You can find plenty of crime thrillers and gripping mysteries on Netflix to keep you entertained throughout the spooky season. One of the most exciting — and disturbing — is the Danish Scandi noir series The Chestnut Man, also titled Kastanjemanden. The series centers on Naia Thulin (Danica Curcic) and Mark Hess (Mikkel Boe Følsgaard), a pair of Copenhagen detectives trying to unravel the mystery of a serial killer targeting women.

The killer is not only murdering his victims but mutilating their bodies in such a way that’s reminiscent of the small chestnut figurines he leaves near his crime scenes. As the detectives work to interpret the complicated web of clues, they begin to connect the dots between the string of murders and the disappearance of Kristine Hartung (Celine Mortensen), the daughter of Rosa Hartung (Iben Dorner), the minister of social affairs and a powerful political figure. Authorities believe Kristine’s case is closed, but her body has never been found, and the detectives begin to suspect that she’s alive after all.

Soon, Hess and Thulin realize that the victims of the killer are all mothers who have had complaints of child abuse lodged against them at some time, but all of them retained custody of their children anyway. More specifically, all of the victims are mothers who aren’t directly abusing their children, but rather turning a blind eye to the abuse. Detectives begin to wonder if the chestnut man killer has some connection to Rosa Hartung, and if his actions are meant as retaliation against her and the department of social affairs. The small chestnut man figurines left at the crime scenes bare Kristine Hartung’s fingerprints, could this mean she’s alive after all and was kidnapped by the chestnut man?

As more victims turn up, along with more fingerprinted-chestnut-men, the audience is served a red herring. It turns out Rosa once played a hand in removing an infant from a mentally ill mother’s custody, and that mother, Benedikte Skans, seeks revenge on Rosa. With the help of her boyfriend, who has been working as Rosa’s driver, Benedikte kidnaps Rosa’s son. When authorities find Benedikte and her boyfriend dead (from what appears to be a murder-suicide) and Rosa’s son untouched, they presume that the couple was to blame for the chestnut man murders and that the case is closed. But in the final shot of Benedikte and her boyfriend, before we see them found dead by authorities, a mysterious car pulls into frame. Was the driver of that car responsible for the couple’s death?

Detectives Thulin and Hess aren’t so sure that the chestnut man case is closed, and soon learn of a cold case from 1987 that involves the murder of an entire family, save for the two young foster kids living there at the time. The murder allowed police to uncover the horrific abuse that the foster children were suffering from at the hands of the family. While the case was never solved, the lead detective at the time recalls to Hess that the crime scene was filled with chestnut men figurines. The foster children are revealed to be a boy named Toke Bering and his twin sister, and Hess begins to piece together that perhaps the crime was never solved because Toke was the one who committed it.

It’s soon revealed that before going to the foster family that abused them and that they ultimately murdered, Toke and his sister were placed with Rosa Hartung’s parents who decided to adopt the twins — that is, until Rosa became jealous of her new family members and lied to her mother about Toke treating her badly. Now, Hess is certain that Toke Bering is the chestnut man and is attempting to get his revenge on both Rosa for getting him sent away, and on all bad parents out there who allow bad things to happen to children.

As the audience learns all of this, detective Thulin is on a mission — alongside Simon Genz (David Dencik), the head of the forensic department — to find the tree that makes the very unique kind of chestnut the killer has been using for his figurines. Soon, Thulin traces the chestnuts to a tree on the farm that the brutal 1987 crime was committed on. When she emerges from Genz’s car to inspect the chestnuts, it’s revealed that Genz is driving the same car that we see appear just before Benedikte and her boyfriend are found dead. Meanwhile, thanks to the discovery of an old school reunion photo, Hess learns that Toke Bering is actually Simon Genz (who changed his name when he turned eighteen), who Thulin is with in that very moment and who — we now realize — killed Benedikte and her boyfriend for interfering in his vendetta against Rosa.

After receiving mysterious messages about her daughter, Rosa shows up at the farm after Genz has already revealed himself as the killer to Thulin and tied her up there. He clearly aims to torture and disfigure Rosa like he did his other victims, but detective Hess shows up just in time. Rosa and Hess are able to free themselves from the farm despite Genz setting it on fire as he tries to escape with Thulin. Hess forces Genz’s speeding vehicle off the road, causing a crash that kills Genz.

The terrifying ordeal of the chestnut man is over with Genz’s death, but authorities still don’t know where Kristine is or if she’s even alive. Finally, the detectives are able to find the home of Genz’s sister, who has been living there in isolation along with Kristine Hartung who she helped her brother kidnap over a year ago. Kristine is reunited with her parents, apparently unharmed.

Fans of the twisting series are hoping for a season two, but so far, Netflix has yet to confirm a second season.