Quote from: Tristram Evans;949766I really loved that first season. Never saw the second, but I heard it dropped the ball.

I'd say it did not - it's different. First one was very psychological and Lovecraftian as well as strongly influenced by Seven, the second is a more classic noir political story, with a few gritty shootouts. It's a bit worse, because definitely scenario stretches under the weight of 4 protagonists, but I'd give it a solid 8 out of 10. It's just that the first one was either a solid 9 or even a 10 that makes the second season appear so much poorer, while I'd say that if it was a new standalone series, it'd be received well. Also, a lot of people are noticeably biased because apparently Colin Farrell is the worst thing in acting since Birdemic, or so they say at least. I found his delivery as a beaten-by-life corrupt cop trying to find a measure of redemption believable and noiric.

Quote from: Rincewind1;949768I'd say it did not - it's different. First one was very psychological and Lovecraftian as well as strongly influenced by Seven, the second is a more classic noir political story. It's a bit worse, because definitely scenario stretches under the weight of 4 protagonists, but I'd give it a solid 8 out of 10. It's just that the first one was either a solid 9 or even a 10 that makes the second season appear so much poorer, while I'd say that if it was a new standalone series, it'd be received well.

With Season Two I got the feeling that they started out still going with "The Occult History of the US Transportation System" and then somewhere in there decided to ditch the paranormal aspect, but didn't rewrite, edit and reshoot for the new focus.  With that many main characters, and that detailed a plot, 8 episodes was way too little time to cover that story.

Quote from: CRKrueger;949771With Season Two I got the feeling that they started out still going with "The Occult History of the US Transportation System" and then somewhere in there decided to ditch the paranormal aspect, but didn't rewrite, edit and reshoot for the new focus.  With that many main characters, and that detailed a plot, 8 episodes was way too little time to cover that story.

Indeed - the plot definitely stretches to the point of collapse under weight of too many protagonists, too little time. The Mad Max is the least developed character, which is a shame because his storyline definitely had much more potential than Lifestyle drama we received. None the less - as long as you watch it with the same idea that the director had, that it's a new noir storyline, not a continuation of season 1, it's in my opinion a solid viewing. I myself like Colin Farrell too, so it was a plus for me as well (as a leftist degenerate, I might as well provide actual proof of my degeneracy).


As for the Cthulhu mythos - I actually would recommend toying with alternative approach. Embrace the Mythos and shout it right from the beginning in player's face, then spin your own story using it. One of the most fun, scary and effective campaigns was when I was playing Bookhounds of London, and the PCs were hired by Mr Wilde, the Repairer of Reputations, to deliver a copy of King in Yellow to the scenario writer of the new upcoming Hollywood flick. Of course, after one of the PCs, inspired by their cocaine addiction, decided to read the book, all hell broke loose as they finished Act III on the walls of their apartment in their own blood. There were also 2 different secret societies trying to get their hands on the book, and a really creepy Adams Family style noble, who was a superior of one of the PCs in their secret society, who ultimately provided the book in return for Cthulhu statue owed by a dockside Cockney gang.


Funnily enough, over the course of the campaign, apart from Mythos scenes, I think the one that scared the players the most was one where the Gray twins (a pun on the famous Kray Twins) were torturing a man who owed them money as a lesson for the PCs to confess to stealing the statue from them. I'd not say I quite unleashed my inner Poison'd player there, but it was pretty gory.

Also, remember - nothing in Lovecraftian Mythos is exactly set in stone, all the informations we have is second-handed. I myself always assumed that the creature met in Call of Cthulhu was not the Great Cthulhu himself, but rather, a "mere" Star-Spawn. Helps to distance a bit from the Godzilla Effect I fear Lovecraftian Mythos suffer nowadays in popculture and therefore, player's conceptions of them.

Of course, if you do use Cthulhu, you are asking for Yum Yum jokes.

I never thought the two seasons would necessarily have anything to do with each other, or even necessarily be in a shared universe, just that they would have a Dark/Pulp/Noir/Weird aspect as the "True Detective" title implies.  The season reminds me of Mullholland Drive.  No matter how well-crafted, you could tell Lynch started with one thing, and managed to salvage it into another.

It would be one thing if the quasi-occult elements got dismissed as just weird shit as opposed to developed, but they were really just dropped.

I guess they're talking about 3 kinda sorta, and Matt says he'll play Rust again, but I think they might do better to just come up with a new storyline, keep it more tightly focused, and I think season 1 benefitted from a single director.

I still enjoyed season 2.

But, to tie this back in to the thread, there are lots of cop shows where they come across some really weird, fucked up occult shit.  The brilliance of Season One was to make us believe that there could be something to it without actually showing us anything that couldn't be explained.  That's what the Lovecraft name drop was for...buy-in.  

In Season Two, they again started flirting with the occult, but that hint of supernatural fear wasn't kept alive.  Really, there's nothing there we haven't seen in weirder episodes of Cop Show X, the name drop that was raising that element at all, was that it was True Detective, but that wasn't enough.

When flirting with the supernatural for the purposes of instilling fear, without making it overt, you have to establish suspension of disbelief or even just reasonable doubt that there is a rational explanation for this.

The decision to drop the occult element came too late, as a result, instead of not being there, it was just kind of dead weight.  All those beautifully done, long, slow shots of freeway designs, marking the landscape like mystic runes...no point anymore.

Quote from: CRKrueger;949777I never thought the two seasons would necessarily have anything to do with each other, or even necessarily be in a shared universe, just that they would have a Dark/Pulp/Noir/Weird aspect as the "True Detective" title implies.  The season reminds me of Mullholland Drive.  No matter how well-crafted, you could tell Lynch started with one thing, and managed to salvage it into another.

It would be one thing if the quasi-occult elements got dismissed as just weird shit as opposed to developed, but they were really just dropped.

I guess they're talking about 3 kinda sorta, and Matt says he'll play Rust again, but I think they might do better to just come up with a new storyline, keep it more tightly focused, and I think season 1 benefitted from a single director.

I still enjoyed season 2.

What quasi-occult elements you mean? I am curious, because it appears as if I have seen the series from a completely different perspective - I assume you mean stuff like burned out eyes, the figurines, weird masks, orgies, etc etc? A good point actually - I myself put all this stuff all off on the "Hollywood decadency" vibe, rather than occult, a wink to the classic tropes of Chandler.

I'm sure my preconceptions had something to do with it.  

I had read where the writer said the season was going to be about "Bad men, hard women and the secret occult history of the U.S. transportation system."

I missed the part where they later said it was going to be about bad men and hard women and they were dropping the secret occult history of the U.S. transportation system.

So when it started, there was a lot that fit in with Decadent Hollywood Noir and also fit with an Occult angle.  Then, the Occult angle just never went anywhere or did anything, even to the point that the cops involved didn't even really consider there was an Occult angle, like Rust and Marty (or really anyone) would have.  The notion was almost conspicuous by its absence.

Quote from: Tristram Evans;949765This I agree with. I will generally only use Mythos beings in fun one-offs. For campaigns, I prefer to come up with my own Mythos, and just occasionally drop in obscure references to the other stuff.

The problem can also appear if you use more conventional movie monsters. Like vampires and werewolves.

People have seen so many interations of them. That a GM has to be really careful to make encounters with them unique and memorable.

The moment you have a player go: "Oh it's just a ______." You lose your audience and pretty much the whole of the atmosphere.

One of my most effective Call of Cthulhu games actually featured a fight between a vampire and a werewolf.