"I don't want to know anything anymore.This is a world where nothing is solved. Someone once told me time is a flat circle. Everything we've ever done or will do we're gonna do over and over and over again."
- Rust Cohle, True Detective
(that's a link to Matthew McConaughey's performance of that scene)
If you haven't seen the show True Detective, it is an HBO mini series about two cops who, over the course of 20 years, attempt to unravel a deep seeded organized crime ring in and around Louisiana. It presents itself as a typical crime thriller about two partners, but quickly subverts expectations of the genre by breaking the way time is presented through the narrative unfolding. Everything that happens to these two men is filtered through a present tense lens, building towards the last episode where the past finally catches up to the future; the men, disconnected from the justice system they proclaim is compromised, attempt to close a case they never could finish. Rust and Marty are supposed to be beacons of hope, realistic characters who are caught between the mechanisms of their own demons and the ones that pervade the culture at large, but without any great supernatural or structural power can make a dent in those demons. The question I struggle with, and has been raised many times over, is whether that dent does enough to inspire real change.
In a way, I feel the show resonates with many things we are talking about in this class. For one, it's storytelling framework is operating "like" a memoir, but I think what is more explicitly related is the question the show raises about the repetition of history, of violence, and it's suggestion we might, ultimately, be unable to break these circles, even when two people take on impossible odds.
Of course, Rust Cohle, the detective in the video and the one who speaks those now famous lines at the top of the post, is a traumatized man who has seen some of the worst humanity has to offer. His investigation into a ring of men who use children for sacrifices was the last breaking point in a chain of events in which he was manipulated by the very system he worked for. In this way, the majority of what we see in Rust Cohle is Nihilism in its most Nietzsche-ian fashion.
It's easy to see write off someone like Rust as a man who has lost hope, who has lost his resilience, or who has given up. And yet, in this class, we have been reading nothing but accounts of systematic tragedy, war, violence, manipulation, and corruption. True Detective consistently frames Rust as the prototypical "crazy guy" who thinks everything is a conspiracy. The world around him, and eventually Marty, continually tells them that things are different now, better; that the memories Rust and Marty recount are in the past and the case is closed.
War, social injustice, economic inequality; these are things that happened in the 20th century, the past. This is the 21st century where things aren't like they used to be:
Right...?
We want to believe all these things are relegated to history and died with the 20th century. We see all these things coming back around again as the clock resets, just under different names and labels.
"Time is a flat circle"
In the season finale, Rust has a revelation while looking up at the stars.
When a character like Rust, who has seemingly lost all hope, finds faith and justice through the verification in a binary system of good versus evil, it feels like the show regresses from presenting the nuanced reality of history and instead suggests a hopeful outlook on the future; that change really can start from within. As Rust wheels away from the hospital, and he smokes his Camel cigarette for the last time, I wonder if he really believes it, just like I wonder if we really believe things are changing for the better.
I wonder if these hopeful narratives of men combating darkness are obscuring the underlying connections between power, violence, and oppression on a systemic level, and wonder if these cycles will keep resetting because of them. Of course I believe feeling the spiritual, cosmic force of human connection through the words and lived experienced of those who survive, those who show perseverance and strength through horrible darkness, is inspiring and hopeful. There is no doubt about that. I only wonder if it is enough.
Maybe I am having a Rust Cohle crisis of my own and maybe I feel like Nadezhda feels the same.
Someone once told me time is a flat circle, and despite that person changing his mind, I'm failing in my attempts to forget it.
I also realize I spent this whole post talking about True Detective. But you know...interdisciplinary studies is important...right? That's my excuse. :)
- Rust Cohle, True Detective
(that's a link to Matthew McConaughey's performance of that scene)
If you haven't seen the show True Detective, it is an HBO mini series about two cops who, over the course of 20 years, attempt to unravel a deep seeded organized crime ring in and around Louisiana. It presents itself as a typical crime thriller about two partners, but quickly subverts expectations of the genre by breaking the way time is presented through the narrative unfolding. Everything that happens to these two men is filtered through a present tense lens, building towards the last episode where the past finally catches up to the future; the men, disconnected from the justice system they proclaim is compromised, attempt to close a case they never could finish. Rust and Marty are supposed to be beacons of hope, realistic characters who are caught between the mechanisms of their own demons and the ones that pervade the culture at large, but without any great supernatural or structural power can make a dent in those demons. The question I struggle with, and has been raised many times over, is whether that dent does enough to inspire real change.
In a way, I feel the show resonates with many things we are talking about in this class. For one, it's storytelling framework is operating "like" a memoir, but I think what is more explicitly related is the question the show raises about the repetition of history, of violence, and it's suggestion we might, ultimately, be unable to break these circles, even when two people take on impossible odds.
Of course, Rust Cohle, the detective in the video and the one who speaks those now famous lines at the top of the post, is a traumatized man who has seen some of the worst humanity has to offer. His investigation into a ring of men who use children for sacrifices was the last breaking point in a chain of events in which he was manipulated by the very system he worked for. In this way, the majority of what we see in Rust Cohle is Nihilism in its most Nietzsche-ian fashion.
It's easy to see write off someone like Rust as a man who has lost hope, who has lost his resilience, or who has given up. And yet, in this class, we have been reading nothing but accounts of systematic tragedy, war, violence, manipulation, and corruption. True Detective consistently frames Rust as the prototypical "crazy guy" who thinks everything is a conspiracy. The world around him, and eventually Marty, continually tells them that things are different now, better; that the memories Rust and Marty recount are in the past and the case is closed.
War, social injustice, economic inequality; these are things that happened in the 20th century, the past. This is the 21st century where things aren't like they used to be:
- Manipulation of the minds of citizens for governmental subservience no longer happens.
- There is no longer any large scale warfare without clear justification.
- The inability to speak openly without fear of prosecution died with Stalin.
Right...?
We want to believe all these things are relegated to history and died with the 20th century. We see all these things coming back around again as the clock resets, just under different names and labels.
"Time is a flat circle"
In the season finale, Rust has a revelation while looking up at the stars.
Cohle: I've been up in that room looking out those windows every night here, thinking...it's just one story. The oldest... light versus dark.
Marty: It seems to me, that the dark has a lot more territory.
Cohle: Yeah, you're right about that. But, you know I think you are looking at it wrong. Once there was only dark, but if you ask me, the light's winning.
When a character like Rust, who has seemingly lost all hope, finds faith and justice through the verification in a binary system of good versus evil, it feels like the show regresses from presenting the nuanced reality of history and instead suggests a hopeful outlook on the future; that change really can start from within. As Rust wheels away from the hospital, and he smokes his Camel cigarette for the last time, I wonder if he really believes it, just like I wonder if we really believe things are changing for the better.
I wonder if these hopeful narratives of men combating darkness are obscuring the underlying connections between power, violence, and oppression on a systemic level, and wonder if these cycles will keep resetting because of them. Of course I believe feeling the spiritual, cosmic force of human connection through the words and lived experienced of those who survive, those who show perseverance and strength through horrible darkness, is inspiring and hopeful. There is no doubt about that. I only wonder if it is enough.
Maybe I am having a Rust Cohle crisis of my own and maybe I feel like Nadezhda feels the same.
Someone once told me time is a flat circle, and despite that person changing his mind, I'm failing in my attempts to forget it.
I also realize I spent this whole post talking about True Detective. But you know...interdisciplinary studies is important...right? That's my excuse. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment