--- title: "Deutschland" year: 2015 kind: "series" canonical: "https://film.one/tv/deutschland" fi1m_score: 74 critics_score: 70 critics_reviews: 8 published: "2026-09-17T20:11:46.471286+00:00" updated: "2026-09-17T20:11:46.900249+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Deutschland (2015) Created by Anna Winger, Jörg Winger · 1h 00m · MPA TV-MA · Drama **Fi1m score: 74** · Critics 70 from 8 reviews *In a sentence:* The Cold War as a gap year: a Stasi boy, a stolen name and a West German supermarket he cannot get over > A Cold War spy thriller with a light step and a good record collection. The first season is brisk, funny and sharp about East and West alike; the two that follow travel further and land less often. ## Synopsis East Germany, 1983. Martin Rauch (Jonas Nay), a border guard in Kleinmachnow, is visited by his aunt Lenora Rauch (Maria Schrader), an officer in the HVA, the Stasi’s foreign intelligence arm. She wants him in the West. He says no, so she and her superior Walter Schweppenstette (Sylvester Groth) take the choice away: Martin’s mother Ingrid (Carina Wiese) needs a kidney, and the state can move her up the list. Drilled by his handler Tobias Tischbier (Alexander Beyer), Martin is sent to Bonn under the name Moritz Stamm, aide to a West German general, to find out where NATO means to put its Pershing II missiles. Left behind is his girlfriend Annett Schneider (Sonja Gerhardt), who does not know where he has gone. ## Review Anna Winger and Jörg Winger’s series takes the most frightening year of the late Cold War and treats it, for long stretches, as a comedy of manners. A young East German border guard is drugged, renamed and posted to Bonn to spy on the West German army, and the first thing that undoes him is a supermarket. Across three seasons, *Deutschland 83*, *Deutschland 86* and *Deutschland 89*, the idea holds up for about one and a half of them. The first eight episodes are a proper pleasure. The eighteen that follow are worth having, with reservations. Jonas Nay is the reason it works. His Martin is neither a natural spy nor a fool, just a decent, slightly slow-witted young man who does what he is told and is startled to find he is good at it. He plays the West as a series of small shocks: the food, the music, the fact that nobody asks who he is. Maria Schrader’s Lenora is his opposite, dry, unhurried and quite without shame about using her own family, and their scenes together carry a charge the plots do not always earn. Sylvester Groth gives Schweppenstette the tired, cardiganed menace of a man who has signed many forms. Edward Berger and Samira Radsi direct, and they shoot the two Germanys as different climates. Bonn is warm and saturated, brown leather and orange lampshades and sun through net curtains. The East is the green of a hospital corridor and the grey of a concrete stairwell, lit as if someone were counting the electricity. The music does the rest. Nena’s *99 Luftballons* is the anthem, and a break-in is cut to Eurythmics as though the jukebox were on the spies’ side, which in this show it usually is. We will own a reaction. Early in the first season Martin stands in the aisle of a West German supermarket and simply looks, and we found ourselves moved by Nay’s face in a way we had not expected from a scene about groceries. It is not played for a laugh, and it tells you what the show thinks the wall divided. By the end of that season we were rooting for a Stasi agent to get away with it, and were not entirely comfortable about that, which is the point. The plotting is the weakness, and it grows. Martin is the only spy the HVA appears to own, so he must steal the report, plant the bug, seduce the secretary and turn up at the summit, and the coincidences that put him in the right corridor pile up. The general’s household in Bonn slides towards soap. Sonja Gerhardt’s Annett, left behind in the East, is given little to do beyond wait, and the series only later works out she is a character rather than a motive. *Deutschland 86*, which arrived in October 2018, moves the game to Africa and the arms trade, adding Anke Engelke and Florence Kasumba to the cast, and tries to be about apartheid, capitalism and the bankruptcy of the East all at once. The lightness curdles; there is more plot and less Martin. *Deutschland 89*, in September 2020, has the better subject, a wall coming down and a secret service with nothing left to keep secret, and it rushes at it as if the money were running out. Schrader and Groth remain good throughout. This is not le Carré. Nobody sits in a grey room being sad about betrayal; the series would rather put a Walkman on him and send him running. It is closer to [*The Americans*](https://film.one/tv/the-americans), without that show’s patience, and has none of the dread of [*The Lives of Others*](https://film.one/film/the-lives-of-others). What it has is affection for both sides and a clear eye about what each had to offer. Watch the first season over two or three evenings, in German with the subtitles, at an hour an episode. If you have grown fond of Martin and his aunt by the end, carry on, and forgive the later runs their overreach. If you have not, the wall comes down without you and you will not have missed a great deal. *Fi1m score 74, published 17 September 2026.