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Final episode of theseries: After decades on the force as one of the most successful homicide detectives, Derrick (Horst Tappert) is to be promoted to chief of Europol, and he's to be let go with a big ceremony with speeches and everything - but then he receives a death threat from Albert Kaschonnick (Uwe Friedrichsen), a criminal he has booked 5 years ago but who apparently still has the best contacts to the outside to arrange a murder. And since he's already in prison, he doesn't even mind having his name connected to the murder, and rather enjoys Derrick's race to save his own life. So Derrick and his assistant Harry (Fritz Wepper) try to make any of his family members and associates talk to find out who actually arranged the murder on the outside: There's Kaschonnick's brother, who still runs Kaschonnick's nightclub where he puts on erotic to sleazy dance performances, Kaschonnick's daughter (Michaela Merten), who's a model these days, his mother (Maria Becker), who's full of hatred towards Derrick for booking her son, his wheelchair bound business associate (Florian Martens) and that man's son (Tobias Nath), who both see Kaschonnick as their benefactor. None of them confess to anything though, but he gets them all curious enough to go to Derrick's farewell ceremony, where he holds a speech about guilt of the "innocent by-stander" who could have done something to prevent a crime. And it's after that speech that Kaschonnick's daughter breaks down and warns him that he'll be shot upon leaving the building - a warning that really comes much too late, as conveniently, Derrick has already been warned by a snitch (who really came out of nowhere, narratively speaking) as to the when and where and even who the actual assassin will be, and in a firefight outside the building the ceremony took place, the assassin and his accomplices have all been killed or apprehended ...

Fittingly, the (then) main cast of the series Der Alte (Rolf Schimpf, Michael Ande, Pierre Sanoussi-Bliss, Markus Böttcher), another Munich-based cop show, and Helmut Ringelmann, producer of both series, are among the audience at the ceremony, but little is made of that. Also Derrick's final words - thanking his assistant - are almost the exact same as inspector Keller's final words in writer Herbert Reinecker's other long-running cop series Der Kommissar some 22 years earlier. The director Dietrich Haugk by the way was fittingly also the director of Derrick's very first episode Waldweg.

Despite its international success, Derrick was a rather flawed show from day one, what with its often forced plots, its failed attempts at realism and relevance, its trademark stilted dialogue, and also the portrayal of Derrick as infallible hero with little other character traits - but all that said, the show would deliver the occasional gem as well as the occasional very entertaining clunker. This very last episode however is neither, just a tired send-off with an even tireder lead actor (Horst Tappert was 75 when this was shot) going through the motions, asking the more or less same characters with different faces the same things - and not even getting anywhere with it, as the whole thing's resolved by a snitch popping up out of nowhere. And frankly, Derrick's speech to make one of the suspects flip is really rather ridiculous, both in content and as a ploy. So really, at the end of this episode one can't help but wonder if the series (running for 24 years total) hasn't stayed on air quite a bit too long ...

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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