It wasn’t the flashiest season of True Detective, or the scariest, or the trippiest. It was the simply the best.

I reviewed the season finale of True Detective for Rolling Stone. This was a really good show.

But there’s one more revelation to discuss … and it’s a doozy. Elsa Montgomery, the documentarian interviewing Wayne in 2015, directly connects his case to the one pursued by — you guessed it — Rust Cohle and Marty Hart, who we even get to see in a newspaper clipping. Isn’t it possible, she wonders, that both crimes were part of a massive conspiracy between rich and powerful child molesters? One in which key witnesses were repeatedly killed or mysteriously disappeared to keep the cops from getting to the truth?

How much hay should we make of the now 100-percent confirmed links Seasons One and Three? Not much, most likely. Note that Elsa claims the “crooked spiral” iconography associated with the Rust and Marty case served as a calling card for the elite pedophile ring. But that particular symbol was spread by Errol Childress — an impoverished, illegitimate, extremely mentally ill offspring of the powerful Tuttle family that really ran the show. Presenting the fancy true-crime director as well-intentioned but incorrect gets right down to the notion of: Can even the most educated investigators, whether they’re detectives or writers or filmmakers, ever really know what happened?

I reviewed the penultimate episode of True Detective Season Three for Rolling Stone.

But forget, for a second, the series’s first two divisive seasons and their maddening whodunits. True Detective Season Three has turned into a show about how a single, central crime spreads like a spiderweb into a whole host of small-town sins. Racism and sexism, poverty and class warfare, sexism and homophobia, addiction and religion: They all play a part here.

Even as old men, Wayne and Roland may eventually discover the truth beneath it all. But maybe the point is that some mysteries of the human heart are simply too big to solve.

I reviewed episode six of True Detective for Rolling Stone.

What makes this not just ironic but fascinating is that Hays and West are easily the least weird, least corrupt, least abusive protagonists that showrunner Nic Pizzolatto has created yet. They like each other. They’re capable of long-term romantic relationships with intelligent women who have lives of their own (even if those relationships eventually end). They’re dedicated to solving the case, even if it means defying the higher-ups. Sure, they’re gruff and have a tendency to play bad cop/bad cop when interrogating suspects, but it’s nothing you haven’t seen in like two dozen Law & Order characters. You could even say that they are [drumroll] … true detectives!

And yet the case is as much of a mess as the hunt for the Yellow King. Why?

The answer is rooted in the previous seasons, and not because of various subreddit-worthy clues indicating they occur in a shared universe. Whether Matthew McConaughey or Rachel McAdams were in the lead, those stories left the power players behind their central crimes untouched, even if individual mysteries got solved.

You don’t need to believe in Carcosa to understand that there are evil forces at work in the world that no murder investigation can eradicate. Poverty, race, class, alcoholism, political corruption, misogyny, people just plain being shitty — they all conspired to commit this crime. Catching the killer won’t stop any of those factors from destroying more lives. Not even a keen-eyed Vietnam War tracker and his trusty by-the-book companion can stop that destruction. The best they can hope for is to preserve the peace, along with some of the pieces.

I reviewed episode five of True D S3 for Rolling Stone. By now it’s become clear that Nic Pizzolatto has a very firm grasp on this material.

The thornier material here centers on Tom and Lucy Purcell, the estranged alcoholic parents of the murdered boy and missing girl. When Roland picks up the former from a bar where he picked a fight with a man that his wife slept with, he spits out the n-word to describe Hays; the black cop’s assignment to the case, he claims, proves that no one’s taking it seriously. But when West sticks up for his partner, saying he’s the best detective on the job, Tom apologizes, immediately and repeatedly — and digs deep into his own despair.

“I can’t be in that house, man,” he says, sounding like a broken man even before he adds, “I just wanna die all the time.” It’s an absolutely heartbreaking performance from Scoot McNairy — the fact that it begins with a racial slur and ends with him begging the cop not to reveal his shameful bigotry only makes it more so.