* ## What the critics say Most critics like Deutschland 83, and they like it for the same reasons. It is described as a taut, stylish spy drama whose freshness comes from the angle: a young East German agent sent West, so that the audience ends up rooting for the Stasi man. Jonas Nay’s lead performance draws steady praise for making that reluctant spy easy to side with. The period detail is admired, the 1980s soundtrack is singled out repeatedly, and several reviews note a dry, ironic humour that keeps the Cold War stakes from turning solemn. The reservations are mild and scattered. Some critics find the plotting contrived and a few of the supporting characters cartoonish; one thinks the plot leans on fairly basic tension. The spread is narrow with one exception: The Times dissents sharply, granting the series an even-handed question about who the real German patriot is but finding it too blunt to explore the point, a potboiler that happens to have subtitles. Nobody else comes close to that verdict. ### Reviews we read (8) - **The AV Club**, Genevieve Valentine (B+): Deutschland 83 offers a stylish, high-stakes take on the spy genre with dry humor and strong lead performance from Jonas Nay as the reluctant East German agent. It balances suspense and character isolation effectively despite some on-the-nose elements. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/deutschland-83-takes-its-spycraft-straight-up-with-a-t-1798184095) - **IndieWire**, Matt Brennan (80/100, inferred): The review positions Deutschland 83 as a fresh spy story that could shape the future of TV drama, contrasting it with the waning The Americans. It highlights the series' timely espionage premise set against 1980s Cold War tensions. [Read](https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/shows/deutschland-83-the-americans-and-the-end-of-an-era-in-tv-drama-trailer-186944/) - **Radio Times**, Ben Dowell (75/100, inferred): The critic finds it a taut and unusual Cold War spy drama that offers an original East German perspective on a stranger-in-a-strange-land story. Praise is singled out for the excellent nostalgia-boosting 1980s soundtrack. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/deutschland-83-lets-you-wallow-in-nostalgia-nena-and-a-gripping-cold-war-thriller/) - **The Guardian** (70/100, inferred): The critic finds the culture clash and espionage premise in this German series refreshing and astutely observed, noting unexpected pleasures in rooting for the Stasi spy protagonist amid Cold War tensions. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/jan/04/war-and-peace-deutschland-83-review) - **The Hollywood Reporter**, Stephen Dalton (70/100, inferred): The critic calls it a fun, glossy remix of recent history with a light, ironic pop-culture spin on apocalyptic events and an engagingly retro soundtrack. Some contrivances and cartoonish characters are noted as drawbacks. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/deutschland-83-berlin-review-772394/) - **The Telegraph**, Harry Mount (70/100, inferred): The series is gripping as an East German version of Homeland, rich in period detail and subtle differences between East and West, though the plot relies on basic tension; the charm of the protagonist makes viewers root for his efforts. [Read](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/tv-and-radio-reviews/12075877/Deutschland-83-review-gripping.html) - **The Times** (★★☆☆☆): The series asks who the real German patriot is in an even-handed way but is not clever enough to explore the point with subtlety; it proves potboilers can come with subtitles. [Read](https://www.thetimes.com/culture/tv-radio/article/tv-review-deutschland-83-beowulf-return-to-the-shieldlands-2dtj7089k93) - **Collider**, Allison Keene (Excellent — Awards material): The critic finds the series tense, stylish, engaging, and engrossing as a spy tale that balances East and West German perspectives through the relatable lead character Martin. She singles out the fast-paced tone with quiet humor and pop culture references alongside firm emotional connection to the protagonist's story. [Read](https://collider.com/deutschland-83-sundance-tv-review/) ## Details - **Created by:** Anna Winger, Jörg Winger - **Creator:** Anna Winger, Jörg Winger - **Director:** Samira Radsi, Edward Berger - **Cast:** Jonas Nay as Martin Rauch / Moritz Stamm / Frank Jonas; Maria Schrader as Lenora Rauch; Svenja Jung as Nicole Zangen, professeur de Max; Sylvester Groth as Walter Schweppenstette; Carina Wiese as Ingrid Rauch; Lavinia Wilson as Brigitte Winkelmann; Sonja Gerhardt as Annett Schneider; Alexander Beyer as Tobias Tischbier - **Runtime:** 1h 00m - **Certificate (MPA):** TV-MA - **Release (the US):** 17 June 2015 - **Genres:** Drama - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3e_k9unJ5c ## Where to watch in the US - Apple TV: buy, hd *Checked 2026-09-17.* Also available in: AT, AU, CA, CH, DE, FR, GB, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## Awards - International Emmy Award for best drama series 2016: International Emmy Award for best drama series (won) ## If you liked this - *The Lives of Others* (2006), Fi1m 84: The Stasi from the other side of the microphone, and the dread this show declines to have. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-lives-of-others.md) - *The Americans* (2013): Soviet spies in Reagan’s suburbs; slower, sadder and better at the long game. - *Good Bye Lenin!* (2003), Fi1m 78: The East’s last days as a domestic comedy, with the same fondness and better jokes. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/good-bye-lenin.md) - *Le Bureau des Légendes* (2015): French intelligence at desk level, for anyone who wanted more tradecraft and fewer coincidences. - *The Spy Who Came in from the Cold* (1965): Richard Burton in black and white Berlin, where nobody gets to enjoy the pop music. --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/deutschland