It's well made, scripted and acted, but one thing makes this "not just another Wartime drama".
Most of these sorts of shows are black and white ; good guys versus evil Germans. Cheer when the Germans get shot/bombed/etc, and the heroes return home to their lives.
In this show it's all shades of grey, and frequently black. The "heroes" do unpleasant things - right from the start - watch 1x02 and 1x05 - not just to the "bad guys" but to the "good guys". Maybe not unusual now, but really odd for the 1970s. Everyone makes compromises to survive in this show.
This is not a show with a lot of happy endings, and indeed the final ending isn't happy either. Not quite Blake's Seven standard though, if you are thinking of watching it.
The Germans - are also shades of grey. Brandt is conflicted and hugely flawed, but the best performance in the whole show goes to Clifford Rose's Kessler, who, once he gets into his stride manages to somehow make Kessler evil and human at the same time.
Kessler comes over as a human being, albeit one totally committed to the Fuhrer, which actually makes him far more unnerving than the "classic" evil Nazi. When I first watched this as a kid Kessler scared the living daylights out of me.
Reinhardt is just ... well , Reinhardt (watch it, you'll see what I mean).
Highly recommended.
Most of these sorts of shows are black and white ; good guys versus evil Germans. Cheer when the Germans get shot/bombed/etc, and the heroes return home to their lives.
In this show it's all shades of grey, and frequently black. The "heroes" do unpleasant things - right from the start - watch 1x02 and 1x05 - not just to the "bad guys" but to the "good guys". Maybe not unusual now, but really odd for the 1970s. Everyone makes compromises to survive in this show.
This is not a show with a lot of happy endings, and indeed the final ending isn't happy either. Not quite Blake's Seven standard though, if you are thinking of watching it.
The Germans - are also shades of grey. Brandt is conflicted and hugely flawed, but the best performance in the whole show goes to Clifford Rose's Kessler, who, once he gets into his stride manages to somehow make Kessler evil and human at the same time.
Kessler comes over as a human being, albeit one totally committed to the Fuhrer, which actually makes him far more unnerving than the "classic" evil Nazi. When I first watched this as a kid Kessler scared the living daylights out of me.
Reinhardt is just ... well , Reinhardt (watch it, you'll see what I mean).
Highly recommended.