Trapped Notes
EPISODE NOTES:
Episode 1:7 years prior to the main narrative, a couple (Hjörtur and Dagný) go to abandoned building to drink, have sex and do drugs. Hjörtur goes downstairs and discovers a fire.
Hjörtur runs back to try and rescue Dagný but fails and she dies.
7 years later a mutilated body is found by fishermen in the local harbour just before a ferry arrives into the port from Denmark, the chief of police Andri starts the investigation as detectives from Reykjavik are stuck due to a blizzard and are unable to make it to the town.
The police force believes the torso is linked to someone on the ferry so no one is allowed to leave the vessel until the Reykjavik detectives arrive.
Andri's ex-wife arrives in town with her boyfriend, her children are happy to see her but Andri is annoyed that she bought her boyfriend along.
Passengers are frustrated by the delay and are eventually allowed off of the ferry after the captain turns off the heating to prevent a police investigation on board.
Jonas Malakauskas, a Lithuanian criminal involved in human trafficking manages to escape from the ferry in a campervan where he has imprisoned a Nigerian girl and her younger sister
Jonas crashes the vehicle and flees.
Episode 2:
Joy and Nishadi find refuge at Hinrika's home. Local officials, led by former police chief Hrafn Eysteinsson and politician Friðrik Davíðsson, try to tempt the locals to sell their land with a view to Chinese investment in the port, but are met by strong opposition from Guðmundur, an old fisherman and hunter. Meanwhile, the torso is stolen from the fish factory where it was being stored, and Jonas escapes from a police cell, but is found dead after crashing a stolen police car.
Episode 3:
After a photo of the torso is posted on Twitter, Hjörtur is arrested. He admits to posting the tweet, but denies stealing the body, and is later released when a further body part is found in the harbour together with a receipt which shows that the dead man was never on the ferry.
Episode 4:
The police determine the identity of the dead man. Guðmundur warns Hrafn about the likelihood of an avalanche and sets off with dynamite to try to draw the snow down safely. His son, Sigurður, tries to stop him, and Andri follows, but the charge, though initially successful, sets off a second avalanche which engulfs all three men.
Episode 5:
Guðmundur dies of heart failure while locals attempt a rescue, and the avalanche results in the temporary loss of power to the community. Hinrika, cut off by the weather, goes to the house of Rögnvaldur, a disabled man who spends much of his time observing others through a telescope. He tells her that he has seen Hrafn beating his wife. Later, Hrafn is burned to death in his garden shed, with the door locked from the outside.
Episode 6:
Hinrika questions Hrafn's widow, Kolbrún, who admits she did not get on with her husband. Ásgeir comes across a camera containing a short film of Sigurður quarrelling with a man named Geirmundur, who is believed to be the murder victim. When Andri tries to question Sigurður, he runs away. Andri follows him to his boat in the harbour, where he finds the missing torso in the hold.
Episode 7:
Sigurður, apparently in a catatonic state, offers no explanation. The weather, having cleared sufficiently for the detective team to arrive from Reykjavik, sees the investigation taken over by Trausti, a former colleague of Andri's. Ignoring Andri's request for Sigurður to be seen by a doctor, Trausti forces a confession and announces he has solved the murders. Sigurður is taken to Reykjavik by helicopter, but suddenly opens the emergency exit mid flight and jumps to his death. When Andri writes a report for his superiors, highlighting the errors made during Trausti's investigation, Ásgeir leaks the contents to a journalist, resulting in an enquiry, to be led by Andri. Meanwhile, Hinrika continues the investigation into the human trafficking operation, and Captain Carlsen is arrested.
Episode 8:
Confidence wanes in the Reykjavik police's conclusions, and Andri is given the reins over the murder investigations. The ferry captain reveals that he is being controlled by the Faroese "engineer", and the agrees to cooperate with Andri provided that his family in Denmark receives police protection. The engineer is captured, and warns Andri that the murders are nothing to do with him, implying that there are bigger criminals operating in the town. It becomes apparent that Guðni, the hotel manager, is acquainted with the engineer and involved in the trafficking. However, Andri is shocked at the chance discovery that his father-in-law, Eirikur, has in his possession the key to Hrafn's shed padlock, evidently tying him to the murder.
Episode 9:
On being confronted with the evidence, Eirikur confesses to having set fire to the shed when he realised that Hrafn and his colleagues had conspired to cause the fire in which his daughter Dagný died so that they could claim the insurance payout. Andri and Hinrika learn from Rögnvaldur that Geirmundur had a car, and they eventually find it, leading to the discovery that Geirmundur was the absent father of Maggi, who is the grandchild of Leifur, the proprietor of the fish factory.
