True Detective: Night Country (Season 4), Episode 4: The second half of “True Detective: Night Country,” episode 4, in this six-episode season, a decrease from the usual eight-episode order of the earlier ones, feels like it is carrying over from the hangover of the last episode, where the personal takes precedence over the plot of the professional. It starts out pretty great, with the usual HBO intro seamlessly integrating into the white noise that Danvers listens to, presumably to fall asleep and avoid all those pent-up emotions that burst open, leaving her an emotional mess. That night, though, she avoids sleeping through the 7th day of the night (Christmas Eve) by watching the video recovered on Annie’s phone, where Annie is seen terrified, recording a testimonial in an ice cave, before a terrified scream cuts her and the screen off.
True Detective: Night Country (Season 4) Episode 4 ‘Part 4’ Recap
Danvers finally dresses and is driving towards her precinct, and she gets a call from Prior, who informs her that not only is the forensic team from Anchorage here early to ship the bodies of the scientists, but her old flame, Captain Connelly, is still around the town to supervise the shipping. Before she can slam on the pedal to drive faster, she sees Julia, Evangeline Navarro’s sister, walking barefoot and barely clothed on the streets. Realizing that Julia is suffering again, she instructs Peter to inform Navarro before she gets out of the car and puts her jacket around Julia, hugging her and cradling her like a baby, trying her hardest not to break down with her.
We then see Navarro consoling her and then taking her to the “Lighthouse,” a medical center. Unlike earlier episodes, this time, the protestations seem subdued, and maybe it is because of Christmas Eve that Julia agrees to be admitted to the rehab center. It feels perhaps like an added sense of foreboding and also a bit of predictable TV writing that when Julia finally decides to be sent to rehab, a few scenes later, she goes back to the same shipwreck over the frozen lake.
That is her “safe spot” (because she sees a vision of her mother coming out of bed), calls her sister and says that she loves her, and then she chooses to undress, folds her dress (like the scientists had, interestingly), and then begins walking towards the ocean in the darkness. It’s harrowing, but as the show is telling us, the people at Ennis are suffering through a darkness that feels supernatural, entering through a membrane present at the “edge of the world.”.
But just because this is the second half of the season, that doesn’t mean that the show loses the feeling of letting the characters be in tighter spots in their personal lives, and that comes to a massive head for a couple of them. In the case of Hank, the only comedic moment of the show, we see him waiting for his mail-order bride to show up, who inevitably doesn’t, and who he mistakes the pretty female air hostess for. He had even adorned his bed with flower petals for the inevitable meeting (in his head). But even as he knows deep down that he has been catfished, he chooses to believe in the reality construed by both “Alina” and himself. After all, it’s Christmas Eve.
But Liz Danvers doesn’t care much about Christmas Eve. She also doesn’t believe Connelly’s excuse of staying back at Ennis as being just a helping hand, even reminding her that the current “climate” in Ennis resembles more of a shitshow than anything else, be it the mining protests, the dead bodies, or the riot at the hospital in the last episode.
Peter Prior, Hank’s son, who is a miracle at not inheriting shitty genetics, had done his research and figured out the identity of a man who, in 1998, had turned up in a hospital with identical injuries to Lund, then went off-grid. Liz is impressed, and as a reward for Christmas Eve, she gives Prior the responsibility of putting out an APB for the man. That’s the situation Prior found himself in when his father walked into the precinct, dejected and eager to drink down his sorrows.
Meanwhile, Liz and Navarro drive up to the one person who can tell them where there might be ice caves in Ennis with the bones and whether those bones are fossilized or recent. Brazenly, the two of them turn out to be at the house of Adam Bryce, the overqualified high school geology professor, whom, of course, Liz had a fling with and had in the first episode consulted on. Bryce, trying hard to ignore the indignation of his wife (who is already displeased at being disturbed on Christmas Eve, much less by his former flame), points out that ice caves do exist nearby, near the Brooks range.
But they would need an expert or someone who has made cartographic maps. As it turns out, those maps were made by Otis Heiss, and of course, the municipal office is closed for the Christmas holidays. But again, the evidence is slowly presenting itself: that Annie might have traversed the ice caves using Heiss’ maps and had been killed, and whatever had attacked Otis had also attacked Lund and the scientists, as well as Annie.
To clear her doubts, Navarro goes to Rose’s cabin (Fiona Shaw) and also checks up on her. As it turns out, she is doing just fine, dressed to the nines, baking cakes and dinner for herself, and having a grand old time. Her escaping to Ennis had been a form of extended sabbatical when she had grown tired of her academic job. As she says, Ennis is quieter, but she didn’t quite expect so many altercations with the dead.
Meanwhile, Liz’s Christmas Eve meet-ups with wives of old flames aren’t going to stop. She is called to the office of the mining office, where we learn that Leah had spray-painted “Murderers” on the front gate. Kate McKitterick, the owner, wants to press charges, but of course, Liz isn’t having it. But again, she berates Leah, and perhaps Leah has had enough because she packs a bag and leaves for the night.
