Babylon Berlin

Tom Tykwer, Achim von Borries and Henk Handloegten's Babylon Berlin launched on ARD/Sky Deutschland in October 2017 and became, almost immediately, the most internationally exported German prestige series in the streaming era. The show won the International Emmy for Best Drama Series in 2018, the German Television Award for Best Drama, and the Grimme-Preis. The first two seasons were simultaneously the most expensive German production ever made.

Cologne detective Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch), traumatised from First World War service, arrives in the dazzling and decadent Weimar Berlin of 1929 on a politically delicate vice-investigation assignment. He is paired with Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries), a stenographer-typist by day and a part-time prostitute by night, who proves to be one of the most operationally capable detectives in the precinct. Across what is now four seasons (with a fifth in development), the series moves through the political and cultural collapse of the Weimar Republic (the Communist marches, the cabaret scene, the Reichswehr Black Reichswehr, the rise of the National Socialist movement) with the same procedural patience that made the Nordic noir tradition export so well.

The series operates simultaneously as crime procedural, period drama, and political-history primer. The Moka Efti nightclub set-piece dance numbers (choreographed to original Bryan Ferry recordings of period music) became viral cultural objects in their own right.