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Episode 10 of the Swedish Wallander series, Lufslottet, “The Castle Ruins”, was confusing in that the summary at Yellow Bird bore no resemblance to the episode shown.
The castle in question was a luxurious block of apartments by the sea, inhabited by smart attractive but empty headed women, going to LC [life coaching] classes, and having affairs with the extremely creepy husbands of their “friends”.
The elderly and eccentric previous owner of the land lived in squalor in a hut and shared his dog’s food despite having 20 million kroner from the sale.
The story begins when the old man withdraws his money from the bank in cash and is later found dead along with his dogs, all poisoned by botulinum. As Kurt, Stefan and Linda investigate the idea that there is equality in Swedish society is completely demolished, and we discover that there are just as many people living way beyond their means as in the Anglo-Saxon world.
The unshaven Stefan gets on well with the children in this episode in contrast to his worsening icy relationship with Linda. While poor Kurt Wallander again spends time calming the explosive Stefan but looks even lonelier when surrounded by the young women in this episode.
The motive and opportunity for the crime should have been investigated much earlier by the team, who instead went off on completely the wrong track, but that at least did make for a more interesting program. Three more episodes to go….
CRIME SCRAPS REVIEW 