Ludik

Daan Ludik is a successful furniture business owner based in Pretoria; he uses his firm's regular deliveries to Zimbabwe to smuggle diamonds. One day an arms dealer wants Daan to uses his route to take an arms shipment across the border... to persuade him he has Daan's brother kidnapped and tortured. The first shipment goes horribly wrong and this brings problems for Daan; most obviously the police start asking questions for the first time. He also has various family problems. Intertwined with this we see flashbacks of Daan's childhood where his family is dominated by his bullying father.

I thought this was a pretty decent six part series; it may not be the best Netflix has to offer but it is refreshing to have another series from South Africa. It is a shame we don't get more series from this interesting country... or indeed the wider continent of Africa. The story is solid and provides plenty of tension and excitement. The cast is pretty good; most obviously Arnold Vosloo as Daan. The end of the sixth episode answered some questions but raised others; hopefully an indication that more is planned. Overall I'd certainly recommend this to fans of crime dramas looking for a less cliché location.

These comments are based on watching the series in Afrikaans with English subtitles.

I wish I knew there was a choice in watching this in Afrikaan and not the horrid choice that netflix made for me . The English compilation/dubbing, I do not know if its the right word, was awful. The sound was AWFUL.

This is the second time that happens .The first one I tried to watch a German show and the actors spoke English, so I knew that something was off. But this time I honestly didn't suspect anything.

Every language is unique and beautiful and I prefer to listen to the original and read subtitles.

I give an extra point for that mistake ,for which I blame netflix I liked the story, the pace, the characters. It kept me interested and it was enjoyable.

Arnold Vosloo's big vanity project!

I really tried to give it a fair shake. But... The sound design is irritating to say the least. The local actors sound like they either just dialing it in or reciting lines. It's not even remotely close to international standards like Squid Game or Money Heist.

This series was all over the place in terms of having many subplots that just popped up at random. The overarching storyline was interesting and well developed but was constantly being interrupted. If streamlined this could have been a much better show. Still decent acting and a fairly high production value.

Now this section is dedicated to IMDb. I'm making this a very, very, very, very long review because of the new rule established for review character length, courtesy of the IMDb staff. I'm glad to report that you can absolutely trust that this review is credible and relevant based solely on the fact that it contains at least 600 characters.

Great potential. Poor delivery.

It starts off with a great premise but over-acting and hamming by most of the cast ruins what could have been a great series.

Arnold Vosloo does a good job but the rest of the actors are many classes below.

The storyline seems to go around in circles too. I am not holding out hope for a second season. I really hope though that the South African TV industry starts to do better and better.

The flashbacks to Daan's childhood seem to serve no purpose except to satisfy some whim of the director. The music is good but overwhelms the dialog and makes it hard to follow.