Harjunpää

Very depressing series with depresses characters. Helsinki need a PR team to counter balance this show. Each two part crime is seedy with unlikeable characters and a team of police who generally stumble upon DNA or an eyewitness to solve the crime. So many other cop shows do it better.such as Thin Blue Line from Sweden.

It's not a format I like, that we see the murderers at the beginning of the episodes and then watch the supposed detective work to catch them. As this TV series is based on a series of crime novels, I assume that this is the system used in the books. In either medium, this would be a deficiency to me.

I can guess at why it was done this way. Both of the stories I watched (it's one story per two episodes) involved or less random crimes. It would be really hard for a viewer to guess at whodunnit. Agatha Christie this is not, it's more like Columbo which I also never took to.

I loved seeing parts of Helsinki that I know or have been to which is why I gave a three. But I just knew that I have better things lined up to watch which is why I deleted the lot.

Generic characters. Generic glass cop station offices. Generic good guy detective. Generic cool tough female partner (still sufficiently eye candy). Generic concerned boss (he's working too hard). Generic (ie utterly shallow) bad guy incel computer gamer who's also, obviously, a generic rapist (attacking generic lone women on generic parkway paths after dark). Generic forensics team. Generic cityscape night shots. Generic dumb uniformed cops. Generic beautiful spouse and kids. Generic soundtrack. Generic dialogue (ok, make that sub-generic). If you like your hot food gone cold and your cool drinks tepid and flat, you'll love this.

The family matters and stuff outside the actual cases are pretty ordinary Finnish stuff; nothing too fancy or shiny but exactly as you'd imagine things to be. The cases themselves aren't too special either, maybe slightly over the top when it comes to local crime culture. Not saying these things don't happen here but let's say these aren't that common in regular police work in Finland.

Overall looks and feels like a Finnish police show; a bit of a low-key ordinary police work, but clearly not aimed for worldwide audience. That must have been an afterthought. Subtitles lose a lot in translation but they're still passable.

The original TV show based on the books was filed in the eighties and it also was a depiction of that day's policework.

Timo is the type of officer that the world needs more of not less. He's quiet, unassuming, and doesn't grandstand like so many "cops." Timo has a lovely family and a wife who understands her husband's role as a police officer. Too many series cast cop-wives as demanding and lacking understanding, jealous, and simply tedious. Timo's team is low-key as well. His female partner is unassuming and doesn't try to compete with other members of her team. The best part is Timo doesn't sleep with his partner like almost cops in every crime series. The pace is slow. No special effects. The episodes range from typical crimes to a couple bizarre ones. No flexing muscles. No macho nonsense. I look forward to Season 2.