Just binged the first series last week with Jeanna and we're blown away by it.
It stars the always excellent JK Simmons - he won an Oscar for his stunning performance in Whiplash a few years ago - as a plodding civil servant at the UN in Berlin. He's been in the same department for yonks and his life revolves around his marriage : so far, so Terry and June, right ?
Wrong.
His entire world is turned upside down when she is hit by a car and when the show starts she's been in a coma for six weeks, with him making nightly visits to bring her flowers and read her poetry at her bedside.
The twist ?
A parallel world was formed in 1987, which can be accessed via a portal under the city, specifically underneath the UN building itself.
Their world is an exact copy .. or it was when the two split. Since then, they've made significant medical advances (a cure for AIDS for example) while we've stolen a march with technology. Their world has some stunning architecture, but bland interiors and green screen PCs. Ours is damaged but far superior in many ways. The two sides are aware of the differences and spy on each other, but now the ante has been upped because individuals are being replaced by their "other" from the alternative world - difficult to detect, identical to look at, etc - making them ideal for espionage.
It's all very much an allegory for the east and west halves of Berlin and is at times quite tricky to follow .. but that's why I love it.
There's no dumbing down and there's a distinct lack of the usual cliffhangers at the end of each episode, allowing the story to unfold more naturally.
Highly recommended
