Bad Banks is the story of Jana Lieman, an ambitious investment banker working in the dog-eat-dog world of high finance. The show starts off promisingly but quickly deteriorates. It's biggest flaw by far is the lack of sympathetic leading characters. Every single leading character, including Jana, is borderline sociopathic with no redeeming qualities. They are singlemindedly focused on their careers (i.e. making lots and lots of money). They break the law, they engage in deceit and violence, they throw people - including their own young children - under the bus. They are emotionally and spiritually empty people driven only by personal ambition.
The problem is not that the characters aren't perfect; there many shows and movies that revolve around seriously flawed individuals, but even a brutal gangster in a mob drama usually has some redeeming qualities that endear him to the audience. They can see that he's not all bad, that he is conflicted about his role and the actions he engages in. This crucial aspect is absent from Bad Banks. Jana starts off as a relatable character who loves her partner and their daughter but two or three episodes in it's clear that she is abandoning them physically and emotionally for her career.
Everybody she associates with, from her boss to her co-workers, are amoral sociopaths who puts making money literally above everything else in life. So when Jana cries in self-pity (she does this a lot) after throwing away a card her daughter made for her, or her boss has a brief moment of self-doubt, it's impossible to feel any sympathy for them. The character that comes closest to being "normal" is her "friend" (these people don't have real friends) and co-worker who is emotionally abused by her horrible parents at every turn and obviously suffers greatly. But she nonetheless has no problem when it comes to treating people as means to further her career. Then there is Jana's other "friend" and co-worker who regularly explodes with rage and beats people into a bloody pulp. His crying and moping when his wife leaves him and takes their kids with her is not nearly enough to redeem him. Every single main character is like this, completely self-centered and tone deaf to their own amorality and sociopathic tendencies.
The second problem is that it's not clear whether the producers of Bad Banks intended this. I get the sense that Jana, for example, is supposed to be relatable as a modern, career-oriented woman who is "making her own life" rather than being constrained by family obligations and motherhood. She says as much when she pushes her daughter and partner out of her life. There are many scenes of Jana crying and there is a whole episode dedicated to her returning home, only to find out that her partner is seeing another woman, where she sneaks into her daughters bedroom to say farewell to her before leaving her child forever. The "message" it sends is that, sure, Jana has flaws but look at how emotionally affected she is when she does morally and ethically reprehensible things, so she can't be _that_ bad of a person. The problem is that it's always about her. Other people in her life who aren't monomaniacally focused on a banking career are treated as disposable. Crying about it afterwards does not make it okay.
It is one thing to acknowledge that a woman has a right to her own life and career but to present abandoning one's child and engaging in gratuitously selfish and amoral behavior as an acceptable alternative to traditional gender roles - as Bad Banks' producers seem to be doing - is problematic, to say the least. If women's liberation from traditional gender constraints is to mimic the worst of men's behavior where does that leave society?
Not surprisingly Bad Banks' portrayal of late-capitalist society is, perhaps inadvertently, bleak. The fact that the series' producers don't seem to realize how thoroughly unpleasant their leading characters are suggests that the amoral dystopia that western society is becoming has already been internalized by significant numbers of people. This makes the show a valuable snapshot of social attitudes in early 21st century Germany (and the west generally). The acting is also quite good and this helps make the show watchable despite its many flaws and the hopelessly over-the-top finale to Season 2. It will be interesting to see how the characters evolve (devolve?) in Season 3.
The problem is not that the characters aren't perfect; there many shows and movies that revolve around seriously flawed individuals, but even a brutal gangster in a mob drama usually has some redeeming qualities that endear him to the audience. They can see that he's not all bad, that he is conflicted about his role and the actions he engages in. This crucial aspect is absent from Bad Banks. Jana starts off as a relatable character who loves her partner and their daughter but two or three episodes in it's clear that she is abandoning them physically and emotionally for her career.
Everybody she associates with, from her boss to her co-workers, are amoral sociopaths who puts making money literally above everything else in life. So when Jana cries in self-pity (she does this a lot) after throwing away a card her daughter made for her, or her boss has a brief moment of self-doubt, it's impossible to feel any sympathy for them. The character that comes closest to being "normal" is her "friend" (these people don't have real friends) and co-worker who is emotionally abused by her horrible parents at every turn and obviously suffers greatly. But she nonetheless has no problem when it comes to treating people as means to further her career. Then there is Jana's other "friend" and co-worker who regularly explodes with rage and beats people into a bloody pulp. His crying and moping when his wife leaves him and takes their kids with her is not nearly enough to redeem him. Every single main character is like this, completely self-centered and tone deaf to their own amorality and sociopathic tendencies.
The second problem is that it's not clear whether the producers of Bad Banks intended this. I get the sense that Jana, for example, is supposed to be relatable as a modern, career-oriented woman who is "making her own life" rather than being constrained by family obligations and motherhood. She says as much when she pushes her daughter and partner out of her life. There are many scenes of Jana crying and there is a whole episode dedicated to her returning home, only to find out that her partner is seeing another woman, where she sneaks into her daughters bedroom to say farewell to her before leaving her child forever. The "message" it sends is that, sure, Jana has flaws but look at how emotionally affected she is when she does morally and ethically reprehensible things, so she can't be _that_ bad of a person. The problem is that it's always about her. Other people in her life who aren't monomaniacally focused on a banking career are treated as disposable. Crying about it afterwards does not make it okay.
It is one thing to acknowledge that a woman has a right to her own life and career but to present abandoning one's child and engaging in gratuitously selfish and amoral behavior as an acceptable alternative to traditional gender roles - as Bad Banks' producers seem to be doing - is problematic, to say the least. If women's liberation from traditional gender constraints is to mimic the worst of men's behavior where does that leave society?
Not surprisingly Bad Banks' portrayal of late-capitalist society is, perhaps inadvertently, bleak. The fact that the series' producers don't seem to realize how thoroughly unpleasant their leading characters are suggests that the amoral dystopia that western society is becoming has already been internalized by significant numbers of people. This makes the show a valuable snapshot of social attitudes in early 21st century Germany (and the west generally). The acting is also quite good and this helps make the show watchable despite its many flaws and the hopelessly over-the-top finale to Season 2. It will be interesting to see how the characters evolve (devolve?) in Season 3.