Marlene and Tristan and Rebecca's brother Hagen met off screen, based on stories when she was singing somewhere and he was smitten. They came to town even though Hagen was estranged from his family because his father needed a bone marrow transplant. During the influence of narcotics he proposed to Marlene. Marlene was over the moon and invited her sister Dana to meet her fiancee. On the way there Dana's car broke down or something and she got her leg stuck in a wolf trap. They quarrelled because she mistook him from an animal thief, but then he saved her from the trap and she fell for him on the first sight. He took her to the castle where she realized that he was Marlene's guy.

Around the same time Marlene and Hagen asked Rebecca to sew Marlene's wedding dress and Tristan to be Marlene's manager. Dana did all the traditional soapy things like trying to get Hagen out of her head and yelling at him a lot while falling more and more deeply in love with him every day. Marlene and Hagen fought occasionally like about Marlene pushing Hagen to agree to take the lead of the company from his grateful father while his father was recuperating when Hagen had no interest in that. Hagen then took over the stables instead and Dana became a horse trainer there. Dana around that time started casually dating Tristan which was enthusiastically supported by Marlene. Tristan eventually confessed his love to Dana, which made Dana freak out. Tristan guessed that the guy she was still secretly in love with was Hagen and broke up with her, but in a friends manner. Marlene and Hagen got married. There were various stories around that time about Marlene being insecure and Tristan as her manager pushing her into things she didn't really want to do, like paying radio stations to get her song played or pushing her to do musical again when she wanted a pop/jazz singer career or pushing her into some seriously weird advertisting stunts.

Dana decided she needed to get things off her chest to get Hagen out of her mind and told Hagen that she was in love with him. This in turn made Hagen freak out, to know that Dana loved him and made him realize that he was in love with her too. There were various "push and pull" episodes around that time in the Marlene and Hagen marriage like positive stuff like Marlene helping Hagen to get some sort of license for his stables by talking up the guy who gave out the licenses, Hagen protecting Marlene from Tristan giving her unnecessary drugs when she lost her voice, Hagen and Marlene both being pissed at Tristan when Tristan leaked a made up affair to the press to get people interested in Marlene again, but also bad stuff like Hagen and Marlene fighting over Hagen wanting kids and Marlene wanting to focus on her career first, Marlene giving out private details and private pictures of Hagen and her to the press and Marlene dragging him to public events to show off their marriage when Hagen didn't want that.

Hagen and Dana spontaneously slept together around that time, from what I remember because their star horse had run a perfect time. Marlene walked in on a dishelved Dana after the fact and through stuff like this Tristan found out that Hagen and Dana had slept together and agreed to be their cover story. Dana pushed Hagen to go back to Marlene, Hagen tried to fix his marriage with Marlene including a romantic getaway but eventually he couldn't take how he always reacted to Dana when he saw her and confessed to Marlene that he had cheated on her and that he was divorcing her. Marlene broke down completely and went into denial. She wanted Hagen back at all costs. There was a lot of push and pull because Tristan felt she was endangering the musical, he was even ready to call off the premiere because Marlene was in no condition to sing, but when she then sang after all and was successfull he fell in love with her (now that she was sort of free/available again from a Hagen POV). Marlene meanwhile was still determined to 1.) find out who the other woman was that Hagen was still crazy about to punihsh her and to 2.) win Hagen back. Dana meanwhile insisted to Hagen that Marlene must never find out because she didn't want to ruin their sister relationship. Eventually Dana broke down and told Marlene the truth. Marlene completely broke down, Dana begged Marlene to metaphorically "take her back" and that she had no plans of ever really being with Hagen anyway, Marlene was pissed still and hated Dana for it and was still determined to get Hagen back. One night she and Dana had a big fight and she spontaneously slept with Tristan. The morning after Tristan declared his love for Marlene and Marlene told him she would rather stay friends, she cared about him a lot as a friend but she couldn't wrap her mind around falling in love with anybody right now. She then slept with Tristan again after being jealous about Dagen and was distraught when Hagen wasn't jealous of her having somebody new like she had hoped for. She ended the sex with Tristan and instead at the advice of her friend Tanja faked being pregnant by Hagen in the hope that he would come back to her. She was crushed when she realized that Hagen was indeed super happy about the baby, but still intended to divorce her and just be an affectionate divorce dad. Tristan realized around this time that the pregnancy was just a lie to get Hagen back, he was superpissed and forced Marlene to confess all to Dana and Hagen and lie to the public that she had had a miscarriage. Marlene around that time had a breakdown when she was chased by paparazzi and nearly run over by a car. She agreed to take a time out to see her grandmother.

