Midnight at the Pera Palace returns to Netflix for season 2 — we bring you a guide to the best time travel show you might not have watched (yet!)
Thursday September 12 sees the return of Midnight at the Pera Palace to Netflix. This gem of a show might be something you’ve yet to try. To our shame we’ve only just taken the time to watch season 1 ahead of this week’s release, and realise we’ve missed out on one of the better time travel shows around. It’s a Turkish show, and the English dub is largely excellent and by no means an obstacle to enjoyment. The plotting is strong, the setting interesting, and it shines a spotlight on an important (particularly for Turkey) time in history.
Here’s the Netflix summary of season 1:
“At a historic Istanbul hotel, a journalist is thrust into the past and must stop a plot that could change the fate of modern Turkey.“
A fuller summary tells us:
The 8-episode series depicts a young journalist, Esra’s encounter with the legendary Pera Palace Hotel in Istanbul. When Esra is assigned to write a piece about the hotel, she accidentally discovers that one of the historic rooms is a portal to the year 1919. Thrust into the past, she lands in the middle of a political conspiracy against the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. Together with Ahmet, the quirky hotel manager, Esra must protect the course of history and the future of Turkey. But Istanbul in 1919 is a dangerous place, and when Esra meets Halit, the handsome and mysterious owner of Istanbul’s wildest club, she realizes that in the Istanbul of 1919, nothing is as it seems and no one is who they say they are.
The cast includes Hazal Kaya as Esra/Peride (her doppelgänger), Tansu Biçer as Ahmet and Selahattin Paşalı as Halit.
An aside for Agatha Christie fans
The hotel is a real location (and used for filming). Agatha Christie was a regular guest, and is said to have written Murder on the Orient Express there. The hotel keeps a room as a memorial to the author. The hotel is actually near the railway station where the train travelled. Esra herself is a massive Christie fan, and the author makes a brief appearance.
What is season 2 about?
Season 1 was full of twists, turns and historical intrigue. Season 2 takes the setting from post-World War I to World War II. Once again the identity of Turkey as a nation comes under threat. Here’s the Netflix summary:
In 1995, after finding her own photograph as a baby taken in the 1940s, Esra decides to go back to the 1940s to discover who her mother and family are. Despite Ahmet’s warnings not to tamper with time, Esra and Ahmet find themselves in 1941. While Esra immediately starts looking for her mother, Ahmet realizes that they have created a crack in time. Moreover, the reappearance of Halit, who has come to 1941 after discovering time travel in search of his love for Esra from 1919, will lead to even more chaos.
If you’ve not tried the show yet, here’s the Turkish with subtitles trailer for season 2, and if that doesn’t encourage you to try season 1 nothing will. We assume the show will have an English soundtrack as per season 1.