The Girl from Oslo

Pretty reasonable overall but about 3 episodes too long. Story is rather weak but there are quite a few action scenes and reasonable character development.

Production and casting ok but on balance I wouldn't watch it again.

Yes. The mother drove me bezerk watching this. If you were a top politician/negotiater before, how come you get braindead 20 years after?

The girl. Everytime something happens she screams like a hurt pig. If something happens, you concentrate to get your ass outta there and quiet. Dont think the writer/author likes women.

When it comes to the story it is a bit simple. Israelis have made really excellent series before, but this was not a great moment. If you want to watch somethin while you wait for your pizza its ok.

This show is decent in terms of plot and acting, but it's basically B-Grade. A young Norwegian girl visiting Israel is captured by Isis along with her friends, an Israeli brother and sister. Her mother, who comes to find her, enlists the help of an unlikely ally, and dot dot dot....

There are some strong players in this show, along with good scenery and production, but it's very formulaic and the characters fall flat in large part because of the choice to make all the main players converse in English. It makes sense, since the Norwegian mother is fluent in the language and even participated in the Oslo talks, as did the main Israeli touch-point. The daughter who is kidnapped is fluent too. As is, apparently, the head of of the Palestinian Authority in Gaza. And a Palestinian doctor she befriended at the time.

But it doesn't work. Because the actors are not fluent, and that's fine, and should have stayed that way.

After a few episodes of this, I felt like I was was watching the SNL "Norwegian Playhouse" sketch. The mother tells someone her plan will pay off "Big Time." He replies "Don't Mess With Me" (OK I made up the second part, but it's basically apt). It ends up sounding ridiculous. The scenes with subtitles work much better, especially those that feature the hostages and their captors, all of which are sufficiently tense.

Anyway, this is a weird mash-up of Scandinoir and "Fauda." It's OK, but not great.

The episodes are short, and the showrunners try to be sure there's a surprise in each of them. Sometimes indeed the plot departs from conventional expectations. Underlying it all, and connected a little artificially to the action-and-adventure story, is the story of an almost stereotypical Scandinavian marriage-- undemonstrative, troubled, somewhat hopeless. I can't judge the Norwegian actors, but they seem at home in their roles, unlike Israeli sweetheart Rotem Abuhab, who has a less prominent role as a spouse and seems unable to find a character in it.

I can't pretend that I understood every plot development; there are factions against factions against factions. But matters keep moving, even if sometimes they seem to move in circles.

As an Israeli, I'm happy to see this kind of collaboration come about. I wish I could recommend it more enthusiastically.

There is a lot that is wrong with this series. The characters annoyed me. Especially the kidnapped daughter Pia and her pain in the butt mother. Maybe do yourself a favor and watch episodes 1 & 2 then reward time is due, skip to the last one episode 10.