Dept. Q Review: Netflix’s Dept. Q Should be Titled Dept. Totally Fine
Dept. Q, Netflix’s new crime thriller, is basically the most recent bingeable program the streaming platform has released. I think that if you were to really assess each aspect of the show (writing, direction, acting, etc.) with a fine-tooth comb you’d conclude that no component of Dept. Q is all that good. Still, it’s always watchable, never truly boring, and fine as something to just have on the screen playing to pass the time.
Even though I’d allege Dept. Q doesn’t have any standout great aspects to it (it’s definitely more of a B show), it doesn’t have any awful facets to it either. I basically sat through all nine episodes of the series feeling that it firmly fell into the “this is fine” camp of TV shows, and it never really ventured from there to get either much better or worse over its run.
The title of the series comes from the Danish Nordic crime novels that it’s based off of. As far as titles go, Dept. Q is about as poor as you can come up with. It lets viewers know exactly nothing about the program.
Really the show could be titled Scottish Crime Drama Detective Show. Because that’s exactly what this show is. For kicks, I asked ChatGPT what a good show title would be for a Scottish crime drama show. It gave me suggestions like Loch and Order, Ashes of Inverness, and The Tartan Veil. These are all very silly suggestions, but they are all also, somehow, better than Dept. Q.
The show’s protagonist is as paint-by-numbers of a lead as you’d expect. We’re going for the tough, know-it-all guy who seems like a jerk, but actually has a heart of gold trope here, a la Dr. House (from House) or Sherlock Holmes (from Sherlock). There is absolutely nothing about Carl Morck as a character that we haven’t seen before done better on other shows.
Morck is surrounded by other unoriginal characters like the badass woman boss and the disobedient son (who’s deep down, as you might have guessed, really a good kid).
The most interesting character on the show is Akram Salim, an ex-Syrian policeman. Still, the manner in which Akram comes to be working with Carl is so silly and completely unrealistic. He basically just keeps asking for a job in the way old people will tell you is how you got a job in the 1950s by simply going up to the boss and saying you’re qualified and want a job. But then, on this show, this strategy works, and they give him a position working with the police.
The main case itself is (like the rest of Dept. Q) fine. It’s acceptable. Again, nothing really original here. Morck and his team are working on a four-year old, unsolved case of a missing prosecutor. There are no real shocking twists, but I guess everything works in the TV version of the real world that we’re placed in. It all feels consistent in the Dept. Q universe.
“You’re such a renegade cop, Carl! You don’t do anything by the book!”
At nine episodes, the series is probably a few episodes longer than it should be. I don’t know if tightening everything up would’ve really made it a greatly improved series overall, but, at the same time, I do think it drags some in later episodes.
If you’re someone who’s not as picky with what to watch, I think that you’ll be totally fine watching Dept. Q. Will you also probably forget all about it a week after watching it? Also, probably yes. It’s a totally fine way to fill you’re allotted TV-watching hours while you hunt for something of higher quality to put on. Watchable, but not all that good.
Grade: 5.5/10