True Detective Recap ‘The Western Book of the Dead’: Everybody Gets Touched

In the season 2 premiere True Detective recap, three equally troubled cops and one powerful mobster try to wrap their hands around a missing city manager that brings all four of them together….

By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer

When Nic Pizzolatto’s eight-episode event series ‘True Detective’ debuted last year with Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson setting a new standard for troubled buddy cop drama, nobody knew it would eventually evolve into one of the most captivating new television series of the past decade.

From the over saturated philosophical dialogue that made you want to buy every Chrysler McConaughey tried to sell you to the Alpha Male every man machismo that Harrelson carried like a sidearm, ‘True Detective’ was equal parts whodunit and occult mysticism that had everybody (including yours truly) running to the library to find out what exactly ‘The King in Yellow’ was all about.

When the first season ended and the show was renewed for a second year, the theories popped up immediately about how Pizzolatto would follow such a critical and commercial success into a sophomore campaign. Journalists and fans alike began to theorize about a new pair of detectives who would fill McConaughey and Harrelson’s shoes and what big mystery would haunt the new cops in the second season campaign?

As it turns out the new season of ‘True Detective’ that debuted on HBO Sunday night seems purposefully made to absolve itself almost immediately from the first year that was so well received. Instead of two cops working a case together there are four lead characters, all of them equally damaged, none of them searching for redemption.

While ‘True Detective’ season 2 might seem far removed from the first season shot in the darkest corners and most dank swamps of Louisiana, the backdrop this time in California is just as opaque and bleak but it’s just better disguised by the sunny skies and ocean backdrops that serve as camouflage to the underlying grit, deceit, and cynicism that paint virtually every character on the canvas this time around.

The easiest way to say this is don’t try to compare ‘True Detective’ season 1 to ‘True Detective’ season 2, but you will certainly find symmetry in a lot of the dialogue, the flawed characters driven by purpose and the cold, grey way Pizzolatto has built a fictional town in California where the streets are lined with corruption and the people are surviving with little to no hope for the future outside of tomorrow.

With that said let’s recap ‘True Detective’ season 2, episode 1 titled ‘The Western Book of the Dead’:

Damages

When we meet Detective Ray Velcoro (played by Colin Farrell), he’s dropping his son off at school for his first day and it’s clear the little boy wants nothing to do with the next nine or so months he’s going to have to endure what we can only assume will be constant badgering and bullying from his classmates. Chad is a red-headed cherub who looks nothing like his father and while Ray looks like he spent a long night in a country western bar before rolling into take his son to school, there’s still an outlaw swagger to this cop that clearly didn’t get past down genetically.

As it turns out there may be no genetics involved at all.

It seems as Ray and his wife were trying to conceive to have a child, she was assaulted and raped and nine months later a baby was born. Ray is currently meeting with a lawyer to get more access and visitation to his son, but when she questions his real paternity, he wants to hear nothing about it. Chad is his son, he raised him as his son, and that’s the only story that matters.

It doesn’t take long for the attorney to question Ray’s move from being an L.A. County Sherriff to his current job as a detective in a one-horse industrial town in Vinci where the smoke stacks run big and the population runs small.

Attorney: “You were with L.A. Sheriff’s Department 8 years before Vinci P.D. Anything there going to hurt you?”

Ray: “No. I welcome judgment.”

Instead of giving the attorney the answers she knows a judge or his ex-wife’s lawyer will ask, Ray instead tosses her a pile of cash and basically says ‘do your job’.

It’s easy to peg Ray as a down on his luck loser who was once a winner, but you have to dig through a few layers to find out where the muck in this guy’s life really started. By all estimates in the debut episode, Ray was once a clean cut Los Angeles Deputy Sheriff until his wife was raped and the cops didn’t have any kinds of answers when all they wanted was to bring this monster to justice.

When all else failed, Ray was contacted by a local crime lord in training named Frank Seymon (played by Vince Vaughn), who magically had the address and picture of the man he believes to be the rapist. Frank promises that this amphetamine freak isn’t part of his crew, but once he started bragging about the rape, he knew something had to be done. So he found Ray, passed along the info and then told him that he didn’t want anything in return.

For now.

Frank: “Not a thing. Maybe we’ll talk sometime. Maybe not.”

Flash forward to present day and it’s never completely disclosed, but only intimated that Ray got justice for his wife and the rapist never saw the inside of a jail cell. Ray must have gotten that call from Frank because for the last 12 years (give or take) he’s been acting as his cop liaison on the streets, carrying out any and all manner of service. Today is a particularly important job that Ray gets called to do because Frank is in the middle of a very important land deal that could not only take him to the right side of the tracks, but made him a multi-millionaire in a matter of a few pen strokes.

