Showing: January 22nd Furthering the current love affair with all things Scandinavian and slightly off-kilter, Rainn Wilson stars as the titular detective, an "overweight, offensive, irascible" detective locked in a constant struggle with his "self-destructive" tendencies, and his dynamic as part of a team of eccentric criminologists. CBS might have passed on the pilot, but Fox clearly have faith and optioned the series for their own network, and from the trailer, it looks like a lot of fun as Wilson goes full cantankerous to play a more grotesque, more self-destructive version of House. The Selling Point: The quality of the source material for one: The Concerns: Can the Americans do Scandinavian without losing what makes it so inherently Scandinavian?
11. Fortitude
Showing: January 29th Can the Brits take to Simon Donald's brand of writing better than the Americans did when he wrote Low Winter Sun back in 2013, based on the British show of the same name? that was cancelled after poor reception, but the star quality of his follow-up, the similarly wintery Fortitude should drive it home with British fans looking for more gritty murders. Chris Eccleston is rightly cherished, and the presence of Michael Gambon, Stanley Tucci and The Killing's Sofie Grabol are equally intriguing presences. Expect it to be character and inevitably performance-led; no bad thing at all. The Selling Point: Grim British crime flicks in small communtiies are terribly in at the minute after the success of Broadchurch, and the last looks bloody great. The Concerns: Won't some people just think this is a sort of negative of Fargo? And Low Winter Sun - from the same writer - was cancelled prematurely.