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About the Show
In 1930 Germany was a liberal democracy. Just four years later democracy is dead, Germany’s leader is a dictator and its government is in the hands of murderers. This series tells the story of how this happened. Leading historians and experts get inside the heads of some of the key players, whose political plotting, miscalculations and personal ambitions helped to destroy democracy and deliver control to Hitler.
Season 1
See how Adolf Hitler and the Nazis rise to power. In 1930, Germany is a liberal democracy. Just four years later, democracy is dead, Germany’s leader is a dictator and the government is in the hands of the Nazis.
Episode 1 | Politics
Learn the chain of events that propels Hitler from the fringes to the heart of the government. After leading a failed coup in 1923, he turns the Nazis into a legitimate, mainstream party and plots to overthrow Germany's political elite.
Episode 2 | The First Six Months in Power
Discover the measures Chancellor Hitler takes to dismantle the German state. The Nazis have the power to ban free speech, books are burned, and Jewish people, gay people and those holding anti-Nazi beliefs begin to disappear.
Episode 3 | Night of the Long Knives
See how Hitler finds himself caught between Germany's president and the Nazis' power base. His advisors persuade him to destroy the Nazi stormtroopers and their leader – one of his oldest friends – to make the SS Germany’s only paramilitary force.
Season 2
Facing defeat on the Eastern Front, resistance builds as Hitler pushes Germany to untold destruction. This is the story of why dictatorships fail, and of the hubris that nearly destroyed freedom, but ultimately destroyed itself.
Episode 1 | Barbarossa
The battles on the Eastern Front, a campaign that saw some of the most brutal and inhumane warfare in all of history, are viewed by many as the defining conflict of the Second World War.
Episode 2 | Stalingrad
It’s 1942, and Hitler has just lost the Battle of Moscow. Now winter in Russia, German troops are in desperate need of fuel and resources.
Episode 3 | Home Front
After Stalingrad, Hitler’s stress intensifies. For once there is no master plan. Hitler leaves it to the men around him to pull Germany back from the abyss.