True Detective Season 4 ending explained

The True Detective Season 4 finale has now aired, so here’s details of who killed Annie K in Night Country, plus what happened to the frozen scientists.

Season 4 of True Detective is the best series since the first, as we wrote in our spoiler-free, five-star review of Night Country.

Jodie Foster and Kali Reis play the detectives in question, investigating two mysteries – the murder of Annie K in the past, and the death of a group of researchers in the present.

Across all six episodes, the two cases have become increasingly intertwined. And now we know how they connect, and who committed the murders. So beware of SPOILERS AHEAD…

True Detective Season 4: What happened to Annie K?

Annie K was stabbed multiple times and her body was mutilated. During the True Detective finale, prime suspect Raymond Clark tells all about how and where that happened.

“She found some notes,” Clark explains to Detectives Danvers and Navarro. “Some scribbles really – and she started to piece together what we were doing.” Turns out that was digging for the DNA of a microorganism in the permafrost. The team had cracked the code – but only when they realized that pollution from the mine helped soften the permafrost, which meant they could extract DNA faster, and with much less damage.

So the scientists were pushing the mine to produce more pollutants – because, as Clark puts it, “the more waste in the water, the more waste in the ground, the better the permafrost was for our work.”

Annie discovered the truth, and started breaking their equipment and destroying their files and all of their work. The seven scientists at TSALAL Station caught her, collectively snapped, and stabbed Annie 32 times. But not Raymond, as it initially looks like he tried to save the woman he loves.

But when Annie survives the attack – and is on the floor gasping for life – Clark finishes the job by strangling Annie to death. Making Raymond Clark her ultimate killer.

What happened to the scientists in Night Country?

Having solved that case, Detective Danvers states this regarding the death of the scientists: “The question isn’t who killed Annie K. It’s who knows who killed her.”

And turns out it was Annie’s community, and the women that work with her at the birthing facility. They discovered the truth, but didn’t report it to the cops, because “it’s always the same story with the same ending – nothing ever happens.”

So Annie’s friends told themselves a different story, with a different ending. One that involved descending on the facility with shotguns, forcing the killers onto the ice, making them remove their clothes, then leaving them to freeze.

But, ultimately, the women believe their deaths were down to Annie’s spirit. As leader Beatrice explains: “If she wanted them, she would take them. If not their clothes were there for them. They’d be half frozen, but they’d survive. But they didn’t though. I guess she wanted to take them. I guess she ate their f**king dreams from the inside out, and spit their frozen bones.”

They all agree that’s just a story, however, and the Detectives leave without making an arrest, declaring the scientist deaths to be down to an avalanche.

What showrunner Issa López says about the True Detective finale

Writer/director/producer/showrunner Issa López has spoken about the fact that Raymond Clark isn’t charged, or found guilty of Annie’s murder.

“It was an homage to many things,” López tells The Hollywood Reporter. “Some of the best Sherlock Holmes stories are the ones where he walks away after he finds the killer, shrugs his shoulders and says, ‘Well, I guess we’ll never know what happened.’ I sadly believe we can’t always expect the establishment’s justice to come and impart justice. So many times, it’s us who have to figure out a way for justice to play.

“I felt that after so many stories where murder and missing Indigenous women are represented, it’s external agents who come and reveal what happened. I thought it would be so interesting to have the women themselves step in and tell the story differently, and give it their own ending.”