If you’ve ever read crime novels then you know that detectives don’t like coincidences. The adventures of Lucija Car in the second week of broadcasting will convince you that she really is a "true detective". Certainly, the closest we've ever recorded.
Some time ago, I read Zoran Krušvar's book "Executors of the Lord's Plan." A relatively simple weft introduced me to Istrian peculiarities, and Rijeka, as a city, perfectly complemented the mythology of the book. I grew up with Istria a lot during my childhood, from family ties to my first journalistic experiences. It was these journalistic experiences that upgraded the already mentioned Krušvar's book with a special taste of the "Istrakon" fantasy festival, which, coincidentally, took place in Pazin this weekend. And while Jules Verne was inspired by the Pazin Cave, while Balašević also sang about it, Istria was bypassed on our screens as if it did not belong to the clichés about the regions that have dominated film and TV series production from Croatia's independence until today. I'm glad to say the second season of "Rest in Peace" has changed that, but I'm even more glad that it's not the only thing that has changed.
Croatian Radiotelevision aired four out of ten episodes. The plot, unlike the first season, was shot in a way that is more reminiscent of the Scandinavian series, and it is evident that the screenwriters had more freedom in this format. The first four episodes can be seen as a warm-up for what is to come, and the fact that after the first week there are a lot of positive comments further emphasizes how high "Rest in Peace" raises the bar for all future productions. Speaking of which, I warmly hope that there will be future productions and that positive reactions to "Rest in Peace" will lead to a redefinition of what is interesting content for domestic producers. It is clear to me "Rest in Peace" format is more demanding and difficult for both viewers and those who produce it, but the great popularity of Scandinavian series such as "Forbrydelsenr", "Bron/Broen" or "Borgen", as well as French "Engrenage" proves that there is an interest in a quality crime genre in our country. In fact, it’s fascinating how these ordinary, life-like things passed by our screenwriters and filmmakers as we duly endeavored to serve content that required neither special engagement nor from viewers or those who produce them. I'd be glad if "Rest in Peace" was just the first series of those that will tackle the world we live in, not the one we flee to.
Any review of any television program starts with its broadcast slot and its promotion. Today, in the age of the Internet and "pay and watch" technology, broadcasting a series at a given time can be considered an outdated model, but while the promotion of the second season is commendable (compared to the first), it is actually strange that HRT did not use the opportunity offered by aggressive "Black-White World" promotions. I am inclined to agree with Zrinka Pavlić from T-portal, who wrote in her critique that this aggressive promotion to CBS was actually a disservice, but it is surprising that none of the marketing experts on national television didn't come with a suggestion to broadcast the first season premiering season two. Thus, since season one passed under the radar, people who like what they have seen so far in season two actually can't legally watch the season that introduced Lucija Car and criticism of modern society to Croatian TV.
Based on the first four episodes, we can conclude that the second season is even darker than the first. The shift from one case-one episode formula made it possible to paint a broader picture throughout the season, so with each further episode, the series draws us deeper into Istrian landscapes that are in stark contrast to the story being told. Although it is constantly emphasized that any resemblance to real people and events is accidental, the references of real-life events will be clear even to superficial viewers. Judita Franković is fantastic again in the role of Lucija Car, and the shift of the series from Zagreb to Istria eliminated the characters with whom I had the most problems in the previous season. This made the whole series even better, and as a special curiosity, I would like to point out the excellent and tense chemistry that Franković and Dragan Despot have in their conversations. Their conversations in prison, where Despot's character ended up after the events of the first season, are particularly interesting because Lucija Car is different from that naive journalist from the very beginning of the story. The anxiety we feel in her character, the obvious panic attacks, hallucinations, and intense reliving of the events made her more fragile, more sensitive, but I would dare say at the same time more lively and sexy compared to the first season. Also, more powerful. According to the characters from the cult stories, this weakness and trauma become a source of her determination and strength needed to shed light on the secret of the company "Chemix", whose workers are dead, but no one has ever been responsible for their deaths. Corporations like to cover up their sins, and digging through the buried sins of a company privatized in that "wild wave" of privatization will bring Lucia to the center of an affair in which it will be very difficult to get the skeletons to speak.
The additional complexity of the story is emphasized by the better characterization of the characters in the fictional Istrian town of Globin. Globin hides his stories and secrets, and the attitude towards those who visit Istria only during the tourist season and tennis tournament in Umag, while at the same time being constantly stepmotherly towards that same Istria, is one of the main topics of the second season. The excellent music of the group "Veja" is an outstanding background for the events in the series. We already saw "Gustaf" last week, and in the ninth episode, the appearance of Alen Vitasović was announced, which will give all fans of Istrian music additional reasons to watch episodes this week. What marks the second season of "Rest in Peace" is the parallel telling of a deep story and Lucija's introspective examination of Mate Šušnjara. Dragan Despot got a much deeper, human, and strongly outlined character this season and his performance is really brilliant. Lucija in Globin falls into a web of various characters. In the beginning, we have a rather pale but later better Anja Šovagović Despot, excellent Helena Minić Matanić and Nina Violić and standard good Goran Navojec. In this spider web of various characters, it is difficult to conclude who is an ally and who is an enemy because each of them can be poisonous to Lucia.
There was a lot of media buzz about the problems with the Istrian dialect, but I must say that it is understandable to me that in such an ambitious project there is a variation in the quality of performance of a demanding dialect. There are several reasons why it is difficult for a television production of this type to be completely authentic. The series is also intended for viewers outside Istria, so I guess it is somewhat adapted for easier understanding, and some actors have visibly put a lot of effort to show the accents and specific lengths as faithfully as possible. The pology on the official Facebook page of the series is commendable, which emphasizes that, unfortunately, with all the effort, complete authenticity could not be achieved. What I would like to point out is the fact that this is not a necessity for a series like this. The story of the series, as well as the relationships between the characters, are of sufficient quality to hold the viewer's attention even when the wrong pronunciation or the wrongly emphasized word "stab in the ear". The screenwriters of the series did not reconstruct the speech but told the story, and it is interesting that this dialect in the series is the only one of its kind in the history of the serial program of Croatian television. Therefore, it is not surprising the positive reactions of the local media and public astonishment about why Croatian scenarios are drowning in the clichés of Dalmatians, Purgers, and Zagorje without the intention to turn a little west or (more recently) east.
For the end of this text, I will return once again to the excellent application of Istrian legends. The one about Jura Grand is an interesting subtext of the series because it raises the question of what human emotion turns a human bat into vampires, and we could push that assumption a little further and say that in the series "Rest in Peace" these metaphorical vampires are hidden behind the cloak of executive power, a power that fits perfectly into that symbolic category of bats. What remains when all the dust is removed from the secrets, all the veils that hid the Globin stories, and how Goran Dukić connected the stunning Istrian landscapes with a morbid and realistic story, we will find out in further episodes that are definitely worth watching. I don’t remember anything similar being filmed on domestic television.
It is a coincidence that "Istrakon" finished this weekend. Coincidentally, we are entering a holiday mood this week. It is also a coincidence that we can read many things on the newspaper pages that remind us of the plot of this series.
If you’ve ever read crime novels then you know that detectives don’t like coincidences. The adventures of Lucija Car in the second week of broadcasting will convince you that she really is a "true detective". Certainly, the closest we've ever recorded.