True Detective creator Nic Pizzolatto is posting through it
After railing against True Detective: Night Country, Pizzolatto asked for hate on Instagram. He's certainly getting it.
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After throwing a huge tantrum over his disdain for True Detective: Night Country—a show he’s certainly making a good amount of money on—earlier this week, original True Detective creator Nic Pizzolatto seems intent on proving he’s even more of an overgrown toddler than previously imagined. At least in the sense that toddlers (hopefully) don’t know how to use the internet, and Pizzolatto seems to be ignorant of its cardinal rule: if you exist, people will hate you. If you ask for hate, they’ll bust down every door trying to comply.
In a new Instagram post, Pizzolatto—who is credited as a producer on True Detective’s recently-ended fourth season even though it was created, written, and directed by Issa López—is literally making himself into the Patrick in chains or Flynn Rider with swords in his face “what’s an opinion that will get you like this” meme. “TRUE DETECTIVE AGGREGATE POST,” the director wrote in his caption. “[T]his here is the place for all your trolling/support/infighting around True Detective and the absolute moral degeneracy and misogyny of anyone who did not think it was good.”
The caption continues:
I’d say “stay civil” but of course civility has no place when criticism of a television show indicates some form of Hitlerian evil that must be stamped out. So roll on, tide. Satire is welcome, and do try to have a nice day.
The second rule Pizzolatto clearly doesn’t understand: if you want anything on the internet to get better or blow over, don’t respond to the comments. There are currently over a thousand of them on his post, to which he’s responded to… more than a handful. To his credit, he’s been somewhat generous on a few of them (emphasis on “somewhat”). “I support you,” he responded to one user who admitted they were “in the minority because [they] thoroughly enjoyed S4.” “Glad you enjoyed,” he said to another who wrote that they “really thought this season was inspired, great, and exactly what the show needed.”
But mostly, he was the same guy who reposted stories saying that “HBO should have stuck with Nic Pizzolatto” on Instagram earlier this week. To one comment suggesting that he “couldn’t write a believable female character if [his] career depended on it (which it clearly doesn’t, since mediocrity gets rewarded)” he replied: “And yet… my female lead character got an Emmy nomination. “Mediocrity gets rewarded”…you should reflect on that, given what’s being rewarded at present.” (Community note: The only actors that have been nominated for True Detective are Woody Harrelson, Matthew McConaughey, and Mahershala Ali. He’s probably talking about Mireille Enos in the first season of The Killing, which is a little deceptive in this context.) To another who asked why he wasn’t apologizing for “creating hate against the season,” he replied: “I didn’t create anything of the kind. It was there from the first ep. And I only apologize if I’ve done something wrong.”
It seems like Pizzolatto might need to take a little nap and cool down if he doesn’t want to end up in time-out. In the meantime, you can read The A.V. Club’s interview with Night Country star Kali Reis—who very diplomatically responded to Pizzolatto’s original tirade with a shrug emoji on Tuesday—to detox.
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The second rule Pizzolatto clearly doesn’t understand: if you want anything on the internet to get better or blow over, don’t respond to the comments. There are currently over a thousand of them on his post, to which he’s responded to… more than a handful. Oooof, yep. If you’re going to lob a bomb, gotta turn off those notifications.
The internet was a mistake.
Wait 10 years, after our second Civil War, when every other thinkpiece will be devoted to that very thing.
Don’t blame the internet. People just aren’t generally mature enough to use it. Quite possibly, and probably, including myself but… I forget what my point was.
lol u forgot something
I mean our brains were absolutely not ready to handle getting access to the complete firehouse of information the internet brought on, and have been stuck trying to adapt to that since.
It’s not really the information that’s the problem. It’s that it’s mixed in with a somehow even greater flood of increasingly extremist opinion and outright bullshit, which is often much more fun and sexy because it isn’t bound by boring old reality. For every person combing through JSTOR for the most thoroughly vetted expert conclusions, there are a thousand people whose worldviews are shaped by the most charismatic youtube conspiracy theorists.
I keep saying this, and I keep getting ignored for it.
