The detective series “Les Carnets de Max Liebermann” returns this evening to France 3 with an unprecedented high-flying season 2 in which the psychoanalyst hero played by Matthew Beard continues to lead the investigation in Vienna in 1907.
A little over a year after the broadcast of the first season, Les Carnets de Max Liebermann (Vienna Blood en VO) returns this evening to France 3 with a new season 2, in line with the previous episodes, which should delight viewers. fans of the Max-Oskar duo!
Set somewhere between Sherlock and The Alienist, the British-Austrian co-produced series takes us back to early 20th century Vienna, just a few years before the outbreak of World War I.
In the first episode of season 2 of Les Carnets de Max Liebermann, broadcast this Sunday at 9:10 p.m. on France 3 and entitled “La Comtesse mélancolique”, Max (Matthew Beard) has opened a practice in town, but prejudices against the psychoanalysis – then a new branch of medicine subject to debate – remained extremely tenacious.
To make matters worse, the life of the young psychoanalyst soon turns into a nightmare when a Hungarian countess who has come to treat his melancholy in Vienna, who is none other than his patient, is found drowned in his bathtub.
All eyes then obviously turn to him, and Max is forced to join forces once again with his friend Oskar Rheinhardt (Jürgen Maurer) to elucidate this crime and clear his reputation in the process.
Endor Productions Ltd/MR Film GmbH 2021
A reconstruction and investigations that make the difference
In addition to this case which touches the hero closely, season 2 of the Notebooks of Max Liebermann, which includes three episodes of 90 minutes each, also confronts Max and Oskar with the discovery of the corpse of a man who has been missing for twenty years and the murder of a monk accused of being a dangerous fanatic. An entire program !
More than ever, the strength of this series created by Stephen Thompson from the novels of Frank Tallis lies in its ability to brilliantly reproduce the atmosphere of the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1907. The image is extremely neat and the episodes, shot in part in Vienna, take us to various emblematic places in the city which offer that little extra soul to the adventures of Max Liebermann.
Beyond this reconstitution, the series can count on a rather dark and gloomy atmosphere which differs from what France 3 generally offers on Sunday evenings, from Grantchester to the Vera Investigations, and grabs us to never let go.
Add to that the convincing performances of Matthew Beard, Jürgen Maurer, Luise Von Finckh (Clara Weiss), or even Lucy Griffiths, who takes over the role of Amelia Lydgate, and you have one of the best detective series of recent years. . Which proves that despite a recipe seen and reviewed – an ill-matched duo of investigators – we can manage to make sparks.