Thursday nights on Tele-Quebec have been filled for the last few years by the Wallander series. The early shows from 2005-2006 were interesting enough, but the 2010 season is a bust. The stories are chaotic and banal--Mankell was not the author--and the acting, camera-work and production values are not up to the standard we demand from European TV. Krister Henriksson seems tired and increasingly uninterested in his work, and that is the actor I'm talking about and not the character. Lena Endre seems to be in the cast because she made a film with Bergman and adds some star quality to the rather mediocre line-up.Arvet (The Heritage) is poorly made, with brackish camera work and poor acting. The two rookie cops, Pontus and Isabelle, are more than a little annoying, and in a well-run police department would never get permanent status. The story is not worth telling; it hardly makes sense. Cinema buffs of a certain age will note that Bjorn Andresen, the pretty boy from Death In Venice, is in the cast.

We come to the story as a party is being given at the home of Claire and Manfred Stjarme, entertaining a group of German business friends. Manfred receives a call on his cell phone. He goes outside to talk, and as we are watching him, from a distance, a figure comes to stab him. Manfred dies from wounds sustained in the attack. Enter Kurt Wallander and his team. There are no clues as to why this apparently rich man was killed, so the police begins investigating.Interested in a possible connection with the cider factory, the detectives find a lot of Polish people working. They zero in Anna Kowalski, who was having an affair with the dead man. Going after the missing Jan Kowalski, the police go to a desolate house where they find Jan has hung himself. The police are puzzled by the circumstances that led to this death. Something does come out, the Stjarmes had fired a lot of the old time workers at the plant and has taken a slew of foreigners, illegal immigrants but mostly Polish that work for a fraction than the old Swedish employees. Claire confesses things were not all perfect between her and Manfred. The prenuptial arrangement between them prevented Claire, whose family owned the business to share half of her fortune with Manfred.Isabelle has been shaken by the shot she received some time before. She was lucky to be alive; her bullet proofed vest saved her from a sure death. Now she has been seeing the police shrink who is trying to help her. Pontus is understanding toward what his partner is going through. A night of dancing and drinking to relieve stress shows both have more than a passing interest in each other. When Isabelle shows at Pontus' door that night, it is fireworks between them.Benjamin Wilkes, a psychologist that works for Claire's firm, arriving at a deposit with his wife, notices someone has forced his way in. He goes to a loft area only to be stabbed to death by an unknown assailant. This incident gets the attention of Wallander. Going to investigate a young woman, Kurt is stabbed on his stomach, but he gets only a minor cut. Isabelle runs after the woman, and when she is near, pointing the gun at the stranger, she cannot shoot her gun.Things will get more complicated later on. Claire has a lot to be afraid. A night when Pontus and Isabelle are patrolling the house, they begin to make out in the car, not noticing a woman going inside, right in front of where they are parked. As it turns out, this is the same woman that tried to stab Kurt. Claire knows perfectly well who she is and what is at stake.This episode was directed by Mikael Marcimain. There is enough action to keep the viewer involved in a story that meanders with different subplots and not a clear picture of what is really going on begins to emerge until the last part of this chapter. Krister Henriksson does his fine take on Kurt Wallander. He shows an interest in Katrina, but she is too afraid to get closer to him. Lena Endre is fine as Katrina.

Yet more shaky camera-work (following on from the previous episode) and further bleached out visuals disappoint as they bring the Swedish version of Wallander closer to its inferior English-speaking cousin. Such a shame when the Swede's robust point and shoot approach underlines the triumph of substance over style which had been this series' hallmark before 2.10.This particular episode seemed to pose more questions than it answered. Why was the cider heiress married to what appeared to be a chemically-enhanced former WCW star? Why did Katarina appear to express annoyance after she'd spotted Kurt and Claire in the restaurant and then suggest that anything more than an office relationship between herself and the detective would be unprofessional? Am I alone in thinking she's been teasing him for the last 10 episodes? Is it a case of "If I can't have him then nobody can?" Was Claire as barmy as her sister? It wasn't clear whether she was beating up Kurt or trying to kiss him during her final interview? FInally, and most importantly, the stars of the show, dear Ebba and faithful old Jussi were missing.....again! I only hope that this doesn't mean that this series is going out with a whimper rather than a bang.

When a businessman is murdered the chief suspects is the husband of the woman he had an affair with and when he is found hanging in a barn with the victim's blood on him it seems like a clear case of murder followed by suicide. There are inconsistencies in the theory though; there is no suicide note and more importantly there are no rope fibres on the man's hands or blood on the rope. Two more murders with the same modus operandi as the first suggests there is still a killer at large. The latter two have links to a local mental institution and one of those was fired after complaints that he had abused patients. One patient was connected to both victims; and she was also connected to the sister of the first murder victim. She had been released recently so immediately becomes the new chief suspect.Isabell claims to be over the events of the previous episode where she only survived due to her bullet proof vest but after chasing a suspect who has knifed Wallander it becomes apparent that she hasn't got over it as well as she claimed. After a night out with Pontus she follows him home and soon ends up in his bed. This might not be a problem but a later moment of passion in their car while they are on duty means a suspect gets into the house of a person they are meant to be protecting and somebody ends up dead. While Isabell and Pontus are getting closer together it seems as if the budding relationship between Kurt and Katarina is coming to an end as she declines his invitation to dinner then says it wouldn't be appropriate for the prosecutor to go out with a senior police officer.This was a decent episode which once again showed that the police face real dangers when confronting suspects. It also allowed for a good amount of character development for Isabell and Pontus which is certain to have consequences for them in the future, Nina Zanjani and Sverrir Gudnason did well in the roles that were somewhat under used in early episodes.