Washington--Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson are gone from "True Detective," but HBO's Emmy-winning cop anthology series is back Sunday for a second season with the same dark, moody atmosphere.
The question is: can a new cast of famous faces and a shift in location -- from the swamps of Louisiana to the gritty streets of southern California -- draw the same cult following?
Series writer-creator Nic Pizzolatto says his team was keen on "fully committing to something new."
"We were conscious of not wanting to repeat ourselves or remake the same album in a different setting," Pizzolatto says in the premium cable network's promos for season two.
"I do think 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."
This time around, Colin Farrell, Rachel McAdams and Taylor Kitsch play cops who end up on a collision course with career criminal Frank Semyon (played by Vince Vaughn of "Swingers" fame) thanks to a bizarre murder in the fictional city of Vinci.
Farrell -- the brooding Irish star who won a Golden Globe for 2008's "In Bruges" -- plays a troubled detective with competing allegiances -- to his department and a mobster.
McAdams -- best known for her turn in the romantic tear-jerker "The Notebook" -- plays a hard-nosed sheriff's detective, and Kitsch -- who starred on NBC's "Friday Night Lights" -- portrays a war veteran and highway patrol cop.
The first two episodes are directed by Justin Lin of "Fast & Furious" fame.
AFP
