YMMV / The Bridge (2011)

• Adorkable: A lot of Saga's more awkward conversations come across as this.
• Alas, Poor Scrappy: In the first season, one may not feel so bad for Ferbé after being a pretty big Jerkass for most of the series, but at the same time you can kind of sympathize with him when he prevents a bunch of children from dying, which causes him to get fired, and considering he genuinely seems to be proud of it, you may feel a bit bad when he's betrayed and killed by the Truth Terrorist.
• Alternative Character Interpretation: Gertrud. Was she genuinely shocked at Oliver's obsession with Viktoria because they had been married for so long, or was she just worried that he'd reveal her plan?
• Awesome Music: The song that plays in the titles and the credits, "Hollow Talk," from the Choir of Young Believers. The tone of the song suits the tone of the series quite nicely, not to mention the apropos lyrics at the end of the chorus.
  And everything
  Goes back to the beginning
• Complete Monster: Season 1 (originally Der Pass): Gregor Ansbach is a mountain-loving computer expert, whose charm, good looks and intellect hide a twisted psychopath. Years previously Ansbach viciously bludgeoned his boss to death for complaining about his inappropriate behavior. Separated from his girlfriend and son, after he locked them in the cellar for two days, almost killing them for disobeying him, Gregor discovered the philosophy of Sebastian Brunner, who preached that society's decadence would bring its downfall. Using the ideology to fulfill his conflicting narcissism and sadism, Ansbach became the Krampus Killer, dedicating himself to bringing about "the red time of the year". Attacking individuals linked to societal problems in both German and Austrian, solely for the fame it would bring him, Ansbach tortured two men to death and hanged a young internet celebrity in the forest. Thwarted from murdering a nationalistic politician for insulting him, Ansbach took out his frustration by viciously beating his assistant to death. Having spent weeks flooding social media sites to ensure a shopping center would be packed, Ansbach set off a homemade bomb on site. Realizing a young immigrant he'd taken him was a threat, he strangled her. Failing his goal, Ansbach switched focus to an obsession he had developed toward Elle Stocker. Feeling his story was sufficiently publicized, he poisoned them both so she would be his "forever".
• Diagnosed by the Audience:
  • Saga. The actor and writers have said that she probably is autistic in some way, but that they didn't explicitly state it to keep their freedom of writing without offending/misleading people. This said, she has been praised as a plausible portrayal and role model for some on the autistic spectrum.
  • Emil Larsson seems to be schizoid, depressed, and sociopathic all at once.
  • Elsa, the woman Saga involuntarily befriends in prison. She doesn't seem like a jaded convict type, but she clearly wasn't insane enough to be committed to a mental hospital.
    Elsa: A woman visited me and said if I didn't kill you, they would hurt my daughter.
    Saga: She said they would do that?
    Elsa: No. (Beat) She said "we", but that becomes "they" when I tell it.
• Evil Is Cool: Admit it, the Truth Terrorist Sebastian is pretty damn badass. He's relatively handsome, has an incredible posture, wears stylish clothing, most of his victims are assholes, has a pretty good motivation, an excellent planner, an absolute genius, and he nearly succeeds, and in the end he actually does complete his master plan!
• He Really Can Act: Adam Pålsson is mostly associated with happy-go-lucky, often quirky or Adorkable characters. Here he plays a nihilistic and mentally abused psychopath who commits gruesome murders and is the Big Bad of season three.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • The Truth Terrorist, poor guy. Almost right after Hansen learns that his wife is cheating on him, and with that not just one guy, but multiple, she and their son die in a car accident, causing Hansen to become depressed, giving up on his job, and eventually becoming homeless, before trying to commit suicide, feeling betrayed by everyone as no one helped him during this tough time. It's no wonder he's pissed at Martin and wants revenge.
  • In season 3 Emil Larsson. His childhood was absolutely terrible and it's saddening as hell seeing him rant over not wanting to exist in the first place.
• Magnificent Bastard: The Truth Terrorist, real name Sebastian Sandstrod, the Big Bad of season 1 is an athletic and military-trained but also well-dressed and charismatic Serial Killer who wants to bring attention to social problems. To do this, the Terrorist starts killing them, giving the issue more attention than ever. Having five children kidnapped and placed inside a locked room, the Terrorist wants to bring attention to child labor by giving a demand that people will have to burn down the offices of five companies using it, everytime it happens he spares one child each, and doesn't back out of the deal once they do as he says. Placing Hennig, an officer committing misconduct which lead to a man's death in the basement of said man's brother, the Terrorist tries framing the brother for the murder by having him torture Hennig. With his true goal being revealed to get vengeance on Martin Rohde for cheating on Sandstrod's wife before she along with their son died, Sandstrod, then named Jens Hansen and the best policeman around, now wants revenge on Rohde for ruining his life. He does this by having Rohde's eldest son August build a good relationship with his father by putting them through life-threatening situations, only to later kill him, just so that it would hurt more.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Some people were having problems hearing the lyrics of "Hollow Talk" that they either make jokes about what the lyrics are or provide joke subs.
  • Saga's introduction to persons who don't know her. "Saga Norén, Malmö County Police".^note Länskrim Malmö in the original Swedish, the "Länskrim" being short for "länskriminalpolisen", broadly translating as "County CID". Malmö itself is in Skåne County
• Moral Event Horizon:
  • The Truth Terrorist has some really good points and seems to never lie when he makes a promise, such as when he lets a bunch of children go because people did as he said, but then you realize that all of this was a lie just so that the real identity of the terrorist, Jens Hansen / Sebastian Sandstrod could get closer to Martin and get vengeance on him. After this everything goes downhill and it is obvious the whole 'Truth Terrorist' thing was an act.
  • Emil crosses this when he kills Hans or when he tries to kill his newborn baby brother, depending on your perspective.
  • After being presented sympathetically for the entire fourth season, Kevin/Brian is revealed to be Susanne/Stephanie's accomplice in killing the loved ones of the people they hold responsible for Tommy's death. He tries to finish his revenge by forcing Henrik to watch him shooting Henrik's surviving and recently discovered daughter Astrid.
• Ron the Death Eater: Saga gets a lot of criticism from viewers for getting Martin arrested in the second season finale, to the point where some people paint her as some Inspector Javert-esque fanatic who is obsessed with following the letter of the law and thinks nothing of betraying her friends for it. While her decision is certainly morally debatable, Martin did kill Jens; not reporting him would amount to covering for murder, and while it's absolutely understandable that Martin would want Jens dead, it's also understandable that Saga wouldn't want to involve herself in the crime by covering it up, especially given her deep-seated aversion to lying. Not to mention that the question whether killing a murderer can be justified or not is a subject of intense debate, so Saga's decision to turn Martin in for murder isn't necessarily only the result of her staunch By-the-Book Cop nature. Also, to imply that she doesn't care about Martin is simply not accurate to the series - she openly describes him as her only friend and is noticeably unhappy about having to report him.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Some viewers think that Season 2 could have expanded more on the aftermath of the attempted bioterror attack in Sweden.
• The Woobie:
  • It's easy to feel bad for Saga - she comes off as rude and cold (which means that she sometimes appear a Jerkass Woobie), but she doesn't realise it and it isolates her from others. This is cranked up to eleven in Season Three when her abusive mother comes back into the picture.
  • Henrik. His wife and daughters are missing and have been for years, leading everyone to believe they're dead. He falls in love with Saga, she gets pregnant, she promises him she'll have the baby...she gets an abortion because she can't bear to lose him. His wife and one of his daughters are dead, one of his daughters is still alive.

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