Frikjent

After reading the announcement of the series on German TV I was intrigued by the theme: A businessman returning to the small village in Norway, where he grew up and, after being a prime suspect in a murder at the age of 18, was acquitted of the crime. He left the town, made a successful career in the Far East, only to return after 20 years or so to save the main employer in the town from going bankrupt. Such a topic offers plenty of opportunities to make an intriguing TV-series. However, already after watching the first episode I was really disappointed. The actors walk, behave, and are dressed like clichés. The investors are of course all smartly dressed good looking young men, who prefer to travel by helicopter, but many of the details have nothing to do with the reality of this world. Their behaviour is irrational, and they take risks that investors would never take, even if they were driven by sentiments. After watching for a while, this gets so annoying, that the basically great theme of the series disappears into the background. There are really much better Scandinavian crime series to watch (like The Bridge), don't waste your precious time on this one.

I approached this series with low expectations, so I didn't completely hate it. But I wouldn't recommend it unless you are really running out of things to watch. The scenery is beautiful, but the writing leaves something to be desired. The mystery is not just whodunnit but who will stay together, who will break up, who will hook up, etc.

There's a great deal of inconsistent behavior.. Characters seek the truth then suddenly don't want to know. They're in and out of love for no apparent reason, or they seek reconciliation, then revenge, then whatever. They reveal secret upon secret upon secret, until it's clear that the entire town should be in psychotherapy. Season 1 just barely held together, and Season 2 was a real setback for plausibility in law and crime shows.

Maybe worth a shot for some, but I didn't feel it improved as it went on.

How many times are they going to bring this guy in for the murder? It's tiresome. It's as if they ran out of ideas.

In recent years, next to Denmark and Sweden, Norway has produced a number of good crime drama series where events occur in a small and/or distant community, with is vices and virtues. In spite of being one of the richest countries in the world, the human basics are the same, plus thinly populated areas and common solitude make investigations more difficult.

All this we can see in Frikjent as well, with tensions up due to a tragic event taken place decades ago. Sometimes it feels that the depiction is too widespread and the role of some characters and episodes is insignificant (e.g. the company-related ones), but the general atmosphere is well depicted and most important performances are pleasant, particularly Nicolai Cleve Broch as Aksel and Lena Endre (a Swede) as Eva whose mutual communication forms the most intensive verbal scenes in the series. The mentioned persons are definitely worth watching in other films/series as well, which I have managed to achieve.

And what is definitely nicer than in Sweden or Denmark, is nature. Also here, beautiful Norwegian landscape and environment is a kind of supporting actor for creating mood and completeness.

despite negative reviews the story is gripping and unexpected turn of events in the very end is delivered only to the patient viewer. it kept my attention and i rated very high for the original surprising ending and interesting plot, not to mention gorgeous lead character and scenery.