Bullshit. Last night I came across as US Army officer’s tactical assessment on the Assault on Toad Hall in The Wind In The Willows.
I’m back to thinking he’s cool after reading this herb ass post!
You’re a ball sucking putz that’s why
What a dick.
Tiny little dick, most likely.Big ol’ asshole tho.
Not necessary..
I think he’s a knob and that TD season 1 was only decent because he had Cary Fukunaga babysitting him, but to be fair, you edited out the part of his post where he said he created the thread specifically so people would stop arguing about season 4 on his post about his father dying.
specifically so people would stop arguing about season 4 on his post about his father dying. How the fuck are so many people SO comfortable with being *SO* tragically, desperately weird?
Are there still people out there that think once the framing device dropped in season 1 that that show was anything other than a generic cop procedural with good cinematography?
Me. Me do too.
yeah, i think many like it to this day. i like it.
Dude is absolutely desperate to make himself the “martyr” here, isn’t he?
Did you even read his post or comments? He liked a couple of critical comments and then directed people to stop commenting on his personal life posts, and created one space for them to do so. He has made no comments even alluding to martyr-dom and has said extremely little about the show other than “don’t blame me” to people who didn’t like the show. This isn’t petulance, it’s the truth — he didn’t write the season and has no involvement in the piece of art being praised or criticized. This article, and comments like this, are the only thing I’ve heard him actually criticize.
Nic, please, for your own sake… log off and go for a walk!
Fuck off man
This is one of those times where I suddenly wonder if he was always this guy and I was just too stupid to notice. See also: John Campea’s relentless sucking of David Zaslav’s dick.
I wouldn’t blame yourself here. The idea that we should even *care* about whether a creator is kind of an asshole* is relatively new.*not talking a predator, or a rapist, or an abuser – an asshole
How do you define “relatively new”? Cuz people had questions about fucking Plato and Socrates being shitbags during their times. This is not at all new.
Tens of millions upon tens of millions of people consuming tabloid shit on the daily, before or during breakfast, definitely is a relatively new phenomenon. The scale is newer. The ubiquity is newer. “Newer” being a relative term, obviously.People having questions about the behavior of, say, Plato and Socrates (who were philosophers and shapers of then-contemporary thought, which I’d rate a step higher than Nic fucking Pizzolatto or whomever)? Not new. Millions of people having questions, due to a whole-ass media apparatus pushing out 3-5 stories per week (occasionally per day, occasionally on this collection of sites) on the same topic? Relatively new.
The hilarious thing is that while AVC is trying to drag the guy here, over on the AVC review of True Detective’s last episode the majority of people seem to agree with him that the show was mediocre at best and the final episode was garbage.https://www.avclub.com/true-detective-night-country-finale-review-1851262570
You can believe both that Night Country wasn’t that great and that Pizzolatto is being an unprofessional ass.
Yeah that’s the thing, he (and toxic fans I guess) have made it so you can’t even express disappointment with the season (which I had high hopes and a completely open mind for) or point out glaring problems like heavy-handed HBO executive notes to tie it to S1 without having some political agenda.
Also known as: Discussing literally any nerd thing on the Internet.
I don’t think he has an agenda (or care if he does) – I just think that him airing his complaints in public is unprofessional. If he has problems, he can take it up – privately – with the other people involved in the show.
Scorsese has an uninformed opinion on superhero movies because they’re popular, and everyone says, “He has that right, he’s the master who made Goodfellas!” but a smaller creator amplifies other voices calling out a mediocre season of his own show and he’s some kind of monster. Not everyone has to have a social media that looks like President Obama’s. He’s allowed to dislike something publicly, especially if it has his name on it.
I’ve been reliably informed – and you will, too, soon, in these very comments! – that if you don’t uncritically love S4 you’re a misogynist.
AV Club being consistent about…anything, rather than just what gets them the most clicks at whatever nanosecond they post something would be nice.
“Bob Smith’s movie is sweeping the box office, a triumph for the filmmaker’s amazing, and thoughtful, vision of mid-century Belgium and the story of the war babies born during occupation of the Low Countries and coming of age in the swinging sixties. Here’s the link to our review from last week.”*clicks link to read the review*
“Holy crap, I can’t believe they let Bob Smith make this turgid, meandering pile of self-indulgence. Almost makes you wish the Nazis won. D-.”
