Netflix doesn’t lack for great detective series, from modern classics like Mindhunter to terrific licensed shows like Dark Winds. The genre has always been popular among users, and a new detective series debuted in late March only to become the most-watched Netflix show worldwide, for a time: Detective Hole, a Norwegian show based on the series of crime novels by Jo Nesbø.

In fact, the full title of the show is Jo Nesbø’s Detective Hole; the author himself wrote all of the episodes, so you can be sure that it sticks close to the hugely successful novels, which have sold over 50 million copies worldwide. That authenticity pays off in a tense, colorful, gritty series that’s entertaining from start to finish.

Funny name, gripping drama

Harry Hole means serious business

If you’re like me, when you saw that a show called “Detective Hole” was blowing up, you wondered about the title: Is this about a hole where detectives hang out, or is it about a guy named Detective Hole? It’s the latter; Harry Hole (Tobias Santelmann) is a brilliant detective who struggles with alcoholism and depression in his personal life. In Norwegian, his name is pronounced “Har-ee Hoo-leh,” so it’s not meant to be funny, but if you’re an English speaker, you probably can’t un-see it. The full Norwegian title for the show is “Jo Nesbø’s Harry Hole,” which just makes things worse, but we’re going to rise above it.

The drama gets going when Oslo police discover a woman’s body; her finger has been severed, and there’s a tiny red diamond placed behind her eyelid. Similar murders begin happening every five days, so Harry has a serial killer on his hands.

At the same time, Harry deals with his colleague Tom Waaler (Joel Kinnaman), who is deeply corrupt. If that weren’t enough reason to dislike him, he and Harry also have beef that goes back years. Although you’d expect the serial killer story to be the main driver of the plot, the story with Tom is at least as important. Finally, Harry tries to keep his relationship with single mother Rakel (Pia Tjelta) together, which is difficult because he’s always in danger of getting overly obsessed with his work or giving in to his addictions.

Some critics think there are too many subplots at work in Detective Hole, and it’s true that the first season can drag a bit in the middle while it sorts through the particulars, but ultimately all the threads weave together very nicely into a thrilling climax.

Detective Hole is great at setting a mood

In some ways, Detective Hole isn’t doing anything that hasn’t been done before. There are a lot of shows about troubled detectives who are great at their jobs but fall apart when they’re off the clock, True Detective and Mare of Easttown being a couple of recent examples. Likewise, Detective Hole fits very neatly into the “Nordic noir” genre, slow-burning Scandinavian crime fiction with a bleak mood. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a popular example, and is the Christopher Nolan movie Insomnia, which was a remake of a Norwegian film.

But it doesn’t matter if Detective Hole uses familiar tropes so long as it does it well, which it does. This show that drips with atmosphere. The first season is set during a heat wave in Oslo, and a lot of the scenes have a sweaty, stuffy energy to them that puts everyone on edge. The moody score from Nick Cave and Warren Ellis is predictably effective, and the performers go above the beyond in bringing Nesbø’s solid scripts to life.

As Harry Hole himself, Tobias Santelmann looks perpetually haunted. He does a lot with a lot with a little, conveying depths of trauma and neurosis with the tiniest of glances. Harry isn’t a cuddly main character, but he does mean well; he’s flawed but redeemable, and you want to root for him more and more the more you get to know him.

But Joel Kinnaman all but all steals the stage from under Santelmann’s feet as the conniving, flamboyant Tom Waaler. While Harry looks like a perpetual ruffled mess, Tom is impeccably dressed with a razor-sharp haircut. He’s a preening, self-satisfied near-sociopath, Norway’s answer to Patrick Bateman. Kimmaman, who these days is best known for playing straight-shooting astronaut Ed Baldwin on the excellent sci-fi show For All Mankind, lets loose and has the time of his life playing this character. He may never live the mirror scene down, and I mean that as a compliment.

Also, at one point Swedish acting legend Peter Stormare shows up as a gang leader. Detective Hole is bursting with talent.

Will Detective Hole be back for a second season?

There are plenty more adventures to undertake

This first season of Detective Hole is based on The Devil’s Star, the fifth book in Jo Nesbø’s series and the first one to be translated into English. Nesbø has published 13 books in the series so far; it started in 1997 with The Bat and continues to this day — there’s a new Harry Hole book coming out this fall. Obviously, if Netflix wants to make more of this show, the source material is there.

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And while the first season of Detective Hole does resolve the main plot, it makes clear that there are more crimes out there for Harry to uncover. Unfortunately, Netflix has not confirmed as of yet whether Detective Hole will return, but given its worldwide success, the chances are good.
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Harry Hole redeemed

Nesbø’s Harry Hole books were actually adapted to the screen before: in 2017, Michael Fassbender played Harry in The Snowman, based on the seventh book in Nesbø’s series. The Snowman is widely considered one of the best of Nesbø’s novels, which is why it was so disappointing that The Snowman movie was awful, with critics and fans alike roundly rejecting it.

Detective Hole is the second chance the series deserves. It needs to get another season if for no other reason than to actually give the world the great adaptation of The Snowman that it needs.