We watched the final episode of the BBC’s Wallander entitled “The Troubled Man” based on the book of the same name by Swedish author Henning Mankell this past Sunday (10/16/16) evening, and it was a calm and thoughtful end to a great series.

(Spoilers follow)

This final fourth series ended with Kurt Wallander more at peace then we’ve seen him up to this point. Instead of drinking himself to self-destruction, the detective is exercising and spending more time with his daughter and granddaughter.

While I usually like a show to keep going if the quality is there, Wallander reminded me that keeping things at a certain clip (four series is this case) means that the main characters are made to grow – you don’t have years and years for them to stay the same and only make a change at the very end.

a cold cup of Sweden

(Sidenote – I believe roughly half of the script was Kenneth Branagh frantically looking about and saying, “Hakan?”)

I also appreciated that Kurt survived to make that growth, to see his memory slipping and accept what’s happening instead of going down in a tragic/heroic gunshot. The rifle he slung across his back gave me pause on that, but all turned out well-ish.

His father showing up at the end was a nice touch as well.

On a show that paired a bleak landscape with even bleaker human nature, to have Wallander find a measured peace was fresher than the wind blowing off the nearest fjord.