Swedish thriller The Machinery in the works

It must be that time of year again because we’re getting all kinds of news about new shows coming out of the Nordic and Scandinavian region.

Streaming service Viaplay has announced another new show, The Machinery.

The Machinery is an action-packed thriller in eight episodes set in the borderlands between Norway and Sweden, and between truth and lies.

Olle Hultén is a regular family father. After a company outing he wakes up on the ferry between Sandefjord (Norway) and Strömstad (Sweden), with no clue how he got there. Next to him there is a bag filled with money, a gun and a ski mask. Olle has no idea what’s going on and no memory of what’s happened, but when the police chase him his instincts tell him to run. He sets off on a violent hunt for the real robbers. 30 million Kroner have been stolen from a cash repository in Sandefjord and several people were killed in the process. Olle is on his own, trying to find the people who are framing him. His only chance is to clear his name before the police catch up to him – but why has he been targeted?

Olle is forced to leave everything he holds dear behind in his quest for the truth behind what is happening to him, desperate to hide his true identity – and what made him run away many years ago. Who is Olle Hultén? What is he hiding? And is he guilty of what he is being accused of?

Look out for it later in the year.

The Truth Will Out recommissioned for second series

In a few weeks’ time, we’ll be getting Swedish series The Truth Will Out (Det som göms i snö) on Walter Presents/All4.

But Swedish streaming service Viaplay has already recommissioned the show for a second run.

The series – which starts on Channel 4 on 11th February and then transfers over to All4 under the Walter Presents banner – is inspired by the true case of the biggest miscarriage of justice in Swedish history and follows troubled detective Peter Wendel as he attempts to create a new, dedicated cold case team.

Wendel’s goal encounters a set-back when an unknown killer leaves a message for the police. It states that Sweden’s most notorious serial killer is actually a fraud. In order to uncover the truth, Peter has to pull his cold case team together quickly but is limited to an unusual bunch of misfits of the police force – the only officers currently available in Stockholm. His newly formed team find themselves at odds with the powerful group of people who got the serial killer convicted in the first place. With a more personal connection to the case than he’d like to admit, and the political media hot on his trail, will Wendel’s inept team be able to expose the truth that has been hidden for so long?

Expressen reports that the second series Robert Gustafsson will reprise his role as Peter Wendel in series two, and that filming starts in this spring.

 

 

Swedish channels developing Eight Months

Swedish channels C More and TV4 are developing the political thriller series Eight Months (Åtta månader), based on the acclaimed suspense novel of the same name by Magnus Montelius.

Åtta månader (Eight Months), written by Magnus Montelius, was published in 2019 by Albert Bonniers Förlag and was quickly praised by critics. It was ranked in second place in December among the best detective novels of 2019 by newspaper Dagens Nyheter’s literature critic Lotta Olsson, and was recently voted the best foreign suspense novel by Det Danske Kriminal Akademi.

It tells the story of journalist Nina Wedén, who reveals Sweden’s foreign minister as a sex buyer. When a new foreign minister – Jacob Weiss – takes office, he appoints Nina as his press secretary. Both rumours and dubious employees circulate around Weiss, and Nina is forced to question who is actually in control of the corridors of power.

At the same time, political advisor Max Boije starts investigating Weiss’s past and discovers a gap of eight months. When one of his sources is found murdered in Riddarfjärden, Max begins to suspect that he has gotten too close to a secret that someone is ready to kill to protect.

More news as we get it.