True Detective Night Country

It had been a long wait for new episodes of HBO‘s acclaimed anthology crime drama True Detective, but it was an exciting prospect knowing Season 4 — titled True Detective: Night Country — was on its way to the premiere channel.

As we’ve seen with previous seasons of the Emmy magnet, the season featured a new cast tackling a fresh mystery in a completely different locale.

True Detective: Night Country‘s season and story was, of course, shrouded in mystery to start, but there was plenty to going on here.

TRUE DETECTIVE: NIGHT COUNTRY’S CAST STARS JODIE FOSTER

The biggest name to join True Detective: Night Country was the two-time Oscar winner Jodie Foster, who earned her first Academy Awards nomination when she was only 15 years old for the Martin Scorsese classic Taxi Driver.

Foster plays Detective Liz Danvers who is partnered with actor and boxer Kali Reis (Catch the Fair One) as Detective Evangeline Navarro.

But like all seasons of True Detective, Night Country doesn’t stop the great talent with the leads. Christopher Eccleston — who Doctor Who fans will remember as the first lead of the 21st-century series revival and Marvel fans will remember as the chalk-faced Malekith of Thor: The Dark World — will also appear in season 4.

There’s also Fiona Shaw, who Harry Potter fans will remember hating as Potter’s Aunt Petunia, and Star Wars fans will recall loving as titular hero’s adoptive mother in Season 1 of Andor. Prolific character actor John Hawkes will be there as well, who fans of other acclaimed HBO series will no doubt remember as Sol Star in the Western Deadwood.

Other actors rounding out the cast include Finn Bennett (The Nevers), Anna Lambe (The Grizzles), Isabella LaBlanc (Long Slow Exhale), Joe Montgrand (Altered Carbon), and newcomer Aka Niviâna.

TRUE DETECTIVE: NIGHT COUNTRY FOLLOWS THE INVESTIGATION INTO A HUGE DISAPPEARANCE

The official description of True Detective: Night Country almost sounded more like the aftermath of John Carpenter’s The Thing or even an episode of The X-Files than that of a crime drama set in a more real world.

The new season moves from Season 3’s Ozarks to a snowy Alaska. Detectives Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) investigate the disappearances of a half-dozen men from the Tsalal Arctic Research Station.

The official said the detectives “will have to confront the darkness they carry in themselves, and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice.”

And this turned out to be true, in more ways than one.

IT IS JODIE FOSTER’S FIRST REGULAR TV ROLE SINCE SHE WAS A PRE-TEEN

Recent years have brought us the news of acclaimed big-screen actors like Jeff Bridges and Harrison Ford making either their very first regular appearances in TV series or their returns to the medium after a long break. With True Detective: Night Country, Jodie Foster joins this prestigious club.

While she’s made a few guest tv appearances here and there, the new season of True Detective will mark the first time Foster has appeared regularly in a series since 1974’s Paper Moon.

Paper Moon was a short-lived sitcom led by the late Christopher Connelly as con-man Moses Pray. When she was only 12, Foster played the young Addie who was convinced Moses was her father no matter how much Moses insisted he wasn’t.

Foster’s other TV roles before True Detective: Night Country were mostly one-offs, many of them voice acting roles, as you can see on her IMDb. For example in the Season 4 episode of The X-Files, “Never Again,” she voices the supernatural tattoo of the alluring Betty, who speaks in the mind of the man her image is carved into.

She can also be heard in the Season 3 episode of Frasier, “Moon Dance,” as one of many big names to play callers to Frasier Crane’s radio show.

THIS WAS THE FIRST SEASON WITHOUT ITS CREATOR

True Detective: Night Country will be the first season of the series without the Emmy nominated Nic Pizzolatto, who created the series.

Pizzolatto apparently made a number of tries to develop a fourth season, but his chances of coming back ended when he signed a First Look deal with FX Productions in 2020.

Night Country is instead produced by Issa López (Tigers Are Not Afraid) and Barry Jenkins (Aftersun), with Lopez writing and directing the first episode.

Nic Pizzolatto was quick to voice his displeasure about the season, ranting on Instagram about the ending in particular.

TRUE DETECTIVE: NIGHT COUNTRY RELEASED IN 2023

The current plan is for True Detective: Night Country to release on HBO on January 14, 2024. It will have been a solid five years in between seasons at that point, marking the longest gap for the series yet.

But there’s reason to suspect this will be another great one even without the show’s creator.

TRUE DETECTIVE: NIGHT COUNTRY HAD A LOT TO LIVE UP TO

True Detective: Night Country will be part of one of the most acclaimed crime dramas in the history of television. The first season pairs Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson, both in the past investigating a series of grisly murders, and years later in the present when the crimes remain unsolved, and both detectives have gone their separate ways.

While both are dedicated detectives, McConaughey’s Rust Cohle and Harrelson’s Marty Hart are like oil and water.

Season 2 — which starred Colin Farrell, Rachel McAdams, and Vince Vaughn — is generally considered to be the embarrassing middle child. But in 2019 True Detective came back with a vengeance, with Mahershala Ali in the lead role, once again split between Ali’s Wayne Hays investigating in the past and an elderly Hays in the present.

The first and third seasons both proved to be big contenders at the Emmy awards.