Miss Marple with Facebook - Why True Crime is so trendy

Whether the series "The Keepers" about the murder of a nun or the classic "file characters XY ... unsolved" - True Crime is booming.

Gemma Hoskins and Abbie Schaub had a teacher almost 50 years ago, which they have never forgotten: Sister Cathy. The nun taught at a girls' school in Baltimore, 1969, on the east coast of the US, before she disappeared and was found murdered two months later. Gemma and Abbie are now older ladies with a mission. They want to clarify why Sister Cathy died. Like Miss Marple, but with Facebook.

The case is very bleak: it is about murder, abuse and the Catholic Church. Did the nun know too much? What do the victims say today? That's why the Netflix series "The Keepers", published in May, is a fascinating and crushing TV experience for the New York Times. The streaming service has already told the crime stories "Making a Murderer" and "Amanda Knox".

True Crime is booming as a fabric for series, films and magazines. As a genre it is old. The classic "Kaltblütig" by Truman Capote appeared in 1966, which is about the murder of a farm family in Kansas. The German permanent burner "file number XY ... unsolved" started 50 years ago, in October 1967.

The new formats? In the international age and in the flood to series is always searched for substances. Criminal cases are there. The spectator fears and suffers.

Also in podcasts, True Crime is an important trend - for those who prefer to hear such stories rather than see. The American "serial" about the murder of a student was surprisingly successful in 2014. This year, the series "S-Town" followed - the crime is not one, as it turns out. In the German radio, "The Talented Mr. Vossen" (NDR) and in "Who Burak shot?" (RBB) were about crime stories from real life.

The "Stern" brought out a separate issue with "Crime" just two years ago. Editorial Director Giuseppe di Grazia calls it a «true print success story». 80 000 copies are sold per issue, and several prizes have been recorded. At the St. Pauli Theater in Hamburg there was a reading with magazine stories. "True crimes capture the reader in a very special way, they address him emotionally, and this is much more powerful than fictional stories do," says di Grazia.

And the classic, which a whole generation of children in Germany secretly peered? According to the broadcaster, the «file number» on the ZDF has more audiences since it changed from Friday to Wednesday evening. In 2016 an average of 5.6 million viewers watched the show, in 2008 it was only 4.8 million. The enlightenment rate of the cases shown was more than 40 per cent in April.

Criticism for alleged sensory loss or voyeurism, there is only very isolated, so the sender. The criminal cases are therefore strictly presented according to the "relevant data". A judge must have approved the public prosecution. Production and editing know "of course" all the requirements of the media law and the protection of minors, as ZDF emphasizes. In other channels, search magazines are also successful. The RBB has just released a second radio station "offender - victim - police".

True Crime, where you can also be seen: Super RTL will release "Cold Justice" from 3 July. In this, two investigators are re-shooting murders, which were filed several years ago. The Berlin law physician Michael Tsokos is now on Sat.1 "Death on the Trail" - and subjects from trunk to the skeleton in the burning car.

Nothing for weak nerves. According to Tsokos, the idea is wrong, for the medicinal paste used mental masse because of the corpse odor. "I can assure you that if I had smeared menthol paste over the past twenty-five years with each of my more than 20,000 autopsies, I would have a gaping hole here now, and you would be staring straight at my incisors."

The world of Abbie Schaub and Gemma Hoskins in the Netflix series "The Keepers" is more tranquil. Her two hobby detectives make their notes on filter bags. A retired policeman wants to bribe Gemma with homemade cracker meatballs. And sometimes a dog hangs through the picture in "The Keepers".