‘True Detective’ Season 2 Episode 5 Recap and Review: “Other Lives”

True Detective Season 2 Episode 5 Recap and Review
Vince Vaughn and Colin Farrell in ‘True Detective’ season 2 episode 5 (Photo: HBO)

“You and me need to talk,” says Ray Velcoro (Colin Farrell) to his boss, Frank Semyon (Vince Vaughn), standing outside Frank’s new downgraded house after learning Frank deceived him about the rape of his wife in HBO’s dramatic crime series True Detective.

True Detective season two episode five begins two months after the terrible shoot-out that led to the death of Amarilla and his men who were the main suspects in the murder of Caspere, the Vinci City Manager. Ray quit the force and now works for Frank full time as a consultant/security expert and his new assignment, besides collecting rent from the run-down apartments Frank owns, is to tail Semyon’s lieutenant, Blake (Christopher James Baker). Frank wants to know where he goes, what he does, who he sees, etc. This leads Ray to discover a connection between Blake and the psychiatrist Ani (Rachel McAdams) and Ray had interrogated about treating Caspere and prostitutes.

Meanwhile, Frank and his wife, Jordan (Kelly Reilly), spend most of the episode going back and forth arguing about having a baby and about Frank going back into the corrupt life he was almost out of. Finally, both realize what they really need is some quality couple time together.

Ani has taken most of the blame for the shoot-out gone wrong and has been demoted to logging evidence and ordered to attend sexual harassment meetings regarding the complaint against her from one of her co-officers. She decides to reach out to the woman who told her earlier about her daughter going missing. It turns out she went missing the day before Caspere’s death. Ani doesn’t believe it’s just a coincidence.

Paul Woodrugh (Taylor Kitsch) has been transferred to investigating insurance fraud and isn’t happy about it. He yearns to be back in the field. His personnel life isn’t much better when he discovers that the life savings he left in a bag hidden at his mother’s place has been spent by his trailer-trash mother who feels she deserved it for carrying him for nine months.

Ani and Ray meet at the bar Velcoro usually meets Frank at to have a drink or two and catch up. She asks him if he really believes Amarilla was the killer of Caspere. Ray reminds her he’s not a cop anymore and that she isn’t a detective. They talk about Paul being reassigned to insurance fraud and Ani says she reached out to him and that he’s not happy. Disgusted with how the departments are treating Ani and Paul, Ray suggests they quit and get out, telling Ani she’s too good for them.

The next day Ray meets with Ani, Paul, and Ani’s boss at the State Attorney’s office. She wants to hire all three of them (off the books) to find out who really murdered Caspere and why. It seems her boss, who only days after declaring the case closed and solved, put his hat in the ring for the Governor’s race. It’s all too neat and tidy and reeks of a cover-up.

At first, Ray wants nothing to do with the secret investigation, but when Ani’s boss tells Ray she can make sure he doesn’t lose his kid – his fight with his ex-wife over custody isn’t going Ray’s way – Ray tells her, “You let me keep my kid, I’m in.” Ray also asks why she wants him involved since she seemed to believe he was the worst of the worst in Vinci. She tells him that since the rumor about him killing the man who raped his wife was wrong, she figured maybe the rest was too. Confused, Ray asks what she’s talking about and she tells him the man who raped his wife years ago was just recently arrested. His DNA matched six unsolved rapes including Ray’s wife.

The following night Ray pays a visit to the psychiatrist who used to treat Caspere and beats the living hell out of him while questioning him about the setup with Blake, the young girls, and Caspere’s involvement. It appears it just might be a big blackmail ring Ray and Ani have come across.

The next day Ani visits her kid sister, the one who went to one of those weird parties and asks her to reach out to some of the girls she knows to try to get an invite to one of the parties so that Ani can go in undercover. At first Ani’s sister doesn’t want to, being out of that life and not being comfortable getting in touch with those girls. She tells Ani they are not trustworthy, but Ani pushes, telling her she’s trying to find a missing girl and this is a lead she has to follow.

The episode ends with Ray going to Frank’s home to confront him about giving him the wrong name years ago.

Slow and fairly uneventful, True Detective season two episode five titled “Other Lives” is by far the least exciting – and boring – episode of the series thus far. All the main characters in this episode seem to be playing catch-up on what is really going down. It’s clear all three know in their guts that Amarilla and his thugs were not Caspere’s killers and that they are the convenient fall guys for something much bigger. Finally, they’re catching up to what the audience already knows.

The performances from the cast are solid, but there’s not much electricity or fire in the air or on the screen. Vince Vaughn and Kelly Reilly have a few nice scenes together as a husband and wife coming to the realization they’re not going to have a family after all but find the time to get close again. Their storyline here feels more like a nighttime soap opera than a crime drama.

Colin Farrell by far gives the standout performance in this episode, especially in the scene when Ray realizes Frank lied and used him years ago by giving him the wrong name of the rapist and the fact that he killed the wrong man, perhaps a completely innocent man. The horror, anger, and self-loathing he expresses without saying a word is mesmerizing. Here’s hoping his performance is remembered come Emmy nominations next year.

With Ray and Frank about to have what looks to be a stand-off in Frank’s kitchen, and Ani going deep undercover as a party girl to try to get close to the conspiracy/blackmail ring, episode six should have much more going on to keep the viewers interested.

A look back: True Detective season two episode four recap

GRADE: C

Original Air Date: July 19, 2015