The Thaw

The Thaw is well-written and acted, esp. Kataryna Wajda as Det. Zawieja. The cinematography featuring a dreary Polish port city is suitably creepy. My main criticism is the "bad mother" motif. The single mom detective who can't look after her child is the most tired trope in Euro-Noir. It slows everything down and adds nothing except canned bathos. There's always a dead husband who the woman is grieving and the kid is a mess because of it. Then there's the mother or grandpa guilt-tripping the bad mom. Really annoying and unnecessary. Grieving and torment are fine for noir leads but the whiney kid has to go.

The cinematography was great, the pace was fine, although yes it is slow, I just don't mind that in this instance. The problem with this series is a police detective who does not notice that she is being followed day after day by the same car? That it is her young daughter that notices? And maybe it is just the polish culture but the detectives behavior toward each other and their suspects was inexplicable to me. Overall, it could have been great but the behavior of too many of the main characters was just, well, lame. Hence only 5 stars and that is mainly for the cinematography. I fast forwarded the last three episodes just to see what happened. Not a good indication.

... good Polish crime drama... entire cast is very solid and production values equal any top notch shows being made anywhere today... yet this series works as well as it does because of Katarzyna Wajda... she is outstanding through each and every episode... guarantee you'll be searching for some-any of her other screen work... ending was slightly muddled and predictable, but overall it's a series well worth searching-out-watching.

A promising beginning, interesting story, nice cinematography. Unfortunately it devolves into silly, overwrought melodrama. The final three episodes made me feel like I was watching a telenovela- it was that bad.

I really object when an otherwise decent police procedural stoops to stereotyping a female lead as an irrational, impulsive liability, rather than just allowing her to be a good detective who gets the job done. And then to have to watch her fall into bed with a hated moronic colleague in a moment of weakness - shame on you filmmakers for giving in to this kind of crap.

I'd add that I'd choose subtitles any day over the truly awful dubbing HBO Max jammed down my throat.

Deep characters, wonderful scenery and very engaging plot. The case of the missing child and a female detective who is looking for any piece of life in her job - This series will surely stay with me for a long time.