HBO has big night planned Sunday

Lacey Terrell/HBO/TNS
Colin Farrell in “True Detective,” Season 2.

[box_info]

“True Detective,” 2.5 stars, 8 p.m. Central, Sunday

“Ballers,” 2 stars, 9 p.m. Sunday

“The Brink,” 2 stars, 9:30 p.m. Sunday

[/box_info]

By Gail Pennington

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

HBO has a big night planned for viewers on Sunday, serving up two premieres and a big return in an attempt to make sure nobody feels the loss of “Game of Thrones,” which ended its season last Sunday along with “Silicon Valley” and “Veep.”

But the satisfaction is limited. Season 2 of “True Detective” is as slow as molasses, and just as dark, in its first hours. And while the two new comedies that follow, “Ballers” and “The Brink,” have their moments, neither provides a lot of laughs.

In its first season, “True Detective” gave us movie stars (Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson) slumming, plus oddball humor and a weird, twisty crime. Only Harrelson’s all-in performance as quotable philosopher-cop Martin Hart really held up through all eight episodes, but “True Detective” creator Nic Pizzolatto deserved all the acclaim he got for essentially reinventing “Dragnet.”

Season 2, again written entirely by Pizzolatto, starts fresh, anthology style, with a new setting (Southern California) and new crime.

This time, the cast is even more star-heavy: Vince Vaughn as a white-collar criminal, Colin Farrell as a police detective with a drinking problem, Rachel McAdams as a sheriff’s deputy with family complications, and Taylor Kitsch as a motorcycle cop with anger issues.

The first hour is taken up mainly with introductions, and the characters rarely interact.

Vaughn, as Frank Semyon, tries to push a land deal through. Farrell, as Detective Ray Velcoro, struggles with a bullied son who might not be his and hits people whenever he gets a chance. McAdams, as Ani Bezzerides, confronts her father, leader of a mumbo-jumbo retreat, for his neglect. Kitsch (Riggins on “Friday Night Lights”), as CHiP Paul Woodrugh, rides fast and gets suspended.

Only in the final scene do three cops come together, after a grisly discovery beside a Los Angeles highway. That gets the plot rolling, but even so, it’s both a struggle and a bit of a yawn.

Following “True Detective” is “Ballers,” a sports comedy (dramedy is more like it) that’s as loud as its lead-in is muted.

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, as a former NFL star trying to reinvent himself as a financial manager for young players, is outstanding, easily the best thing about “Ballers.”

Johnson’s Spencer Strasmore has a lot to deal with. His own finances are pinched, and he’s reluctant to lean on friendships to get clients. Plus, despite his outward good cheer, he’s in pain from an old injury that has him gobbling pills.

Spencer wants to help young players avoid the mistakes he made, but they are almost universally self-destructive, seemingly determined to live fast and die young.

The most talented, and biggest problem, is Ricky Jerret, (John David Washington), whose fists fly too readily and land him in hot water early on. Rob Corddry plays Spencer’s jerky boss at the financial firm.

Set in Miami, “Ballers” is good at showing both the shiny high life of professional athletes and its dark, sad underbelly. But if you’re looking for laughs, keep looking.

The other new HBO comedy is “The Brink,” a political satire with Jack Black heading a cast that includes Tim Robbins, Pablo Schreiber, John Larroquette and Aasif Mandvi. The creators, brothers Roberto and Kim Benabib, have suggested that, if the show succeeds, each season will deal with a different political crisis around the world, one sending us to “the brink” of destruction.

First up, the crisis is in Pakistan, where Black is serving in the foreign service under Secretary of State Robbins, a drunken lout whose sex fantasies involve his own death. Black’s Alex Talbot couldn’t care less about politics, or Pakistan; he just wants to score drugs. And speaking of drugs, Navy pilot Zeke “Z-Pak” Tilson (Schreiber) is scoring them from his ex-wife back home and selling them to his shipmates.

Via his driver (Mandvi, who is wonderful), Alex gets information that might save the world, if he cares enough to follow through. When you think about it, that’s funny.

All three series, of course, are full of nudity, sex and strong language. This isn’t TV; it’s HBO.