Bloodride

This Norwegian series is made up of six unrelated stories. Each one follows characters as things get increasingly creepy and lead to a 'twist' ending. Like another reviewer I was reminded of 'Tales of the Unexpected'... as with that series the twists aren't too surprising but that didn't spoil my enjoyment. There were a few gory moments but nothing that is likely to disturb horror fans. Inevitably some episodes are better than others but I still enjoyed them all. Many had scenes that made me wince and one genuinely gave me the chills. I'd certainly recommend this to fans of the genre; if you don't like it you won't waste too much time as the episodes are only thirty minutes long.

The series is available both in the original Norwegian, with subtitles if needed, and dubbed. I watched the first episode in English and wasn't too keen on the dubbing; so much so that when I realised there was a subtitle option I re-watched it and enjoyed it more.

No idea why the bus is involved, but this is an anthology of dark stories, a bit similar to "Inside no. 9" (though not quite as good). The genre varies nicely: from classic supernatural horror to psychological thriller. It's not exceedingly gory, and doesn't have jump scares.

Karakterdrap, I thought, was wonderful. For the other episodes something that makes the rating 7 rather than 8 or 9 is that some of the twists are a little half-baked. First, some of them become obvious a little earlier than the plot suggests they should. Second - and most important - after we see the twist, there's not enough time and context given to fully appreciate it. It's missing the foreshadowing that would make you go "oooh... that explains that little detail earlier". At the same time it doesn't spend any time after the twist to show the alternative side of the story that we hadn't seen (it's usually just given in one or two sentences), so I'm often left with questions that I wish were explored a little more.

Even with some well known horror tv and movie tropes and a couple of obvious story lines apparent 5 mins in it is very entertaining. My guess on the obvious plots may have to do with the money men not believing in the project, the unknowns involved or that they wanted well worn horror movie/tv (I hate this word) tropes with some lost in translation fears on top. I think the talent (actors, directors, writers) all understood that when it comes to horror the basics monsters mental illness/serial killers are great and easy to do in many ways, new and culturally diverse are appreciated for showing us new terrors mix in with are own. I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on Norwegian TV/movie Horror or even American horror but when I saw any of the truly odd 1950s Italian horror movies I was immediately drawn in to what the weirdness was and sometimes I didn't read the translation or just forgot they were there. While i understand wanting to making something appeal to as broad a group as possible that's not as important when it involves horror. I do have one major issue overall the music was distracting and did not add to the experience or as far as I'm concerned compliment the story in any way but it a small part of the picture. If you generally like horror anthology in all their forms you'll like this if you bare with a couple less original story lines before it gets going telling new ones

Naturally with being an anthology some stories are going to be more enjoyable than others, but it was a very solid overall enjoyable horror series. I think some horror stories work much better being shorter. So the series format of these works very well and none of the stories overstay their welcome.

Another reviewer said "Twilight Zone in colour" and the way they all learn a lesson during their episode, and then get on this bus. I can really see that. I found it all very enjoyable though.

This reminded me of Tales of the unexpected more so than Black Mirror but then again I am older than most on here.