Gender issues heat to a boil as "Men Who Love Women" do so only when women know their place, especially in business and politics, or so goes Tobias Lindholm's glib, shallow script mapping out a serious problem for Denmark's first female prime minister Birgitte Nyborg (Sidse Babett Knudsen) whose essence is heavy-handedly familiar and whose resolution is predictably trite. Not helping is snickering innuendo as Lindholm's script devotes equal time to the romantic lives of Birgitte and television news journalist Katrine Fønsmark (Birgitte Hjort Sørensen), gender "balance" as subtle as American political melodrama that cannot address issues of women's equality without constant reminders of women's sexuality.
Making that groaningly obvious is Henriette Klitgaard (Stine Stengade), "the Clit" (yes, really), Birgitte's brainy, beautiful Business Affairs Minister wunderkind tasked with spearheading her initiative requiring that all corporate boards must include an equal number of men and women, a ham-fisted mandate that rankles Minister for Social Affairs and Gender Equality Pernille Madsen (Petrine Agger), the central-casting feminist who believes the initiative is her purview, and especially Joachim Chrone (Ulf Pilgaard), Denmark's most powerful industrialist ("krone" is Denmark's currency) who threatens to offshore his enterprise unless Birgitte kills the bill, and who also has dirt on the Clit, who---surprise, surprise---has sexy skeletons in her closet including a bygone one-night stand with Birgitte's husband Phillip Christensen (Mikael Birkkjær).
Additional salaciousness comes from Katrine's budding attraction to her spin-class instructor Benjamin (Kenneth Christensen), to the dismay of her ex-boyfriend Kaspar Juul (Pilou Asbæk), Birgitte's spin doctor hoping for a reconciliation but who nevertheless puts the moves on Henriette as "Borgen" descends into sexual stereotype as inevitable as Henriette's ultimate fate. At least gender equality is reached as Annette Olesen makes her directorial debut, cold comfort regarding this major misstep in an otherwise-standout series.