‘True Detective’ fans think Matthew McConaughey will appear in new season

True Detective fans are speculating whether season four will see the return of one of the series’ most well-known characters, following some clear links between the different seasons.

The fourth instalment in the crime drama series, titled True Detective: Night Country, aired earlier this month on HBO. Starring Jodie Foster in a lead role as Detective Liz Danvers, who is investigating the disappearance of eight men from an Alaskan research station, critical reviews of the series have been largely positive.

After the second episode of the latest series aired on Sunday (January 21) some fans are beginning to notice links to the first season of True Detective, which starred Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson and premiered in 2014.

In the latest episode of True Detective: Night Country, Fiona Shaw’s character, Rose, is led by a mysterious presence to some missing bodies in the snow. When viewers discover that the phantom was her former lover, Travis Cohle, who chose to freeze to death instead of die of leukaemia, some started to draw links to the first season.

Travis is the father of McConaughey’s character, Rustin ‘Rust’ Cohle, and had been mentioned in the pilot episode of season one. Rust tells Harrelson’s character, Martin Hart, that his father had leukaemia and also explains that he grew up in Alaska, which is the setting for True Detective: Night Country.

A further link was included between Travis and Rose in the spiral symbol etched into the forehead of one of the corpses in the snow. The symbol is seen on the back of a murder victim in season one, and was eventually connected to an evil being, worshipped by a cult. Rust had started seeing the spiral everywhere he went before he solved the case.

In True Detective: Night Country, which was co-produced by McConaughey and Harrelson, the symbol is mentioned more than once, firstly when Rose asks Detective Navarro (played by Kali Reis) if she had seen the symbol, to which Navarro responds: “It’s old, missy. Older than Ennis. Older than the ice, probably.”

In a five-star review of the latest series, NME wrote on Killing Eve’s Shaw: “Her quietly haunting performance still feels like a key piece in this cryptic puzzle.”

Following a somewhat negative response from fans, showrunner Issa López suggested fans of the first season are deliberately criticising the latest instalment, impacting its overall reviews. The series had attracted criticism for its opening titles and inclusion of supernatural elements.