Kalle Laukkanen
The second season of the popular Nordic Noir murder mystery series from Finland builds upon the characters, relationships, and settings developed in the first season.
Detective Inspector Kari Sorjonen (Ville Virtanen) heads the special crimes division of a small coastal city near the Russian border. He had hoped for a quieter life away from big-city crime but the economic expansion spearheaded by the Mayor brings corruption, drugs, and crime—some of it connected to organized crime across the border.
The first mystery in the ten-episode season reaches back to a case that Detective Lena Jaakkola (Anu Sinisalo), a former Russian cop who is now part of Kari's team, worked on years ago, dredging up old wounds that involve her daughter Katia and bad blood with the Russian mob. Subsequent mysteries involve a conspiracy connected to a daycare center, a sniper targeting seemingly unconnected people in town, and a serial killer who may be involved in cannibalistic rituals, and the season ends with two petty criminals taking Kari and his family hostage to force Kari to investigate the sudden disappearance of their mother and young sister.
The personal stories and family drama of Kari and Lena are intimately intertwined with the cases. Kari, who seems to be afflicted with Asperger's Syndrome, wants to be more present and emotionally open with his family but doesn't always succeed, which only intensifies difficulties with his teenage daughter, a struggle mirrored in the relationship between the emotionally close-off Lena and her rebellious daughter. This season adds a cliché common to many similar shows: a criminal mastermind who takes a personal interest in Kari and escapes to continue the battle of wits in a future season.
But otherwise, writer/creator Miikko Oikkonen keeps the show grounded in the culture of the fast-growing city and its uneasy mix of business, crime, and corruption. The show deftly balances the personal and professional spheres of Kari and Lena while adding layers to the characters and their relationships, and Ville Virtanen centers the series with his richly realized performance as Kari Sorjonen. His tics and rituals become a defining part of his character, but Virtanen also shows how Kari struggles to compartmentalize the gifts that make him such a good detective so it won't overwhelm his efforts to be a responsive, supportive, loving husband and father.
The series runs on Netflix in the U.S. and concludes with a third and final season, Rated TV-MA for nudity, adult situation, drug use, adult language, and violence. 10 episodes on three discs on Blu-ray, all in Finnish with English subtitles. Highly recommended.