S1E1 From Under the Glacier

Katla Season 1 Episode 1 'From Under the Glacier' premiered June 17, 2021 on Netflix as the opening episode of Baltasar Kormákur and Sigurjón Kjartansson's eight-part limited series. The season earned a perfect 100-percent Rotten Tomatoes score from 11 critics, averaging 7.8 out of 10, with Ready Steady Cut noting 'a rich atmosphere and compelling mysteries keep Katla engaging even as it takes its sweet time to get to the point' and the Globe and Mail describing 'a beguiling mystery about heartbreak in this slow-moving, Stygian and enigmatic eight-part series.' The premiere establishes the near-emptied town of Vik with documentary restraint: ash-covered streets, a skeleton crew of residents who chose not to evacuate, and the Katla volcano still active in the background. The show shoots in the actual volcanic landscape with Dolby Vision cinematography that Reel 2 Reel Talk praised as one of the series' most distinctive qualities. The first ash-caked figure arrives at the episode's end, and the premiere correctly refuses to explain anything - the mystery is introduced as an atmospheric fact before it becomes a narrative proposition. The IMDb audience score of 7.0 for the series reflects the patience the premiere requires from viewers accustomed to faster genre pacing.