True Detective Season Two: Was Ray Velcoro Set-up?

Something major happened on last Sunday’s episode of True Detective. If you haven’t seen it already, well, this post is going to spoil it like crazy. If you have seen it or just don’t care about that sort of thing, feel free to proceed. Things are going to get weird.

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At the end of the second episode of True Detective season two, Detective Ray Velcoro was shot twice by a man dressed in black and wearing a crow mask. The second shot was point-blank. But with that said, we’re pretty sure that Velcoro will live to fight (and drink) another day.

Semyon is not a trust-worthy guy; he’s a criminal, just like Velcoro is

Let’s talk about the events that lead up to the now infamous scene. The address that Velcoro goes to is given to him by Frank Semyon. Semyon is not a trust-worthy guy; he’s a criminal, just like Velcoro is. But he seems to have a soft-spot for Velcoro. Either that, or he likes having a detective in his pocket.

Perhaps both.

Semyon does, however, refer to Velcoro as a “burnout,” and can be seen becoming frustrated with him on a couple of occasions. Suspicions automatically fall to Semyon in the case of a set-up since he’s the one that supplied the information, but it could go a bit deeper than that.

The entire situation could be a set-up that doesn’t involve Semyon. It would not be out of line for True Detective to be tricky in that way. True Detective conspiracies run deep, as can be seen in the first season when the detectives are trying to track down the Yellow King in the second half.

When Velcoro arrives at the house, the camera pans over to a car across the street. This is not the car that Velcoro arrived in, and is ostensibly shown to hint that either he may have been followed or is being watched. It’s a very True Detective thing to do.

When he walks in the house, there is a pool of what appears to be fresh blood. Yet Velcoro holsters his gun after seeing it, as if he’s convinced there isn’t any danger. That doesn’t make much sense, as music playing and blood would usually indicate the presence of a person.

A person that you likely don’t want to be involved with.

The situation feels as if he was prepared for the shooting, though didn’t know all the details.

But Velcoro proceeds calmly. Assuming he’s alive, he also would have to have been wearing a bullet-proof vest. The situation feels as if he was prepared for the shooting, though didn’t know all the details. In either scenario, being set-up or participant in a set-up, it’s obvious that there is something going on here. Things are not as they seem.

True Detective season two is slowly building a web, and the crow men are certainly part of it. But for all we know, so are Semyon and perhaps Velcoro. Caspere’s death is causing a lot of trouble for Frank, but that doesn’t mean he’s not associated with the crow men in some way.

It’s unlikely that the shooting of Velcoro was a straightforward murder attempt; someone is in on something. It’s only a matter of time until we can piece it together. Still, if Velcoro survives this, it will be too soon to pat him on the back without knowing more.

You can watch a clip of the shooing below. Put your detective hats on, people.

Next: Ray Velcoro is not dead.

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