HBO's 'True Detective': A murky mystery, bogged down in a swamp

"True Detective," an eight-part crime drama premiering on HBO Sunday night, is a beguiling and moody mess, a narcotic with nearly no addictive effects. It fixates on the familiar, sullen murkiness similar to recent procedurals ("The Killing" and "Broadchurch," for example) and adds several more layers of its own artistic yet unfulfilling murk. Early on, one of the main characters, played by Matthew McConaughey, asks a prostitute if she can score him some quaaludes. "I don't sleep," he explains. ...