Families Like Ours

Suspend your disbelief (its a science fiction after all) and imagine your privileged life has come to an end and you are now a refugee. The best science fiction isn't set in space but gives you an alternative reality that is not that far out there that it is believable and maybe changes how you look at the world.

This program is more about refugees than climate change but I find myself thinking i should maybe sell up and move to higher ground before it's too late!

Overall there are serious aspects to the program but yet it is sometimes incredible how stupid the characters can be so its hard to take it too seriously but I'm finding it entertaining and maybe will have renewed respect for refugees. For these reasons I can't give it more than 8/10.

I have seen 4 episodes now and this show is great! The situations the families and persons are put in seems realistic and you can understand their emotions and dilemmas throughout the episodes. As we near the time for departure, things heat up, but that again is something that feels realistic and i never sat with the felling "why did he just do that". Even when i disagreed with a characters decisions or actions, i still understodd where that person came from so to speak.

I can see its receiving a lot of flak from other user critics here (and everyone is ofc entitled to an opinion! ;-)) regarding the persons/families taking bad decisions. I dont think i ever had it that way. We have characters that sudddenly are told, that they have to evacuate the country, and if they can't find their own jobs/housing in "better" countries, the state will provide housing for them in countries less favores by the characters in the series. That puts tremendous pressure on you and your family to take a LOT of decisions very quickly anf navigate in a volatile situation, when you dont know what other countries will say, and when the laws are changing by the day. So i think its a bit harsh judging them from that perspective, and i actually do think they make rational decisions from their perspective. Are they stupid sometimes? Yeah like the decisions WE would make if we were in the same exact situation.

So i can strongly recommend this series, where you get invested in the charcters. There are strong character-buildup and that makes all the social and moral dilemmas much more interesting and you really feel for these characters, when they are in jeopardy. See it, you wont regret it!

The idea is good here. Showcase what it means to be a refugee, by making the Danes go through what is happening to many in war ridden countries. Acting is fine as well.

However it just becomes too forced. There are situations where main characters makes such stupid decisions that it became unbelieveable and nearly unbearable to watch. Add to this that it is incredibly slow at times, especialy the last few episodes are just dragged out. It could have been maybe 4 episodes instead.

I would still recommend Danes to watch it as a learning exercise of how it is to be a refugee. The empathy refugees deserve is for sure missing in todays society.

Thomas Vinterberg's series "Families Like Ours" is an ambitious tale about a Danish family facing an apocalyptic crisis. The acting is decent, but it is difficult to sympathize with the characters as they often make incredibly foolish decisions.

From the beginning of the series, we see the family navigate through a series of catastrophic choices that only worsen their situation. Their inability to think rationally and act sensibly makes it hard for viewers to engage emotionally. Instead of learning from their mistakes, they repeat them over and over, which can be frustrating to watch.

Their decisions are often driven by extreme stupidity and short-term thinking, It is hard to feel sympathy for characters who seemingly do not learn from their mistakes and continue to put themselves and others in danger.

Although the series has its strong moments and manages to create an intense atmosphere, it is difficult to overlook the many foolish decisions the family makes. This makes it challenging to invest emotionally in their fate and leaves the viewer feeling frustrated rather than empathetic.

There was the Kierkegaard quote on the leap of faith but this series remained stuck in the aesthetic phase fair and square. Upper middle class families tumble down the wheel of fortune to expose how bad we are with refugees and how awful the Poles are. At the same time the protagonists lack a realistic sense of self-preservation and resilience, in other words: quite dumb. In its attempt to be a morality play its ethics and lack of humanism are very problamatic. So quote Kierkegaard as much as you like: on the surface, okayish for a few hours of entertainment but deeply flawed in its political messaging and dramatic depth, zero fathoms deep.