Faroese crime drama Trom got off to a good, solid start in its opening two episodes. It was absorbing without being totally edge-of-your-seat but had an interesting set of characters as well as a solid central murder mystery. Of course, being based in the Faroes Trom also – and quite understandably – exploited its incredible surroundings to good effect.
I now want to go to the Faroe Islands. But that’s by the by.
Now we’re up to the halfway stage, we’re starting to get somewhere in the case of the murdered activist, Sonja Á Heyggi.
What is Hannis up to in Trom?
Her father Hannis Martinsson is doing his best to snoop around the islands, trying to find out what happened to her and why. He sneaks back into Sonja’s sealed-off house and finds a map – so he does what any good hunter does and follows that map. In this instance, that means visiting each location Sonja marked on it, which all have something to do with local millionaire and capitalist extraordinaire, Ragnar í Rong (who we met briefly in the first episode).
Indeed, we’re being led down a road where Ragnar looms large at the end of it. It seems he owns all of the big business on the island, is the ‘benevolent’ friend of Sonja’s mother Aurora and, to boot, is in cahoots with the police chief, Karla’s stern boss. He also threatened Påll in hospital and told him to keep his mouth shut, and Sonja was investigating him, too.
And, let’s face it… his name is Ragnar í Rong, which actually sounds villainous. (He’s played by Olaf Johannessen, by the way, who’s been in ALL THE NORDIC THINGS.)
Karla having a tough time in Trom
Elsewhere, Karla is having a tough time of things.
She’s fully aware that this could be the biggest murder investigation in Faroese history, and she’s feeling the pressure. As if to demonstrate people under pressure make bad decisions, Karla has already been a bit naughty by accessing Sonja’s phone and seeing her son Gunnar is somehow implicated in the mystery (another favourite Nordic Noir trope… the implicated teenager), and then deleting CCTV footage of the two meeting one night in the street from the database. And now she has found that he’s carrying Sonja’s treasured necklace in his belongings.
But there’s a small lead in the case, exposed by the brilliant, small-but-mighty Anita – a local mechanic was found to have worked on both Påll and Sonja’s cars before the former inexplicably came off the road.
This mechanic – Bergur – is a former drug addict and dealer. Whose rehab facility did he use to dry out? Ragnar’s, of course.
We’re into the final two episodes next week, and I’m wondering if Ragnar is too obvious a villain. Could something be going on at Glisli college, a place where threats to Sonja originated from? Could Gunnar have something to do with all of this?
We’ll soon find out.
Paul Hirons
READ MORE: OUR EPISODES ONE AND TWO REVIEW
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