If I were asked to condense the entire era of prestige television — all its plots, moods, tropes and aesthetics — for time travelers from an entirely different entertainment era, I’d probably have them sit down and watch the first season of “True Detective,” the eight episodes starring Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey during his “McConaisance” career phase of perfect role selection. In those eight-odd hours of television drama from 2014, you can see almost all the distinctive features of prestige TV as we’ve known it for the past 25-odd years. Like many prestige-era shows, the original “True Detective” is a dark reworking of a traditional American genre, in this case the police procedural in which odd-couple detective partners turn out to be perfect for each other. It’s a small-screen story that draws a lot of oomph from casting marquee big-screen actors. It’s a drama pitched to blue-state HBO subscribers that’s set somewhere “out there,” beyond the creative-class cosmopolis, where liberal modernity seemingly dissolves back into violence and primitivism.

---

Persons: I’d, Woody Harrelson, Matthew McConaughey, ”, It’s, it’s, HBO Davids, Chase, Milch, Simon — it’s, Nic Pizzolatto, Cary Joji Fukunaga Organizations: HBO Locations: American