Stranger things are happening in Winden...
It's exceptionally rare for someone to come across a work of media that is so uniquely gripping, you literally cannot compare it to anything else presently in existence. Now, the streaming service Netflix offers a... let's just say, mixed bag of content. There are exceptions, however. BoJack Horseman is objectively one of the best written shows in, say the past five or so years which has helped immensely with my depression when I discovered it two years ago (and it certainly hasn't received the mainstream attention it rightfully deserves). Then, there's a little foreign gem of another level: Dark.
Elisabeth Doppler x
While unfairly compared to Netflix's cash cow Stranger Things for new viewers, the American 80's nostalgia sci-fi and the German mindfuck have very few elements in common (note: watch it in the original German). Both may present a familiar inciting incident: a boy (Will Byers and Mikkel Nielsen) in a small town (Hawkins and Winden) goes missing and... that's basically where the comparisons end. (Un)popular opinion-Dark has better writing-better twists, better characterization, better plotting, better emotional manipulation. Everything. Stranger Things is fun if viewed as a limited series, but shallow. Dark is another beast entirely. But it's German, so of fucking course and it doesn't rely on Stephen King tropes to sell a story. Nothing wrong with that (believe me, I love King), but the nostalgia factor overstays its welcome eventually. Dark is familiar, yet fresh. It plays with time travel, but it isn't sloppily thrown together (let's forget the abomination Cursed Child exists); every plot point, every character arc is solidly thought out and clearly went through numerous creative input and extensive rewrites so everything comes full circle. And because it's a product of Europe, the cast is neither Hollywood beautiful nor fairly likable; they're normal looking Wonder Bread white people, unlikable at times and cynical [SPOILER: Hannah Krüger/Kahnwald is a literal sociopath].
Jonas Kahnwald x
Oh yes, be aware-there's soooo many white people... and maybe it's me, but before I got to know the characters, they all kind of looked the same (by the end of series one, beginning of series two, I could distinguish the cast; those first few episodes were wild, though). However, it's clear there's a conscious casting decision for that (yes, the casting directors are wizards). For the first series at least, y'all basically need a flow chart or family tree of some kind to keep track of all the pasty white German people (because you can't get much diversity in a small German town, realistically) across the various timelines. It's here you come to learn why Jonas Kahnwald (played by Louis Hofmann) and Magnus Nielsen (played by Moritz Jahn) for instance look similar; they're all related to each other in some way (thankfully, Wikipedia has a useful tree... which includes spoilers). The casting by that logic is on point and since we see most of the cast through three different periods, it's never a guessing game of which young actor is meant to be the younger version of an older character and vice versa (that rarely happens; I'm thinking of the 2010 British Jessica Chastain film The Debt and of some of the cast of the adult "Losers Club" in It: Chapter Two where the young and old versions aren't always the best). Sometimes, the casting is too good. It took me ages to realise (until the last episode of season two, that is) that Ulrich Nielsen from 2019 and older Ulrich trapped in 1986/87 were played by two different people and not Oliver Masucci in "aged-up" make-up. Apparently, I wasn't the only one. It's bloody witchcraft.
Carlotta von Falkenhayn
If I had to compare Dark to anything, I would say (hypothetically) in a pitch session, it's Twin Peaks meets Donnie Darko. Or that French series, Les Revenants.
Interestingly enough, I'm nearly done reading my second John Ajvide Lindqvist novel (of Let the Right One In fame), Little Star (it's an acquired taste). Maybe it's because her face is fresh on my mind, though Carlotta von Falkenhayn who plays Elisabeth Doppler (Charlotte's eight, nine-year-old deaf daughter, my second favourite character to the "White Devil" Claudia Tiedemann) nearly fits the description of the main character Theres (a.k.a. Little One, Tora Larsson and Tesla) to a tee-if she were thirteen, fourteen (I think she's about twelve?). Though Theres is Swedish and Carlotta is German, white people are white people, no? Guess who I'm going to be drawing for the next few weeks?
Elisabeth Doppler x
While unfairly compared to Netflix's cash cow Stranger Things for new viewers, the American 80's nostalgia sci-fi and the German mindfuck have very few elements in common (note: watch it in the original German). Both may present a familiar inciting incident: a boy (Will Byers and Mikkel Nielsen) in a small town (Hawkins and Winden) goes missing and... that's basically where the comparisons end. (Un)popular opinion-Dark has better writing-better twists, better characterization, better plotting, better emotional manipulation. Everything. Stranger Things is fun if viewed as a limited series, but shallow. Dark is another beast entirely. But it's German, so of fucking course and it doesn't rely on Stephen King tropes to sell a story. Nothing wrong with that (believe me, I love King), but the nostalgia factor overstays its welcome eventually. Dark is familiar, yet fresh. It plays with time travel, but it isn't sloppily thrown together (let's forget the abomination Cursed Child exists); every plot point, every character arc is solidly thought out and clearly went through numerous creative input and extensive rewrites so everything comes full circle. And because it's a product of Europe, the cast is neither Hollywood beautiful nor fairly likable; they're normal looking Wonder Bread white people, unlikable at times and cynical [SPOILER: Hannah Krüger/Kahnwald is a literal sociopath].
Jonas Kahnwald x
Oh yes, be aware-there's soooo many white people... and maybe it's me, but before I got to know the characters, they all kind of looked the same (by the end of series one, beginning of series two, I could distinguish the cast; those first few episodes were wild, though). However, it's clear there's a conscious casting decision for that (yes, the casting directors are wizards). For the first series at least, y'all basically need a flow chart or family tree of some kind to keep track of all the pasty white German people (because you can't get much diversity in a small German town, realistically) across the various timelines. It's here you come to learn why Jonas Kahnwald (played by Louis Hofmann) and Magnus Nielsen (played by Moritz Jahn) for instance look similar; they're all related to each other in some way (thankfully, Wikipedia has a useful tree... which includes spoilers). The casting by that logic is on point and since we see most of the cast through three different periods, it's never a guessing game of which young actor is meant to be the younger version of an older character and vice versa (that rarely happens; I'm thinking of the 2010 British Jessica Chastain film The Debt and of some of the cast of the adult "Losers Club" in It: Chapter Two where the young and old versions aren't always the best). Sometimes, the casting is too good. It took me ages to realise (until the last episode of season two, that is) that Ulrich Nielsen from 2019 and older Ulrich trapped in 1986/87 were played by two different people and not Oliver Masucci in "aged-up" make-up. Apparently, I wasn't the only one. It's bloody witchcraft.
Carlotta von Falkenhayn
If I had to compare Dark to anything, I would say (hypothetically) in a pitch session, it's Twin Peaks meets Donnie Darko. Or that French series, Les Revenants.
Interestingly enough, I'm nearly done reading my second John Ajvide Lindqvist novel (of Let the Right One In fame), Little Star (it's an acquired taste). Maybe it's because her face is fresh on my mind, though Carlotta von Falkenhayn who plays Elisabeth Doppler (Charlotte's eight, nine-year-old deaf daughter, my second favourite character to the "White Devil" Claudia Tiedemann) nearly fits the description of the main character Theres (a.k.a. Little One, Tora Larsson and Tesla) to a tee-if she were thirteen, fourteen (I think she's about twelve?). Though Theres is Swedish and Carlotta is German, white people are white people, no? Guess who I'm going to be drawing for the next few weeks?