“SOKO Hamburg” and “Last Track Berlin”
ZDF crime series get a final season
Aleksandar Radenkovic (left), Jasmin Tabatabai (middle left), Josephin Busch (middle right) and Hans-Werner Meyer (right) are investigating in “Last Track Berlin”. After 13 seasons it’s over.
© ZDF/Oliver Feist
ZDF is discontinuing the crime series “SOKO Hamburg” and “Letzte Spur Berlin” after the next season. The station wants to get younger.
The ZDF crime series “SOKO Hamburg” and “Letzte Spur Berlin” will end in 2024. The station announced on Friday that the last season of both formats would be commissioned. The episodes will then be broadcast in the original slots in 2024 and form the conclusion of the two crime formats.
Series fall victim to strategy changes
ZDF program director Dr. Nadine Bilke (47) justified the step with “sustainable program development”. ZDF will “invest more in offers for younger target groups”. As a result, “we have to part with successful programs that we have come to love,” says Bilke. “We have therefore decided to end the crime series ‘SOKO Hamburg’ and ‘Letzte Spur Berlin’ in favor of developing new formats.”
The broadcaster wants to appeal to younger target groups with a renewed program portfolio. The aim is to reach people who have so far used the ZDF program little or not at all. 100 million euros are to be redistributed for this purpose by 2024.
That’s what the crime formats are about
“SOKO Hamburg” has been running since March 27, 2018 in the 6 p.m. slot on ZDF. The series deals with the investigation of crimes and murders in Hamburg, Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein. From season one, the regular cast includes Marek Erhardt (53) as chief inspector Oskar Schütz and Anna von Haebler (36), who mimics chief inspector Lena Testorp. The Hanseatic share the slot with their colleagues from Potsdam. The sixth season with 13 episodes will be produced in 2023.
The 13th season of “Letzte Spur Berlin” with twelve episodes will be filmed this year. The series revolves around a fictional unit of the Berlin State Criminal Police Office. The missing persons office, which works independently, tries to clarify the fate of recently missing persons. Since the first season, the team of investigators in the capital has included Jasmin Tabatabai (55) as Chief Inspector Mina Amiri and Hans-Werner Meyer (58) as Chief Inspector Oliver Radek. On April 20, 2012, the series had its premiere. Since then, it has supplemented “SOKO Leipzig” as a Friday crime thriller in the 9:15 p.m. slot.