I enjoyed the first half of this series, and if my review was based on that alone it would be higher (this is based on season 1 - I haven't seen the second one yet).
It starts off with a local Laplander police woman finding a Russian prostitute held in captivity and a body buried in the snow outside. Off the back of this, a virus is discovered and a German virologist is brought in to help identify the source and who has been infected. Ultimately, this leads to a much greater conspiracy involving some military types and shenanigans between Russia and Finland.
On the plus side, the locations are pretty impressive and if you like lots of snow (and people on snow mobiles) then you'll definitely find some enjoyment here. The acting is reasonable and it moves along at a fairly swift pace (although whether it needs 10 episodes for the first season is debatable).
However, my main issue is that the plot starts to become a little ridiculous towards the latter half. There are so many little sub strands and coincidences going on that it starts to lose focus. The whole operation into Russia is just stupid and unrealistic and at the end I was none the wiser about what the people instigating it actually wanted. The stories about the German doctor's nutty wife and the liver transplant for the daughter were fanciful (take note, you can get a liver transplant in a day in Finland - it was like someone swapping a new hard drive in a computer).
This brings me onto the relationship between the policewoman and her daughter. What an absolutely appalling parent she was. She was constantly dumping her child on her mother and then abandoning her for work. One minute she was concerned about her, the next she was off again, spending nights with the German virologist.
The mix of English and Finnish (with a smattering of German) meant some of the delivery of lines came across a little wooden. The caricatures of the military types and baddies in their James Bond-lite villain lair with accompanying rings hanging from the ceiling (just why?) had me chuckling when I probably shouldn't have been.
It probably sounds like I'm being unfair and I don't mean to be - but it was frustrating as I think this started off well. I just think they tried to pack too much stuff in.
It starts off with a local Laplander police woman finding a Russian prostitute held in captivity and a body buried in the snow outside. Off the back of this, a virus is discovered and a German virologist is brought in to help identify the source and who has been infected. Ultimately, this leads to a much greater conspiracy involving some military types and shenanigans between Russia and Finland.
On the plus side, the locations are pretty impressive and if you like lots of snow (and people on snow mobiles) then you'll definitely find some enjoyment here. The acting is reasonable and it moves along at a fairly swift pace (although whether it needs 10 episodes for the first season is debatable).
However, my main issue is that the plot starts to become a little ridiculous towards the latter half. There are so many little sub strands and coincidences going on that it starts to lose focus. The whole operation into Russia is just stupid and unrealistic and at the end I was none the wiser about what the people instigating it actually wanted. The stories about the German doctor's nutty wife and the liver transplant for the daughter were fanciful (take note, you can get a liver transplant in a day in Finland - it was like someone swapping a new hard drive in a computer).
This brings me onto the relationship between the policewoman and her daughter. What an absolutely appalling parent she was. She was constantly dumping her child on her mother and then abandoning her for work. One minute she was concerned about her, the next she was off again, spending nights with the German virologist.
The mix of English and Finnish (with a smattering of German) meant some of the delivery of lines came across a little wooden. The caricatures of the military types and baddies in their James Bond-lite villain lair with accompanying rings hanging from the ceiling (just why?) had me chuckling when I probably shouldn't have been.
It probably sounds like I'm being unfair and I don't mean to be - but it was frustrating as I think this started off well. I just think they tried to pack too much stuff in.