Streaming series review - Homicide Hills: Season One

Homicide Hills: Season One *** (out of 5) Here’s a change of pace – a light-hearted police series from Germany! A country not exactly renowned for humor (Google Robin Williams on that point) gives us its equivalent of charming shows like England’s New Tricks, France’s Sharif or Canada’s Murdoch Mysteries. In this case, Sophie Haas (Caroline Peters) is a tough, brash cop in Cologne who thinks she’s up for promotion. She’s right… in a way. The brass doesn’t approve of her bold tactics, seemingly irked by her gender and unmatched success rate. So they ship her off to become the chief of a sleepy village’s force far from their turf.

Upon arrival in quaint, quiet Hengasch, she finds a staff of exactly two, with a caseload that’s almost nonexistent. Everyone knows everyone, and no one commits any serious crimes. Or so it seems. Haas keenly notices details and patterns that others haven’t. In the opener she connects several old fires to other presumably benign, unrelated events that turn out to be part of an undetected murder. After proving herself in that case, the outsider starts earning respect and acceptance from those who resented her intrusion. That adjustment is eased by the friendly presence of her charming father (Hans Peter Hallwachs) – a retired surgeon who moved there with her.

If this setup seems familiar, you may also be a fan of one of my favorite darkly comedic movies, 2007’s Hot Fuzz. But the delightfully sinister underbelly of that English hamlet is not to be found in this one. That shift better suits this medium, since the weird challenges Simon Pegg had to face wouldn’t be sustainable throughout a series. Hengasch is more like a Mayberry, with an array of variably amusing and/or annoying locals. Petra Kleinert, as the omnipresent wife of Officer Schaffer (Bjarne Madel), elevates the nosy, meddlesome neighbor to an art form not seen here since Gladys Kravitz in Bewitched. The show ran for 45 episodes in four seasons from 2008-22, earning a handful of awards and nominations for Peters and the program.

MHzChoice is importing its 13-episode debut season of 50-minute tales that aired from 2008-10 abroad. Based on the first 10 made available for review, there’s plenty of potential for the characters and relationships to evolve, and for viewers to increasingly enjoy their company. The tenor seems more like less-violent variations on our lighter procedurals (Rizzoli & Isles, Castle, The Closer, etc.) than our sitcoms.

The second case begins with an old guy’s body face down in a stream. It looks like suicide, and would have been dismissed as such but for Haas’ instincts. Plus having plenty of time to pursue hunches, given the dearth of active files on her desk. The third involves a concert pianist whose finger was amputated and being held for ransom, leaving but a scant few hours for retrieval, as the clock ticked rapidly on the viability of the detached digit for the reattachment essential to his career. Episode 5 shifts into French farce territory. A few cases put our intrepid trio in peril. Others give them romantic and other growth arcs to complement the crimes they solve. This sampling of adventures was easily engaging enough to inspire curiosity about what will lie in the 35 tales yet to come.

(Homicide Hills: Season One, mostly in German with subtitles, streams on MHzChoice as of 4/4/23)