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(This podcast is accompanied by an article, “The World Itself: Powerlessness, Fantasy, Transportation Systems & Lost Masculinity in True Detective 2.” PDF here. Audio reading below.)
Second part of in-dept exploration of True Detective season 2 with Heather Poirier, on the American Dream, ideology, and weaponized memes, the power of ideas, art as inoculation, The Counselor, a positive virus, connecting to internal wounds, art-as-science, the tropes of advertising, the ongoing work of inoculation, localizing the problem, the price of being an inoculator, the good news for Nic Pizzolatto, trying to solve algebraic problems using arithmetic, the many aspects of Nic Pizzolatto, the Pizzolatto transmission, history and progeny, the struggle of writing, an infinite regression point, liminalism and deconstruction, fatal flaws, sex in True Detective, Pizzolatto’s life changes, gaining access to the Hollywood underworld, Vinci as metaphor for the entertainment industry, the secret occult history of US transportation, the circulatory system for money, Earth biosphere, weaponized meme carriers, the pattern of bruises on Lera Lynn’s arms, the Greek chorus, the main theme of True Detective, the secret that protects itself, Jasun’s dis-enmeshing from the mother’s psyche and becoming a husband, the lost object, Frank’s last walk, the loss of male authority & female generative power, dead mothers, relating to shadows, the difference between male and female mother-bondage, Antigone’s mother, Woodrugh’s mother, emotional incest, the male child as husband surrogate, the weight of history, Medea’s children, Orpheus and Eurydice, rescuing the female principle, the paternal intervention, what does it mean to be a father, Tony Chessani, Ray’s intervention for Chad, the rape of Persephone, Ray-as-Orpheus, Nails as father figure, reparenting, the Virgin Mary and Santa Muerte, the thread running through season 1 & 2, Lloyd de Mause, psycho-history & child development, analyzing credit sequence images, the controlling intelligence behind True Detective, “White Water 1999,” an archetypally selected detective.
Audio reading of “The World Itself” (38 mins) Download mp3
Songs: “PTSD Blues,” by Ex Luna; “Beat The Devil’s Tattoo (Live)” by Black Rebel Motorcycle Club; “Palida Luna” by Lidya Mendoza; “My Least Favorite Life,” by Lera Lynn; “Kill!” by The Raveonettes; “Bad Vibrations,” by The Black Angels; “The Rose,” by Conway Twitty. On audio reading: “Lately” by Lera Lynn; “The Angry River” by The Hat ft. Father John Misty & S.I. Istwa; “Descent into the Inferno,” by Scraping Foetus Off the Wheel.
“Who wants to go get whipped? And if you do want to go get whipped, aren’t you really being entertained? So do you think that anybody who comes to see me is coming for any other reason than entertainment?” – Bob Dylan to Time magazine journalist
Thanks for the fascinating discussion. Surely makes me want to go back and watch the whole season again from the start, when I can get around to it. I think most audiences turn away from anything that doesn’t provide them with a release at the conclusion. I’ve been thinking about this more and more with the recent slew of rebellion-based movies like the “Hunger Games” trilogy and “Insurgent” and so on. How do they neutralize anger/action?
Hunger Games also seems meant to assuage Empire-guilt by empathizing/identifying with under-developed communities being ruthlessly torn apart by a technologically advanced superpower.