.

• Is there a cover up that Marty and Rust are complicit in? 
• They surely fed some lies to people to do Rust's UC work, and I'm sure they weren't the last fibs they spread in the interest of solving the case.  

• What happened with Rust to put him where he is now?
• See above.  Also ingesting drugs, chemicals via his undercover and narco work. 
• I'm sure eating all those drugs with the biker gang didn't help

• Will Marty and Rust have differing accounts? 
• So far they are covering different ground it seems, rather than giving accounts from different perspectives on the same particular events. 
• Even as they start to point the finger at Cohle, it seems like Marty will stick to the story.  If not for some shred of loyalty remaining to Cohle, but to avoid implicating himself.

• It seemed like we should take what they are saying at face value.  How reliable are the narrators?
• Hmm.  Well we have the first fib we're aware of, with Cohle's alibi.  Now he's getting into his survivalist dad, and while it sounds plausible it seems like anything related to this has to be taken with a grain of salt
• Reading The King in Yellow, particularly the first story "The Repairer of Reputations", unreliable narration has to be considered.  The narrator in that story makes Arthur Anderson accounting look legit.
• Very unrelated, but making my way through this book it seems like Vonnegut took a lot of inspiration from it

Round Up

• Lots of masks removed in this episode
• Marty's mask of normal family life is torn off by Lisa, leaving him with no kids, no wife and no home
• Cohle is done interacting with the humans at the opportunity to reassume his UC identity, Crash Virginia
• Even the bikers wear police uniforms when they head into the projects to rob the stash house, but that lasts a hot second before it all goes pear shaped 
• Meanwhile, Cohle, is a cop, undercover as an associate of the biker gang, who are posing as cops in the worst disguises ever 

• Six plus minutes of a single shot, the camera following Cohle in and out of rooms and buildings, tracking helicopters, going over fences, etc. Has to be seen to appreciate.  Consider the actions involved, it makes the tracking shot in Goodfellas look easy (they go in a big square, people)
• Getting it over the fence alone was a feat 
• EDIT: Here it is!!!! 
• If it reminded me of something, it was Kima's undercover work in The Wire's "The Cost"
• Actually, maybe it wasn't only Rust and Marty, considering that helicopter was there.  Or maybe it got called over to the fracas
• Rust tells Marty he thinks Marty and Maggie will get back together, but I think he just needs him stable as his back up
• Another mention of the Yellow King and Carcosa, first in the diary and now Charlie talking about the nonsense Reggie was spewing
• Reggie also claims the spiral symbol as his
• And leads satan worship
• Something about stones and Carcosa.  Could be the gravestones mentioned in "An Inhabitant of Carcosa"?

• Unsure of the passage of time.  Thought it started in '92 but must be '95.  Cohle mentions Mogadishu, which happened in '93 and the way they are counting the years doesn't work with 1992.  Not sure where I got 1992.
• Marty made a wisecrack!  Found it hilarious when he gives Cohle a look as he and Charlie commiserate over spending all day with someone spouting nonsense 
• “Gotta be tough, living with somebody spoutin’ insane shit in your ear all day long,”
• One of the great things about this show is that there is so much more leg work to be done in the absence of Google machines.
• I think there will be some whining that the shootout didn't happen in this episode.  And knowing that they catch the guy eliminates some of the suspense.  But there are so many facets to this show which they set up early on so that catching this one guy is not the sole purpose of the show.  Not only that, there are only eight episodes, so we know it's only delayed a month at most, rather than say, years.  Cohle's UC work was far more than just a side adventure, it was filling in the middle of the investigation.  If you're only concerned about the start and end points, then you are likely to be disappointed.  But seeing Cohle in his element was well worth the delay, as was the 6+ minute unbroken shot. 
• One of the other facets they set up early on was having characters after all.  And this was the character episode of character episodes for Cohle. 
• Maybe I just enjoy things differently, but why skip to the last chapter of the book?
• Whining probably exacerbated by the two week layoff.  But c'mon, it's eight episodes.  Any shorter and it'd be a movie.
• Also...
• Crazy about this show, folks.