Kommissar Rex

Abstract

Kommissar Rex is a long-running detective series that takes place in the streets of Vienna and its surrounding areas, produced by the Austrian public television network (ORF). It began in 1994 and is now in its seventh season. We have attempted to analyze this series in terms of its significance for the political and social situation in which Austria finds itself today, with the influx of immigrants from the Balkan states and the continuing degradation of Vienna as a center/broker of exchange between east and west. We argue that the significance of the Kommissar Rex series lies in dealing with the social symptoms that the Austrian public are experiencing concerning its identity. Utilizing a Lacanian psychoanalytic perspective, we argue that Rex's `wild', untamed side, that is beyond the law, is put to use to reinstate the law and to ease current anxieties.