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Female creators are ready to tackle sexual violence and abuse in their shows. But they don’t always want to show it.

This was one of the key takeaways from Monday’s Berlinale Series Market panel Owning the Narrative – Deconstructing Stereotypes in TV Series, moderated by Variety.

“There are many things that can trigger and re-traumatize people, so we tried our best not to. With director Elsa van Damke and her co-writer Jana Forkel we decided not to show the actual rape,” said “Angemessen Angry” producer Solmaz Azizi.

Azizi produced the Germany series with Marie Bloching, which sees a young woman developing superpowers after an assault.

“I’ve seen many images of naked body parts that I cannot get out of my head. It can be pleasant – I don’t mind seeing Idris Elba walking out of a shower – but it might be something I’m not prepared to see,...

With Baltic shows growing bigger and bolder and producers looking for more international collaborators, local creators reach for original stories and established IPs, delivering period dramas and timely satires. However, crime shows, whether contemporary – like this year’s Berlinale Series Market Selects “My Dear Mother” – or set in the 19th century, still take the crown. Or at least the top hat.

“Melchior the Apothecary”

Creators: Indrek Hargla, Elmo Nüganen, Olle Mirme

Director: Elmo Nüganen

Based on popular crime series books by Indrek Hargla – about an apothecary who heals the sick and solves mysteries – the show is set in medieval Tallinn. Shot as a trilogy, which was a box-office success in Estonia, it’s sold by Global Screen as a miniseries. It features Märten Metsaviir and Maarja Johanna Mägi, who was chosen as one of Berlinale’s Shooting Stars and will be next seen in the Finnish remake of “Cold Feet.

Berlinale Series Market Selects pick “My Dear Mother” might start with a brutal murder, but it’s not really about the crime, “It’s a unique love story,” says writer Raoul Suvi.

“Maybe not easily understandable, but it’s based on a fight against injustice that nobody sees or cares about, and on the sense that the main character deserves love and a much better life.”

In the Estonian-Ukrainian six-episode show, produced by Zolba Productions in collaboration with Ukraine’s Film.UA Group, the audience is put in the role of a judge and a journalist – both trying to understand what happened in the life of a girl accused of killing her own mother.

“As the story develops, they realize that the institutions, including her own family, haven’t fulfilled their main principles and goals,” reveals Suvi.

“[I wanted] to create a narrative which is not documenting a single case but creates a...

Exclusive: Here’s a buzzy one headed to MIPCOM.

With the Cannes confab less than a fortnight away, we can reveal My Dear Mother, an Estonia-Ukraine collab series about a young woman whose troubled past is brought to light when her mother is found brutally murdered on a beach.

Directed by Doris Tääker, who was Ad on Christopher Nolan’s Tenet, and written by Raoul Suvi, My Dear Mother is made in the Nordic noir tradition, charting a story that blurs the line between victimhood and manipulation, raising questions about the protagonist’s role in the crime. Doris Tislar (Lioness) is playing the lead and cast includes Indrek Ojari, Elina Reinold and Saara Pius.

The series for Elisa Estonia is made by Estonia’s Zolba Productions in collab with Film.UA Group. Film.UA Design worked on the series including using advanced de-ageing techniques for Tislar, allowing her to be portrayed...

Estonia’s Jevgeni Supin from Zolba Productions, credited for the first Estonian Viaplay original “Who Shot Otto Mueller,” has unveiled his slate of five high-end dramas, including “My Dear Mother” repped by Film.UA Group and “Von Fock,” due to world premiere at Tallinn TV Beats’ first Screening Day on Nov. 20.

Supin’s extensive slate and the caliber of his TV projects, all framed as international co-productions, reflect both his ambition to set Estonian -and Baltic- drama on the global map and his pioneering breakthroughs in co-production.

The four-part period crime “Von Fock”, for instance, was the first Estonian series ever to receive support from both Creative Europe’s Media Program and Eurimages’ pilot program for series co-productions in June. “This [EU public money] meant the world to me,” said Supin, who recently stepped down as head of TV Beats Forum to fully focus on producing. “It shows that we indie producers from the...