One of the biggest, if not the biggest long-runner in Sweden, Beck has lasted for over fifty years, starting life in television 1967. The series is about Martin Beck ("Pitch", in direct translation), a well-known commissioner in Stockholm who is absolutely dedicated and married to his job, although he does in fact have a family. The episodes always include at the very least one murder that Beck and his colleagues have to solve, but unlike Wallander, the murderers are often revealed during the beginning of the episode, instead of the killers being mysterious and unknown until the climax.
The stories of the episodes vary alot. For example, one of the episodes is about something as simple as a man finding a dead body while taking out the trash, and another is about a group of eco-terrorists making terrorist attacks in Sweden. The villains are also very different going along with the plots, there are standard murderers like people killing their husbands for different reasons and not doing much more, to absolute maniacs and cop killers. Arguably the thing that has kept the series going for so long are the lovable characters, which makes the series more comedic than other similar series. Characters include Valdemar, only credited as Martin's neighbour, who constantly makes hilarious jokes in the episodes and is the only character, other than Martin himself, who has appeared in every one of the thirty eight episodes. Gunvald Larsson, the secondary protagonist seasons 1-5, a brutal Cowboy Cop who has zero tolerance with criminals, often abusing them while in interrogation. Gavling, the Big Bad of season 1, who is impossible not to hate as he kills his own men for fun and other things. Inger Beck, Martin's daughter. And most recently Steinar Hovland, a Norwegian cop who is incredibly charismatic and is replacing Gunvald Larsson after his death.
So far, the series has had six seasons and thirty eight episodes, and is now streaming on C More.
- Anti-Hero: Gunvald Larsson, who abuses every single criminal he meets and constantly insults them, even if they are innocent. He's the secondary protagonist.
- Joakim Wersén, Beck's boss, is surprisingly nice for the protagonist's boss in a crime-thriller, but seems to be obsessed with how media sees the police, rather than making more necessary decisions. Understandably so, however.
- Affably Evil: Very rare. Most of them are faux, and the three villains who are affable include a mentally-challenged pedophile, a criminal who is also a member of a cult which sees reality as a literal video game and kill random people because they want to experience the video game in real life, and a finnish gangster who threatens everyone who he dislikes. The nicest of these is the pedophile, by the way.
- Alas, Poor Villain: After Karin, in "Eye for Eye", has been discovered as the serial killer behind the five murders, she explains that the reason she killed her classmates was because she was raped for an entire hour when she was only thirteen, and everyone just stood and laughed. Lena offers to help her, but Karin instead points the gun at Lena, but changes her mind, and commits suicide instead.
- Asshole Victim: Very frequently. A big example however is when Gavling is preparing to kill a woman he had previously victimized, killing her newborn baby by throwing it down from a balcony, but this time actually wanting to kill her ten years later, using a... syringe... this time, in order to cause an overdose. The police come in time, and offer him to jump down from the balcony, or they'll shoot. They have too shoot.
- Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Due to Martin's job, he often has a hard time getting free time with his family. However, the scenes where he actually does have that, it becomes this.
- Big Damn Heroes: Gunvald has lots of these, often during interrogations, in fact. However, he has a pretty awesome one where he forces the entire police squad to protect one woman who he previously dated from an eco-terrorist group, even doing a car chase scene where he kills one of the members of the group at a pier, where he is forced to brake.
- Big Bad: Gavling, in season 1, is one of the few recurring villains in the series.
- Bitter Sweet Ending: Gunvald's death is regarded as this. He gets killed by some random mook while searching for a dead body. Now, that's not really how you kill off a character who is more popular than the main protagonist.
- Bury Your Gays: A gay police officer gets killed in The Money Man, although it is moreso because he is a police officer he gets killed rather than being gay.
- Butt-Monkey: Martin. Especially in Buried Alive, since he gets, well, buried alive by the killer, and it's revealed that he is in fact claustrophobic. Poor man, poor man.
- Oskar Bergman is this in his first episodes. He is constantly bullied by Gunvald and the other policemen due to being new and therefore unprofessional. However, he becomes more experienced as time goes by, even becoming a bit of a badass.
- Cult: There is a disturbing one in "Traces in the Dark", see the entry on Affably Evil.
- Darker and Edgier: While the show was never necessarily "lighthearted", episodes like The Girl in the Cellar and Buried Alive are much darker than other episodes, with almost no humor at all, which is something the show is known for having.
- Deadpan Snarker: Gunvald.
- Defective Detective: Martin is definitely this. Mostly disconnected from his family, his entire life is dedicated to his job, and always has to go through rough cases.
- Disappeared Dad: Martin himself is this. He has a son who didn't even know he had a dad until he was in his 20s.
- Gunvald tells a story of how his dad just disappeared one day. He would apparently always joke about disappearing, and one day, he did.
- Driven to Suicide: Many criminals in the series end up pulling a Suicide by Cop, or, in extreme cases, kill themselves. It's actually more common for them to attempt suicide, in fact.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones:
- Jesper Wennqvist, in "The Ad", may be a serial rapist who lures people into "buying" a sofa from him, but only to rape them once he meets them. However, he genuinely loves his mom, and his backround is rather tragic as well, being born from a serial rapist himself.
- Gavling's unnamed mercenary seems to generally care for his associates.
- The true murderer in "The Girl in the Cellar" kidnapped a little girl while on a trip to Germany with her husband, because she wanted children, and she is shown to actually care for her.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Santos Golenza and Victor Bengtsson, from The Price of Revenge are absolutely shocked by Dag Sjöberg's utter cruelty and sadism. The biggest example is when Dag kills two police officers at the start of the episode, just because they happen to be nearby. Then again, all three of them are fine with blowing up a scraper.
- Faux Affably Evil: As stated before, most villains in the series appear to be polite, but often it's just a facade.
- I Never Said It Was Poison
- Karmic Death: Dag is a six times cop killer, and he gets killed by a cop.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: The homosexual police officer is killed by Gavling this way.
- One-Steve Limit: No character in the series is named "Gunvald" or "Martin" other than Larsson and Beck. Wonder why.
- Plucky Comic Relief: The Neighbour, who always wants to have a drink late at night with Martin.
- While not entirely "plucky", alot of Gunvald's humor is kind of plucky, especially that one time where he gets angry at a coffee machine for not having cappuchino.
- Protagonist Title: Obviously.
- Rabid Cop: Gunvald is often very violent against the suspects. It is deconstructed in one of the episodes where he gets suspended for his behaviour.
- Running Gag: The Neighbour wanting to take a drink with Martin.
- Serial Killer: Everything from criminals who just kill lots of people, rapists, or even terrorists, exist. It is more common though for a villain in the series to only kill one-two people rather than being full-blown serial killers.
- Tender Tears: The three main protagonists in the first seasons all have their villains. Beck cries at Jesper's death in The Ad, who is about as tragic as someone can be. He was born from a serial rapist raping his mom, which caused him to go insane. Lena Klingström feels bad when Karin explains her motivation and committs suicide. And Gunvald cries when a heartless monster dies, Dag Sjöberg, one of the few men he was ever truly terrified of.
- Trauma Conga Line: Beck being buried alive.
- Truth in Television: The Price of Revenge was acclaimed for being realistic and very similar to an event that happened in Sweden years before the episode where two police officers were killed.
