Dortmund "crime scene - love me": A narcissist does not love

If you have understood one thing in the ten years that the Dortmund "crime scene" has existed, then it is this: four commissioners do not form a team for a long time.

On your own, past and against each other, that was the motto in the Ruhrpott for a long time.

Trust, the tacitly assumed, sometimes tense basis of collegiality in other “crime scenes”, only existed in Dortmund as a constant shortage economy.

But since Peter Faber (Jörg Hartmann) gave up his compulsion to go into the afterlife and Martina Bönisch (Anna Schudt) after a badly ended affair with the head of the forensic investigation, Sebastian Haller (Tilmann Strauss), her preference for non-committal sex, one works a little less at a distance .

Jan Pawlak (Rick Okon) already had the opportunity to come to terms with his relationship skills in the last episode, which was about his drug-addicted wife.

He used them badly, going it alone, which almost cost him his life.

This story is not over yet.

Only from the newcomer Rosa Herzog (Stefanie Reinsperger) has so far little been known privately.

Toxic immaturity

That changes in “Love me!”, the extraordinary episode celebrating the tenth anniversary of the Dortmund “Tatort”. Herzog's mother Susanne Bütow (Rosa Enskat) appears.

She left her child many years ago to go underground with the next generation of the RAF.

Now she needs Herzog's help.

No trace of regret.

Two convincingly intertwined storylines by the author Jürgen Werner are about children abandoned by their mothers.

It's his twelfth screenplay for Dortmund, he knows his characters.

In the foreground, however, are the evil effects of toxic immaturity.

Director Torsten C. Fischer (most recently "Tatort: ​​Vier Jahre") transfers the template's complex web of emotions and abuse of power into a "Tatort" episode that should be among the top ten of the best in the series in the future.

In their depiction of the violence of pathological narcissists against ex-partners, as drastically described by the psychoanalyst Marie-France Hirigoyen in "The Masks of Wickedness", the episode has exemplary character: Werner, Fischer and their cameraman Theo Bierkens ensure that the topic is not talked about or explained away,

but conveyed in brutally direct scenes.

Haller, a perverse professional of manipulative trivialization, is all about power and control.

And with Bönisch, he has made a strong woman his victim in order to strengthen his own importance.

"Love me!" ties directly to its predecessor.

Martina Bönisch's offended ex Haller still stalks her, accepts no rejection, circles her.

The inspector reacts with factual confrontations and consistent professionalism among colleagues.

Haller spreads behind her back that she is depressed and has an alcohol problem.

He unsettles her, humiliates her, sends her a disciplinary complaint and, most importantly, withholds important evidence from her.

Two dead women are found in the Dortmund forest cemetery.

The actual scene of the crime appears in variations, as a doll's house, flashbacks, replicas of scenery and murder rooms (production design by Eduard Krajeweski).

Feline Wagner, the first to die, disappeared a year ago.

Now, like the other victim who was reported missing two years earlier, she is wearing a cheap yellow summer dress like those sold in the 1990s.

Actually a beautiful last place, this burial forest, says Bönisch to Faber.

"Do you want to be cremated later?" Faber replied: He had often wanted to die, but had never given it a second thought.

And Bönisch: "I would like it in such a place." That's how you beat around the bush.

The obvious trail leads to the Ihle funeral home.

Thomas Ihle (Jan Krauter) and his wife Julia (Marlina Mitterhofer) are not particularly helpful.

They are in mourning every day, which not only shows in their black clothes, but has apparently also rubbed off on their mood.

Your employees are also very busy, people always die.

The fact that the dead women resemble Bönisch and that they apparently met their murderer through a dating website, that Bönisch probably already had an appointment with him and that the anniversary of the murders is approaching, is only inadequately discussed in the Dortmund team, which in turn leads to the kidnapping of one of the policewomen , who soon desperately talks about her life.

In the end there is an escalation for which empathetic mothers and narcissistic men are to blame, but by no means in the same way.

What remains?

Faber and Bönisch really investigate together for once, “fabern” together, play the roles of perpetrator and victim and even allow the mixing of professional distance and private closeness at one point.

Anna Schudt and Stefanie Reinsperger in particular give great performances in "Love Me!".

In the next Dortmund "crime scene" hardly anything will be the same as it used to be.

The

runs this Sunday at 8.15 p.m. in the first