Summary

• True Detective: Night Country is already on the path to avoiding the mistake season 1 made by not fully embracing its supernatural elements.
• The eerie and haunting atmosphere of True Detective season 4 captures the unsettling feeling that viewers loved about season 1.
• True Detective: Night Country is teasing a supernatural or paranormal mystery that will force the detectives to confront the horrors of the long polar night in Alaska.

If it wants to win over long-time fans, filming locations, True Detective season 4 captures a distinct, haunting atmosphere — one made all-the-more chilling by Ennis' unending darkness.

In fact, it's that unsettling feeling that True Detective season-one viewers clamored for when the show first aired. A nonlinear narrative, the anthology series' first outing follows Louisiana-based homicide detectives Rust Cohle (Matthew McConaughey) and Marty Hart (Woody Harrelson); in 1995, the duo investigate the murder of a sex worker, Dora Lange, and, 17 years later, they're forced to revisit that past. Influenced by weird horror fiction, True Detective season 1 is at its best when it leans into Cohle's philosophical pessimism and its strange lore rooted in Robert W. Chambers' short story collection, The King in Yellow.

True Detective Season 1 Disappointed Some Viewers By Avoiding Supernatural Elements

Created by Nic Pizzolatto, True Detective season 1 continually alludes to a figure called "the Yellow King." A reference to Chambers' 1895 short story collection, The King in Yellow, the titular entity is a creation of supernatural, Gothic horror at its finest. In fact, Chambers' writing style, which vaguely refers to supernatural or macabre events, later influenced the horror of H.P. Lovecraft. Much like these inspirations, True Detective toes the line between the real and the unreal — the grounded and the fantastical. As Rust and Marty uncover more of the show's central mystery, they discover Carcosa.

A place that's referenced in The King in Yellow and works by Ambrose Bierce, Carcosa is also the name given to the stone ruins situated on True Detective's Louisiana bayou. When Rust and Marty investigate the ruins in the show's finale, it's clear that all sorts of horrors have occurred within its crumbling walls, including ritualistic child sacrifice. The heinous acts were committed by a cult of wealthy politicians and church leaders, all of whom worship the Yellow King. Although True Detective hints at a larger conspiracy, it never fully indulges in its supernatural leanings.

True Detective: Night Country Is Already Teasing A Supernatural Or Paranormal Mystery

While True Detective season 4's six-episode mystery is just getting started, the crime drama is already teasing some supernatural elements that Danvers and Navarro will be forced to confront during the area's long polar night. True Detective season 1 symbols and references, including the strange, spiral glyph that leads Rust to Carcosa.

If the tell-tale symbol wasn't proof enough, True Detective season 4, episode 1's epigraph directly references Chambers' The King in Yellow. The chilling quote, which reads, "For we do not know what beasts the night dreams when its hours grow too long for even God to be awake," is attributed to Hildred Castaigne — a character in "The Repairer of Reputations," one of the stories in Chambers' collection. However, Hildred never says the line in the story; given that the character struggles with getting a grip on reality, Night Country sets up a supernatural twist from the start.

How True Detective: Night Country Can Avoid Season 1's Supernatural Mistake

With many viewers most intrigued by True Detective season 1's Carcosa and Yellow King lore — and the looming, larger conspiracy that stems from it — the show's refusal to explore its Lovecraftian horror elements more deeply was something of a letdown. On one hand, what makes that brand of horror so unsettling is its vagueness; what audiences imagine is often far more terrifying than anything that can be conjured up on screen. Nonetheless, True Detective season 4's connections to Rust Cohle allow it to dig into the larger, supernatural conspiracy teased by season 1, setting up an unforgettable outing.