After I watched a few episodes of “Astrid,” a French detective series streaming on PBS, I asked the nun-friend who’d recommended it, “Will it always be this dark?” She replied cheerily, “every episode starts with a murder.”
Usually murder mysteries aren’t my style, but this one has intriguing elements beyond the gory details. What I like best is the developing friendship between Police Commander Raphaelle Coste and Astrid, who is on the spectrum. Coste quickly realizes that Astrid thinks differently and sees things that “neurotypicals” miss. Wisely, she brings her to crime scenes where neither woman flinches at the bloody corpse. Astrid then works as an archivist in the police records department to uncover relevant cases; she has a photographic memory of files, and arranges evidence visually in a private room. There, she demonstrates an intelligence that breaks the mold, reaching her conclusions in solitude. A childhood fascination with puzzles surfaces when she treats each crime as a matter of fitting clues together precisely.
Gradually, Raphaelle invites Astrid to tea, then dinner. They exchange symbolic gifts, and become friendlier without some of the usual social cues. (Astrid hates being touched; it’s a real breakthrough when she gradually learns to touch Raphaelle’s hand as she lies in the hospital after a gunshot wound, and finally lets Raphaelle hug her, towards the end of the first series. Surprisingly, she smiles with joy.)
Astrid’s habits of punctuality and pristine order serve her well. In a complicated and perhaps implausible ploy, on the verge of being kidnapped, she arranges files in her workroom startlingly out of place, which Raph notices she’d never do. They send a signal as Bach once did, translating musical notes to letters and spelling out Astrid’s kidnapper’s name.
Like refugees in another country, Astrid’s social skills group–people on the spectrum–meet regularly to discuss how to function in the neurotypical world, how to read cues in another language. They may not understand jokes or social signals, but several are geniuses at computers, their skills helping the police unravel some baffling murders. Without spoiling the end of the second series, they come through like champions for wrongfully imprisoned Astrid and Raphaelle, brilliantly helping to solve a crime.
My nun-friend was sad when the second series ended; so was I, mightily impressed by the deep humanity of the show. But hope springs: a third series has been completed in France and awaits translation for export to the US. On the horizon: a brightness for the long winter nights?
Kathy Coffey 