Once there was only dark. If you ask me, the light's winning.

The story is not about pessimism being as much of an illusion as optimism. It’s about humans living life and coping with life’s trauma in various ways. Nic said a lot and he probably stole that character of rust but whatever. It’s my fav season of tv. Rust becomes this pessimist to survive his daughter’s death, more realistically he just actually becomes a violent coke addicted unethical cop to cope with his daughter’s death. Then he kills a junkie for giving their baby meth. And the cops own him and put him through literal hell. And he does it, longer than anyone else, because he doesn’t value his life and wants to die while lacking the constitution for suicide. But living like Rust, surrounding yourself with people you hate to hopefully do some good, risking life all day everyday. He was Crash for 4 years. ep. 4. For 4 years, geez. And then when he almost dies enough to retire he says no. Put me on homicide somewhere. All they had was Louisiana. So he could have been taken care of for life, but goes to Louisiana, a tight knit tough to breach community where floods come take evidence, files, and people every year. Nothing ever gets solved, cops aren’t use to trying. And he says I’m gonna go look at dead bodies everyday. Because he has no value for his life outside of maybe any use he can be doing things others can’t stomach. His home completely bare. Just his 2 addictions. The job and booze. He’s torturing himself. He’s punishing himself. He’s being a good person the only way he knows how. By never making a selfish choice based on joy or comfort or pleasure by always being completely focused. Even drunk, functional but hammered. He’s a pessimist to cope with his life which is as close to suicide as u can really be while being a functional member of society. Maybe not even to cope, but to justify. And that’s why he pulls no punches with Marty and calls him out on the cheating and drinking and not being focused. After the shootout. When Marty gets promoted for fucking up and not controlling his emotions and prolongs the case maybe 17 years. And Rust then works the case no support while Marty plays dumb and philanders and coasts off his collar. Rust doesn’t respect Marty or the other cops. They are all playing cop. They are not True Detectives. They are actually worse than not existing, because they get in the way. And their coping mechanisms of drinking and drugging and cheating and fighting and covering up for each other and going to church on Sunday and keeping a gun by the bed and hitting their kids and lecturing their kids while they do the same thing. It’s all hollow. It’s all pageantry. It’s all an illusion of safety and culture and society. And it’s all a lie. But they believe it so hard to keep the feeling of safety they will let demons prey on their children with their heads in the sand. He hates them for allowing it. He hates them from standing in his way while he tries to stop it. And he doesn’t know but truly believes it will never end because humans are the problem. And he can’t handle the bureaucracy and pageantry and hypocrisy of being a cop. He can’t handle the bureaucracy and pageantry and hypocrisy of being a human. So he quits and isolates. And let’s go as much as he can and just works on boats and bars until he sees something he recognizes and realizes he has a job to finish in 2010. But he’s grown. Not like Marty, Marty has grown on paper. He left in good standing started a security company made good money plays golf, fishes. But really the company ain’t much of anything and his life is empty. Rust on paper hasn’t gotten a haircut. Hasn’t done anything productive. Hasn’t fixed his taillight since he threw Marty into it 17 years ago. But he has grown. He has grown in his understanding of himself. He doesn’t do good with people. He’s not gonna talk to people. He does one thing good. And that’s all he’s done. A whole life devoted. A True Detective. And he can drink because drinking is the same as the job. It’s ok in moderation but too much will kill you. And Rust will take that trade because his whole life is not adverting his eyes and to do that all day everyday you can’t be sober. When Rust reconnects with Marty over the case and they are in Marty’s office Rust asks Marty some questions and has small talk. Because he’s not letting his anger make him unnecessarily mean to everyone. He’s realized himself and his short comings and is making an effort to push past and connect because he needs Marty and his resources financially and psychologically. Marty can do things Rust can’t. Play the game ways Rust can’t. Everyone says Rust knew himself Rust knows himself he always did. But that’s wrong. Rust didn’t know nothing mattered. He just truly truly believed. All his data collection had led him to one thing. Humans are terrible, no one can make a difference, nothing ever ends. But when he dies briefly and he feels his pop and he feels his daughter. He realizes that relief he saw on those dead faces wasn’t because life is so bad and nothing is better. It’s because there might be something else. Something you can’t explain. Rust is a man of science. A well read scholar. He’s not above changing his summation based on new information. Now let’s revisit the scene. Rust explains feeling his daughters love. Starts to break down. Marty distracts him with the stars. And asks about the stories rust use to make up in Alaska. Rust engages because the prompt made him think of one of his aha one liners. There’s only one story. Light vs dark. Marty says oh man dark has more territory. Rust says there use to only be darkness. Ask me lights winning. It’s a metaphor. And it has nothing to do with pessimism. That’s a lense to look at the story. These lines are about the story itself. The darkness is that systematic abuse of power and theft of innocence for no other reason but tradition and delusion. That’s the murder cult. But also the cops. Playing favors and being incompetent. And also the society. The society that sends kids to be assaulted at churches because that’s what their parents did. It use to be all death and violence and the rich using the poor. And those well springs of depravity will always exist. But there’s light in people. And through cooperation with people with different life experiences and different skills choosing to fight for what they believe in and to denounce their darkness life has as much light and hope as ever. They didn’t get everyone in that cult. And it’s not the only cult. And it’s not even the worst cult. The darkness is overwhelming if you just look at the darkness. But against all odds they got a little justice and vindication and brought light to their area which is a hard hard area that had been dark for a very long time. There’s no closure to losing a child. But all those hurt fathers holding on to a box with the kids stuff or remembering something to tell Rust while u can tell their lives are hell. The bar owner. They aren’t fixed now. But they did what they could and they are still in the dark. But maybe for that moment while they were a part of a righteous movement, they held a light, a match even. And people fighting the darkness for momentary light even though it’s not enough and it’s not sustainable and it’s not going to last. U can see a small light in the darkness and it is inspiring.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/user/Fun-Slide3932/