The Island (2020–2024) User Reviews

A slow burn horror/thriller

[gc-17365 · 6/10 · 31 July 2020]

After a binge watch of Dark I came across this and thought what the hell - another German series that maybe as good

But it is a very slow burn show

The first 5 episodes are spent setting up the characters, families, connections, rivalries, love affairs and so on

There is an introduction to the virus early on but doesn't really feature in the show again (bar some news reporting) til episode 6 where it then becomes the focus of the episodes

Having finished filming in December 2019 this was a very opportune series for what the world has experienced in the past 6/7 months

Decent German drama

[Quigonjay · 7/10 · 4 September 2020]

No idea why it has sci-fi listed in the description as it is not sci-fi, it is just a drama/thriller. Thought it was a good effort though. No idea when it was filmed but quite relevant as it based around a growing global pandemic. Not familiar with any of the actors but thought there was some decent performances. Hope they do a season 2.

Good German drama series about a deadly virus crisis.

[bertler-1 · 7/10 · 26 October 2020]

Haunting and depressing series that shows, what could happen in our world if we were threatened by a deadly virus. When we see how dramatic the actual effects of a real threat like the corona virus are, you can confidently consider the disturbing descriptions in this series to be quite realistic. Exciting entertainment thanks to good actors and a constant atmosphere of threat. The open end promises a second season.

Nice Binge-Watch For a Rainy Day

[xlinucs · 6/10 · 7 September 2020]

Pros: Casting Choice, Costume Design, Cinematography, Music, Make-Up, Pacing, storylines which offer a variety of perspectives

Cons: Dialogue (sometimes it felt really stiff and forced), sO many clichés (the coke-addicted, unsuccessful author, the mysterious, quite teenager with a past they don't talk about, etc.), romanticization of a teacher-student relationship, the last two to three episodes got quite messy

One would think this series was shot in April 2020 and although it was sort of well-known that the world wasn't prepared for a pandemic of this magnitude, it's still impressive that they finished filming in 2019. Some aspects of the story are unbelievable but mostly I didn't mind. Kinda bummed that my favorite character gets killed off, although predictable. I really enjoyed Roland Møller's acting but it looks like he won't return for season two.

Solid pandemix tv serie

[ekatarina-34156 · 7/10 · 30 August 2020]

The 8-episode series will keep your attention until the end! My recommendation

Great pandemic thriller series!

[sunlounge29 · 9/10 · 30 July 2020]

Edit 2022: Season 2 was awesome! If you're into the early seasons of TWD you're in for a treat! No walkers but a similar vibe... currently my favorite post-apocalyptic series!

Although shot in 2019 this series is an amazingly accurate pandemic thriller that doesn't feel like sci-fi at all in mid 2020.

Sløborn anticipated all the social reactions and emotions from scapegoating the outsiders, conspiracy theories or government propaganda frighteningly well.

All in all it's rather slow paced but feels at no time boring or lengthy. I had to binge it in one day and definitely would watch a second season! Kudos to Emily Kusche who plays the main character very convincingly!

Worth it!

[petertempmail · 1 August 2020]

Slow telling but worth to see it. Many similarities to Covid19

Gradually sinking, eventually ending (s01-03 review)

[suse-04098 · 7/10 · 24 March 2024]

S01: For me, what makes this show the most interesting is that I watched it when it first came out like two months into the Covid-19 pandemic with all those unsettling parallels. However, on my third time watching this season I am realizing that the more problematic the characters are the more I love them. I adore Magnus for putting up with the youth group, Devid for never saying anything but at the same time so much, Evelin for giving Anton hell, and Jan and Nikolai for being their impulsive selves. I still haven't forgiven the writers for Magnus's death but I like the way Evelin handled everything. I also find it very ironic that Nikolai finished his book lmao. 9/10

s02: I still liked it a lot but at some times I couldn't really connect with the dystopian aspects. I am still not a fan of Evelyn but I was stoked to see so much of the group dynamics of "Neue Chance". Freya also was a super annoying character as she clearly couldn't handle all the stress but I am beyond happy for Jan to have this much screen time. He really seems to be way more similar to his brother than he'd like to admit - stoked to see what he is up to in the next season. 7/10

s03: This entire season, except for the last episode, felt like we were getting nowhere. I mean, yeah, things were happening and, yeah, we had some exciting/tense moments but it didn't feel like anyone was working towards an end. Things just kept happening there was one too many close call. I really liked the ending tho and wish we could have gotten one last look at Sløborn before the end. 6/10.

