Ultimately, Das Boot looks to be a wonderful find for fans of high-quality international television series with real ambition.

A spectacularly ambitious enterprise of unfailing power, rich in all the ways that matter in drama, in writing.

There have been plenty of films and series that purport to show the grim reality of war, not least Das Boot’s forebears. This series, coy as it may be about its status as a reboot, is an extremely capable addition to the canon.

Unlike the 1981 Das Boot, the TV version only spends about a third of any given episode following the crew of a submarine. And whenever it gets out of the boat, it doesn’t really feel much like Das Boot.

The USP of Das Boot 2.0 is that the underwater drama has to budge up to make room for landlubberly intrigue involving the resistance. On the plus side there’s Vicky Krieps, who was so ineffable in the film Phantom Thread, as Simone Strasser, a wartime translator from Alsace caught on the horns of a dilemma. ... Somehow it’s odd that she should be the best thing in a testosteroney drama about blowing up convoys.

From its window-dressing address of Nazis’ “final solution” attitudes toward Jews, to its dutiful recreation of Petersen’s submarine set pieces—in which alarms sound for each incoming attack, the crew goes quiet as it’s stalked by enemy destroyers, and rapidly escalating sonar beeps presage imminent danger—Das Boot is a handsome endeavor that’s never urgent or unique. Or, consequently, necessary.

The sense of cheapness and naked commercialism that pervades the series makes its explicit depiction of disturbing violence—a death by firing squad, the gang rape of a Jewish woman by German sailors—feel unearned and, particularly in the latter case, completely irresponsible.

What could have been a good drama about German u-Boat crews devolves into terrorists and PC Germans. It seems both the protagonists (brother and sister) all end up as **** through a combination of bad writing and poor plotting. Every WW2 cliche you could think of ends up in this show. Silly

Looks very promising at first. But quickly derails into silly "Spy" subplots that slowly but surely take over the entire show. Expected to see a a show true to the source material as it follows the lives **** submarine crew? Well why would you want that? Here is some "French" resistance for you instead. Is this really DAS BOOT now? Visually the show look good, but I simply cannot understand why a show based on acclaimed book and film spends so much screen time on characters and plot points that have NOTHING to do with submarine warfare. (Aside from the decoding the Radio transmissions). Let me put it this way, If you want an average Spy flick set in the second world war? Sure, this has some entertainment value to it. Are you a fan of the original source material? Stay away from this show. You'll just be disappointed. That fact that they even use the music from the film makes this even worse. It's not a terrible show, but it's a terrible adaptation of an amazing movie and book.

In a word: Dreadful Looks quite good, starts off promisingly with the submarine crews, has some nice submarine scenes and decent actors but quickly goes to pieces. From the junkie lady lesbian resistance "fighter" plot which swallows the show, the ludicrous hamfisted narratives that develop as the show goes on and the submarine arc losing all credibility. Then they throw in a bunch of completely out of the blue "shocks" with clear sjw origins and the show quickly goes beyond the pale. Very, very poor. If you are a fan of the Wolfgang Peterson original (and why wouldn't you be?) stay clear of this utter abomination, watch the original again instead and save yourself.