Netflix’s Dark: Everything you need to know before season 2

Check out our refresher before binging Dark season 2 this month!

The first season of Netflix’s Dark premiered in the streaming service back in December 2017, and it feels like an eternity since we last saw our favorite residents of Winden, Germany. With season 2 premiering this Friday, now is as good of a time as any to get a quick refresher on the first season. So don’t worry, here’s everything you need to know before Dark returns.

Families at front and center: Everything in Dark at all timelines at a basic level is revolving around 4 families. The Kahnwalds, which includes Jonas, Michael, Hannah, and Ines. The Nielsens, which includes Mikkel, Martha, Magnus, Ulrich, Katharina, Jana, Tronte, and Agnes. The Tiedemanns, which includes Bartosz, Regina, Aleksander, Claudia, and Egon. And The Dopplers, which includes Elisabeth, Franziska, