Borgen: The First Tuesday in October

"I want a divorce."

So, that's it. No more Borgen on BBC 4 until the Winter, we're told. I suspect it'll be worth the wait, although I certainly hope they don't show it as two consecutive episodes a week next time. That's not a very clever way to show a series where each individual episode requires much, much digesting, and I'm not sure I was the only one put up to just record it until much, much later. I can think of a few things about the last episode which I wish I'd written about last night. I feel like that with every episode. One episode a week, please!

This episode is such a deeply satisfying culmination of the threads, character-based and thematic, which have run right through the season. Birgitte's marriage collapses into selling-out for the cameras, and then into inevitable but cathartic divorce, just as the first anniversary of her premiership looms, alongside a new Parliament and a new year's legislative programme.

It's clear there's no way back from the strain, and the lapses in judgement, suffered by Birgitte. Such is the nature of power. All senior politicians live in a bubble which, in the end, inevitably severs them entirely from reality. And the sheer physical and emotional strain of this most demanding of jobs is so utterly crushing that it seems to approach Stockholm Syndrome at times. Relationships with "civilians" tend not to survive such pressures. Not only Birgitte, but also Bent and the Sir Humphrey figure have given up hope of a functional relationship with their spouse, whatever the "official" situation. All of this feels very, very realistic, and it's interesting to relate it to UK politics.

It's only where both partners exist in this world that there's any hope. It's very notable how, even though Katrine ends the episode disgusted with Kasper, things between them end on a note that's rather on the hopeful side of individual. Neither of them could possibly maintain a relationship with a "civilian"- what choice do they have? I suppose that's a kind of Stockholm Syndrome, too, but it isn't really anywhere near that bleak. They may fight, a lot, but they understand each other perfectly and what they have between them is, for all its faults, real.

The early mention that "Cabinet seats cost popularity" certainly raised at least one eyebrow from me, being an accurate description of what the inevitable compromises of power have done to Lib Dem support here in the UK, and Nick Clegg is nowhere near as pretty as Birgitte Nyborg. The Labour plotting against Bent, Birgitte's father figure and her only true friend in politics, is devastating for her at a time like this but also feels very real.

The episode is framed around Kasper's speech, and his struggle with it, culminating in Birgitte's triumphant delivery which, of course, confirms that she can still be a good Prime Minister in spite of her inevitable problems. Kasper actually shows himself to be a bloody good scriptwriter; his comments on Kennedy's inauguration speech, and the need for pathos and ethos as well as logos (See? I just spontaneously remembered stuff from a module in Rhetoric I took at uni, a disturbingly long time ago…!), show how well he understands the values of the political principles he lacks. Of course, now that we know his history it's fascinating to speculate on why he's like this. Also interesting is how he casually uses the lovely but soon-to-be-sacked Sanne for his own gratification at a time when he seems to be getting on fine with Katrine, dumping her so very casually.

Katrine, on the other hand, is very, very principled, but how much of this is really ambition? I notice that Kasper seems to hint at this when he points out that she's not yet thirty but wants to dictate the news policy of a major channel. I suspect she'll follow Hanne Holm into newspapers.

In one sense things are wrapped up. In another, we're right in the middle of things. Politics is like that.