How are they not wearing their mask correctly?

[rlongstaff-31284 · 9/10 · 9 September 2020]

Remember when we weren't sure, does the mask protect you or protect them?

This how transports you to the uncertainty that surrounded the beginning of the current pandemic. Is that a sin, is it a sin to enjoy this dramatisation? I am not sure, but.

An average of 7 is a crime for this show. For sure, this needs to be watched when you are ready with regards to the pandemic, I imagine many negative scores relate to those who are not ready. Incredible to see current events foreshadowed so accurately. Very high standard of acting, dialogue, script. Believability waned slightly towards the end but we want an exciting show non? Laughing and rooting for characters in the closing stages.

Highly engaging and did Not get boring as some suggest!

Not Bad but loses momentum halfway through

[sgroth5267 · 6/10 · 28 March 2022]

Picture and sound quality are great. I can't tell if the acting is bad or if it's because of the English dubbed voice acting. A lot of the character motivations seem to change on a whim without any explanation, most likely due to less talented writers who need to make the character do something different so their story can unfold the way they want it to. Eerie foreshadowing of the covid virus pandemic. Finished watching really only because I paid for it, not because I was actually captivated by the story. Not sure if a lot of these issues are due to different countries ideas on how things should go.

Good series for the most part, absolutely horrible in the end

[bergermanuel · 5/10 · 10 August 2020]

Up until episode 6 Sløborn goes strong with convincing character and story build-ups (although there's a few too many different storyarcs), and does especially well with introducing the main issue - a deadly pandemic - quite in quite subtle tones, focusing more on societal reaction and the slowly growing awareness towards the virus, instead of throwing in right into your face. Thing is: everything that was built up before is drawn through the mud during the last two episodes, where the tone of the Series changes radically, nobody in the writers room seems to care about inherent logic anymore, but just throws one wanna-be drastic moment after the other into the plot. It's actually really painful (not in a good way) and even cringey to watch in the end - especially because of the fact that it had so much potential in the beginning.

Episode 1-6: 7-7.5/10 Episode 5: 4/10 Episode 6: 2/10

Amazing

[schueddis · 10/10 · 5 August 2020]

Impressive Emily Kusche and Rolland Möller. Impatient may find the first 3 parts lengthy, but so the storylines are well prepared and brought together later. Sometimes disturbing, because it currently seems realistic. Please: Not suitable for children.

Started well, ended confused

[bbosma-24403 · 5/10 · 2 December 2021]

This series started well, all the subplots looked like they had potential, but most didn't come together...and then there were the almost inevitable bits that drive you crazy where people just behave in unbelievable ways. Worse, the response to the virus makes no sense - it was just illogical to evacuate the island when the virus was running wild on the mainland. Generally good performances but overall disappointing.

Distressing

[nivkaplanbooks · 8/10 · 28 July 2022]

Great drama with great characters. The actors are superb and the storyline flows. Not a dull moment! Obviously very relevant to present day situation taking it a few steps further, showing us where this all could end.

prescient movie

[flowirin · 8/10 · 27 December 2021]

All we are missing is the 'evacuate or die' part of the pandemic response.

Sloborn is a slow builder, with some weird themes, but engaging in a good way.

So much potentional...

[elftor1234 · 4/10 · 12 March 2021]

Yes, I watched it from the beginning. The tension building and character construction were very promising. A little too much teen drama here and there, but I expected that these whiny teen characters were soon going to have a surprise of their lifetimes.

I watched the virus arrive, slowly burning through the island. And waited. When after three episodes the medical chopper finally arrived to get first coughing teens to the hospital, I felt genuine shivers. I felt like I was watching Chernobyl Episode 1 only in slow mode. I expected to witness the sheer horror of human helplessness against raging elements.

