Almost exactly a year ago, train stations and shopping malls were packed with posters telling of fear, intoxication, and megalomania in the Weimar Republic of Berlin - now these posters are hanging everywhere again. It's about "Babylon Berlin", the big series panorama in 16 episodes. The background: In October 2017, the pay-TV provider Sky showed the premiere of "Babylon Berlin", only now is the first with the premiere in free-TV.
It is a complicated story: Although Sky did not even contribute a quarter to the record budget of 38 million euros - so that pays the reckoning, the station wrestled from the ARD, the series for a longer period exclusively to be allowed to evaluate. Many critics saw it as a public start-up aid for a private provider, a hitherto unique funding stunt in German television history.
When "Babylon Berlin" finally starts broadcasting on free-to-air TV this Sunday, it's also the starting signal for a television autumn in which so many different providers are showing so many German high-end series as never before - and their financing models are no less daring.
Who works with whom? What is going on where? In our commented picture gallery you get an overview.
Berlin is burning, Brandenburg is suffering
"Babylon Berlin", from 30 September in the ARD In the drug halls and dance halls of Berlin: The traumatized returnees from the battlefields of the First World War are stunned with opium and morphine, industrialists intoxicate themselves to Großmannsträumen of a new powerful German Reich. In the middle of it, Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch) chasing after an SM movie, in which the young Adenauer is to be seen. The series creators around Tom Tykwer prepare the German Cinema of Fear from "Caligari" to "Dr. Mabuse" with the latest narrative techniques of standard television. Cost: 38 million euros. 16 episodes. Continuation is already commissioned.
"Deutschland86", from 19 October on Amazon Prime Video The Stasi in Africa: The bankrupt GDR tried in 1986 by weapons shifters in the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa to earn, the choice of business partners hardly corresponds to the socialist ideals. Jonas Nay and Maria Schrader (photo, l.) Are once again seen as a broken hero and a broken anti-heroine. Powerful sequel to "Deutschland83". Cost: 13 million euros. 10 episodes. "Germany89" is already booked.
"Hackerville", from 8 November at TNT series Cyberterror in Romania: A specializing in cybercrime BKA investigator (Anna Schumacher, photo, l.) To convict Eastern European hackers. In many respects, the most interesting cooperation in the German series autumn: At the station level HBO Europe and TNT series work together, on a creative level the "Deutschland83" showrunner Jörg Winger and the Romanian arthouse directorial star Cristian Mungiu ("4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days "). 6 episodes.
"Perfume", from November 14 at ZDFneo Fine nose and corpse stench on the Lower Rhine: Five boarders trying to decipher the mystery of the human fragrance and produce it all kinds of unappetizing. For first professional viewers, the very, very free adaptation of Patrick Süskind's novel is a radical aesthetic series creation, for others it is a picture-perfect bestseller ballpoint. Will probably have to discuss it yet. Netflix will take over the international evaluation in 2019. 6 episodes.
"Beat", from 9th of November on Amazon Prime Video Twitching and gutted bodies in the nightlife of Berlin: Nightclub impresario Beat (Jannis Niewöhner) mixes with everything, with which one can make money in the party mafia turnstile: DJs, drugs, Weapons and human organs. Now the police hook him as a V-man. Amazon in the rush of capital - how many series tolerates Berlin? The party metropolis is repeatedly used by international TV producers as a selling point. 7 episodes.
"Milk And Honey", in November at Vox sex work in Brandenburg's fallow: Because the daddy of his father goes down the drain, Johnny (Artjom Gilz, photo, M.) begins to work in escort. Recovery through intercourse in a structurally weak state - that sounds risky. But the station Vox has already proven with the award-winning series "The Club of Red Ribbons" on a childhood cancer ward, that knows how to implement difficult substances smart. Like "The Club", "Milk And Honey" is the adaptation of an internationally successful format - namely the Israeli dramedy "Johnny and the Knights of Galilee". 10 episodes.
"The boat", from November 23 at Sky Shore sinking in the Atlantic: The extremely free remake of Lothar Günther Buchheim's logbook novel combines the male drama at sea with a female-dominated resistance scenario to land. For all its dedicated work on the fireworks front, that would call a modern narrative approach. Cost: 24 million euros - calculated in terms of broadcasting minutes, the series is more expensive than "Berlin Babylon" and thus sets a German production record. 8 episodes.
"Dogs of Berlin", starting on 7 December at Netflix Berlin burning: A German-Turkish national player is murdered, Arab clans are their territory in Neukölln from, the neo-Nazis rule in Marzahn. Netflix goes social analysis: In its second German production, the streaming service was apparently inspired by the surprise hit "4 Blocks" and sends the great Fahri Yardim into an opulent crime panorama. 10 episodes.
In part, the cooperation for the normal television viewers hardly understand: On October 19, for example, "Germany86", the continuation of the elaborate cold war scenario "Deutschland83". Namely at Amazon. This is a small change for the old followers of the series, ran the first season three years ago but on RTL. The station is still on board as a co-financier, but the second season will show until the end of 2019.
Also for the implementation of "perfume" they agreed on a completely new cooperation model: The thriller series was financed jointly by ZDF and Netflix - but the proportion of the streaming service is the much lower. Therefore, the very, very free Patrick Süskind adaptation will be shown in ZDFneo in November, then in the ZDF main program and finally still be available on the broadcaster media library. Netflix will do the evaluation late in the year, especially for the international market.
Wherever one looks in the German television series, one encounters at present on surprising alliances: The cyber crime series "Hackerville", which plays in Germany and Romania, becomes of TNT series and the new Eastern European dependance of the US Pay TV authority HBO co-financed. In Germany, from 8 November TNT series takes over the Erstausstrahlung.
Star producer Hofmann vs. streaming services
"Netflix needs to dress warmly"
That all partners get their money's worth with these complicated international co-productions, there is still no proof of this. The producer Nico Hofmann, who is in the lead with his company Ufa in the production of "Deutschland86" and "Hackerville", assumes that the trend towards a share economy will soon be over. In the SPIEGEL interview he recently stated: "The producers will try to keep the series in their own systems."
As evidence for Hofmann's thesis, one could take the remake of "Das Boot" as an eight-part series. Sky once again set a record-breaking budget (with the help of Bavaria), but this time it was put up without another German channel partner. The pay-TV premiere is on 23 November, from a free-TV premiere you want to know nothing about Sky.