Kastanjemanden (2021-2026)

Where S1 of The Killing kept us glued to the tube for twenty episodes at the time, The Chestnut Man comes to the point in six episodes. Danish-made, top actors and here too a missing girl. The Chestnut Man is a well-crafted classic Nordic Noir thriller. Which while formulaic, is quite exciting.

However, there are quite a few points deductions. First of all, the sleuth duo. I don't know who feels a little chemistry with them, but I don't. Naia Thulin (Danica Curcic) is quite er... ordinary. Definitely not Sarah Lund, Sofia Karppi or Saga Norèn. We can't all wear a glitzy sweater or be flawed as a main character, I get that. But Curcic falls short as lead. Olivia Colman could also be your neighbor in Broadchurch, but just a charismatic neighbor. To be fair, the script doesn't give Curcic many options. Colleague Mark Hess (Mikkel Boe Folsgaard) gets more relief, although Hess (only surnames, huh) remains mostly mysterious. In addition, the light has been turned off in every place. You are constantly looking at a dark screen, and that quickly becomes exciting; do I see the denouement?

Enough criticism. The Chestnut Man looks nice, has a nice plot and is of familiar Danish quality.

Translated from Dutch · View original

Because of Forbrydelsen and Broen I did become a fan of the Scandinavian 'dark noir', but with this series I got the feeling that I was starting to get a bit satiated. We've all seen it before, a female director with relationship issues and a male director with a tragic past, but somehow it felt very formulaic and worse here not too intrusive yet. It looks nice, but 2 weeks after I finished the series, I notice that it has not really made a lasting impression.

Translated from Dutch · View original