Alison Herman TV Critic Looking back, 2014 was truly a different time: Obama was in office, skinny jeans still reigned supreme and “True Detective” established itself with an unabashed emphasis on masculinity.
Three years earlier, Ryan Murphy had revived the anthology series with “American Horror Story,” but it took the imprimatur of HBO, massive movie stars and a “serious” genre like crime to give the format real prestige.
In pairing Matthew McConaughey with Woody Harrelson on a journey through the bayou, creator Nic Pizzolatto elevated some of that genre’s clichés and left others intact — including a marginal presence for women, crowded into bit roles as wives and villains to make room for portentous monologues and four-minute tracking shots.
The fourth season of “True Detective,” subtitled “Night Country,” is both a sharp break from the show’s past and an implicit response to its shortcomings.
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