YMMV / Mot i Brøstet

• Contested Sequel: Karl & Co. It was never as popular as Mot i brøstet, and only lasted for about half as many episodes, but it still had its fans. Even today, viewers can never agree whether it was on par or almost on par with the original, whether it was an Even Better Sequel, or whether it was total garbage.
• Critical Dissonance: None of the series was even remotely liked by critics. Mot i brøstet especially was the butt of many jokes among professionals and for much of its running time was used as the prime example of how lousy Norwegian TV was. Fans still adored it though; ratings were consistently high and even now lots of people remember the series and characters fondly.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Elna, the only character on the show who was treated to loud cheers from the Studio Audience every single time she entered a scene. Small wonder she got larger and larger roles as the series went on.
  • The only thing about Karl III that the audience actually liked was the deadpan Roy Butler, played by Bjørn Sundquist. General consensus is that both the actor and the character were too good for the series they appeared in.
• Overshadowed by Controversy: Almost nobody remembers Radio 2 these days. If they do, it's either because of Tore Ryen's Creator Breakdown or for the atrocious way producer and TV station TV2 treated its actors. Already before the series premiered, three of the main actors were fired for being "too old" for the Younger and Hipper tone TV2 wanted, leading to five episodes needing to be re-filmed with the younger replacement actors. Then, the ordered second season was cancelled without the actors being informed of it, leading to problems for some of them, as they'd declined other offers or even quit former jobs in order to be in the series.
• Sequelitis: Where Karl & Co has enough fans that it's more a Contested Sequel, Karl III was hated by critics and audiences alike. The tonal shift was not well received, and the decision to axe all the more eccentric and likeable characters to only focus on a rich and successful Karl didn't win the series any fans either. As mentioned above, the only aspect of the show the fans liked was Bjørn Sundquist as Roy Butler, and his chemistry with Nils Vogt as Karl — but this wasn't nearly enough to save the series, which is seen as Tore Ryen's biggest failure to date.
• Strangled by the Red String: Henry's romance with Elna came out of nowhere in the Series Finale. It was pretty obviously put there just because the showrunners thought a Wedding Finale would make a nice ending to the show.
• Values Dissonance: You can tell that Mot i brøstet was made in the 1990s, and that it wasn't particularly Fair for Its Day either. Lots of casual misogyny, some casual racism, a bit of mild homophobia and transphobia, and quite a bit of blatant body shaming going on in some of the episodes. Karl & Co is slightly better but still has some blatantly homophobic and body-shaming episodes.