This is doubly true of Lucy, whom Amelia visits. The moment the teacher offers a shoulder to cry on, the grieving mom unleashes a torrent of self-loathing. “I’ve got the soul of a whore,” she says, lamenting her neglect of her kids. Her pain takes the form of rhetorical questions: “Children should laugh, right?” And: “What kind of woman hates the only things that ever showed her love?” Wishing she had the courage to use her gun on herself, she begins just straight-up bawling and howling “God forgive me.” Actor Mamie Gummer is so convincing here you want to cover your ears.

But when she takes poorly to her visitor’s suggestion that she reach out to Wayne with any information she might not have previously revealed, an entirely different sort of pain starts pouring forth. She immediately turns on the teacher, exploding in a sudden fireball of racist invective so intense that her visitor almost runs from the house. Anyone who says suffering is somehow ennobling is clearly fooling themselves.

I reviewed the strong fourth episode of True Detective Season Three, co-written by Deadwood‘s David Milch, for Rolling Stone.

The real difference now is that the dialogue and performances line up with the relatively linear plot. Mahershala Ali, Carmen Ejogo and Stephen Dorff may play characters tied to a major crime investigation, but other than that they act like normal people. They drink a bit too much when they want to have a good time, or when they want to forget bad ones. They fall out of touch when they take different jobs (“Once we stopped working together, we just … stopped,” as Roland puts it) but are happy to reunite. They complain about the size of big-box stores, racial disparities in the state police, whether or not they spend enough time with their kids. West even holds Tom Purcell’s hand to pray as part of the recovering alcoholic’s surrender to his Higher Power. It’s hard to imagine Marty Hart or Ray Velcoro doing anything of the sort. Never mind the flat circles of time; what you’ve got now is a True Detective that’s shooting straight instead of weaving spirals.

I reviewed episode three of this straightforward season of True Detective for Rolling Stone.

In 1995, the Emmy nominees for Best Drama were Chicago Hope, ER, Law & Order, NYPD Blue, and The X-Files. In 1996, the Emmy nominees for Best Drama were Chicago Hope, ER, Law & Order, NYPD Blue, and The X-Files. In 1997, the Emmy nominees for Best Drama were Chicago Hope, ER, Law & Order, NYPD Blue, and The X-Files. That is: two cop shows set in New York, two medical shows set in Chicago, and some aliens, spread across four networks, represented the height and breadth of the art form for three years running.

In 1995, the Emmy nominees for Best Comedy were Frasier, Friends, The Larry Sanders Show, Mad About You, and Seinfeld. In 1996, the Emmy nominees for Best Comedy were Frasier, Friends, The Larry Sanders Show, Mad About You, and Seinfeld. In 1997, the Emmy nominees for Best Comedy were Frasier, 3rd Rock from the Sun(surprise!), The Larry Sanders Show, Mad About You, and Seinfeld. Three shows about neurotic well-off New Yorkers, one show about neurotic well-off Seattleites, Garry Shandling, and some (other) aliens, concentrated almost solely on NBC with one lone outlier represented the height and breadth of the art form for three years running.

By 1999 that lone outlier was airing The Sopranos and Sex and the City, and the story from there is familiar to pretty much everyone. The Wire and Deadwood, Mad Men and Breaking Bad, HBO, AMC, FX, DVDs, DVRs, the New Golden Age, new voices, shorter seasons, higher standards, bigger stars, superstar showrunners, more choices, the widely pronounced death of monoculture and the waning of the Big Four broadcast networks—an embarrassment of riches, an art form in its ascendancy at last.

In this quest-narrative of progress through increased options, streaming services were supposed to toss the One Ring of monoculture into Mount Doom for good. They’d offer virtually limitless viewing options. They’d enable viewers to cut the cord that bound them to cable and broadcast networks, allowing those viewers to watch those endless options whenever and wherever they wanted. When the biggest of those services, Netflix, entered the original-programming fray in earnest, it kicked off the arms race of production known as Peak TV. In this content-rich environment, creating a culture-unifying hit is a war for the throne that only one or two shows could win, but finding the right show for your personal subculture of one was easier than ever. No more TGIFs, no more Must See TVs: Television was the art form of the future, and Netflix was the future of television, and the future was here at last.