That’s not even a little bit accurate a summary, even with the MRA trolls jumping in first.
It didn’t stick the landing, for sure. It had it’s charms. It *tried* to create a cohesive theme of everything but S2, with the results being mixed.Honestly, I thought it misused some excellent actors, and left as many questions as it tried to answer. How much of that was executive meddling, cutting down the season, etc., I don’t know.
He’s been openly known as an asshole from the start. He was openly plagiarising Rust speeches back in season one and dodging any questions over it. Cary isn’t an saint himself, but he’s also been saying for years what an arrogant asshole Nic was.
Rachel McAdams was nominated for a Critics’ Choice Television Award, for ‘Best Actress in a Movie/Miniseries’, for season 2 TD. I assume Pizzolatte means that, and not an emmy.
Is Nic being an asshole? Sure he is. So was Kubrick. So is David Fincher, Werner Herzog, Michael Bay, David O. Russell, Francis Ford Coppola, James Cameron. But the difference is that they aren’t whiny little bitches and posting that they are butt hurt on socials. I wonder if Nic’s name falls off this series at some point.
That’s permanent, you can’t erase that credit. They moved Justin Roiland’s name from the opening credits to the end credits of Rick and Morty. On Buffy and Angel, the couple that produced the movie are credited in every single episode, even though Joss Whedon probably hates them. Either they name it something else, or they send him a check. And honestly, they’re more likely to get me to watch a show if it wasn’t named True Detective at this point.
Sweet baby the whiney little bitch is you crying on the AVC.
UNSUBSCRIBE
I suppose he posted that Instagram photo because he thinks he looks good? That’s not a good photo. That’s a guy who’s saying, “I was supposed to be the designated driver?”
It’s like a joke photo from a movie where the character is trying to be a tough guy
I’m sure it’s hard for Nic. Season 4 is clearly the best season so far, and it definitely blows doors on season 1. It also nailed the ending – which his season utterly failed to do. Look, he’s probably still stinging from the huge negative backlash from the season 1 final episode. At this point he seems frail and vulnerable about this. I wish him strength. Stay strong Nic!
As always, people’s opinion’s about other people’s opinions about other people’s opinions is riveting stuff.
Oh but the comments
“throwing a huge tantrum” — yikes, you’re going way out of your way to paint an inaccurate picture here. He also made it clear he didn’t want the comments on his grief posts, and would rather people have one contained place to let out their bullshit. Painting this as a meltdown or being angry is so far away from the very, very simple truth.
So “posting through it” is basically just him mocking people who insist that he hates women because he didn’t like a mediocre season of a TV show? Seems reasonable.
He is a salty man with bad style. Dicktown is a much better detective show anyway.
https://bleedingcool.com/comics/recent-updates/swipe-file-finale-of-true-detective-and-alan-moore-and-gene-has-top-ten/
LOL Emma desperate to drag him down and prop up Season 4, which by all accounts, was bad.
DtotheG desperate
“Bullying is ok when it is done by people who agree with us. He was asking for it.”The AV Club. So sad what you became.And yes season 4 was a bad, and it seems to be even the majority opinion. The fact it had high ratings so people liked it is like saying season 8 of Game of Thrones was the best because it had the highest ratings of the series.
is literally making himself into the Patrick in chains or Flynn Rider with swords in his face “what’s an opinion that will get you like this” meme That’s not what literally means.
Unless you can share photos of this happening.
Season 4 was originally pitched as simply Night Country. Issa Lopez recieved a great opportunity alongside being placed in the line of fire of an extremely critical fan base. It’s a new genre for her and she did a fine job.
Many things can be true. It can be true that Pizzolatto is a thin-skinned dope. It can also be true that True Detective wasn’t really as good as we all thought it was before it crumbled through our hands and we didn’t want to go back and check if perhaps we had been a little too eager in our love. And it also can be true that Night Country was a sloppy, overwrought, overwritten, underwritten, beautifully shot piece of garbage.