Zahn McClarnon feels the heat in Dark Winds third season trailer

Lt. Joe Leaphorn (Zahn McClarnon) is haunted in the Dark Winds third season trailer. Are the monsters he's chasing real? Are they just nightmares? Or is he, himself, the monster he fears most? If the trailer is anything to go by, the answer may be all of the above—as we'll find out when the series returns to AMC on March 9. 

Dark Winds is adapted from Tony Hillerman's Leaphorn & Chee novels. This season pulls elements from multiple books, including Dance Hall Of The Dead ("an early Hillerman novel that many, including our co-producer George R.R. Martin, consider his finest," according to showrunner John Wirth) and The Silent Pig. In the expanded eight-episode upcoming season, Leaphorn and Chee (Kiowa Gordon) investigate the disappearance of two young boys, while Bernadette Manuelito (Matten) stumbles across a conspiracy in her new job at Border Patrol. After the kiss between Bernadette and Chee at the end of the second season, there'll be plenty of "yearning" between the two, Wirth promised in a recent interview with The A.V. Club. 



That yearning is felt in the Dark Winds third season trailer as Bernadette and Chee both lay down on their beds hundreds of miles apart. But they've got their hands full with new mysteries and new characters on the scene. That includes FBI agent Sylvia Washington (Jenna Elfman), who ominously tells Leaphorn, "You spent your life helping others. But your life is a lie." Wirth told The A.V. Club that Elfman's character is "kind of like Colombo": "She takes up residence at the tribal police station. The guys think she doesn’t have any ball and they’ll tolerate her, but eventually realize she’s savvy." He added that Elfman and McClarnon "have tense scenes where suddenly he’s the antagonist because he becomes a suspect for her." Sounds like the monsters will be unmasked—whoever they may be.