Love & Anarchy

Being Scandinavian everything and everyone has style. Outfits that are supposedly thrown on are meticulous in their colour coordination. The furniture and décor is always tasteful, and everyone has money, even the IT guy sharing a Hispster influenced 'hovel', (yup, lots of bare chip board, just like a trendy Shoreditch café). The sound track is 'cheesy Indie pop' that 15 year olds will love, yet is still a step above the better Eurovision entries.

But once you get past the clichés and the 'Visit Sweden Because We're Cool' tourist ad' this is a smart and witty tragi comedy. There's a sense of self discovery that begins with a dare and snowballs. The characters get fleshed out, even bit players, so that we get to know that everyone deep down is not as happy as they could be.

We're shown that women can like porn too, that the famous Swedish egalitarian attitude to parenting and society isn't all it's made out to be, that some of the men and women can be real selfish a-holes and a barrier to happiness.

I haven't finished, I'm halfway through ep' 7. I'm desperate for the main characters to work it out and find happiness, but it will be messy, people will get hurt.

I am a middle aged man that used to scorn this kind of thing as being too 'fluffy' and for sad, divorced women with a taste for mid day cocktails. I'm glad I'm all grown up now otherwise I would have missed this. I think ep 8 is going to make me cry, just a little, but I hope so.