The Idiot is a costume drama TV series produced by Russia TV Channel in 2003, based on Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel of the same title. The series' script is very close to Dostoevsky's original text, and the series features well-known Russian actors.

In the center of the plot is a senior investigator named Masha Shvetsova and her male colleagues. The plot is the most vital, but, like in “Streets of Broken Lanterns,” it is seasoned with a fair amount of humor - otherwise, how can the audience (and the heroes) endure countless morgues, identifications and other “cute” charms of the investigative routine?

1938, Soviet Russia. There were two of them, both strong and courageous. But one fateful day, Igor Petrov, the commander of a Red Army unit, is compelled to exchange ID papers with a satecracker known as Ash. The incident leads both men to start their lives completely anew. For the following ten years, Petrov and Ash will live their lives in the fear of discovery. They will commit acts of bravery and insidious crimes in the name of the other so that the thiet becomes a hero, while the commander turns into a violent outlaw. The only thing they have in common is a tragic, painful love for the same woman. For ten years they will each encounter death and destruction before fate brings them together once more. There will be two of them again - strong and courageous, ready to fight for their love.. with the knowledge that retribution awaits them.

Vadik, a young opera singer from Moscow, is being transferred to St. Petersburg because his fiancee lives here. As a mentor, Vadik receives a senior operative, Captain Gosha Kolpakov, a psychotic suicidal and misanthropic man living the darkest moment of his life. Two partners travel around St. Petersburg near Bulanov and investigate the case of the disappearance of the corpses of young girls from morgues.