At the latest when Helga crashes through the floor of her living room, she realizes that she is stuck. It's been two years since her husband left her for another woman, but she's still angry and hurt. Everything changes when her cleaning lady goes on vacation and sends Polish worker Ryszard to replace her. Initially the target of Helga's resentment himself, Ryszard soon becomes her confidant. Although they don't speak the same language, Helga feels understood. In the safety of their own four walls, the two grow closer. But when Helga's family and friends find out about her secret, she finds it difficult to admit her feelings for Ryszard, who doesn't fit in at all with the usual image of masculinity in her milieu. Will Helga sacrifice her young, late happiness to social conventions?

When Bertha dies, her granddaughter Iris inherits her house and finds herself back in the home where she and her cousin used to play dressing-up in the summer holidays. While she wanders from room to room, she gropes her way through memories and things she had forgotten: What did her grandfather really do before he went to war? Which men were Bertha’s daughters in love with? Who ate his apple with the seeds?

The two washed-up TV stars Micki and Ginger and the unemployed physicist Reno try to kidnap a young woman. But one of the three kidnappers suddenly doubts the value of the money and drives his accomplices mad. The kidnapped woman is already missing. Three children from a good family are looking for their sister: the dutiful Junior, who counts up his day in seconds, his brother Adrian, who, by contrast, thinks life is one big family outing, and Sophia, the artist, who never finds the real thing in life.

Kain, a young rock musician, is on his way from an "insider tip" to an acknowledged newcomer. Even though he often has to work at night, he leads a more or less settled life until he meets Nina. Nina, who is blind from birth, works as a switchboard operator at the post office. Her life as well is settled, and more so than for Kain the order in her life is a system of security for her. They fall in love and as time passes Nina gets much more involved in Kain's life as a musician than she wanted to.

Maja Witt and Klaus Burck have been a well-rehearsed team for years, ensuring law and order as police officers in Bremen. At least that's what they try to do. Time and again, however, they are shown their limits. Criminals are set free again, and they themselves get no respect at all. When the arrogant teenager Ahmed Issa spits at Klaus during a mission, this finally goes too far: the two fight back and start to take the law into their own hands, using any means necessary. But the other side is not standing idly by...

In Hamburg's Elbtunnel, a man is shot in the middle of a traffic jam in his car. The murder victim obviously belonged to a group trying to discover abandoned places first. The investigators suspect an act of revenge by a competitor.