I’ve not read the Wallander stories, so I don’t know whether the drawled “veerrrry helpful” is present in the original or something Kenneth Branagh has dreamt up, but it is fast becoming a catchphrase. The second (of three) visit to the Land of Abba and the grumpy detective who has been christened Inspector Norse started, as last week, with a gruesome death (in this case the stabbing of a cabbie – he didn’t die right away) and went quickly downhill from there.

This series has, apparently, already garnered quite a following. Must be from people who always watch crime dramas and are desperate for some new fodder after years of Columbo, Morse, Frost and Midsomer Murders repeats.

I can’t think what else it can be, because Branagh aside this dire, depressing, grey programme has virtually nothing going for it. Pedestrian plots, characters that wander aimlessly about with next to nothing to do or say, and a format that seems better fitted for radio than it is for television. By that I mean the endless shots where there’s a someone on the left of the screen, someone on the right, and they stand there for hours tal…king…verrrry…slow…ly to each other with absolutely nothing else happening. It’s a bloody miracle there aren’t more deaths in each episode – from boredom.

Yes alright the countryside is nice, the seascapes are inspiring (if you like being reminded of a cold, wet, windy day at Filey) but if I’d wanted a travelogue I would tune in to the Travel Show or something. And I still can’t quite get my head around the fact that they all speak English, with English accents, but then every so often you’ll catch a glimpse of a Swedish newspaper (written in Swedish) or some Swedish telly (where they might be speaking in either Swedish or English, depending on whether the programme content is germane to the story).

What’s more we haven’t had such a messed up family life behind our main detective since Frost went through his divorce. It’s all so utterly grim. Wallander himself carries a permanent grimace as if he can’t quite believe he’s fetched up in this god-forsaken place when he should be striding the stage at the RSC.

The claustrophobia is heightened by the relentless use of extreme close-up and the fact that no-one in Sweden ever turns the lights on. Or if they do, the photons are instantly absorbed by the heavy wood panelled walls or the drab wallpaper. OK, we get the message, he’s depressed. We don’t need to be hit over the head with images of depression and subliminal hints at depression in every single scene.

Far more depressing than all that, though, is the 90-minute format carrying a 60-minute story. What, are the Beeb trying to save on the licence money by spinning it out?

One more story to come, next Sunday. Thank heavens for a short run, or it would be turning from a murder investigation into a suicide. Mine.