Development , showrunner for
True Detective: Night Country Initially,
Nic Pizzolatto was directly involved in a fourth season of
True Detective, but ultimately
Issa López would be selected as showrunner, writing and directing the whole season. Pizzolatto remained as an executive producer, marking his first season without a writing credit. Before the release of the
third season, Pizzolatto explained that he had a "really, really wild" idea for a potential fourth season. After the season finished airing, he explained that he decided to drop his idea, intending to use a new idea after discussing the project with an unnamed actor. In July 2019, Casey Bloys, HBO president of programming, explained that "If Nic has an idea that he is excited about, we will talk about it but not rushing into anything." In January 2020, Pizzolatto signed an overall production deal with
Fox 21 Television Studios and
FX Productions, putting into question his involvement in a potential fourth season. By the next year, HBO began exploring ideas for a fourth season with other writers, including
Lucía Puenzo and
Sam Levinson. Bloys later said, "There's something in the
True Detective area, there's things we're feeling good about. I would say stay tuned on that one." In March 2022, HBO announced that a fourth season had entered into development, which would carry a subtitle,
Night Country, a first for the series. López would write and direct, and also executive produce the season alongside
Barry Jenkins,
Adele Romanski and Mark Ceryak. In June 2022, HBO officially greenlit the season, with López serving as showrunner. When preparing season 4, subtitled
Night Country, director and writer Issa López chose to create a "dark mirror" of the
first season: "Where
True Detective is male and it's sweaty,
Night Country is cold and it's dark and it's female." López has also cited the
Dyatlov Pass incident and
Mary Celeste as inspirations for the season. Another inspiration was
Billie Eilish's 2019 song "
Bury a Friend", which López described as "such a dark, moody, fun, sinister little song that I thought it could absolutely work." It was used to score
Night Countrys title sequence. López started to listen to Eilish during the
COVID-19 lockdown, when she wrote the season, and noticed how similar in theme "Bury a Friend"s lyrics were. In a 2019 interview, Eilish said she wrote the song from the perspective of the
monster under the bed. López was recorded to say "It's perfectly possible that the events of the show happened because I was listening to Billie."
Casting In May 2022,
Jodie Foster was confirmed to star in the season, marking her first adult TV role and her first starring role in a television series since her portrayal of Addie Loggins in
Paper Moon in 1974. Foster described her character, chief Danvers, as awful; an "Alaska
Karen". In June 2022, it was reported that
Kali Reis would join Foster as co-lead, in a role originally conceived as Latina and as a "hardass" military veteran. In September 2022, it was reported that
John Hawkes,
Christopher Eccleston,
Fiona Shaw,
Finn Bennett, and
Anna Lambe would also appear in the season. In October 2022, Aka Niviâna,
Isabella Star LaBlanc and Joel D. Montgrand joined the season. Eccleston stated, "I'd never have taken such a small part if it wasn't for Jodie. [A]ll my scenes are with her, and she's been a heroine of mine for many years."
Filming The season was filmed in
Iceland and
Alaska with a budget of $60 million. Filming began in November 2022 and wrapped in April 2023. The conditions included nighttime shoots at , with director López commenting, "I'm Mexican, so I'm really not fond of the cold." She said that viewers would find the environment authentic "because we were there, because the actors were cold, because the filmmakers were cold." ==Cast==