A True Detective Fan Theory Predicts A Surprising Killer

Five years after True Detective’s critically acclaimed third season, the HBO crime anthology is back with another dark mystery, and this time, it takes place during the polar night. True Detective: Night Country follows detectives Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) as they investigate the bizarre deaths of researchers in small-town Ennis, Alaska.

True Detective: Night Country is inspired by several real-life, unexplained mysteries, showrunner Issa López told Vanity Fair — the 1952 Dyatlov Pass incident, and the 1872 disappearance of the Mary Celeste crew. But don’t expect those stories to help you figure out the ending because they’re unresolved.

The series will put “everything on the table,” López said, so that viewers can piece together an answer. And that’s exactly what fans are doing — with several rallying around a specific Reddit theory on who the killer might be.

Is Navarro The Killer?

Reddit user u/4rustybrain posits that Navarro is behind the very crimes she’s investigating, operating under an altar ego named Sedna.

Sedna is the Inuit sea goddess who can control marine animals — and as the Redditor points out, Navarro’s first conversation in Episode 1 is about local crab numbers.

Sedna was referenced in Episode 1, when Peter Prior’s son showed him a drawing of a woman with her fingers cut off. According to legend, Sedna’s fingers were cut off by her father — and López seemed to acknowledge on Instagram that, yes, the drawing represented the mythological figure. Navarro encountered a woman missing fingers herself, which the fan suggested could “signify Navarro’s true identity.”

The Redditor added that other characters have questioned who Navarro is several times, which may also leave viewers questioning her. According to the theory, the detective might have killed the researchers to avenge the murder of Annie, whose case has remained unsolved.

A Season 1 Throwback

True Detective has teased the killer with a drawing before (remember the “spaghetti monster” from Season 1?), so it’s not difficult to imagine the show taking a similar route in Night Country.

López wanted this installment to be a “dark mirror” of Season 1, per Vanity Fair. But this time around, she’s making sure all the clues are available on screen. And it sounds like some of them might be hiding in plain sight. López said that the person or characters who committed the crime “are right there in front of you through the entire series.”

That would certainly track with Navarro being involved with the killings.