'Luna + Sophie' to Continue as 'Partners in Crime: Potsdam Homicide'

PBS Passport members are most likely aware of the German buddy cop series known in the States as Luna + Sophie, which started streaming here in the spring of 2022. The timing was fortuitous, as it arrived on the platform within days of Annika, which Masterpiece initially launched as an early binge release for members ahead of its linear debut later that year. The two women-led crime series buoyed each other to the point that Luna + Sophie was one of the first Walter Presents shows to land a linear weekly release on PBS stations starting in 2023. However, it was unclear at the time if Walter Presents would bring more than the current three seasons over, not because the show wasn't popular, but because the series was never about Luna or Sophie. The show's real name is SOKO Potsdam, one of eleven case-of-the-week spinoffs from the popular German police procedural SOKO München, and after the show's first few seasons, both actors exited. 

SOKO Potsdam is far from the first series to have its title altered from the original when moving to English-language television; that's the case for almost every series that streams under the Walter Presents banner. Profilage is called The Paris Murders, Il Paradiso Delle Signore, which translates to The Ladies Paradise, is known here merely as Paradise; then, of course, there's my personal favorite, Litsid, the Estonian series whose title literally translates to Whores. That won't fly on PBS, so Walter Presents renamed the series after the lead character, Madame K. That wholesale renaming also occurred with SOKO Potsdam. "SOKO" stands for "Sonderkommission," which translates to "special investigative team," and much like CSI or NCIS here in the U.S., each spinoff is named for the German city the procedural is set in: SOKO Leipzig, SOKO Kitzbühel, SOKO Köln, etc. 

Since Americans wouldn't have the SOKO context, Walter Presents named it after the buddy cop team at the center of Potsdam: childhood BFFs Luna Kunath (Caroline Erikson) and Sophie Pohlmann (Katrin Jaehne). However, like every long-running procedural, most actors leave after only a few seasons. Jaehne left the show at the end of Season 3, and Erikson followed at the end of Season 4.

Despite losing one-half of the titular team, Luna + Sophie arrived with Season 4 in January 2024, introducing Sophie's replacement, Tamara Meurer (Anja Pahl), and teaming her up with Luna with mixed results. However, the end of Season 4 didn't just see Erikson's exit; it overhauled most of the existing cast, a measure these cookie-cutter procedurals tend to execute when ratings flag or the cast budget gets too big. Pahl continued on as Tamara, gaining new partner Pauline Hobrecht (Agnes Decker) in Season 5. The two remain the current leads in Season 7. which debuts on ZDF in Germany in the coming weeks; Season 8 is listed as in "preproduction." That's three seasons of the show (at minimum) that Walter Presents accidentally locked themselves out of unless it was nervy enough to continue to air the show under the moniker Luna + Sophie sans Luna + Sophie.  

Instead, Walter Presents has decided that a new cast equals a new show. However, don't look for Tamara + Pauline coming to PBS anytime soon. Walter Presents has perhaps learned its lesson about naming shows after the lead characters (a lesson Vera is also currently learning to its detriment), especially when the show is part of a series known for its turnover, and will now reintroduce the series as Partners in Crime: Potsdam Homicide, with Season 5 renumbered to Season 1.* 

(*The last time PBS thought renumbering seasons was a good idea and took Season 5 and renumbered it as Season 1, it was The Great British Baking Show; hence Netflix's filing new seasons as "Collections" that are off by three numbers.)

The good news for fans is that anyone who became attached to Tarmara in Season 4 is guaranteed multiple new SOKO Potsdam seasons as the series catches up to the current season airing on German television. More importantly, this new title allows Walter Presents to bring over other SOKO spinoff series and visually tie them together under the moniker "Partners in Crime."

Luna + Sophie (SOKO Potsdam) Seasons 1 through 4 are streaming for members on PBS Passport and the PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel over at Amazon. Partners in Crime: Potsdam Homicide Season 1 (SOKO Potsdam Season 5) will arrive with all episodes on both platforms on Friday, January 10, 2025.