And now we know what it looks like. In 2018, 14 of Neflix’s top 20 shows, and all 10 of its top 10 shows, were broadcast-network reruns. Friends, which received its first Emmy nomination while Bill Clinton was president, is number one.

So begins my essay on Netflix’s recreation of TV monoculture and what that means for people who watch television, whether professionally or recreationally, for my Deadspin debut.

The dumb handsome dirtbags. The heart-on-sleeve performances by the actors (Alessandro Borghi, Giacomo Ferrara, and Eduardo Valdarnini) who play them. The action, romance, tragedy, and extravagant cynicism. The lush lighting, lavish scenery, aching score, and sharp cinematography. The use of betrayal, backstabbing, and devastating shocks—crime-fiction staples all, for obvious reasons—as ways to explore their polar opposites: love, loyalty, and the natural human desire to be able to depend on others, and to be depended on in turn. Everything good about Suburra: Blood on Rome in general is good about its second season finale in particular.

Indeed, the rapid clip at which gobsmacking, heartwarming, and heartbreaking developments take place in “Tell Me the Truth” make this that rarest of beasts: a Netflix season that should have been longer.

I reviewed the season finale of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season Two for Decider.

The dumb handsome dirtbags. The heart-on-sleeve performances by the actors (Alessandro Borghi, Giacomo Ferrara, and Eduardo Valdarnini) who play them. The action, romance, tragedy, and extravagant cynicism. The lush lighting, lavish scenery, aching score, and sharp cinematography. The use of betrayal, backstabbing, and devastating shocks—crime-fiction staples all, for obvious reasons—as ways to explore their polar opposites: love, loyalty, and the natural human desire to be able to depend on others, and to be depended on in turn. Everything good about Suburra: Blood on Rome in general is good about its second season finale in particular.

I reviewed the season finale of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

In one of the most momentous episodes of Suburra Season 2 to date—an episode in which one member of our core trio is crowned king and another is tortured till he’s a broken man—a little detail in the first minute or two after the opening title sticks with me. It’s morning, and Aureliano and Nadia have slept off their narrow escape of the previous night. She wakes up first, and pads over to the couch where he’s sleeping, seemingly just to get a look at him. She turns and walks toward the window, not realizing that for a brief moment he’s opened his eyes, just to get a look at her too. Storied television romances have been built on much less subtle and solid a foundation.

I reviewed the penultimate episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season Two for Decider.

In one of the most momentous episodes of Suburra Season 2 to date—an episode in which one member of our core trio is crowned king and another is tortured till he’s a broken man—a little detail in the first minute or two after the opening title sticks with me. It’s morning, and Aureliano and Nadia have slept off their narrow escape of the previous night. She wakes up first, and pads over to the couch where he’s sleeping, seemingly just to get a look at him. She turns and walks toward the window, not realizing that for a brief moment he’s opened his eyes, just to get a look at her too. Storied television romances have been built on much less subtle and solid a foundation.

I reviewed the penultimate episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

Famous last words, Aureliano.

I reviewed the sixth episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

“You wanna go to war?!?” Well, kinda. The sixth episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 may be called “It’s War,” because that’s the desired outcome of nearly everyone involved: Adelaide Anacleti’s Sinti Roma faction, who want to take Ostia by force; her son Spadino, his wife Angelica, and his friend Aureliano Adami, who want to team up to ambush Adelaide’s men, thus protecting Aureliano’s turf and handing control of the “Gypsys” to Spadino; Amedeo Cinaglia and Sara Monaschi, who want the chaos to scare the Roman people into voting for the Right, a politically advantageous development for them both. Alone among the major characters, only the itinerant mob boss Samurai wants to stop the bloodshed, to facilitate his own political alliances. But when the shooting starts, everyone gets both far more and far less than they bargained for.

I reviewed episode six of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season Two for Decider.

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s Suburra!

When you kiss but feel bad cuz you just killed her dad, that’s Suburra!

When you free / several refugees / just so there can be / unrest in the streets, that’s Suburra!

When you roast dudes like ribs then go shopping for cribs, that’s Suburra!

Yes, romance, parenthood, racism, and the smell of burning flesh are all in the air in this episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome. Named “The Crib” after the hilariously gaudy baby furniture Spadino and Aureliano buy for the former’s forthcoming bundle of joy—at the end of a long night during which Aureliano burned the abusive cousins of his new right-hand woman Nadia to death and then dumped the corpses in front of the heads of all the Ostia crime families as a warning never to do business with “gypsies” again—this one is jam packed with everything that makes this show so goddamn good to watch.

I reviewed the fifth episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s Suburra!

When you kiss but feel bad cuz you just killed her dad, that’s Suburra!

When you free / several refugees / just so there can be / unrest in the streets, that’s Suburra!

When you roast dudes like ribs then go shopping for cribs, that’s Suburra!

I had a little fun reviewing episode five of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

The dream of the ’90s is alive in Suburra. That’s one of the many, many, many things I find endearing about this show, I realize now. Sexy, cool-looking dirtbags cruising around in a late-night city to late-night electronic music, like if The Sopranos starred the cast of Trainspotting. It’s beautiful, man, just beautiful. If I could ensure I wouldn’t get shot, or wouldn’t have to sit someplace crying because someone I love got shot, I’d move there in a heartbeat.

Speaking of the ’90s, a decade during which I did a lot of crying, men cry a lot on Suburra, too. Maybe more than in any other show I’ve watched, when you factor in the small number of episodes to date and the short running time of each? That’s another attractive element. Again, I always call this show “emotional,” and this is why.

I reviewed the fourth episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

The dream of the ’90s is alive in Suburra. That’s one of the many, many, many things I find endearing about this show, I realize now. Sexy, cool-looking dirtbags cruising around in a late-night city to late-night electronic music, like if The Sopranosstarred the cast of Trainspotting. It’s beautiful, man, just beautiful. If I could ensure I wouldn’t get shot, or wouldn’t have to sit someplace crying because someone I love got shot, I’d move there in a heartbeat.

Speaking of the ’90s, a decade during which I did a lot of crying, men cry a lot on Suburra, too. Maybe more than in any other show I’ve watched, when you factor in the small number of episodes to date and the short running time of each? That’s another attractive element. Again, I always call this show “emotional,” and this is why.

I reviewed episode four of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider.

How confident in its storytelling is Suburra: Blood on Rome at this point? Confident enough to introduce purple as a signature color for Livia Adami during the episode in which she dies, then paint the whole world with it as her brother Aurelio gives her a burial at sea.

Confident enough to reunite its three main characters early in its second season’s run for the express purpose of doing something long overdue: teaming up to kill Samurai, the taciturn Roman crimelord who’s been screwing with all their lives like a capricious deity from the start. Not just planning to do it, either—deciding to do it, tonight.

And confident enough that even though it seems unlikely that our three amigos would succeed in taking out the show’s number-one villain in episode three of Season Two, the death of Livia in the previous episode (at Samurai’s hands, no less) is enough to make us in the audience believe that anything could happen. In other words, it’s exactly as confident as it deserves to be.

I reviewed the third episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider. 

How confident in its storytelling is Suburra: Blood on Rome at this point?…Exactly as confident as it deserves to be.

I reviewed episode three of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season Two for Decider.

One of Suburra‘s many strengths, and the one most responsible for making it such a strangely endearing show regarding its dirtbag characters —other than the fact that they’re all played by incredibly beautiful actors I mean— is how emotional it is. I think I’ve used that word every time I’ve discussed the show at any length, but it’s the only one that fits. There are so many shots of so many people quietly crying about losing other people while that lush, mournful theme hits in the background that you can’t help but feel something like what they’re feeling, you know? It’s the contrast between everyone’s affected tough-guy personas and their tendency to melt into sobbing puddles when they’re rejected or bereaved that makes you care.

“Consequences” (Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2, Episode 2) counts on this. It drills right down into one of the series’ closest and most volatile relationships, and then ends it.

I reviewed the second episode of Suburra: Blood on Rome Season 2 for Decider.