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Jake

True Detective Weekly 2: Night Finds You

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I actually really liked the bit with the knives. It felt like an honest portrayal of a woman in position where she is painfully aware of here physical limitations in comparison to her male peers who have likely never felt afraid for their safety in the way that a woman in Ani's job must feel every day. Reminded me of that Margaret Atwood quote about men being afraid that women will laugh at them and women being afraid that men will kill them. Much more preferable to your standard Strong Female Characters who would never hint at their vulnerabilities. And at least Ani didn't talk about being raped!

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I actually really liked the bit with the knives. It felt like an honest portrayal of a woman in position where she is painfully aware of here physical limitations in comparison to her male peers who have likely never felt afraid for their safety in the way that a woman in Ani's job must feel every day. Reminded me of that Margaret Atwood quote about men being afraid that women will laugh at them and women being afraid that men will kill them. Much more preferable to your standard Strong Female Characters who would never hint at their vulnerabilities. And at least Ani didn't talk about being raped!

 

I also thought that the knives were simply a nice touch for a damaged but strong woman taking control in her own way, rather than being a specific signifier of man-hating, since McAdams' character didn't seem to particularly relish the thought of stabbing a man when describing her gameplan to Farrell. That said, I share Jake's implicit hope that she never actually stabs anyone and her decision to arm herself to the teeth is simply a character note.

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I had an awful realization today that I probably know how things are going to shake out between Colin Farrell's character and Vince Vaughn's (if Pizzolatto is as much of a plot recycler as he seems to be).

 

Farrell's character does something to piss off Vaughn's, or Vaughn starts to see Farrell as a liability. Vaughn sets up a hit on Farrell but it goes awry and Farrell gets away with some kind of damning evidence on Vaughn. Farrell tries to blackmail Vaughn but Vaughn traces Farrell and they get into an altercation that sees a bunch of Vaughn's goons dead and Farrell severely injured and imprisoned. Farrell does his time, gets out and stalks Vaughn's bar. Farrell is ready to kill him, until he has the opportunity too, and then he doesn't because he realizes that he's scared.

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Oh trust me, I like that scene about Ani - but I know that typically when I enjoy a female character on some level, it's not necessarily because that's intentionally what the writer wanted. Just my experience with these types of characters. I mean, I think the reason no one is agreeing with my read on things (which is fine, it's an opinion not a fact) is just because these kinds of characters are the ones I end up enjoying but are supposed to be other kinds of people to a different kind of audience. I've been the person who people see as man-hating, cold, or otherwise damaged in some way. I just know how a lot of male writers tend to write women in this way, I am just hoping my prognostications largely turn out to be unfounded. 

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I can't figure out how to spoiler tag this, so I'll just turn the text white. Highlight below if you so desire.

 

For future: 


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When Ani raid's the porn studio her sister Athena* works at, Athena calls Ani a prude of all things. When the creepy shrink asks Ani what happened to the other kids who were at the commune she implies she attributes her sister's choices to growing up there and her own choice to become a cop to her rejection of their values (which I bet had a lot to do with free love). That coupled with all the weapons and her choice of reading material shown in the first episode makes me think she has some kind of Freudian thanatos complex (speaking of Freud, that ecig tho, not to mention Ray's commentary re: robot dicks in case it was subtle). From her choice in porn and the way she freaked out her boyfriend, I get the impression her rejection of her dad's hippy values has manifested in a taste for rough sex.

I don't think she hates men at all. If anything, I think she's looking for a man who will help her explore those urges. When she freaks out her boyfriend in the first episode, she seems disappointed in him more than she's ashamed of herself. Maybe that's why she's so weirdly open with Ray?

Also, I think her being so heavily armed has everything to do with her death fetish and that she uses her dangerous job to justify it to others.

Maybe that's why Ani reads as a man hating lesbian in relation to how other writers write other tough lesbians; they conflate homosexuality with a rejection of "normal" sex.

