Wallander and death of my father

I don't usually do reflective posts, but I'm going to indulge myself a little today. ( Usual service back tomorrow no doubt. )

Boris Johnson is wrong today in the Telegraph as to why the English adaptation of Wallander is so compelling, and its not a sort of sang froid about Scandinavians being as bad as the rest of us.

We can see Kurt Wallander drowning slowly through out both series. Friends dying, betrayal, fractious family relations all bringing the tide in in a way you assume will certainly drown Kurt.

This week saw the death of his father. He doesn't take the time, and with the exceptions of one or two work colleagues, no one else is going to give it to him ( certainly not what's left of his family ).

No one knows what the death of a father is really like, until they have experienced it. Yesterdays episode played that part brilliantly. ( I remember a Sunday school teacher of mine telling us that, and how annoyed he was by the superficial reassurances from people who had no such similar experience. He was spot on. )

Its Kenneth Branagh's portrayal of Wallander slowly bleeding humanity that's so appealing, and I suspect for those men over a certain age the empathy they feel for it. ( See girls your always asking us to open up and talk about our feelings, now you see why staying quiet was always a good idea.)

Just maybe its self indulgent, but when the reasons for stoicism are eroded by the years and events its quite understandable.

I haven't read the books, or seen the Swedish series, so I don't know where this is all going - but its a journey many hooked viewers will take with Kenneth Branagh.

PS I didn't say how this all relates to my own father, but that in part is the point.

Dad died almost 10 years ago.