smokingboot

Excellent.

Up there with Life on Mars and True Detective season 1. Of the three it's the one most cleanly defined as a drama; LoM's often played for laughs and nostalgia and has that slight touch of SF to it, TD works the mythos of the King In Yellow to perfection. Both use evocations of elsewhere and other to illustrate human truths.

Das Boot uses human events to illustrate human truths. I've never seen the film, need to watch it at some point. The series moves between the U-Boat itself and events at its home port among those connected to it.One moment of trope infection; the resistance turns up and I had my 'Allo 'Allo moment, remembering to listen carefully, I will say this only once. Beyond that there's one speech in 16 episodes I think must have lost something in translation. The series works with three languages and subtitles so smoothly I don't even notice. The pace is incredible, I've just binge watched both series. In season 2, there is more about American ambivalence, Dublin's involvement; ironically given the subject, it's a much bigger world than the average war drama, and yet we stay close, very close.

As an aside, the cast ranges from pretty to breathtaking. When they're not covered in diesel, covered in blood, or on fire, there's an awful lot of eye candy here. With his hair slicked back Rick Okon is basically a pair of angst-ridden cheekbones, Tom Wlaschiha's looks change by light and mood, but never have I seen a man so clearly embody wolfish soulfulness as Clemens Schick. Of course, he can only ever be Von Reinhartz, or it doesn't work. The beard must stay. I speak as the voice of destiny here.