Episode 10:
Andri deduces that seven years earlier, Geirmundur had raped Maria, but in exchange for not pressing charges Hrafn made a deal with Geirmundur to burn down the fish factory and leave town. Andri coaxes Maggi's mother, Maria, into confessing that she killed Geirmundur in self-defence after he returned to town looking for Maggi, broke into her home, and attacked her. Leifur and his conspirators in the factory fire, including Hrafn, Guðni, and Sigurður, covered up the death and disposed of the body. Guðni, cornered in the fish factory, tries to escape by threatening Andri and Leifur with a gun and locking them in the deep freeze. He shoots Ásgeir, who has come to assist, and threatens to harm Maggi if Hinrika does not allow him to go free. Andri escapes from the freezer, and he and Hinrika arrest Guðni. Agnes leaves town with her boyfriend, her daughters, and her mother, leaving Andri behind alone. The stranded ferry casts off with a new captain, and departs the fjord.
slightly unpredictable ending
crediting their audience for being smarter and making them work out what will happen next
more realistic
No black people in main cast
Joy and Nishadi find refuge at Hinrika's home. Local officials, led by former police chief Hrafn Eysteinsson and politician Friðrik Davíðsson, try to tempt the locals to sell their land with a view to Chinese investment in the port, but are met by strong opposition from Guðmundur, an old fisherman and hunter. Meanwhile, the torso is stolen from the fish factory where it was being stored, and Jonas escapes from a police cell, but is found dead after crashing a stolen police car.
Episode 3:
After a photo of the torso is posted on Twitter, Hjörtur is arrested. He admits to posting the tweet, but denies stealing the body, and is later released when a further body part is found in the harbour together with a receipt which shows that the dead man was never on the ferry.
Episode 4:
The police determine the identity of the dead man. Guðmundur warns Hrafn about the likelihood of an avalanche and sets off with dynamite to try to draw the snow down safely. His son, Sigurður, tries to stop him, and Andri follows, but the charge, though initially successful, sets off a second avalanche which engulfs all three men.
Episode 5:
Guðmundur dies of heart failure while locals attempt a rescue, and the avalanche results in the temporary loss of power to the community. Hinrika, cut off by the weather, goes to the house of Rögnvaldur, a disabled man who spends much of his time observing others through a telescope. He tells her that he has seen Hrafn beating his wife. Later, Hrafn is burned to death in his garden shed, with the door locked from the outside.
Episode 6:
Hinrika questions Hrafn's widow, Kolbrún, who admits she did not get on with her husband. Ásgeir comes across a camera containing a short film of Sigurður quarrelling with a man named Geirmundur, who is believed to be the murder victim. When Andri tries to question Sigurður, he runs away. Andri follows him to his boat in the harbour, where he finds the missing torso in the hold.
Episode 7:
Sigurður, apparently in a catatonic state, offers no explanation. The weather, having cleared sufficiently for the detective team to arrive from Reykjavik, sees the investigation taken over by Trausti, a former colleague of Andri's. Ignoring Andri's request for Sigurður to be seen by a doctor, Trausti forces a confession and announces he has solved the murders. Sigurður is taken to Reykjavik by helicopter, but suddenly opens the emergency exit mid flight and jumps to his death. When Andri writes a report for his superiors, highlighting the errors made during Trausti's investigation, Ásgeir leaks the contents to a journalist, resulting in an enquiry, to be led by Andri. Meanwhile, Hinrika continues the investigation into the human trafficking operation, and Captain Carlsen is arrested.
Episode 8:
Confidence wanes in the Reykjavik police's conclusions, and Andri is given the reins over the murder investigations. The ferry captain reveals that he is being controlled by the Faroese "engineer", and the agrees to cooperate with Andri provided that his family in Denmark receives police protection. The engineer is captured, and warns Andri that the murders are nothing to do with him, implying that there are bigger criminals operating in the town. It becomes apparent that Guðni, the hotel manager, is acquainted with the engineer and involved in the trafficking. However, Andri is shocked at the chance discovery that his father-in-law, Eirikur, has in his possession the key to Hrafn's shed padlock, evidently tying him to the murder.
Episode 9:
On being confronted with the evidence, Eirikur confesses to having set fire to the shed when he realised that Hrafn and his colleagues had conspired to cause the fire in which his daughter Dagný died so that they could claim the insurance payout. Andri and Hinrika learn from Rögnvaldur that Geirmundur had a car, and they eventually find it, leading to the discovery that Geirmundur was the absent father of Maggi, who is the grandchild of Leifur, the proprietor of the fish factory.
