Only a few months ago I was gushing, here, about the first in the cult series of Forbrydelsen/The Killing, which I'd caught up with late on DVD. And now, oh joy, Lund is back on our screens for a second season ...
Image source: lifeofwylie.com
So once again I find myself not only addicted, but harbouring a) the delusion that I am actually fluent in Danish ... and find myself muttering for fanden! nej tak, er du sindssyg? randomly to myself (see here for a brief but excellent tutorial on swearing in Danish - click on the expressions to hear the audio versions and marvel at the cadences, not to mention the disjunct between spelling and pronunciation - you thought English was bad?) ...
and b) an urgent desire to refurbish my entire house in cool, clean Scandinavian style ...
Image sources: trendecoration.com freshome.com homedesignset.com yousaytoo.com
But I digress ... the good news is that BBC4 has decided to give us a double whammy of two episodes per Saturday night, in prime-time viewing slot - a veritable gloomy Danish killing-fest of two sofa-gripping hours with no commercial breaks ... in other words, sheer bliss of the kind only Forbrydelsen Freaks would understand.
In a nod to the legion fans of the famous jumper, it's back this season, in the same chunky knit style, only a solid red this time ...
Image: guardian.co.uk
In my humble opinion, it's sartorially less appealing than the first jumper, but for die-hard fans the knitting pattern for the red version is already available here on Radio Times online, while if, like me, you prefer the original and are not handy with needles, Gudrun & Gudrun offer a genuine Faroese Sarah Lund jumper for 280 euros (here) ...
Image: gudrungudren.com
Lund of course is her unique, inimitable female detective self - only more subdued and a little broken by the disciplinary action meted out by her superiors at the end of Killing 1 (who could forget that kick-ass moment when she held up her fellow police officers with their own gun?).
Image: nordjyske.dk
She is brought back from the ignominy of ferry-traffic duty by her former boss, the mono-syllabic and oddly cadaverous-looking Lennaert Brix (above left), who realises he needs her help with a puzzling new murder ... When he asks her to give him one good reason why he should trust her with a new case (duh!), she mumbles some unconvincing apology for past misdemeanours, then says "but this is what I do best". Oh, don't we know that ...
Besides Brix and Lund, the cast is all new in this season - Lund has the usual dysfunctional relationship with a new side-kick in the form of Ulrik Strange (above right, played by Mikael Birkkjaer) - and the plot is all tied up with the war in Afghanistan and political extremists on opposing sides ...
Lund takes on the Danish military. Source: tvtid-dyn.tv2.dk
My only reservations so far, other than the new jumper: one, a distinct absence of sex appeal amongst this season's Danish politicians ...
Image: politiken.dk
(bring back Troels Hartmann, I say) ...
Lars Mikkelsen as Troels Hartmann in Series 1. Source:imdb.com
... and two, an absence (so far) of another great female character to equal the fantastic Pernille Birk-Larsen (played by Ann Eleonora Jørgensen) of series 1.
These are minor quibbles, though. So far this season is shaping up to be every bit as addictive as the first. Just please don't ask me out on a Saturday night ...