True Detective season 3 plays on the real life Dungeons and Dragons panic of the 1980s
The third season of 'True Detective' has reached a crucial stage in its storyline. Although it would be reaching for the stars to say that we know for sure who killed Will and kidnapped Julie, there have been a couple of revelations on the show which could be possible clues.
The most compelling among them are the toys that Wayne Hays (Mahershala Ali) finds in the woods while searching for the kids.
The Arkansas investigator discovers some gaming paraphernalia at a spot in the woods, where he suspects the children met an adult. This adult was possibly the person who could be responsible for the two crimes.
Apart from a doctor's kit and some dolls, Hays finds a board of the popular game Dungeons and Dragons. Viewers today may not find something amiss in the discovery of an innocent seeming game, but if you shine a light on its murky past, there's a good chance that you'll see that writer Nic Pizzolatto is perhaps throwing us a breadcrumb to lead us on the right path. You'll see the connections soon.
Satanic theories behind Dungeons and Dragons
The satanic panic that Dungeons and Dragons set off in the 1980s was huge, and while it may seem archaic now, for the times it was understandable. The game involves participants role-playing different mythical characters - either negative or positive - to ace whatever storyline they invented on the go.
The game, unlike most other board games, didn't have a set of rules that governed how it was played, and naturally ruffled some feathers. What scared some parents and religious groups was the fact that the entire game took place in the minds of the kids, and they had no viable control over the characters their children were portraying. No wonder religious groups declared it to be satanic.
While role playing games had been around for ages, Dungeons and Dragons took the fancy of American kids on a wide level and gained much popularity around 1974. It appealed to adolescents perhaps because of just how much of an imaginative escape it was (Remember the internet wasn't around then and TV wasn't beaming thousands of channels into our homes).
It is also worth noting that this time period in American history was testing the moral belief systems of its citizens in a big way. Ted Bundy, Charles Manson, Son of Sam murders, the Hillside Strangler murder, John Wayne Gacy, the killer clown, were phrases that permeated the everyday consciousness of Americans, who tried to make sense of these macabre killings and killers.
The lack of a viable explanation in most cases had everyone looking for someone or something to blame.
Created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson in 1974, Dungeons and Dragons soon became the convenient peg on which to hang any mysterious murder or dissapearance -- though with no valid evidence for any connection.
It started with the disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III in 1979. A child prodigy, the teenager mysteriously disappeared from his room at Michigan State University.
A private investigator, William Dear, was hired by James's parents to find their son. Dear declared that the disappearance was connected to the game.
"There was a cardboard with a series of tacks," he told the New York Times much later, recalling the time he went to the 16-year-old boy's dorm room. He also recalled in the interview that although he did not know what he was getting into, he believed that it had something to do with the game.
"You're leaving the world of reality and entering the world of fantasy. It advocated murder, decapitation. This isn't a healthy game," he continued.
Two days after Dear set foot in James' dorm room, he got a call and the missing student was found. However, the teenager wasn't able to tell him much. He also didn't find proof linking the incident to the game. Soon after, James committed suicide.
Media outlets implied that it was somehow related to the game, especially after Dear wrote a book titled, 'The Dungeon Master: The Disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III'.
Game co-creator Gygax slammed the book saying that the private eye was using the incident for personal gain. "It was a witch hunt," he said at the time, and he seemed to have a point.
Then in 1982, high school student Irving Lee Pulling died after shooting himself in the chest. He was said to have been a kid who didn't really fit in - but his mother Patricia Pulling believed her son's suicide was caused by him playing the fantasy board game.
Pulling was so convinced of this that she even advocated the banning of the game. She spearheaded the campaign 'Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons' (BADD) in 1983 that propagated that the game was trapping teens between 11-17 years of age into satanism and called for its ban.
A handbook was handed out to police, pastors, parents, teachers, and librarians to help them deal with the problem. She also claimed that she was an expert on occult crimes and was helping police with murder investigations with satanic links.
Appalled by this movement, author Michael Stackpole published an investigative piece on BADD and Patricia Pulling called The Pulling Report.
In it, he said, "In her pursuit of a grand Satanic conspiracy – the same one she ultimately holds responsible for the suicide death of her son – she has engaged in unethical and illegal practices. Her methods and tactics, at their very best, taint any evidence she might offer and, at their worst, construct a monster where none exists."
However, the panic didn't disappear immediately. It was as though one part of the population wanted it banned and the other part wanted it bad - the sales of the game produced by Tactical Study Rules Inc skyrocketed.
Along with the popularity of the game, ran a parallel dread of the game that linked it to a wide variety of crimes. There were claims that said the game promoted "homosexuality, rape, sodomy and perverse acts of sexuality," according to a report in Daily Trojan published on October 8, 1981.
The report also said that "evangelical groups threatened to buy all the games and burn them if the stores did not stop stocking them."
The groups also claimed that when they put the sixes involved in the pieces of the game into the incinerator, "screams would come out."
There were also tall claims made about it propagating satanism, suicide, and sorcery. Infact, D&D was dragged in front of the court as the cause of crimes in many cases.
It was suggested that Darren Molitor, who was convicted of first-degree murder in 1985, killed due to the influence of the game.
Thomas Radecki testified, unsuccessfully, that the game had made him kill. In fact, he also testified in at least 12 other cases putting the blame on the game, all unsuccessfully.
Another interesting case at the time was Dr. Amy Bishop's murder spree, which was said to have happened under the influence of the game. The claim fell apart when evidence was brought into the picture, of course.
Though no concrete links were ever established between the game and the crimes where it was cited as an influence, it's notoriety followed it right till very recently.
In 2010, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld a ban on the game by the Waupun Correctional Institution, with Captain Muraski, the institution's gang specialist, claiming that the game made the inmates violent and hostile while inculcating in them a want to escape.
The missing kids in the Ozarks...
While the facts of the story seem to thwart any angles of superstition, one must remember that 'True Detective's tone this season is very much like the slow burner first season starring McMatthew McConaughey.
There is an eerie occult tone to the proceedings, and the atmosphere of the 1980s is pretty much evident in the settings and ambience.
Two children disappear out of the blue, and the first thing preliminary investigations uncover is a Dungeons and Dragons board? Co-incidence? Probably not.
Will's body was also found looking like the killer was paying homage to his first communion, so there's a possibility that we are looking at an individual or group that desperately wants to spread fear with religious connotations.
Also, notice how the teens in Devil's Den were wearing Black Sabbath T-shirts and wearing their hair long? Is it just a McGuffin, or is there a significance to this seemingly innocent piece of attire? If there is, don't be surprised and say we didn't warn you. Time is a flat circle here.
Catch the fourth episode of 'True Detective' on January 27 at 9 pm on HBO.