Unfortunately on the day when Frank has an important presentation where city manager Ben Caspere will present to a group of potential investors an idea that could net them all a huge chuck of Federal funds, his business partner has gone missing and there’s a brand new expose on the front page of the local newspaper putting a spotlight on Vinci’s deep-seeded corruption from the top on down.

Frank’s assistant insists that the article never mentions him so he shouldn’t worry about anything the article might imply.

Frank: “This is place is built on a co-dependency of interests. Worries me you talking so stupid.”

In other words, when it comes to Vinci if you accuse one of them, you accuse all of them. As Frank’s wife Jordan says, ‘everybody gets touched’.

So to counteract this writer completing his new eight-part series, Frank sends Ray to do a little dirty work to make sure this investigative reporter doesn’t investigate shit and his reports stop right now.

So Ray drinks down a flask of bourbon, puts on some gloves and a mask (remember that creepy ski mask guy from the trailer putting up his shush finger?) and goes up to pay the reporter a visit. A few crashes, bangs and slams against the window later and Ray gets his job done. He tells Frank the good news when they meet for a drink that night.

Ray: “I asked him how long he thought it took Stephen Hawking to type a piece of investigative journalism. He ain’t going to be writing that story no more.”

Ray also has some actual work to do today because all of the power brokers in Vinci are also very worried about this story in the newspaper and Caspere’s disappearance. They don’t want to report him as a missing person just yet, so they put Ray and his partner on the case to find out where he’s disappeared to.

Following a conversation with Caspere’s assistant where she discloses that the city manager doesn’t have enemies, he does hold the purse strings for a lot of prominent people in town because he’s got his fingers in a lot of honey pots. He’s also been taking frequent trips to Monterey and the Russian River Valley lately and she passes along a list of all his properties in town.

When Ray and his partner arrive at Caspere’s house, the place has been ransacked with furniture overturned, windows smashed and signs of a pretty epic struggle. The cops also realize rather quickly that Caspere enjoyed a lot more than helping to plan a city budget or institute policies laid out by the mayor because he was definitely into some kinky shit in his free time.

The house was covered in sex toys and erotic paintings, but Caspere was gone and so was his computer. Was Caspere kidnapped because he knew too much and somebody wanted to silence him or did he just swipe left when he should have swiped right?

Either way, we find Caspere a little later being driven around in the backseat of a sedan wearing sunglasses in a ‘Weekend at Bernie’s’ kind of way while his killer drives the car with a giant crow mask sitting next to him. Where are they going and where will Caspere end up? Stay tuned.

As for Frank, he ends up giving his presentation without Caspere around and it raises the ire of everyone from the mayor to his Russian mob contact (played by Timothy Murphy), who appear to be investors in his new land scheme. The plan is to buy up as much land surrounding a new transit system that will run through the heart of California and then when the Federal government frees the funds to acquire those parcels for commercial and residential real estate, the owners (Frank and his partners) stand to make millions.

As silver tongued as Frank might be, he’s not Caspere and he doesn’t have the answers people want to hear and he’s getting push back instead of signed checks. Frank’s entire future is on the line, his partner has disappeared and he’s dangling in the wind without net below.

The Samurai

All Ani Bezzerides wanted before work was a little morning delight with her faux-boyfriend, but from the sound of things she wanted it rough and he wanted to cuddle. Ani works in the L.A. county sheriff’s department where she might be one of the only female officers on the roster (shown in brutal detail as she gets ready for work in an empty female locker room while the men’s room is packed from one side to the next with naked ass cheeks everywhere). She’s a big fan of Samurai literature with books such as ‘Hagakure’ sitting on her coffee table along with a ton of instructionals about how to use knives.

When Ani goes to work she tries to use her badge for a little family intervention as she busts up a supposed prostitution ring only to find out the owner and the women inside were just running a legit webcam service online. It turns out one of the girls happens to be Ani’s sister and she was the reason why the cop came bursting in the doors looking for answers.

After a failed intervention, Ani is then forced to serve a foreclosure notice on a house, but the lady inside is more worried about her 24-year old missing sister who the authorities aren’t too interesting to look for these days. Ani appears ready brush the case off as well until the concerned sister reveals that the missing girl worked as a maid at a spiritual place of awakening called ‘The Panticapaeum Institute’.

Why was Ani so curious?

It seems her hippie father Eliot (played by David Morse) is the Jim Jones/David Koresh of this particular bunch and Ani is not a big fan. She questions him about the girl although the other employees can only say she left a couple of weeks ago because she found a better job where she works in clubs and makes more and puts in far less hours.

