The Defeated (2020)
9/10
Ignore the reviews!
23 August 2021
Clearly there are a lot of bots on here - so many of the negative reviews either didn't watch beyond the first episode or take issue with the portrayal of the Russian or some other stupid thing that is ultimately unrelated to the show.

This show is fascinating that, while largely in English, Germans speak to one another in German, Russians in Russian etc - for people that aren't fond of foreign language films or subtitles it can take some getting used to, but it is very immersive and a cool take.

The pilot/first episode was slow to me and the weakest of the episodes and ultimately I think the scripts could have been better overall - but I found that as the series progressed I became more and more engaged with the storyline and what was going to happen/what would happen.

To me, each episode is better than the last.

Mala Emde (whom you might recognize from 2019's Charité at War or the 2015 Anne Frank movie "Meine Tochter") is a stand out. Great actress - hope to see more of her in English language films.

Logan Marshall-Green has a great performance - I won't spoil his role here.

Nina Hoss is another standout.

Solid performances by Taylor Kitsch (something about his accent just took me out of the scenes at times - maybes because it is so different than his "normal" accent) Michael C. Hall also had a solid performance but nothing compared to what he brought in those early season of Dexter and at times he comes across as more of a caricature of a guy from 1946 with his accent and appearance.

Really happy to hear that production has already begun on the second half of this limited-series.

Interesting to see where this will lead us.
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