She came back and apologized to her family about the baby lie. Around this time Tristan's best friend from college came to town and Tristan told him that Marlene was off limits because Tristan was interested in her. During a time where all of them hung out with Dana and Hagen (who were a couple by then) Marlene got into a huge fight with Dana and Hagen and got pissed at Tristan for not supporting her, so she went off with Alexander to sleep with him (Tristan slept with a one off girl instead). During the foreplay Marlene had second thoughts because of Tristan and called stop, but Alexander ignored her and raped her. Dana sensed that Marlene was in pain and found the injured Marlene. She guessed what had happened and supported her. They also let Marlene's parents in on the secret and eventually even Hagen. Marlene was determined not to have anybody find out because she had chickened out on going to the doctor after the rape and thought nobody would believe her without proof/she just wanted to go on with her life. Meanwhile Tristan was pissed because he thought, encouraged by Alexander, that Marlene and Alexander had casually slept together and threatened to fire Marlene when Marlene didn't want to do sexy photoshoots or ran out on a recording session because Alexander was stalking her. A few weeks in he showed up at the Wolf house to deliver Marlene's firing where it broke out of Dana and she yelled at him that Marlene had been raped. Tristan was furious and tried to stab Alexander to death and then choke him during a supposed training fencing duell (fencing was sort of Tristan and Alexander's thing). Alexander had him arrested, but because Tristan knew that Marlene didn't want anybody to know about the rape he claimed in front of the police that he had attacked Alexander for a more casual reason which put him in danger of receiving a much harsher sentence. Meanwhile Tristan's other brother, Sebastian the lawyer had figured out what was really behind it all and forced Marlene to finally register her rape with the police or else he would do it. Tristan was released from jail due to excusing circumstances and once again declared his love for Marlene and once again received the same "not now/I only need a friend" answer. Marlene's dad tried to fix up Marlene and Tristan and even though they had a fun time together, Tristan afterwards overheard Marlene say to her dad that there was nothing between her and Tristan and there wouldn't be in the future either. Tristan was hurt and told Marlene he wanted to break off all personal contact other than stuff about business and in regards to the rape. Marlene was unsure what to do and went to her friend Tanja where she expressed fear that it would be lying to Tristan to tell him she loved him, Tanja assured her that Tristan had done so much for her Marlene would regret it if she let him go and he went for somebody else. So Marlene went to Tristan and gave him a vague promise that she would love him eventually and Tristan was satisfied with that.

On continued the rape story for a while (including Tristan almost being exposed for trying to bribe a false witness and Marlene storming out of the trial room and being found by Dana). Eventually Alexander was sentenced (he broke down at the trial after a confrontation with Marlene, his story was that he had genuinely thought that it was consensual until Marlene made him realize that he had indeed raped her and that she wasn't just some crazy bitch out to ruin his reputation [that is how the writers skirted around Alexander being sentenced even though there was not a shred of evidence against him]). After the trial Marlene and Dana had another big fight and then made up and Marlene told Tristan that she was now ready to give the whole relationship thing a try. Of course Marlene freaked out when it came to the sex aspect and started seeing a therapist => that's where the backstory videos starts, Marlene find out that she was pregnant, Marlene befriending Rebecca and Marlene and Tristan fighting about Marlene's abortion.

It's kinda hard to cover the feel of the story though. For example I never got any genuine couple vibes from Trima because this covers about 1,5 years and for half a year Tristan genuinely showed now deeper interest in Marlene other than casual lust and trying to push manager stuff on her which she didn't like and Marlene showed no interest in him at all. During her marriage with Hagen she really was devoted to Hagen and never showed any interest in Tristan. Tristan only fell in love with Marlene after a friend of his (who he'd just made out with) told him he needed to be more emotional and spontaneous. During the rape story there again were loooooooooooooooooooong stretches of Marlene not showing any interest in Tristan and all the "money shots" from this storyline imo went to Marlene/Dana (like Dana cradling Marlene in her arms). (Tristan around that time had a secondary story as well about his other best friend Philipp being in a coma/Philipp's wife being distraught and not wanting to pull the plug [she's the one who told Tristan to be more spontaneous and then having to protect Helena from the wrath of the distraught wife] and he split his screentime between that and Marlene) I always thought that Marlene kinda "slid" into the relationship with Tristan post Hagen because he was just so persistent/insistent rather than really choosing him.

Woah. Even though I didn't ask the question I just had to read this. Tristan really is a nut job, eh? I just hope he doesn't go all schizo' like with Rebecca judging from the clip of episode 4114.

Has she always been this nuanced in her acting or is it just the awesome Marbecca chemistry that brings it out?

She sometimes seemed a bit icy or a bit too fakey-fakey smile (especially when flirting with guys) to me but that could have been how *Marlene* is supposed to be.I have read many people saying about her that they found her a lot more warm and natural in her scenes with Tanja and especially with her family and more stilted outside of that => but again, that might be the character, the "true" Marlene with her family and the diva/trying to impress people Marlene outside. And maybe Marbecca is the story that just asks for a lot more complexity in feeling or that "marries"/connects those two aspects of her.

I was wondering -- I have seen in several music videos a clip of Marlene and Rebecca slow-dancing together. It looks like they are in the castle and they are surrounded by candles. What episode did this happen in? Is it "real" or is it a dream one of them is having?

Does anyone know what Tristan asks Marlene about Rebecca, and what her answer is, at about 0:28 of this preview? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q41yZ-X4yWY

Did something happen to precipitate this love confession from Marlene?

. Even when she has to tell Tristan that she's pregnant, she doesn't actually say the words

Was she like this with Hagen too?

M and T have the weirdest, smells-of-desperation kiss ever. Did something happen to precipitate this love confession from Marlene?

In German we call that "aus der Nase ziehen", the truth always has to be pulled from her nose by somebody else.

It's kinda tied with how VL works and what their structure is. VL is kinda this soap/telenovela hybrid where there is usually 2 main love stories that are told with a lot of kitsch, where they really lay it on heavy (sensing each other psychically, dreaming of each other, music montages).