Marnow Murders

There are surprises around every corner in this series. The two protagonists are very competent cops and extremely troubled individuals, spectacularly played by Petra Schmidt-Schaller and Sascha Alexander Gersak. (Both were awarded well earned German TV Prizes.) Also standing out: Anne Schäfer and Jörg Schüttauf. No black and white, good against evil here. Unusual for a German production, the good guys are corrupt, take the law routinely into their own hands, try desperately to get away with it and to bring down the real villains for good measure. One memorable scene after the other: A crime victim taking revenge in a shocking way within minutes after the deed. The heroine telling how she lost her whole family. A stunning action sequence with the hero trying to save his own family. A second season would be very welcome.

Wow, these series from Germany really rocked. Nice locations with an intriguing serial murder story hold me electrified.

The actors did a very good job, so all the staff and the director. The eight episodes are well packed with mystery, suspense and action. The running time is perfect and I wanted never stop watching.

I mean it offers high value of entertainment with fast paced scenes and I was never bored.

I hope there will be other episodes with this crew in future. Would be really interesting if there are other mysterious cases to solve. As I mentioned The main actors delivered a top performance and I liked them very much.

Check it out. 7/10.

I'm all for the character-driven crime series from Scandanavia, but Germany delivers some of the best, more nuanced series in the genre. Marnow Murders (as titled/viewed in the US) has great, movie-quality characters, beautiful filmaking, quirky storyline and...two central figures that draw you into their individual worlds. Exceptional "tv."

Hi, my review is based on seeing the original German production. Germany has a long history of producing fine crime dramas, it is the most popular genre in television. The series "The Toten von Marnow" is in my opinion, one of the best shows ever made in this genre. Everything about this series has been beautifully crafted and I'll list some of my reasoning below.

Firstly, the realism of the characters. The cops in this show are absolutely not like your typical Hollywood maverick cops who seem to win every fight, have an IQ of 150 and are disrespectful to their bosses. The main protagonists are just ordinary detectives, both with tragic back stories, which become involved in a conspiracy reluctantly. Each bad decision they make leads to further unforeseeable consequences. They are portrayed brilliantly with a full range of emotions by the leads Sascha Alexander Gersak and Petra Schmidt-Schaller.

The antagonists are equally well portrayed and their motivation, based on misdeeds of the bankrupt former East German government at the end of it's reign, is understandable. There are not hoards of minions being thoughtlessly slaughtered on the way to solving the crime. The people behind the conspiracy are not evil masterminds or one dimensional villains, they are just ordinary people too, who just want the story buried, so they can go on with their new lives in the West.

The pacing of the series is almost perfect. Each episode ends leaving you wanting to see how it develops further. There are plenty of truly unexpected moments in the series, and the conclusion, where the reason for the crimes and the actions of the perpetrators is revealed is both poetic and understandable.

Definitely worth watching if you're a fan of realistically portrayed crime dramas.

It doesn't get any better than this. The script is superb and completely unpredictable and there was never a point where I felt like it was being 'filled' as I so often do with Netflix so the eight episode run seemed perfect. The dialogue is excellent and about the most natural I've heard. There's even a good few moments of humour in there and thanks to this show I've learned a few German swear words. The actors are superb, all of them, there was never a moment when I didn't believe any of them they were all absolutely convincing. Despite the leads being seriously flawed people and imperfect police officers they are very real and hugely likeable. The personal lives part is also perfectly balanced and almost always relevant to the story so it doesn't turn into a chore watching them at home with their significant others. I've never watched German TV before but I liked listening to the language. Even my wife who refuses to watch foreign TV with subtitles was hooked and we binged watched the show on C4 in two days.

If I had a gripe then I'd say that while it's a murder show and the very nature of murder is brutal I dislike graphic violence and some of the murders could be done without so much gore 'vielen dank' and while I'm at it that gore was always repeated during the 'last time' refresher at the start of each episode, poor Mr Dreyer. I also dislike 'next time' trailers at the end of each episode believing they spoil the experience so I had to grab the remote to stop them. They we unnecessary as I was already hooked and didn't need encouraged to watch the next episode. We'd watched entire episodes without realising or checking the running time once. All German TV can't be this good but based on this I'll be giving it another go. When something is this good it should be left alone for everyone to enjoy in its original form so no English speaking remakes please.