Frank Schätzing (65), the creator of the globally successful science fiction thriller “Der Schwarm” (2004), apparently doesn’t really like its serial adaptation. In an interview with the weekly newspaper “Die Zeit”, which appears on Thursday, he expressed his criticism of the eight-part ZDF film adaptation, which will be broadcast in prime time from March 6th.
According to the advance notice, the series is narratively “fundamentally wrong”, “cobbled together nonsense” and “of no current relevance”. The Cologne writer further comments: “Some things are ready for the cinema, other touching and talkative relationship box TV. It pilchers more than it raves. Good cast of actors, but underchallenged.” In addition, the “global dimension of the threat is not noticeable, not to mention the topicality or an intelligent alien strategy”. In summary, Schätzing says: “One should have trusted the narrative of the novel more, the maximum escalation of the thriller.”
Schätzing also finds clear words about the cooperation with the production team around Frank Doelger (“Game of Thrones”). In the beginning he was part of the team, but then withdrew due to differences in content.
“In the end he wanted to tell the ‘swarm’ on his own, just according to his ideas,” Schätzing recalls in the interview. “I dropped out hoping that the result would still impress me. Don’t do it,” he says.
What happens when nature strikes back? In various regions of the world, the sea suddenly seems to pose an indefinite danger. A handful of international scientists see a larger connection between the events and put forward a thesis that shakes the very foundations of human civilization: Out there, at great depths, there is intelligent life older and more powerful than humanity, and that is now migrating starts to fight back…
The international cast includes Leonie Benesch (31), Barbara Sukowa (73), Oliver Masucci (54), Klaas Heufer-Umlauf (39) and Franziska Weisz (42).
Even before the author’s points of criticism became known, producer and showrunner Frank Doelger told the broadcaster about the series project:
“I also realized how difficult it would be to turn the 900-page exploration of the natural phenomena that propels the story into a compelling, character-centric series.” What was decisive for him was “that I imagined the series as a ‘monster film’ in which the protagonists are aware that something is lurking out there, but don’t know exactly what”. The monster’s existence was to be “hinted at from the beginning, but not revealed until the very end”.
Doelger sums it up: “A monster film, then, in which we realize that we are the monsters. That was the challenge we set ourselves.”
