I've always been a big fan of Nordic Noir. That might seem a bit unusual for a bigger lifelong fan of science fiction, as well as an author of science fiction novels and stories. But the two genres are close cousins -- if detective mysteries are whodunnits, science fiction can be aptly read and seen as whatdunnits -- and some authors combined the two genres, as Isaac Asimov astutely did with his robot detective novels (I took a crack at that genre blend as well, with my Phil D'Amato stories and novels).
But Nordic Noir -- which can be geographically identified as stories that take place in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland -- has a special zing, a platter of gruesome crimes, investigated by slightly cracked but brilliant detectives who also manage to have a wicked sense of humor. Dept Q., which takes place in Scotland, has all of these characteristics in gleaming pitch black spades.
The TV series, which debuted on Netflix at the end of May, is based on a series of novels by the Danish author Jussi Adler-Olsen. My wife and I binged the nine episodes over several evenings concluding last night. (Is watching nine episodes over several nights rather than in one sitting aptly termed "binging"? You tell me. I will say thanks Netflix for putting all episodes up at once, which permits binging, whatever exactly that means.)
The transplantation to Scotland works great -- it is, after all, in the northern part of the British Isles, and many of the characters have Nordic names. The cold case team that investigates the disappearance of Prosecutor Merritt Lingard is, as per Nordic Noir protocols, a group not of three misfits, but of deeply wounded, highly talented people. DCI Carl Morck was nearly killed in a previous case that left one of his partners (James Hardy) unable to walk, and killed another. Akram Salim is a Syrian immigrant with a calm Sherlockian logic and demeanor and a harrowing past (one of my favorite characters now in any series). And DC Rose Dickson is on desk duty at the beginning of the series, traumatized because she accidentally killed an elderly couple with her car. See what I mean about deeply wounded?
And to make matters worse for our characters, but better for the series, they're actually embroiled in one way or another in at least three horrendous cases: the disappearance of the prosecutor, the shooting that hit Morck (he's physically healed but psychologically struggling), and the case that Lingard tried and lost before she disappeared (in which a man who probably killed his wife was found not guilty). And indeed there are all kinds of other murders that come to light as the story proceeds, propelled by gunfire, tempestuous family relationships, various kinds of romance, dreams, and a hyperbaric chamber.
The great story is served by memorable acting, with Matthew Goode as Morck, Alexej Manvelov as Salim, Leah Byrne as Dickson, Jamie Sives as Hardy, and Chloe Pirrie as Lingard. And hats off to Scott Frank and Elisa Amoruso for inspired directing. I give Dept. Q my highest recommendation and can't wait to see more.
Continuing our binge watching of superb Scandinavian crime drama (aptly known as Nordic Noir) on Netflix, we caught a trilogy of movies, based on the novels of Jussi Adler-Olsen - The Keeper of Lost Causes (2013), The Absent One (2014) and A Conspiracy of Faith (2016). This Department Q Trilogy, as these novels and movies are known, was flat-out superb!
We've seen a fair number of "cold case" television series in the past few years, mostly from England and the U.S. But these Department Q tales have something more, in terms of intensity and originality of characters, and depth of stories, which range from a woman kidnapped and held in a pressure chamber for several years, to a group of rich kids in school gone very wrong, to a faith-based psycho. The last two themes are also familiar, but there's nothing familiar about the way they're laid out and developed in these three memorable movies.
The cast is completely unknown to me and I suspect most American viewers, with the exception of Fares Fares, who played a small but pivotal role in the late, lamented Tyrant on FX. He's even better in the Department Q trilogy, playing Assad, the partner of Carl, also well played by Nikolaj Lie Kaas. Carl is on the verge of being burned out, for a variety of reasons. His boss barely tolerates him, and he has no luck with women. But he has a heart of a gold and an indomitable spirit, and is exactly the kind of detective you'd want on your side if your case or cause was hopeless.
