Arctic Circle is a Finnish series on the Topic channel in the U.S. Likable Nina Kautsalo (Iina Kustonen) is a cop in the small town of Ivalo in the northern Lapland region of Finland, near the border of Russia. When she and her partner (Janne Kataja) find a dying Russian sex worker in the basement of a run-down farm, they figure it’s a sex trafficking case. But when the prostitute turns out to have a deadly virus (not zombie virus, thank goodness), a German virologist from Helsinki, Thomas Lorenz (Maximilian Brückner) as well as the KRP (Finland’s FBI) come to town. Meanwhile, mysterious men from both Germany and Russia have plans of their own. Arctic Circle is well-written, and avoids virus-scare tropes.
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Complex Plot
When Nina finds the prostitute in the cabin, she starts investigating the local “Hooker buses” that come in from Russia, trying to find out who the dying girl is, and who was holding her captive. When the prostitute’s blood shows unusual results, her sample is sent to a virology lab in Helsinki, staffed with multinational doctors. German doctor Lorenz discovers that her blood carries the “Yemeni” virus that was discovered, and kept secret, a few years ago in Yemen. It is sexually transmitted, and attaches to the Herpes 9 virus, lying dormant until a woman gets pregnant, after which it kills the mother and causes grave deformations to the fetus. Lorenz is confronted by agent Stenius (Kari Ketonen) of the KRP and told to keep his finding under wraps “for national security reasons.” A furious Lorenz reluctantly agrees, and heads to Ivalo to test all women who are positive for Herpes 9 to see if they carry the virus. Unfortunately, one of those women is Marita (Pihla Viitala), Nina’s bartender sister, who is forced into quarantine in the hospital without knowing why. It’s a terrible situation, because there is no plan in place to tell or help these women if they do test positive. The KRP also head to Ivalo, bounce Nina off the case, and have her chaperone Lorenz around town.
Meanwhile, a mysterious and wealthy German man named Marcus Eiben (Clemens Schick) and his sidekick Jens (Joi Johannsson) find out about the new Yemeni outbreak and head to Ivalo as well. It’s unclear what they are doing, but Eiben knows Lorenz, and wants to keep his plans secret. There is also a Russian criminal named Cevikovic that is involved somehow, but after 5 episodes, it’s unclear yet.
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Our take on Arctic Circle
The sharp turn that the investigation takes after the virus is discovered is an interesting device, especially since the virus is not a zombie virus, nor was it found frozen in the tundra. Arctic Circle successfully combines typical small town and family drama with an international crisis and possible conspiracy. By having Nina’s capricious sister carry the virus, it really brings the threat home. As for Nina, she is refreshingly untormented for a TV detective, although she is a single mother with a Down’s Syndrome daughter that her mother helps raise. There may be one too many plot lines and a few too many episodes in Artic Circle season 1, but so far, the writing is good, the cinematography of the forbidding landscape is fantastic and the performances are engaging.
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