'Babylon Berlin' Commissioned for Fifth & Final Season After Long Delay

The pandemic surfaced some odd hits on Netflix in 2020, but none quite so esoteric as the two German language series Dark and Babylon Berlin. The former was a time-traveling apocalyptic puzzle box series that just so happened to release its third and final season at just the right time to catch the attention of those stuck at home. However, the latter was something unlike anything on television, like an HBO experiment that had gotten loose and wound up on German TV by accident. One part interwar period piece set in the waning days of the Weimar Republic, one part musical, one part police procedural, it captured all the anxiety of the growing fascist rhetoric of the 2020 election, the sense of helplessness in the face of unstoppable history, and the hope that maybe a few good guys can make a difference, or at least survive.

Netflix scooped up the first three seasons just as the third arrived in January 2020, making it a perfectly timed arrival. Unfortunately, Sky and Sky Deutschland were unprepared for their series to become an international hit and fumbled the rollout of Season 4, which somehow never made it to Netflix in the U.S. despite arriving in Germany and the U.K. in October 2022. With the contraction of the streaming world in 2023, Sky Deutschland then stepped out of the original programming game, leaving the show in the lurch, even though Season 4 clearly was not meant as a conclusion. Netflix, understandably, ditched the show in February 2024 when the rights expired, allowing the tiny, mostly unknown streamer MHzChoice to pick it up.

Of course, that's when movement finally started on getting the fifth and final season off the ground. X-Filme Creative Pool has stepped in to help produce Season 5 alongside Season 1-4 producers Beta Film and local pubcasters ARD Degeto, SWR, WDR, and Radio Bremen. Production on Season 5 is now slated to begin this fall.

Here's the synopsis for the show's final season:

Based on Volker Kutschers' fifth novel The March Fallen, Season 5 is set in the darkest period of German history, the new season will be set in the dark times of February 1933, when the Nazi Party took power.

Volker Bruch (Generation War) and Liv Lisa Fries (The Wave) are confirmed to return to reprise their roles of Gereon Rath and Charlotte Ritter. The director/writer trio of Henk Handlogten, Achim von Borries, and Tom Tykwer will also return for the final season, which will run eight episodes.

The series will be co-produced by Christoph Pellander and Carolin Haasis from ARD Degeto, Manfred Hattendorf and Monika Denisch from SWR, and Alexander Bickel and Caren Toennissen-Brand from WDR. Stefan Arndt, Uwe Schott, and Michael Polle executive produce for X-Filme alongside Jan Mojto, Dirk Schürhoff, and Moritz Herzogenberg for Beta Film.

Babylon Berlin Season 5 has no set release date, but it is expected to arrive in 2025. Seasons 1 through 4 are currently only available in the U.S. on MHzChoice, but since most people have no idea it exists, chances are it won't garner an audience until it moves beyond that service. Luckily, most MHzChoice shows end up on one particular streaming service more than any other: PBS Passport. Fingers crossed.