Nic Pizzolatto Gets Real About Season 2 of 'True Detective'

The countdown to the return of HBO’s gritty crime series, True Detective, is officially on. To stoke anticipation for the June 21 premiere of Season 2, the network has released four new posters featuring the all-star cast — including Colin Farrell, Vince Vaughn, Rachel McAdams, and Taylor Kitsch — looking seriously grim.

To provide some context behind the posters, HBO also released a Q&A with series creator, Nic Pizzolatto, who reiterated that the two seasons won’t be linked by any storylines or characters. (In other words, don’t hold your breath waiting for the McConaissance to continue.) However, he does add that “the seasons have a deep, close bond in sensibility and vision, a similar soul, though this is a more complex world and field of characters.”

Those characters include a world-weary detective (Farrell), a dogged sheriff (McAdams), a soldier-turned-cop (Kitsch) and a veteran crook (Vaughn). Pizzolatto says that having a four-person, as opposed a two-person, ensemble necessitated a shift in the show’s structure. 

Gone is the complicated flashback structure in terms of a more straightforward narrative. “I try to be open to whatever structure the story and characters suggest. As the characters multiplied and their individual and group complications grew, a more integrated and linear structure worked best. And there was the conviction that if we were to do something entirely new, then we shouldn’t lean on past conceits, but really build from scratch.” In other words, storytelling, unlike time, isn’t a flat circle.

True Detective premieres June 21 at 9 p.m. on HBO.