True Detective type TV Show network HBO genre Crime

A long, long time ago, when the star of Dallas Buyers Club was just a slip of a McConaughey, he made his onscreen debut in an episode of Unsolved Mysteries.

McConaughey played Larry Dickens, a heroic young man who confronts a pedophile and ends up being shot 14 times for his trouble. Also, his character’s mother is called Dorothy Lang. Hmm — McConaughey going up against a sex offender, a name that’s thisclose to Dora Lange… sounds a lot like HBO’s True Detective, doesn’t it? There’s even a red pickup truck! (And, yes, strategic shirtlessness; once a McConaughey, always a McConaughey.)

But here’s the weirdest part: True Detective creator Nic Pizzolatto didn’t know anything about McConaughey’s earlier credit until moments ago.

“What?!?!? Had NO IDEA such a thing existed,” Pizzolatto told EW’s Jeff Jensen via email. “McConaughey never said anything about it, so he must not’ve remembered. That’s like eerie coincidence number #50. We’re in a hall of mirrors now, men…”

So like, this means time really is a flat circle — right?

Actually, maybe not. UPDATE! The folks at True Detective HQ are thinking this video can’t be totally legit. A theory: Perhaps some clever True Detective fan added the “Dora Lang” identification, though no one there has seen the original episode of Unsolved Mysteries to know for sure. (By the way, neither have we.) “We’re thinking it must be. It’s too much of a coincidence,” writes Pizzolatto via email. “But yeah, that must be a hoax. If it’s not, it’s some unthinkably improbable coincidence.”