With original boundary-breaking content, thrilling plots and charismatic actors, Danish television series have captivated audiences worldwide in recent years. The latest show to hit the small screen is Ride Upon the Storm which is being distributed in almost 80 countries with a debut late January in Britain. The new drama was created by Adam Price, the BAFTA winner behind the acclaimed drama Borgen, which followed the political and personal tribulations of a Danish woman prime minister. Danish shows, with both exoticism and gritty realism, have quickly soared in popularity beyond their initial local Scandinavian viewership, Pia Jensen, an Aarhus University communications associate professor specialising in television series, told AFP. Long known for the Nordic noir crime genre, the big international breakthrough for Danish shows came with The Killing, a hard-hitting series following a Copenhagen female cop’s investigations. Then came crime thriller The Bridge in 2011. The Nordic noir genre has proven so popular that its aesthetic and themes are now being replicated beyond Scandinaviaith ‘s borders, with shows such as Shetland and Broadchurch made in Britain, Jensen said. For foreign audiences, Denmark, as it is shown on television, is “an exotic society, something to aspire to because of the welfare state and the strong women characters”, she said, referring also to the 2010 hit “Borgen”. She added, clearly amused, that it´s “as if Denmark is the fantasy land of gender equality”. Paradoxically, in this almost utopian world, the characters are “normal” people with whom audiences can identify, according to Jensen.
Published in Daily Times, January 7th 2019.