Black Butterflies on Arte: Series Inspired by a True Story?

Black Butterflies, Arte’s new series, has already been announced as the fictional event for this return. Created by Olivier Abau and Bruno Merle, this addictive thriller follows Adrien (Nicolas Duvachel), an uninspired writer who is hired by the mysterious pensioner Albert (Niels Arestrup) to write his memoirs.

But when a man tells her about his passionate love affair with Solange, Adrien discovers that he is actually dealing with several serial killers who ran rampant in France every summer in the 1970s.

At a time when adaptations of various facts abound in the audiovisual landscape, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, featuring the campy duo of Axel Granberger and Alize Costes, is not actually inspired by a true story.

The two creators did clarify at a press briefing organized by Arte that the characters of Solange and Albert are not based on actual serial killers. “The idea was to create a romantic story“, they explained.

“So no, their story is not inspired by a real story. But it is clear that there have been many pairs of serial killers. It was a very real story. We obviously did our part by reading what we needed to read and watching the few movies that dealt with the subject. But there is no specific incident that inspired this story..”

Olivier Abou and Bruno Merle also said that what particularly interests them in the history of serial killers is the sometimes ambiguous role that women may have played in some of the murders. “They rarely condemn because he barely takes action. So they have a very ambiguous role of victim of consent, which was interesting to explore.“

Find the first three episodes of Les Papillons Noirs this Thursday, September 22, from 20:55 on Arte. The entire series is now available on Arte.tv.