Our Biggest Unanswered Questions After ‘True Detective’ Season 4

Editor’s note: The below contains spoilers for True Detective: Night Country.

The Big Picture

• Strange occurrences in Ennis may be linked to human interference with nature, triggering a supernatural response.
• Navarro’s fate remains mysterious — she may be alive helping native women or have ventured into another realm.
• Annie K’s tongue at Tsalal could have been placed by a supernatural entity or Annie herself seeking justice post-mortem.

The finale of True Detective: Night Country came with the answers we sought — but not all of them. Over the season’s six episodes, Chief Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Trooper Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) face the darkness in the Ennis winter to discover who killed Annie Kowtok (Nivi Pedersen) and the Tsalal Station scientists, uncovering mysteries that go way deeper than just people being killed. Still, some season-long questions are purposely left open, giving the audience a lot of food for thought after the season finale. These are the burning (or, better yet, the freezing) questions that remain, from the nature of Ennis and its supernatural elements to the backstories of Danvers and Navarro.

Why Are There So Many Strange Things Happening in Ennis?

The supernatural element of Night Country has led to many debates during the season since True Detective is usually a more grounded show. However, strange things are always going on in Ennis, Alaska. People have visions, are visited by ghosts, and see into other planes of existence. Most of it can be rationalized as being the effects of medication, polluted water from Silver Sky Mine, or simply stress and PTSD, but people like Navarro and Rose Aguineau (Fiona Shaw) are really open to the supernatural and see things other people don’t, and even the super skeptical Danvers gets her moments.

This is likely a symptom of Ennis’ deep connection with nature. That’s a place where natural forces are so strong, that light and dark literally have to take turns and weigh over people’s behavior. When Bee (L’xeis Diane Benson) explains to Danvers and Navarro what happened to the Tsalal scientists, she talks about a female entity being responsible for their deaths; nature itself. While it may also be related to the large serpent-like skeleton in the Tsalal Station underground (the so-called “night country” itself), there are hints that it’s actually an imbalance caused by human interference. The caribou leaping to their deaths in Episode 1 and the extreme blizzard that kills the scientists seem to be the primary examples.

In a perfect metaphor for colonization, Tsalal and the mine come along and tamper with life and the natural order of things — Tsalal is researching the permafrost for microorganisms that can extend the average human lifespan, while the mine is poisoning the native population by polluting the water. In this context, the spiral is a symbol of this natural power that gets appropriated and subverted by colonization. Ennis is already a place where “the world comes apart at the seams,” according to Rose, and all that is surely enough to trigger a natural — or supernatural — response from the land itself.

What Happened to Navarro?

After the deaths of the Tsalal scientists and Annie K are clarified and light comes back to Ennis, Navarro is shown walking into the cold wilderness and vanishing, as Danvers tells the investigators that she thinks they “won’t find her in the ice.” The way things are presented makes a lot of people think that Navarro might indeed be dead, but things Ennis are never so straightforward, so there are many theories about what could have happened to Navarro.

First, Navarro could be alive, just venturing into the wilderness to reach remote villages and communities to help other native women avoid the fates of her sister Julia (Aka Niviâna) and Annie K. In Episode 3, she also mentions how her mother was abused by her father, causing the girls to move back to Alaska from Boston. Protecting native women is a noble cause and one that’s dear to Navarro, and not something she is completely able to do while working for the police, unfortunately.

The second theory, however, suggests that Navarro may indeed have ventured into a different plane of existence. This is supported by her supernatural abilities and the fact that she has seen such realms. In the finale, Danvers even has her promise to “come back” if she ever decides to do this, to which she agrees. The final frame shows them reuniting in a cabin, but there is a line separating them, implying they may indeed be in the same physical place, but on different planes.

How Did Annie K’s Tongue Show Up at Tsalal?

When Bee tells Navarro that Annie K’s tongue is not part of their story, the immediate impulse is to question who did it, then. That’s not the right question, though. In a GQ interview, Hank Prior actor John Hawkes all but confirms that Hank cut out Annie’s tongue as a message to the native population to stop protesting against the mine. In Episode 5, Hank even admits to having moved Annie’s body. But how could it have made its way to Tsalal when the scientists were killed? Per a Business Insider interview, Night Country creator Issa López adds, “There are many ways that tongue could have ended up there. Some of them are natural and some of them are not.”

On a more rational theory, Bee and her partners could have taken it, and she simply lied about it to Navarro. It doesn’t sound likely, though. For this one, a supernatural theory sounds more correct. It’s important to notice that Navarro is the one who found Annie’s tongue, that she knew and respected Annie, and also is open to the supernatural. With ghosts roaming around Ennis in the darkness of winter, it doesn’t sound strange at all that Annie herself could have placed her tongue at the crime scene for Navarro to find and connect both cases. Annie deserved justice, and that’s about the only way she could get it. Another possibility is the supernatural entity that Bee talks about, the female entity that killed the scientists to avenge Annie’s (“her daughter”) death. Still, Annie seems like someone who prefers to take matters into her own hands.

What Does the One-Eyed Polar Bear Represent?

Among the supernatural visions characters often have, a recurrent one is a one-eyed polar bear. This is only seen by Danvers and Navarro both as a plushie and as the animal itself roaming the streets of Ennis. Interestingly, it never attacks them, and instead just gets close enough for them to see it lacks an eye and then wanders away. These visions are related to Danvers’ backstory. Years before the events of Night Country, she had a romantic relationship with Leah’s (Isabella LaBlanc) biological father, Jake Peterson (Svend Hardenberg). Together, they had a son, Holden (Inuik Lee Nielsen Shapiro), who died as a child. Liz and Holden used to play together while listening to “Twist and Shout,” and Holden would cover up one of his eyes and say “I see you!” His favorite was the polar bear plushie. Another hint is how there are many single eyes drawn in the rooms where Liz and Navarro are standing.

What Happened to Oliver Tagaq?

In Episode 3, Danvers and Navarro drive to a remote nomad community in the wilderness in search of Oliver Tagaq (Lance Karmer), who used to be an equipment engineer at Tsalal Station. He left his job before Annie’s murder, but could still be a valuable lead. He is incredibly hostile towards the detectives and shows contempt when Navarro says she doesn’t know her Iñupiaq name. Later, when they go back to the community to pay Tagaq another visit, he has vanished, leaving only a spiral drawing behind. Tagaq’s disappearance is neither inquired about nor investigated, but, as someone who used to work at Tsalal, it makes sense that he would want to vanish when the station is being investigated. After all, they provided fraudulent data to support the mine pollution of the Ennis water system.

All six episodes of True Detective: Night Country are now streaming on Max.

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