And in the next episodes, the horror really revealed itself. However, it was not Chernobyl type horror. It was not that these characters would face fighting the unknown and making life and death decisions by our best, fallible intentions. No. Far from it.

The horror was with watching how the series and characters developed. All the stereotypical characters, the pregnant teen, teen nerd, teen bully, parents who just don't get it, violent dad, writer with drug addiction. They were not comical architypes to be developed into meaningful human beings. They were not caricatures.

The series was not coming-of-age story, no. This was a teen drama about how all adults (parents, doctors, mayors, police, army) and most of the other teens are stupid and can not handle situations. This was a story about how pregnant 15 year old is the most grown up and integrous human being in the whole Germany.

Episode by episode Sløborn got worse. In the end show did degenerate into a series of cliches. Strange conspiracy theories, obvious plot holes, army fighting against civilians, bad action scenes, teen heroes fighting against bad authorities. It's all there.

After the first three episodes I expected Contagion like semi-realistic pandemia movie. And after that I got a cheap teen action movie with a lot of cliches and plot holes. I felt very betrayed in the end. All this masterful suspension and tension built for nothing.

One of the best German shows out there

[luckylucky-88996 · 9/10 · 12 May 2023]

I really enjoy this show and I'm looking forward to the third and final season!

Being German myself, I'm proud to say, in my opinion, this is one of the best German shows out there right now. In the same league with Dark.

Great characters and frightening realistic depiction of a very leathal pandemic. Note, that the first season was written bevor Covid!

And it depicts the reactions from public and government to the outbreak and the measures against the Pandemic very realistically.

I also think a below seven Rating does not fit this show. I think it has a great script, with a good mixture of realistic and dramatic elements and it has great and very believable acting.

Definitely a recommendation!

Drops the ball......

[s3276169 · 5/10 · 24 August 2020]

"Sloborn" tries to keep too many balls in the air and ends up dropping them all.

There is simply too many plots and sub plots in this series. It starts to show by the time you are about half way through, as the plots intersect and become more scrambled as the story moves towards its odd ball conclusion.

It does have some merit up to the fourth episode and the acting is decent. I found a number of the characterisations a bit too peculiar and some, deeply unlikable. The abusive cop/father and the druggie author, stand out in this regard.

Not bad but could have been better if the story had been kept simpler and the characters made a little more relatable.

5/10 from me.

Annoying

[sunwolf-301-403095 · 3/10 · 26 August 2020]

The first six episodes where quite okay, the last two merely annoying, in fact very much so. Interestingly, this series were filmed in November 2019, just before Corona. Some of what happened a few months later in reality they got quite right. Two things I did find really irksome: (1) The last few episodes play into the hands of conspiracy theorists. The good guys survive cause they disobey the measures introduced by the authorities. (2) In the end the film becomes far too unrealistic: Bundeswehr soldiers searching a house do not detect the four children crouched under a table! Wait a sec! That's just one example of many similar extreme improbabilities. I liked the first five or six episodes somehow, yet after having watched all eight I wish I would have spent these eight hours better.

Facts meets fiction, or fiction facts

[jackreyno · 5/10 · 1 August 2020]

Update: Oh dear. What turned out to be an innovative German genre show wound up to become a washed up TWD rip off. Proof and point. Germans are afraid of being inventive by creativity and ultimately steal from what once was unique across the ocean. No more words wasted on this.

What I wrote 2 years ago:

Great show that pulled me in binge watching like the actually crisis kept me in front the TV at the beginning, but like the true Corona events it started to get boring as time goes by. Don't want to go in too much, but the events in the last two episodes didn't catch me in terms of believability. Also characters who was believed to be having the main part of the show turned out to be meaningless at the end like Evelyn's dad, who certainly will play a bigger role in season two, but as the rest of the events it left me unsatisfied at the finally. But in the end...this show is one more proof for German TV to finally wake up from its paralysis.

Reality has beaten it at the box office

[jablan · 5/10 · 11 September 2020]

Very unlucky moment for pandemic themed series, for several reasons: 1) we spot the details got wrongly much easier, 2) in reality we are supposed to trust the government, and, frankly, 3) we are all fed up with the pandemic, it's around us, so why bother watching it on TV too?