A rejection of love and life (Eros) in favour of death (Thanatos) characterizes Paul and Ray as well; Paul attempts suicide immediately after forcing himself to sleep with his girl friend and Ray has given up on sex after his wife's rape (something that seems to have damaged him more than it damaged her). Franks the only one of the four main characters who is actually trying to build something for the future. His greatest fear is the nihilism the rest of the show wallows in.

*Interesting note, the Raven (ie: the mask the killer is wearing) is linked to Pallas Athena in Greek mythology. Specifically, the Raven was her companion and a symbol of wisdom but was terrible at keeping secrets. When it revealed too many secrets, Apollo punished it by turning its feathers black and the Owl replaces the Raven at Athena's side. There's also a passage in the bible that specifically mentions that when ravens kill lambs, they peck out the eyes first.

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Re: the relevance of Leonard Cohen's song "Nevermind"...isn't that a raven mask that the killer wears?

 

*Interesting note, the Raven (ie: the mask the killer is wearing) is linked to Pallas Athena in Greek mythology. Specifically, the Raven was her companion and a symbol of wisdom but was terrible at keeping secrets. When it revealed too many secrets, Apollo punished it by turning its feathers black and the Owl replaces the Raven at Athena's side. There's also a passage in the bible that specifically mentions that when ravens kill lambs, they peck out the eyes first.

 

I think it's an eagle: the sharp curve of the beak, the flat head, the brown eyes, the couple of white feathers (like golden eagles have).  An eagle that's been painted black and silver, but still.  But we shall see!!

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Franks the only one of the four main characters who is actually trying to build something for the future. His greatest fear is the nihilism the rest of the show wallows in.

 

That's actually a really interesting point. The criminal is the one who's trying to build something, who actually has faith in the future and is trying to move beyond his shitty past into a semi-respectable venture. This isn't stated explicitly at any point, but I get the impression if Frank were given the option to go straight while retaining his wealth (or the wealth he had before this all went sideways), he probably would. He doesn't seem to enjoy wallowing in the nihilism, as you put it.

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I actually really liked the bit with the knives. It felt like an honest portrayal of a woman in position where she is painfully aware of here physical limitations in comparison to her male peers who have likely never felt afraid for their safety in the way that a woman in Ani's job must feel every day. Reminded me of that Margaret Atwood quote about men being afraid that women will laugh at them and women being afraid that men will kill them. Much more preferable to your standard Strong Female Characters who would never hint at their vulnerabilities. And at least Ani didn't talk about being raped!

 

Agreed. I shared some of the cast's concerns in the first half of the first episode that Ani would be a faultless, invulnerable character who was left to play the straight woman to Paul and Ray. The knife scene finally dispatched that notion though and exposed her (well-founded) anxieties.

 

E: I also really hope the show doesn't go in for that 1:1 mapping of figures from Greek mythology a few people have been speculating about above. Even the names felt heavy-handed to me. I hope the crew aren't encouraged by the insane theorycrafting which surrounded season 1 to make a more coherent (ugh) mythology.

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Can I ask a quick question? When talking with the therapist, McAdams' character says that she grew up in a household of five kids: two now in jail, two dead, and her a detective. Where does that leave her sister, who wasn't actually imprisoned in the first episode, right? Is Ani just cheating by leaving her out, to make the therapist guy feel bad?

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The porn scene with Ani read really hard to me as really... queer?

 

This is exactly how I felt watching that scene too. Maybe that's part of why she's so uncomfortable with her sister doing what she's doing? She doesn't want to run across her sister when she's exploring that facet of her sexuality.

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Can I ask a quick question? When talking with the therapist, McAdams' character says that she grew up in a household of five kids: two now in jail, two dead, and her a detective. Where does that leave her sister, who wasn't actually imprisoned in the first episode, right? Is Ani just cheating by leaving her out, to make the therapist guy feel bad?

 

My read on this that either her sister didn't actually grow up there, which I think is unlikely, or she's exaggerating because admitting that her sister is getting her life in control on her own terms diminishes her because she can't admit her sister could find a path without just doing what Antigone tells her.

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