And Liz, obstinate as ever, throws the just-prepared turkey in the trash and chooses Vodka as her meal, binge-watching the Annie K. torture video until she makes the connection. The power is switched off. Whoever switched the power off at Tsalal station also switched the power off in the ice caves. The right question, as Liz drunkenly calls Navarro and is asked by her in return, is, “Who puts a generator in an ice cave?”
So that’s the question Liz’s ex-protege and her current protege have to solve, much to the chagrin of both Pete’s father and his girlfriend, who are taking care of the kid. As the show progresses, the character of Liz is shown to be acerbic and yet demanding fierce loyalty. It’s in sharp contrast to what Ted professes led to Liz’s reassignment: she had already been unsocial, but after the deaths of her husband and son, it had been unbearable. No one had wanted to work with her. It paints a complicated picture of a woman who might have been too capable of differentiating between the work life and the personal until tragedy strikes.
Current-day Liz, drunk and angry at being unable to lose herself in coitus with Ted, angrily storms out of the house, ignoring the protestations of Ted to not “drunkenly drive.” But even as she drives through the snowy landscape, she again sees the vision of the one-eyed polar bear and swerves, hitting her car on the side of the road. She then, unafraid, looks at the polar bear. At this juncture, because of the location, the reality of the polar bear is not likely to be discussed, but the fact that Liz is also witnessing visions could prove that the town is becoming more and more afflicted with darkness.
Navarro, too, feels eerily close to touching that darkness when she, along with Prior, drives up to Oliver Tagaq’s cabin because he might be the only one who knows about the power switch-up at the Tsalal station. As it turns out, his cabin is empty, Jenny is cut, and half bowls of food are left on the table. The man had left in a hurry. But before Navarro can investigate further, she learns of Julia’s death, which leads to her driving up to the hospital, and after shouting at the orderly, she trashes the place. Her anger and sorrow have not subsided, and she drives to pick a fight with the abusive husband (back in episode 1) and his buddies.
It’s a gruesome and dirty fight, with the three guys and her going at it, and the fight ends with her crawling her wounded body to Qaavik’s place, shocking Qaavik from his stupor. Qaavik, in a very sweet fashion, tricks her into thinking that he is proposing marriage before snapping her broken fingers back in place. The resultant scream of profanity devolves into sobbing as Navarro cries in Qaavik’s arms, having lost the only family she had.
Pete Prior, on the other hand, is okay with playing the passive-aggressive game, where he knows that his girlfriend is mad at raising the child all on her own. But he still states how she blames him for leaving her with a child, which is a boneheaded move that could only portend a worse future. Christmas Eve thus ends quite eventfully in Ennis, and the next morning, Navarro turns up at Danvers’ place. Both women are haggard and worse for wear, one due to skirmishes, the other due to alcohol.
It doesn’t help that Navarro notices the stuffed polar bear, which reminds her of the vision she had seen and the whisper she had heard. Cumulatively, Danvers sees the far-off look of Navarro, which is one she is very familiar with because it was the look she had when they confronted Wheeler. In the flashback, we see the full event, and we witness Navarro witnessing the spirit of the dead girlfriend. Back in the present, a battered yet stony-lipped Navarro denies seeing the vision, while the angry Danvers proclaim her to be a liar. Navarro leaves in a huff, but she can’t drive her car out of the driveway before Danvers stops her. She had received a picture of a man in a familiar parka suit walking on the dredges.
True Detective: Night Country (Season 4) Episode 4 Ending Explained:
The dredge where the man had been last seen used to be a magnificent place, according to “Navarro.” It also resembles the abandoned state of the shipwreck where Julia was last seen. The inside of the shipwreck is adorned with designs and a portmanteau similar to the one in Clark’s caravan. But as Navarro and Danvers enter the vacant dredge, they see the man. Danvers follows, while Navarro sees a vision of a dead body with blue highlights in the hair floating away. Who did she see? Annie or Julia?
As Navarro follows the vision, she sees footprints leading up to a Christmas tree, after a hallway eerily resembling the Lighthouse (rehab center), until she is suddenly visited by a specter that screams in her face. Meanwhile, Liz follows the pink parka-wearing man without backup, climbing up through the rig and ultimately cornering him. But instead of Clark, who we expect because the parka is similar to the one that Annie had worn, we see it is Otis Heiss. Otis being present at the dredge means he is somehow involved, and his wearing the parka is a good enough inference that he is working in close proximity to Clark.
But the recluse, with the blue eyes, is unwilling to come clean to Liz’s questions about Clark’s whereabouts, instead cryptically stating Clark had gone back down to hide. He is in “The Night Country,” and now they are all stuck in it. As Liz walks back down, she sees Navarro in a stupor, her ears bleeding and her face in dumbfounded shock.
It’s a question of whether, in the next two hours, the mystery will be solved. The follow-up question is even more important: would the solution be satisfactory? Considering how Season 4 is acting as an inverse to Season 1 in both looks (hot and damp in Season 1, freezing cold in Season 4) and the key area of interest (a realistic, gritty plot with the supernatural as an added garnish in Season 1 while the supernatural takes center stage in Season 4), one can hope the ending too lands coherently.
