ULTRAVIOLET

dir. Jak Komasa, Sławomir Fabicki, Bartosz Prokopowicz, Łukasz Kośmicki i Anna Jadowska, 2017-2019

The series is loosely based on the novel “The Skeleton Crew” by Deborah Halber. The idea and executive producer is Wendy West, who held the same role during the making of Dexter or The Blacklist, among others.

The main character is Ola Serafin (played by Marta Nieradkiewicz). What we know about Ola is that she spent some time in London and has a failed marriage behind her. After returning to Poland, she works as a taxi driver and lives with her mother, Anna (played by Agata Kulesza), with whom she has a rather tart relationship. The person who relieves this tension is her mother's partner Henryk (the excellent Marek Kalita), who supports Ola in her endeavours and repeatedly saves her from trouble. And it has to be said that she has an extraordinary talent for getting into trouble. It all starts with an incident she witnesses: a young woman falls from an overpass and dies on the spot. Ola claims that the victim was dropped. However, when the police learn that before the whole incident Ola had taken drugs that could have affected her perception of reality, they disregard her testimony, claiming that it is unreliable. The girl, however, is uncomfortable with the case. She feels that the police's actions are incompetent, as she has experienced in the past. She decides to find out for herself what happened that day on the viaduct. On the Internet, she comes across a group called Ultraviolet, which amateurishly deals with criminal cases abandoned by the police. Its members only communicate with each other via instant messaging. Ola introduces them to the case and involves them in solving it. Introduced members of the group of amateur detectives include Tomek, an employee of Radom airport (Michał Żurawski), a computer genius nicknamed Piast Kołodziej (Viet Anh Do) and internet influencers - the Chapko sisters (Regina and Dorota Polańska). With each episode comes a new case to solve. The police treat Ultraviolet as a gang forever obstructing their investigations. Inspector Waldemar Kraszewski (played by Bartłomiej Topa) is particularly fed up with them, who, given the number of cases solved by members of Ultraviolet, secretly envies their outcome and is aware of how poorly the police efficiency compares to them. The group's only ally is commissioner Michał Holender (Sebastian Fabijański). At first he thinks they are a bunch of idiots from the Internet. He repeatedly asks Ola to step away from the cases and not interfere in the police proceedings. Over time, however, when he sees that the operation of the 'violets' is effective, he begins to use their help himself, although he treats them with detachment to the end.

Jan Komasa admitted that the most interesting aspect was working on set with a crew of talented Polish film actors. And the series was a challenge in terms of trying to transplant a foreign idea to the Polish market, i.e

A total of 22 episodes were made and aired in two series. Opus TV was the executive producer and most of the scenes were shot in Lódź, Poland. Key locations include:

Samuel Bornstein Tenement House, 9 Traugutta Street

The tenement at this address played in the first episode of the second series. The protagonist, Ola Serafin (Marta Nieradkiewicz), learns that her family inherits half of a Łódź tenement house. The other half is inherited by her uncle from abroad, of whose existence she had no idea so far. Together with her mother (Agata Kulesza) and her partner Henryk (Marek Kalita), they go to see the inheritance of her great-grandfather. They find it hard to believe the situation. Admiring the front of the tenement house, they hear from the lawyer that before the war it was one of the most beautiful tenement houses in the district. Located on the ground floor of the tenement house, the club café ‘Owoce i Warzywa’ plays host to a bar where the family members come to celebrate the reunion.

PKP skyscraper, 28 Tuwima Street

The interiors of one of the tallest buildings in Łódź, commonly known as 'Żyleta', played host to the interiors of a police station. Every time Ola Serafin appears at the police station, it causes a certain nervousness among the policemen working there. The commanding officer, Inspector Waldemar Kraszewski (Bartłomiej Topa), is particularly unhappy about her visits.

Interestingly, the interiors of Ola's mother's flat were also arranged in this building.

Textilimpex skyscraper, 25 Traugutta Street

As for the police station filmed from outside, it was the entrance to one of the skyscrapers on Traugutta Street. The police cars standing underneath were borrowed from the nearby Municipal Police Station at 28/30 Sienkiewicza Street.

The building also has a bar - arranged as a Chinese restaurant - where Ola usually meets one of the police officers, Michal Dutch (Michal Fabijański)

Tenement house, 114 Kilińskiego Street

Ola's mother's flat is located here. The interior of the flat has been arranged in a high-rise building of the Polish State Railways (PKP), while we can admire the surroundings of Kilińskiego Street when Ola or Henryk are sitting on the balcony.

Łódź Fabryczna Railway Station

On the viaduct at the back of the station, the first story takes place, with which Ola's criminal adventure begins. A young woman falls from an overpass and dies on the spot. Ola is sure that the girl did not jump alone, and that there was someone else on the viaduct besides her. Looking for help online, she comes across a group of amateur detectives called 'Ultraviolet'.

The silhouette of the modern railway station repeatedly appears in introductory shots or so-called establishing shots.