True Detective: Night Country – Season 4 Episode 5 Recap & Review

Part 5

True Detective: Night Country Episode 5 begins on New Year’s Eve, with Navarro retrieving Julia’s ashes from the crematorium. 

Meanwhile, Danvers is interrogating Otis about what he knew about Raymond Clark. Otis tells Danvers that Raymond asked him how he survived his horrific injuries and mentioned an awakening, as well as the Night Country coming up again. Danvers demands that Otis tell her the details of the injuries he got on that day, and Otis tells her he and a few other men were trapped in the ice because the ground beneath them had completely caved in.

Otis tried to get help, but he was caught in a blizzard, when he heard screaming, which caused all the men to move towards it. Otis tried to prevent them but blacked out. He regained consciousness in a hospital. Danvers asks him to mark the entry points of the cave system. He tells her she can’t go there alone and Danvers tells him he’s going with her. However, Otis won’t work for nothing and demands heroin in return, but Danvers tells him she can’t provide that. 

Things go from bad to worse for Pete as Kayla tells him to leave after packing his bags for him. Pete goes to Hank’s house to ask if he can stay with him. Danvers and Navarro reach the spot that Otis marked on the map, but the entry point has been shut off with the help of explosives.

Leah is at Silversky Mining with the other protestors. A fight breaks out, and the police arrive: Navarro notices someone getting heavy-handed with Leah so she punches him to protect her. She calls Danvers to ask what to do with her, to which she tells her to bring her in to the police station to teach her a lesson. Elsewhere, Danvers receives a call from Connelly asking her to show up at Silversky Mining for a meeting with him and Kate to discuss the riot. 

Back at the station, Pete informs Danvers that Tuttle United is funding both Silversky Mining and Tsalal. Silversky and Tsalal being funded by the same company causing a potential conflict of interest, and a possible motive for them being involved in Annie Kowtok’s death if she was onto them about the pollution. 

Danvers heads to Silversky Mining and gives the files on Tuttle, Silversky, and Tsalal to Navarro to investigate further. The meeting between Katie, Connelly and Danvers doesn’t go well as Connelly is furious with Danvers for going to the exploded entry point, which is on Silversky property. He tells her to stop trying to link Annie Kowtok’s death to the Tsalal scientists.

Danvers tells Connolly that Silversky and Tsalal are funded by the same parent organisation. Connelly then randomly brings up William Wheeler’s murder-suicide and claims he didn’t die by suicide, and then tells Danvers he is shutting the whole investigation down. 

Kate meets with Hank to discuss a way to deal with Otis Heiss because he will uncover everything when he leads Danvers to the mine where Annie was potentially killed or abducted. Hank hints that he was the one who moved Annie’s body in exchange for becoming the chief of police. But obviously, this didn’t happen because Danvers showed up. Kate promises Hank he’ll get another shot at it if he deals with Otis.

Meanwhile, Qavvik returns the rock with the spiral on it to Navarro and his friend Kenny tells her that it’s a marker for spots in the ice where it’s weak and it can breaks and leads to an access point to the caves: The Night Country. 

Navarro tells Danvers about it but she shuts her down, informing her that the case is over. Navarro tells Danvers that Annie’s death is on her shoulders now.  Navarro then frees Leah from her holding cell and tells her to go home. With help from Rose, Navarro puts Julia’s ashes in the sea, but a hallucination almost gets her killed but Rose reaches out to save her.

Danvers has a change of heart about the investigation, and decides to take Otis out of the clinic to look into the entry points of the caves. She brings him some heroin from the evidence room to get him to comply. Danvers notices that Hank is watching her every move and is getting a bad vibe about things.

She asks Pete to come into her office with his laptop. Turns out, Pete has been looking into the murder-suicide of William Wheeler and has figured out that Danvers and Navarro killed Wheeler and made it look like a murder-suicide. Unfortunately, Hank accessed Pete’s laptop and found the investigation and told Connelly about it.

Connolly then used the information to shut down the case. Danvers tells Pete to move out of Hank’s house and move into the shack behind her house, and Pete takes her up on the offer and turns up there and settles in. 

Danvers takes Otis to her house and tells Navarro to join her there. Otis marks the safest and easiest way to enter the caves (The Night Country) and once he does this, Danvers hands him the heroin and he goes into the bathroom to smoke it. Hank turns up at Danvers’ house claiming he’s been ordered to pick Otis up.

When Otis tries to run, Hank shoots and kills him. He turns the gun on Danvers, but Pete comes in with his gun, and Hank tries to plead with his son. Danvers tells Pete to think carefully before doing anything. Hank reveals he was the person who moved Annie Kowtok’s body, which prompts Pete to shoot him as he raises his gun to kill Danvers. 

The episode ends with Navarro turning up at the house and she tells Danvers they need to get to the caves because there’s evidence there that Kate is trying to cover up. She tells Pete to clean up the mess and take the bodies to Rose. Danvers and Navarro get in the car and head to the caves.

The Episode Review

The penultimate episode in Season 4 of True Detective is quite riveting as more of the pieces of the puzzle fit together. There are some powerful scenes involving Jodie Foster’s character Liz Danvers, but the supporting cast around her are every bit as good.

There is a lot to cram into the final episode next week, but it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if there were some things left unexplained as that is totally in keeping with the True Detective world.