True Detective Season 2: Bleeding Out in the Desert

My final verdict on season two of True Detective:

It's funny that I was riding the success of this show a year ago, talking about it on podcasts and radio in Chicago and Calgary and even on a pilot for a Hulu TV show. And my io9 article on the Lovecraftian/King in Yellow allusions sold close to 500 copies of my books, which was pretty amazing (and I'm deeply grateful to Nic Pizzolatto for that). Despite its flaws, the first season was must-see television, and its combination of great characters, actors at the top of their form, an intriguing story with a glaze of the supernatural and cosmic horror, and stellar direction, was episodic TV magic. 

But my first impulse after watching the second episode of season two was to write a parody of it.

And now, having watched this season stumbling and bleeding-out through the desert to die and be picked apart by vultures, I feel bad for PIzzolatto—it has to hurt to be Hollywood's golden boy and then to have such a roundly-derided sophomore slump.

I'm not sure the series can survive without Pizzolatto putting together a writer's room—and not one full of sycophants. That script should have gone into the shredder. And please—for the love of God—someone tell Vince Vaughn to stick to comedies.