13 out of 12 stars! Tschugger Bax is back and making his way into our hearts again

Simone Meier

Let’s remember – or as an American series would say: “Previously on ‘Tschugger’.” Guys, what a season two finale that was! Johannes “Bax” Schmidhalter (David Constantin), the man in whose life and work everything always goes wrong, grew beside himself or dived into a reservoir, where he was left with a broken ballpoint pen clamp (retaining clamp, a word that is needed even less often than goods separating bars), stopped the explosive mechanism of a Nazi sect and prevented Wallis from being flooded.

It was really very exciting. Bax saved Wallis from the “end of the world”. Because that is “Tschugger”: there is Wallis, i.e. the world, and then some strange satellite areas inhabited by “Grüezine”, i.e. non-Wallisians.

And how was Bax thanked for this unique heroic act, in the best Tom Cruise tradition? Not at all! The Federal Council decided that the population could not be burdened with Nazi sects and the end of the world. According to an official statement, the reservoir was converted into a hot tub, from which the drowning Bax was fished out. Only his BFF Pirmin (Dragan Vujic) and the adored federal police officer Mrs. Brotz (Anna Rossinelli) know the truth. Very tender, very small feelings arise between Bax and Brotz. And Pirmin sends Bax to Federal Bern, where the federal police officer lives.

And now? A few months have passed, his hair and beard have grown, Bax has left the dangerous world of the police and is stuck in Bern. He runs a smoothie truck there and is clean, except for the highly effective organic drops from his new friend Stöffu, whom he met in the respiratory therapy group. At night he sometimes stands under Mrs. Brotz’s window and wonders where he could finally acquire the beautiful cutlery of love rhetoric. Bern, in “Tschugger”, is an oasis of mindfulness and comfort.

Meanwhile, several devils are dancing in Valais. Gucci rapper Almira (Annalena Miano) still doesn’t have a record deal and is in urgent need of money. Her slave Juni (Arsène Junior Page) tries to rob lonely older women. Bax’s brother ponders a mysterious key from a corpse’s rectum. Wolves howl in the Pfynwald. A sinister prepper sets traps for anything with legs. Valais, the heart of darkness in Switzerland.

Pirmin is now a househusband and father; he and Regina inherited a small villa from their late father-in-law. The two French-speaking police officers who replace him and Bax have even worse haircuts than Bax, and you immediately know that their character can only be worse.

It makes sense that Bax is sucked back into Wallis’ dark, wolfish maw. That crime and alcohol will erase his pleasant Bernese Gielendom again. Already at the end of the second episode there is the greatest possible accident, i.e. unimaginable accident, for a few seconds you are tempted to join the “Tschugger” team around David Constantin (screenplay, direction, acting) and Sophie Toth (production ) because of the monstrosity of this. Unfortunately, you make such good series. Kill your dearest darlings. And the soundtrack is ‘Iemerg’ by Tocotronic – a melancholic catapult like no other.

And that’s exactly what a “Tschugger” carves into the heart: that there is so much emotion in it in addition to the jokes and slapstick. Bax is probably the biggest crybaby in the history of the series; no one cries as often as he does – out of heartbreak, out of self-consciousness, out of drunken world-weariness. Self-mortification mixed with comedy results in self-irony – and that’s one of the most compelling qualities a person, a movie or a series can have.

Of course, the third season will be so tumultuous that you occasionally lose the thread of understanding, but the most important thing is that Bax finds his way back to Wallis, that he does everything. stupid wears cool retro ski clothes and finally stops drinking Pirmin’s wife’s breast milk. Or so.

The cliffhanger of the fourth and unfortunately final season, which has already been filmed, cannot be imagined in a more megalomaniac way, because the end of the world stuff is now really taken seriously. If we were to give stars here, “Tschugger III” would get 13 out of 12.

“Tschugger III” opens on November 19. at 8:05 PM, on November 26. at 9:40 PM and on December 3. at 10:20 PM on SRF 1. Or simply in its entirety from November 19. on Play Suisse, where you can also watch the first and second seasons.