The only Nordic project picked out of 50 submissions from 50 countries, Vaka is being produced by Sagafilm’s Erlingur Jack, Kjartan Thor Thordarson and Hilmar Sigurdsson for Iceland’s streamer Síminn.

The sci-fi TV show is written by newcomer Brynja Björk Garðarsdóttir. “This is the first major project for Brynja Björk whose background is in media and marketing, and she is very much a part of Sagafilm’s drive to bring in new fresh talent to the scripted drama industry,’ told Sagafilm Nordic’s CEO Kjartan Thor Thordarson to nordicfilmandtvnews.com.

When a new biotech drug for narcolepsy called Vaka, accidentally ends in Reykjavik’s waters,
local residents are rapidly infected and start developing sleeping disorders. The insomniacs gradually turn into ticking-bombs that go off one by one with terrible consequences, such as a British passenger jet which crashes in the Atlantic Ocean due to a sleepless air traffic controller. Elka, the chief of police for the Civil Protection Agency, finds out about the infection, but her own life begins to unravel once she and her girlfriend, Þórey, both turn out to be infected.

Thordarson said he is looking for UK/International partners for the series, which has secured about 28% of its financing so far.

In 2019, Sagafilm scooped the C21 Best Drama Series Pitch Award with its crime drama project Signals, commissioned by Iceland's Channel 2 (Stöð 2).

Recent successful shows produced by Sagafilm include The Minister and Stella Blomkvist season 2.

Iceland’s production powerhouse, minority-controlled by Beta Film, is currently working on the major feature project Operation Napoleon directed by Óskar Þór Axelsson from the best-selling crime book of the same name written by Arnaldur Indriðason.