True Detective Creator Nic Pizzolatto Slammed Night Country & Reddit Isn't Happy

"True Detective" Season 4, which is titled "True Detective: Night Country," officially confirmed a huge connection to Rust Cohle — the character Matthew McConaughey plays in Season 1 — around the time its second episode premiered. A character in the first two episodes named Travis (Erling Eliasson) seems like he might be Rust's father, and showrunner Issa López explicitly confirmed that to be the case on X, formerly known as Twitter. None other than former "True Detective" showrunner Nic Pizzolatto criticized these and other connections between "Night Country" and Season 1 on Instagram, and fans online aren't happy about it.

A screenshot of Pizzolatto's comments serves as the basis of a popular Reddit thread, the title of which describes his criticism as "interesting" but passes no further judgment. First, Pizzolatto wrote that a canonical link between the two seasons is "so stupid." Then he replied to a comment wondering whether or not McConaughey might play Cohle again in "Night Country," first distancing himself from the new season before promising that McConaughey will not and would not be a part of it.

The top comment in this thread, by u/gamehen21, praises Pizzolatto's skill as an artist before criticizing him as a human being. "He is a brilliant writer and a storyteller," replied u/pat9714, reflecting an opinion plenty of other users share about the former "True Detective" showrunner. "As artists go, Nic is temperamental. Not every artist is a fun person to be around or work with."

In a comment with more than 1,000 upvotes — once again praising Nic Pizzolatto's work before critiquing his Instagram comments — u/felixlighter1989 wrote, "I'll always love S1 but that's pretty lame of him to crap on the show like that when the season isn't even half way over."

Some users like u/rafaelzeronn and u/holdmynope, however, withheld any degree of praise for Pizzolatto, criticizing both the man and his work in light of his Instagram comments. "He doesn't even understand the reason why people loved Season 1 in the first place," the latter user wrote. "The guy is lost in his own mind."

For what it's worth, Issa López doesn't begrudge Pizzolatto's open distaste for her continuation of his series. "I believe that every storyteller has a very specific, peculiar, and unique relation to the stories they create, and whatever his reactions are, he's entitled to them. That's his prerogative," she told Vulture. So, while his Instagram comments may have affected his standing in the minds of many Reddit users, Pizzolatto and his work remain a source of inspiration for López even in the wake of his hash words about her "True Detective" season.