Episode 10:
Andri deduces that seven years earlier, Geirmundur had raped Maria, but in exchange for not pressing charges Hrafn made a deal with Geirmundur to burn down the fish factory and leave town. Andri coaxes Maggi's mother, Maria, into confessing that she killed Geirmundur in self-defence after he returned to town looking for Maggi, broke into her home, and attacked her. Leifur and his conspirators in the factory fire, including Hrafn, Guðni, and Sigurður, covered up the death and disposed of the body. Guðni, cornered in the fish factory, tries to escape by threatening Andri and Leifur with a gun and locking them in the deep freeze. He shoots Ásgeir, who has come to assist, and threatens to harm Maggi if Hinrika does not allow him to go free. Andri escapes from the freezer, and he and Hinrika arrest Guðni. Agnes leaves town with her boyfriend, her daughters, and her mother, leaving Andri behind alone. The stranded ferry casts off with a new captain, and departs the fjord.
slightly unpredictable ending
crediting their audience for being smarter and making them work out what will happen next
more realistic
How does Episode 1 Season 1 of Homelands follow or disrupt Todorov's narrative theory?
Todorov described narratives as having a state of equilibrium which is present at the start of a narrative. In HOMELANDS this equilibrium is set in Washington around a spy espionage thriller. This is established in the setting and the location (Washington DC is the capital state of the U.S). What becomes the equilibrium is the story set post 9/11 which focuses on how well Homeland security can deal with terrorist threats. What both TRAPPED and HOMELANDS have in common is the fact that in the first episode we see prior to the actual present day. TRAPPED has as 7 years ago flashback and HOMELANDS has a 8 year flashback. By having these flashbacks it disrupts Todorov's theory by not following a traditional equilibrium. I much prefer watching a TV series than a film as the story carries on over time instead of across 2 hours. The fact that there is an ongoing story as well as small character changes make a TV drama a lot more interesting than a film. I feel as though by having multiple equilibrium's and disruptions it can differ from a film as there is only so much you can have in one film meanwhile a series or box set can carry through multiple series/ seasons.
In applying Todorov's concept of equilibrium to long form TV drama, disruption to the community or state of affairs takes place. In HOMELANDS the discovery of Nick Brody who has been missing in action for 8 years is the jolt that drives the narrative, which gives the audience a story and narrative are for the lead character Carrie Mathieson. The narratology revolves around a strong female character that are represented as the investigator of the crime un each episode. Todorov argues that a realisation of disruption occurs next in the narrative structure and sometimes this is the same as the disruption itself. These suspicious unravel in episode 1 where Carrie has to uncover the evidence that Nick has been turned. Here it is the female intelligence officer that realises that something has gone wrong.
Todorov's ideas regarding recognition of disruption are relevant here and although they appear differently in the narrative structure of the two dramas, his ideas help us to analyse just how the recognition occurs and, as they are both crime dramas, when the recognition of disruption is revealed, it helps to create further suspense and engagement with the narrative.
In applying Todorov's concept of equilibrium to long form TV drama, disruption to the community or state of affairs takes place. In HOMELANDS the discovery of Nick Brody who has been missing in action for 8 years is the jolt that drives the narrative, which gives the audience a story and narrative are for the lead character Carrie Mathieson. The narratology revolves around a strong female character that are represented as the investigator of the crime un each episode. Todorov argues that a realisation of disruption occurs next in the narrative structure and sometimes this is the same as the disruption itself. These suspicious unravel in episode 1 where Carrie has to uncover the evidence that Nick has been turned. Here it is the female intelligence officer that realises that something has gone wrong.
Todorov's ideas regarding recognition of disruption are relevant here and although they appear differently in the narrative structure of the two dramas, his ideas help us to analyse just how the recognition occurs and, as they are both crime dramas, when the recognition of disruption is revealed, it helps to create further suspense and engagement with the narrative.
Todorov's theory applies to HOMELANDS to an extent, his ideas around the original equilibrium and disruption are applicable but the theory is less relevant in terms of resolution and the new equilibrium. The theory is disrupted and it shows how HOMELANDS doesn't reach a full resolution and therefore doesn't have a new equilibrium in order to create a story arc that follows the conventions of a long-form TV drama in order for the audience to keep watching. What TRAPPED includes in their ending is that it is slightly unpredictable and leaves their audience questioning endless possibilities for what could happen next which is not what HOMELANDS do. It makes TRAPPED seem more realistic and credits their audience for making them work out what happens next rather than giving them options for whats to come.
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