Deutschland 89

I just love this series. Depicted nicely the complex political situation in Germany (east and west) during the cold war era, and gave an idea how it had a huge impact on global politics. Of course there are some side stories, but they made the series more interesting.

I thoroughly enjoyed watching all 3 seasons. I was a teen (from the UK) during these years, so I remember quite vividly the goings on & music from this period of the Cold War era.

These comments assume viewers have seen the previous two series, Deutschland 83 and 86, as it is necessary to watch those to fully enjoy this series. I watched in German with English subtitles.

Another three years have passed and things are about to change forever in the DDR; it is 1989 and various Warsaw Pact countries have opened their borders and let people out... in a matter of days the Berlin Wall, the very physical symbol of a divided Europe, is going to fall. Our protagonist, Martin Rauch, is once again caught up in the key events. These see various characters trying to plan for what happens next; making the DDR a fairer, but still socialist country, facilitating reunion with the Federal German Republic or just making money. For much of the time he is joined by Nicole, his son's teacher, who he becomes romantically involved with. This will inevitably lead to many dangerous situations and further confrontations with his aunt Lenora.

I found this to be an enjoyable conclusion to the Deutschland trilogy; it nicely incorporates real events and manages to be tense even when the target of an assassination attempt is a real person who famously was not assassinated. The cast does a fine job bringing the various characters to life. There are plenty of twists and turns which take Martin and Nicole across the wall to West Germany then on to Romania and Italy then back to East Germany. There are some flaws; it does feel as if it is trying to shoehorn rather too many events of the time into the story, such as the Romanian uprising, and the epilogue comparing the Berlin Wall the Trump's US-Mexico border wall was rather crass. That didn't spoil the series though; I'd certainly recommend it to those who enjoyed '83 and '86.

A great finale of the third season for me. By chance I saw today that the final season is online and I watched all the episodes straight away. well corona time. I've lived in Berlin since I was born and have often visited East Berlin with my father. always with the entrance fee of 20 D-Marks per person. The Berlin Zoo was cheaper! In the west everything is illuminated and modern, in the east of Berlin the smell of two-stroke engines and the houses sometimes looked as if they weren't renovated or renewed after the 2nd WW. Today it looks completely different. The actors, the script and the integration of the authentic film material are very successful. German productions are apparently only good if they are financed by Amazon or Netflix, see "Dark". It's worth watching the 8 episodes!

Entertaining series. Music was a lot better in 83, 86 seasons. Good wrap up for 89. However, there was no need for the last 10 seconds of political visual commentary. Comparing the Berlin Wall with the United States southern border is asinine.