Eliot can’t give her anymore, but Ani’s true agenda comes out quickly enough when she begins asking about his knowledge of her sister’s new job and how she’s making a living. Eliot already knows and needless to say Ani isn’t happy. It appears despite her sister making her own choices, Eliot is more concerned about his cop daughter who can’t even acknowledge that he’s her father.

Eliot: “Do you even like what you do or is it just a reflexive urge towards authority out of defiance?”

Ani: “Talk to your daughter, prick. Help her”

Eliot: “I just did.”

Ani ends her night by getting tossed out of a casino for being drunk and disorderly before getting the call that brings her to the scene of a very peculiar crime.

PTSD

After fighting in the Middle East, Paul Woodrugh returned home and decided he wanted to be a motorcycle cop. There was just something about that wind whipping through his hair as a sense of freedom and a constant threat of death if he made just one wrong turn that reminded him of what it was like in war.

On this day, Paul pulled over a very reckless driver, who escaped house arrest to score some drugs but rather than explain why she was swerving all over the road and driving at high speeds, she instead offered him a little side treat to forget he ever saw her. Paul didn’t take the bait, but she still called in a report that a cop pulled her over and was willing to waive the ticket in exchange for a blowjob.

Paul denied the charge of course, but his superior officer said that Internal Affairs will have to do an investigation and he would be on paid administrative leave until they finished.

When he returned home, Paul found his girlfriend Emily there waiting for him on the bed. She was ready to pounce, but he insisted on getting a shower first.

Paul retired to the bathroom where his wounds of war were much more visible and he popped a blue pill and began counting the minutes until his flag would fly one more time. Paul finally emerged from the bathroom a half-hour later and his macho persona was saved after taking Emily to pleasure town.

Later that night, Paul got up and said he had another job to do because idle time just didn’t work for him. It seems Paul never spends the night and he would rather cruise down the highway in excess of 100 miles-per-hour on his motorcyle rather than stay in bed and deal with the nightmares that still arise whenever he closes his eyes.

Paul’s stress and depression overwhelm him on the ride and he decides to shut off his lights on a dark highway and just let whatever happens happen. When he finally comes to his senses, Paul nearly crashes but instead comes upon a man sitting on a bench with sunglasses over his eyes and not the slightest pulse in his veins.

The Investigation Begins

At some point after his son’s first day of school, Ray arrives to see Chad while his ex-wife’s new husband is already there to pick him up. Ray isn’t acting in accordance with his visitation rights, but what he’s more concerned about is the fact that his son’s brand new sneakers are missing and he wants to know why.

After accosting his own kid and calling him a ‘fat pussy’, the scared little boy finally gives up the name of the student who stole the shoes from his locker and cut them up because it’s what he wanted to do.

Ray finds his way to the boy’s home where he brings him and his father outside and proceeds to lay a beat down with a set of brass knuckles as the kid watches his dad get stomped in the middle of their lawn. Ray taunts the boy as a sadist who must enjoy this level of punishment just like he does at school.

Before it ends, Ray warns the little boy not to bully anyone else at school or he would be back and next time things won’t end with his dad just getting a broken jaw.

Ray: “You ever bully or hurt anybody again, I’ll come back and butt fuck your father with your mother’s headless corpse on this goddamn lawn.”

Following a day filled with assaulting parents and reporters as well as searching for city managers, Ray eventually meets with Frank to get his payment and then fall asleep in the booth after drinking down a fifth of Johnny Walker Black.

Just when it looks like he’s going to fall over and catch a nap, his phone begins to buzz. They found the city manager and Ray is wanted on the scene.

When Ray arrives he meets Ani, who has been called in from the Sheriff’s department and Paul, who discovered the body. It seems the missing city manager had his eyes burned out of his head by some kind of chemical and he suffered a serve pelvic wound — better known as having his cock and balls cut off.

Caspere’s death will have far reaching consequences and now whether they like it or not, these three cops have been drawn together for better or worse. Everybody gets touched.

Notes from the Scene:

There’s a new intro to ‘True Detective’ this season although the graphics look similar if not slightly adjusted to showcase the new cast. The song used this season is ‘Nevermind’ by Leonard Cohen.

The other two songs featured prominently in the episode are ‘All the Gold in California’ by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis — played during the final credits — and ‘This is My Least Favorite Life’ by Lera Lynn — played by Lera Lynn in the bar where Frank and Ray meet. If her voice sounds familiar it should because she also sang the song featured in the trailer for ‘True Detective’ season 2.

Make sure to come back next week for the new episode of ‘True Detective’ where Ani and Ray begin to look into the reasons why Ben Caspere was tortured and killed.