Norway’s modern-day drama Ragnarok is now streaming on Netflix
Danish screenwriter and playwright Adam Price has created a modern-day rendition of Norway’s most famous legend. Ragnarok is now streaming on Netflix.
Post-apocalyptic stories have been flooding the cinematic universe this last year with films like Mortal Engines, The Last Boy, Ad Astra, I Think We’re Alone Now, and many others. But few have taken to describing modern-day end times through new renditions of old Norse mythology. Danish screenwriter and playwright Adam Price is one of those few, with his latest Norweigan TV series Ragnarok now streaming on Netflix.
Price’s six-part, Norweigan-language-based TV series introduces brothers Magne (David Stakston) and Laurits (Jonas Strand Gravli) who have just moved to the fictional town of Edda to start at a new school. While the parents of the two boys remain elusive, it’s clear that not only does Magne harbor a special, weather-based “gift,” but also that his classmates may too be hiding secret talents and family history.
In this coming-of-age-drama-meets-action-film, Magne and his brother must defend the town and the people they start falling for from beings known as “giants,” some of which turn out to be students at Magne’s and Laurits’ school. There are fights with spears, hatches and, for audience’s cinematic delight, thunder and lightning.
As if the person-to-person clashing of titans was not enough, Edda’s landscape also starts to shift with melting ice caps, intense pollution, tropical winters, and flood-worthy downpours.
Price has been anything but subtle with his series’ parallelled connections to the original legend of Ragnarok. According to Norse mythology, Ragnarok is a series of events–from natural disasters like storms and volcanic eruptions to a battle between Norse gods and giant beasts–that eventually lead to the earth’s destruction, the extinction of humanity, the death of Thor and his family, and the world eventually being drowned in water.
While Price’s story seems to start off with the hope of a different Ragnarok ending, where Magne and Laurits (who look an awful lot like Thor and his brother Loki) might actually beat the beasts before the earth is destroyed, the Netflix series does have a lot of other similarities with the original story. Perhaps one of the biggest parallels is that the town Edda has the same name as the Poetic Edda, which tells the story of Ragnarok.
Executive produced by Norwegian writer Simen Alsvik, Meta Louise Foldager Sørensen, and produced by Stine Meldgaard Madsen, Ragnarok also stars Herman Tømmeraas as Fjor, a senior and alleged student giant, as well as Theresa Frostad Eggesbø as Saxa, Magne’s love interest in the series.
Will you be binging Ragnarok this weekend? What other recently released Netflix series are you hooked on? Let us know below!