Just got around to watching the episode. I thought it was an ok episode. By that I mean I think its been like most of the season. It was an up and down episode. Better than the awful episode last week but still very inconsistent. There will be a good scene followed up by an awful scene followed up by a mediocre sign, etc. There is stuff I like when I watch an episode. I don't think the show is awful television by any stretch. But it absolutely dips and at times it is awful.
Overall there's just too much self loathing and brooding.
I think is one of the real cruxes of the issue. I know its annoying to do and I don't think everything should just be a comparsion to the first season to beat up the second season but some of the problems were just elegantly solved in season 1 so its relevant.
Everyone is brooding and self loathing. And you can get away with that in a 2 hour film noir movie. But the longer it goes, the more it just seems to feel disconnected from the real world. Sometimes it feels like characters are trying to deliver Shakesperian dialogue about their enui towards the human condition. And some of that has always been in noir but its a fine line you have to tread within that universe. I remember not liking Brick for the very same reasons.
So in Season 1 you had Cohle who was as broody and angsty as anyone in season 2. He was a fascinating character but he was perfectly counter balanced by Martin who wasn't that kind of character. He was a much more grounded character. Flawed but grounded. So he was this perfect counter measure to Cohle. Whenever the story got too existential, Martin was there to ground it. Whenever it got too grounded, Cohle was there to make it about something bigger. And the perfect balance is that it never dips into either situation for too long.
This story has no successful grounding anchor. The characters are all self loathing and brooding. Instead of a character, the grounding part is supposed to be their personal lives. With the gay guy, its supposed to be his battle against being gay. With Velcoro, its supposed to be his son. With Rachel McAdams its her family stuff and her relationships. With Frank, its having a kid I guess and losing control. But its just hard to care about that stuff with how this show is constructed. All that stuff just feels like annoying distracting side stuff when it comes up instead of interesting stuff to flesh out the characters. I feel like its treated like shit to get out of the way just to get back to the actual reason we are here which is the case.
I know some people didn't care about the family shit in the first season and I can get that but even if that part of it didn't work for you, the two big characters themselves still served the same purpose. They were the ying and yang.
