Since childhood Peter Schlönzke dreams of a career as a TV presenter. His great role model is Heinz Wäscher, who is always looking for talented young entertainers for his popular show. Peters mother announces her shy boy for an audition, which, although mercilessly goes wrong, but brings him a job as a cable helper. He meets the popular entertainer from the unlikely side: as a bus scrapper who despises his audience. When Peter stumbles into the limelight by chance, he has a unique chance - as successor to scrubber.

A 17 year old tries to find his own identity in October 1958 while Elvis Presley begins his service as a G.I in Germany. He is torn between his parents' generation which was marked by war and the new "American way of life" which is particularly present in the town of Bremerhaven.

Werner Blücher is what you'd call a real thoroughbred crook: not a second seems to go by without the cunning rascal coming up with an idea for the next coup. It's just too bad that Blücher's criminal career hasn't been too successful so far - his lawyer has just got him out of prison once again. And although his arch-enemy, the fanatical chief inspector Schmitz-Kesselhoff, is doing everything she can together with her dotty assistant Müller Zwo to get Blücher out of circulation once and for all, the gallant crook is already planning the next thing.

Hilde Breitner, a contented factory worker, faces upheaval when her husband becomes disabled and dies from occupational illnesses. Financial setbacks hit her daughters - one loses her new snack stand, the other abandons university to work in the factory - forcing Hilde to confront her own economic vulnerability. Awakening to workers’ rights, she becomes her workplace’s employee representative, learning to advocate for change.

A Swabian shoe factory comes into the possession of the GDR as an inheritance. The new managing director "from over there" tries to reorganize production methods and working conditions from a socialist point of view. The idea is an appealing satirical "comparison of systems" that suffers from somewhat uninspired direction.

Jack Radford and his wife Sarah no longer love each other, but money keeps their marriage together. Jack runs the Donnington real estate agency, which Sarah and her brother Edward inherited from their father. Edward, a failed concert pianist, has not been involved in the business for years, but now a real estate scandal threatens to ruin the family business. An apartment building in Spain has collapsed due to structural defects, killing several people in the rubble. The company was heavily involved in the construction and sale. When a dead body is found in the Radfords' pool, Cliff Jordan, nearing the end of his career, gets back to work. At first, all he has is a bloody kitchen knife in his mailbox.