The Chestnut Man Review: A Chilling Procedural That Earns Its 10/10
The Chestnut Man opens on an isolated farm in 1987, where an entire family has been murdered. More than thirty years later, Copenhagen police find a young woman dead in a playground. Her left eye is cut out. One hand is gone.
Trailer, via Netflix.
A Figurine Made of Chestnuts
Detective Naia Thulin catches the case. Danica Ćurčić plays her as a cop who works alone and prefers it. Her new partner, Mark Hess, is a Europol investigator pulled back to Copenhagen against his will. Mikkel Boe Følsgaard plays the reluctance without playing the sulk.
Beside the body lies a tiny figurine made of chestnuts. That detail does the work a dozen procedural scenes usually waste time on.
The Fingerprint on the Chestnut Man
Forensics turns up a piece of evidence on the figurine: the fingerprint of a missing girl. She is Kristine, daughter of Danish Social Affairs Minister Rosa Hartung, played by Iben Dorner.
That link is the engine of the season. A serial killer is murdering mothers across the city, and the only thread back to him runs through a politician whose child vanished. Søren Sveistrup wrote the novel the series is based on, and the show follows it.
Kasper Barfoed’s Camera
Kasper Barfoed and Mikkel Serup direct. The show keeps the book’s cold patience.
The supporting cast earns its screen time. David Dencik plays forensics worker Simon Genz, a friend to both detectives. Lars Ranthe plays Nylander, Thulin’s boss. Ali Kazim plays Nehru.
Hide and Seek Arrives in 2026
Netflix renewed the series for a second season in 2024, adding Sofie Gråbøl and Katinka Lærke Petersen. It premiered 7 May 2026 as The Chestnut Man: Hide and Seek.
What the First Season Gets Right
Here is what the first season gets right, in order of how much it matters:
- The chestnut figurine, a clue that is strange without being cute.
- Thulin and Hess, a partnership built on friction rather than banter.
- The Hartung thread, which gives the murders a public cost.
- Copenhagen itself, shot as a city that keeps its secrets.
Why the Score Holds
Plenty of crime series have a grisly clue and nothing behind it. The Chestnut Man has a clue, a missing child, and a detective pair that never asks the audience to like them.
The published score is 10.0 out of 10, with a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. That score applies to the series as a whole, which runs 12 episodes across two seasons.
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