Well Marty's wife was decent for most of the series. It's not that there has to be decent people as characters, they just can't all be broken to the point of being so closed-off. Marty was closed off only to his wife and kids. Rust was closed off to everyone but was still compelled to "bear witness" as he put it.
Season 1 depicted the complexities of human nature. We had people who did bad things, but were still at times good; or the 'good' guy being show to sometimes be bad. People who had gone through tragedy, but in a strangely optimistic way kept going forward. People who had every reason to be as depressed, flat and as Eeyore as they wanted, but that makes for bad tv, so were given complexities. Season 1 was actually pretty humorous, nuanced, charming, etc. Characters were their lived histories, which was sometimes dark, but never completely stifling like they were no longer multidimensional people who were complex and nuanced.
Probably true. And probably a theme: you're so corrupt; so corrupt and you don't even know it. It's been so easy you can openly discuss kickbacks by simply saying "hey, get me that kickback or else" which felt clumsy even for people who have only known corruption.
You're really jumping the gun there considering it's only the second episode and we haven't gotten anything more than bits and pieces of each character's past or had a chance to see how they react to this case...
I wasn't in the best TV show of all time camp at this point in S1 (the aroma of Breaking Bad was still hanging in the air) but the show had it's hooks in me by the time Rustin Cohle spoke the words "Then start asking the right fuckin' questions". I don't expect a repeat this time around but I'm fully open to being pleasantly surprised.
Look, you know something feels off with this season. I'm just trying to explain why. You can pretend I'm just an outlier hating on a show just to spite you, but look around at all the people feeling something is off. How long are people supposed to wait for it to get better? Do you think MORE exposition and ham-fisted dialog revealing information on the characters is what makes them nuanced or complex? Pro-tip: it's not the information about a character, but how well the viewer feels they're an embodiment of their lived history that makes a character feel real and believable and complex, and thus empathetic and interesting.
Nobody is saying season 1 is perfect, but there are objective reasons it was well received. It's the most logical comparison because a) it's the same fucking show with the same writer everyone gave a ton of credit to and b) season 1 managed to do things season 2 isn't doing from a craft/creation/production element so the things season 2 isn't doing is all the more obvious because it's the same fucking show and same fucking writer so how is the dialog suddenly very stilted and flat?!
There isn't the possible supernatural vibe to the show but holy moly, Vince Vaughn's monologue there was super creepy.
There were quite a few really memorable "quiet" scenes I enjoyed this episode.
technically not true, season2 has a lot of other similarities to season one so far. 2 burned out corrupt cops, fucked up religious angle, weird people wearing strange shit on their head, missing hookers and sweeping landscape camera shots. i say they are doing their best to recreate season 1 but in a more urban setting. on paper it would make people think of season 1 and it make us love this season as well, but in reality it just makes us miss how well done season one was in comparison to this brooding mess.
