Jodie Foster's True Detective season switches up sun-baked setting for Alaskan Night Country mystery

Welcome to Night Country.

After it was revealed that two-time Oscar winner and Emmy nominee Jodie Foster would be starring in True Detective season 4, breathing new life into the long-dormant drama series, HBO divulged new details on the next mystery.

With Issa López now at the helm as a quadruple threat (showrunner, director, writer, and executive producer), the new season officially received a series order and will be titled True Detective: Night Country, which is the first time a season has been given a subtitle. And instead of tapping another sun-baked American setting like Louisiana (season 1), California (season 2), or the Ozarks (season 3), the show will now shoot in Iceland to evoke an Alaskan setting.

This will be the Ice season of a series of Ice and Fire.

Foster will star as Detective Liz Danvers opposite the newly announced professional boxer and indie actress Kali Reis (Catch the Fair One) as Detective Evangeline Navarro. The new mystery surrounds the mysterious disappearance of the six men who operate the Tsalal Arctic Research Station in Ennis, Alaska one long winter night. Danvers and Navarro "will have to confront the darkness they carry in themselves, and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice," reads a plot synopsis.

Daniele Venturelli/WireImage; Frazer Harrison/Getty Images Jodie Foster and Kali Reis star in 'True Detective: Night Country,' which is set in Alaska

"We are tremendously excited to return to the True Detective franchise and to be working with the multi-talented Issa López, whose singular vision for her Night Country installment will be beautifully realized with Jodie Foster and Kali Reis in the starring roles," said Francesca Orsi, executive vice president of HBO programming.

Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson starred in the first season of True Detective, which helped launch the "McConaissance" in 2014. Colin Farrell, Rachel McAdams, Vince Vaughn, and Taylor Kitsch headlined season 2 in 2014; and Mahershala Ali then starred in season 3, which aired on HBO in 2019. So it's been a while since we've heard any official movement on another installment.

True Detective: Night Country marks a new era for the drama. Writer and series creator Nico Pizzolatto was heavily involved in all three previous seasons. He's still attached to season 4 as an executive producer, but this new Alaskan story seems to be the brainchild of López.

Pizzolatto had struck a new deal with FX in 2020 with plans to reteam with McConaughey on a show called Redeemer, but that has since been canceled and The Hollywood Reporter reported last year that the writer was looking to get out of his deal with the network early.

Also executive producing True Detective: Night Country are Foster, McConaughey, Harrelson, Barry Jenkins, Adele Romanski, Mark Ceryak, Alan Page Arriaga (who's also writing for the series), Mari Jo Winkler, and True Detective director Cary Joji Fukunaga.

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