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Max Raabe with musical interlude in »Babylon Berlin«: In the wake of the enemies of democracy

Photo: Frédéric Batier / ARD

Was the Weimar Republic doomed to fall prey to fascism as a result of the Nazi seizure of power? The fourth season of »Babylon Berlin«, which started with production partner ARD after its premiere on Sky last year, traces the complicated power currents of 1931 in a convoluted conspiracy thriller – but from a wide variety of perspectives.

From the headquarters of the SA, where work was being done to make Berlin the center of the "movement," we go to the not-so-glamorous Moka Efti dance palace, where emaciated revelers dance until they drop for prize money. From the glittering feasts of big industry, where one dreams of the rearmament of Germany and new national greatness, it goes to the editorial offices of the fascist press, where propaganda for the growing brown mob is being worked on. Always in the middle of it all: Inspector Rath (Volker Bruch), who pretends to be a Nazi in order to infiltrate the fascists - and then gets caught up in the maelstrom of the enemies of democracy.

Leap moments in history

The creators of »Babylon Berlin« Achim von Borries, Henk Handloegten and Tom Tykwer talk about showing history in the making. When will it be decided who comes to power? "For us, it's all about the switching moments. We are obsessed with the idea that everything could have turned out very differently," Handloegten told SPIEGEL. Our aim is to refute this common image of Weimar, that it was a doomsday society per se, that it inevitably had to run towards the historical catastrophe of the 'Third Reich'."

In our analysis of the background to the fourth season of »Babylon Berlin«, we wrote: »The directors show how their characters slowly become Nazis in the early thirties – or how they resist the compulsion to conform. The protagonists are ambivalent to the point of pain, as a viewer you follow them at eye level. There is no omniscient narrator who leads you to the conciliatory or fatal outcome of the story (...) Among the most disturbing moments of the new episodes are those at the beginning, in which Volker Bruch marauds across the Ku'damm in SA uniform because he has been given the task of infiltrating the brown thugs to defend democracy. In the course of the mission, his loyalties become more and more fragile. Who is a Nazi here? And who looks like that?"

We gave ten out of ten points. What is your opinion on the politically charged historical panorama?

In June, ARD announced that it had commissioned the development of the fifth season of »Babylon Berlin« together with the production company X-Filme and the financiers of Beta Film. The pay-TV broadcaster Sky, which had previously co-financed the mammoth project, is no longer on board. In the meantime, the company has completely said goodbye to the uncertain in-house production of series. »Babylon Berlin« is now allegedly sold in 140 countries. By means of the income from the granting of the licensing rights, the high production costs could possibly be absorbed even without a second German broadcaster.

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