If there are gods and overlords of TV watching me write this post right now, please, I beg of you, bring back Rust Cohle for the third season of True Detective. The HBO original series burst through the gates of television with a stentorian vision of greatness, and it nary let up until the finale. Most of that fire was stoked by the two amazing leads, Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson, but fanning the flames in the background was creator Nic Pizzolatto, who wrote all the episodes by his lonesome.
“I miss Rust Cohle, man,” McConaughey said on the Rich Eisen Show this Wednesday. “I miss watching him on Sunday nights.”
We do too, McConaughey.
The first season was such an outstanding achievement that its weight crushed the second season, which saw Vince Vaughn, Rachel McAdams, and Colin Farrell do their best with a script that didn’t feel fully fleshed out. But, it’s not all Pizzolatto’s fault. HBO President Michael Lombardo said he rushed the scribe to finish the second season, and the show and Pizzolatto faltered. It’s not even like the second season of True Detective was a horrendous failure (although it may spell the end of the anthology series) — it just couldn’t stand up to the towering achievement in visual storytelling the first season provided.
McConaughey knows it too, and he wants to reprise the role that earned him an Emmy nomination. He’s even talked to Pizzolatto about going back to Cohle.
“It would have to be the right context, the right way,” McConaughey told Eisen. “That thing—when I read [the original script] I knew in 20 minutes if I can play this guy, Rustin Cohle, I’m in.”
The thespian also told Eisen that he was extremely pleased while playing Cohle.
“I was a happy man when I made that for six months, because I was on my own island,” the Oscar winner said. “Luckily my wife put up with me.”
HBO, the ball’s in your court.
