User Reviews

Particularly Europe has seen several crime series where events take place in a small community, in a idyllic place, and in spite of good stories and performances, they still seem odd as such places and most local citizen cannot be so maleficent and vicious. As the island of Samsø is a known tourist place, then felonies happening there are mostly connected with outsiders, tourists, providing the events with more realistic angle.

Nevetheless, most of them are rather trivial, sometimes not fully explained and motivated, and the atmosphere around is somehow stuffy (at least for me as non-villager). The characters seem realistic, but as for performances, it is peculiar that the actors having bigger fame and versatility have small and casual roles only (e.g., Sidse Babett Knudsen, Lars Brygmann, Thure Lindhardt, Lars Mikkelsen), while those playing leading characters are not so much used in Danish films (well, I liked Lars Bom in Rejseholdet as well, but he is still no Mikkelsen or Brygmann). As regards the female leads Lotte Arnsbjerg and Amalie Dollerup, I can't say that I am eager to follow their further career.

Therefore, I find Strisser på Samsø a 2nd grade series, but still much better than similar US ones. But if you like Danish (+ Swedish) crime series, it may be worth watching, at least for drawing a parallel.

"Strisser på Samsø (A Cop on Samsø)" is one of the prime examples of a solid Scandinavian thriller series. Sweden is the primary producer of such shows, but Denmark has shown it has something to offer there as well with this well directed and acted show. Lars Bom plays the leading character, a cop who moves out of Copenhagen with his daughter looking to find a more idyllic and calm life. Soon he finds out that the island Samsø is far from idyllic and calm. Nearly every inhabitant of this island seems to be suffering from their own disease, including incest and sado-masochism.

"Samsø", as it was titled in Norway, is really exciting to follow most of the time and the actors are pretty solid. Lars Bom is a strong leading man and hero and there is a fair share of sex and action involved. Simply put, an exciting show to watch.