Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Telly addicts

Anyone watching Deutschland 83?

307 replies

Destinysdaughter · 03/01/2016 21:35

Am enjoying it so far. Very intriguing
premise and beautifully shot. I don't mind subtitles, find they make me concentrate more and am very interested in this period of history. Looking forward to see how it develops...anyone else? ( guess most of you are watching War and Peace tonight!)

OP posts:
Davros · 17/02/2016 19:20

I've been thinking about it (still!) and now I think General Edel got shot but can't make up my mind whether he did it himself or Alex did it

IPityThePontipines · 17/02/2016 20:38

I've been pondering about it too, for all the occasional implausibilities*, it was a very vivid drama.

I think General Edel shot himself, as said upthread, he had lost everything he cared about.

Also more cynically, I'm not sure what his character would have to offer a second series as opposed to Alex, like Theydon'tknow said upthread.

I'm pondering wowfudge's comment upthread that "Martin loved the freedom he had the west and the lifestyle.", because a major aspect of the series is that we didn't know much about Martin's inner thoughts at all. It was quite telling when he dropped Yvonne at the West German Embassy and she realised that he didn't have any real feelings for her.

I think because for all that Martin was the face of the series, it was really about two families, the Edel's in the West and the two sisters in the East and their relationship with the East German state.

*The murder/disappearance of a young soldier on a train, in suspicious circumstances would be a pretty deal. The face of the real Moritz Stamm would be everywhere, making it impossible for someone else to assume his identity.

scarlets · 17/02/2016 21:24

Stamm was an orphan whose elderly guardian (his great aunt) had died, so there was no family to miss him iirc. I'm assuming that it was somehow arranged for him to be transfered to Edel's team (maybe by a GDR infiltrator like Kramer) with a view to "replacing" him with Martin en route. Not sure though!

SymphonyofShadows · 18/02/2016 09:28

That's exactly what happened. The E Germans discussed how they would do it, and broke Martins finger so he wouldn't be asked to play the piano. Intel said he was am accomplished pianist.

boredofusername · 18/02/2016 18:19

Slightly off-topic, but I've just watched the film Goodbye Lenin again and a somewhat younger Alexander Beyer who played Tischbier was in it.

SwedishEdith · 18/02/2016 19:30

Interview with Jonas Nay coming up soon on Channel 4 news.

Hygellig · 18/02/2016 21:49

Really enjoyed this series, even if it seemed very unrealistic/implausible at times (a bit like The Americans).

I wonder what happened with the real Moritz Stamm. Did his family report him missing to the police and therefore would the army have been informed?

From a language point of view, I wondered why Martin was addressing Tischbier as Sie (the formal 'you'), whereas Tischbier addressed him as 'du' (informal 'you'). This might have happened with some other characters as well, I can't remember. Can any German speakers enlighten me?

Hygellig · 18/02/2016 21:50

Oh sorry, scarlets has answered my question about no-one missing the real Stamm.

gingercat12 · 18/02/2016 22:02

Hygellig I suppose Martin was considered to be younger and junior compared to for instance Professor Tieschbier.

2rebecca · 18/02/2016 22:15

Agree it seemed unlikely if Stamm was that eminent that he wouldn't have a lot of family and friends trying to keep in touch with him.

wowfudge · 18/02/2016 23:35

I thought it was obvious he enjoyed being in the west - from the moment he couldn't believe everything on the shelves in the supermarket, when he got a walkman, etc, etc. He had more freedom in the west than in the east. His day job was a darn sight more interesting for starters.

Hygellig · 19/02/2016 18:14

When I did a year abroad in Germany whilst at university I remember some young German people I spoke to saying they sometimes didn't know whether to use Sie or Du. I had thought that both speakers would use one or the other, however, unless an adult is talking to a child. Maybe Martin didn't feel comfortable becoming too familiar with Tobias T. I wonder if there will be another series, given that it didn't get very good ratings in Germany.

SauvignonBlanche · 19/02/2016 18:33

Did anyone else see Jonas Nay being interviewed by Matt Freight on Channel 4 news last night?
He came across as really sweet! It was funny the way he kept moving between German and English until Matt Frei told him to stick to German.

IPityThePontipines · 19/02/2016 18:47

I'm hoping the international market will be lucrative enough for them to not worry about German ratings. There's also the possible that someone like Netflix or Amazon could fund it.

Sauvignon - I did see the interview and agree he came across sweet. I think he can speak fluent English and was clearly expecting the interview to be in English, so I'm not sure why Ch4 interviewed him in German.

SauvignonBlanche · 19/02/2016 18:53

I think that perhaps Matt Frei wanted to practise his German though as he's also clearly fluent there wasn't a lot of point.
It's funny that he's not recognised in Germany, except by British tourists.

gingercat12 · 19/02/2016 22:35

In my mother tongue, which is not German, there is a complex set of rules on when can you use formal and informal language. It is mainly to do with age, seniority and gender and you are only allowed to address someone informally when the older / more senior / female person gives you permission, but they can always address you informally. (But they rarely would.)

SwedishEdith · 20/02/2016 00:58

Matt Frei is German so it was in the spirit of the programme that he was interviewed in German. Made is good fun and an interesting change from a bog-standard interview. And, yes, Jonas came across very well.

gingercat12 · 20/02/2016 13:20

I have downloaded All4 app so I can watch the interview and Walter Presents Grin

Destinysdaughter · 20/02/2016 17:07

Sie is a formal way of addressing someone and du informal, like vous and tu in French

OP posts:
IPityThePontipines · 21/02/2016 21:16

There's a big whole in my Sunday nights now. Not helped by the fact, I'm having to sit and write an essay instead.

Deutschland 83 has a different intro in Germany:

I think I prefer the international one.

2ManySweets · 22/02/2016 09:36

pontipines I have to disagree - I really like the UK intro - so much so I'm singing it to my baby when she's unsettled and tbf it seems to work!

Going to actually go back to episode 7 this week again; watching it in a lonely ward doped up to my eyes on painkillers fresh from a CS means I didn't give it the attention it deserved

IPityThePontipines · 22/02/2016 14:32

2Many - Sorry, I wasn't clear, the UK intro is the international one, as Deutschland 83 was shown in the US before it was shown here and the same intro was used.

2ManySweets · 22/02/2016 18:17

Ah-ha!

boredofusername · 23/02/2016 12:21

There's an interview on the Guardian website now - which is in English. Interesting that the actor plays the piano really well :)

www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/video/2016/feb/22/deutschland-83-star-jonas-nay-we-have-a-responsibility-towards-refugees-video?CMP=share_btn_tw

2ManySweets · 24/02/2016 10:22

OMG: looks like the song was originally done by Plastic Bertrand!

open.spotify.com/track/6vxfPqPMseQJMme1FkzCyZ

Swipe left for the next trending thread