# Honey reimagines Carolyn Martens’s early spy years in East Berlin

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/honey-this-flirty-kinky-killing-eve-prequel-should-have-been-called-carre-on-spying/
- Published: 2026-11-14T07:00:37+00:00
- Updated: 2026-11-14T09:47:38+00:00
- Original publisher: The Guardian (publisher lean: Left)
- Original article: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/nov/14/honey-bbc-flirty-kinky-killing-eve-prequel-should-have-been-called-carre-on-spying
- Topics: Culture, Europe, World

## Key points

- *Honey* explores Carolyn Martens’s early spy career in East Berlin.
- Its camp style mixes Cold War espionage with modern humour.
- The review finds Friedrich Baumann especially compelling.

## Summary

*Honey* is a glossy, camp prequel to *Killing Eve*, following Carolyn Martens’s early years as a spy in East Berlin. Working under the alias Martha Schmitt, she is tasked with seducing influential men and photographing them to secure information for the West; the review praises the show’s female-led, playful take on espionage.

Set in 1982, the series pairs Martha with American agent Kurt Fischer and pits her against Stasi officer Friedrich Baumann. Its pop songs, anachronistic jokes, stylish disguises and light kink give it a knowingly modern, flirty tone, though the review says this can sit uneasily with the setting’s history of oppression and sometimes strains credibility. Ann Skelly, Rory Kinnear and Jannis Niewöhner are among the cast.

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Summarised by TalkFuse (https://talkfuse.com/). Quote the original publisher for the reporting and link this page for the summary and discussion.