The first few episodes got me hooked, due to well carved characters, their believable stories, and good acting. The disease was in the background, and the stories was in the focus. Intentionally or not, all goes to hell in the final 2-3 episodes, actually exactly at the moment when Bundeswehr jumps in. At that moment, nice psychological drama turns into (a bad) action/horror movie, with people dying coughing blood all around, teenagers killing other people, army shooting at civilians and so on. All the sympathy that we had for the characters is gone and we no longer care what happens to them (except whether they will plainly survive or not). All the built up credibility and charisma is destroyed. I know that's what probably happens in apocalyptic scenario, people are being stripped to surviving animals, but frankly that's not something that keeps me interested.

This series tries to be everything at the same time, and fails at all of it. Too bad, as there's obviously a great talent. The author, the girl, the cop dad, redemptive coach, the bully and the bullied, all great characters, yet all gone in the middle of the series. Such a shame.

Starts well but gets more and more unbeleivable by end

[px-82689 · 5/10 · 2 September 2020]

They keep calling the disease "pigeon flu" implying it is in the corona virus family like SARS, covid-19, etc but clearly the physical symptoms and high mortality clearly show it is a hemorrhagic fever like Ebola. On an island it would have been very possible to isolate and contain the infected but that would have not allowed the later extreme plot events. There are some interesting subplots and intriguing characters however, certain decisions made by major characters strain credulity and one character's particularly heinous action is very unbelievable given the person is not a sociopath. There are other characters who attain measures of personal redemption. All in all it is an OK apocalyptic story but it is clear that the plot was designed all along to achieve a certain ending for certain characters and set the stage for a second possible series..

Redundant, Generic

[Tweetienator · 4/10 · 21 February 2022]

Sløborn takes everything that made The Walking Dead a parody of itself: too much personal drama (soap opera) and conflict for the sake of conflict, same with violence. On top, some teen angst and a tour de torture of redundant, boring dialogues. At best a mediocre show, a younger audience will like it maybe more. Production and acting are okay.

nice try, but did not blow me away....

[waltercarlucci · 4/10 · 30 July 2020]

I do not want to go to much in the Pandemic theme, the series it's a bit boring. I knew too often what will happened next. the Author tried to cover too much, Pandemic, Teeny Drama, teen bootcamp, Family Tragedy, Fake News & Media control, it's just too much, sometimes it works but to often not. And nothing really seems to catch me. The Actors mostly are very good and Emily is great. The series brakes to much with the own logic, why on earth do you want to evacuate an infected Island in the middle of global pandemic... People are afraid to go to a funeral but have no problems hugging with infected... The characters are often to stereotype, they do not touch me, rarely I can identify myself with them.

Unconvincing in some aspects

[laduqesa · 5/10 · 9 August 2020]

There were major flaws in the series. The most glaring was that, if it were true that the government was sending people to camps to try to stamp out transmission, then why would they evacuate a whole island of people 30 minutes from the mainland, many infected, to a camp? An island is an ideal isolation locale. In any real world, the population would have stayed on the island and not been moved over the water.

Another flaw was that some characters didn't act, well, in character. The goody two shoes girl from the xtian sect meets boys in secret and lies for her best girlfriend. The nerdy bullied lad protects the bullies even when he knows the gravity of the situation. People don't practice social distancing despite seeing the devastating effects of the disease. On the contrary, they seem to deliberately go out of their way to infect themselves and others.

I understood that corporal punishment of children by parents in Germany was outlawed twenty years ago. No one seems to have told the parents here. I found this to be a flaw too.

Having said that, I watched this over two days to the end. I don't regret having done so. Much of the plot was true-to-life. I believed in most of the reactions and storylines - it's a shame that some were not credible, as detailed above.

And talking about the end, where did the army go? They would not have taken off and left bodies in the streets. It seemed a bit of a cop out that the army's absence enabled the escapees from the fort and the weirdo author to remain in peace amidst the devastation and deserted town.