Nicola Walker's Scottish crime drama 'Annika' has been climbing Netflix's top 10 since it recently landed on the streaming service. The two-season crime comedy, which first aired on the BBC in 2023, stars Walker as DI Annika Strandhed, the new detective at Scotland Police's Maritime Homicide Unit.
Plot and Character
Annika Strandhed is a single Norwegian mother to a teenager who is having a miserable time at school and making it her mum's problem. Walker's character spends her time solving Glasgow's baffling series of crimes, speedboating (which Walker has said she wasn't always hugely fond of doing), and breaking the fourth wall, à la Fleabag and House of Cards.
In the opening episode, she investigates a murder by harpoon to the eye, with the line: 'I think death by harpoon suggests someone who's trying to get a point across'. The first season concludes with a dramatic reveal to the audience of the identity of Annika's daughter's father; the second season picks up moments later.
Walker on the Show
In interviews about the show, Walker stressed that accuracy was not top of mind when making Annika. 'We're interested in something that's a bit more operatic in its intentions, a bit more dramatic, a bit more theatrical,' Walker told PBS of the show, which holds an 83 per cent score on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.
'And what I love about Annika is she is a woman I really think I know, and she is someone I would love. She's funny as well. She's clever, she's well-read, she's odd and weird. If I'd met her in a room, I would definitely gravitate towards her,' Walker said.
Walker's Career
Walker is no stranger to playing a copper, having starred in the espionage thriller Spooks and as Detective Cassie Stuart for years on ITV's Unforgotten, a performance fans have hailed as 'exceptional' in a Reddit thread dedicated to her acting chops.
'I think she is one of the finest roles written for a woman on television,' Walker said of Cassie in the same interview. 'I thought we really gave the audience a woman they could believe in. I doubt I will ever find a character like Cassie again, and that's okay, because you have them and you have them for the right amount of time.'
Once she exited Unforgotten, the chance to play Annika on screen arose, and Walker said she couldn't imagine letting anyone else play her radio role. 'She's mine. I've played her for 10 years on the radio. I've been in love with her for a decade before we even started shooting. That was a no-brainer,' she said, noting that it brought the sum total of cops she's played to 'a lot'.
She added: 'I certainly can't imagine ever entering that arena again. I feel like there are other parts to play and other worlds to inhabit. But if a script came through and it was amazing and the character happened to be a policewoman, yeah, I'd do it. I'm all about a great script. And nothing would stop me from doing something if I thought the script was brilliant and someone wanted me to do it.'
After Annika was cancelled last year, Walker got the chance to flex her comedy muscles again in Disney Plus's Alice & Steve, where she plays a mother out for revenge when she discovers her teenage daughter is dating her middle-aged pal. Annika is available to stream on Netflix.
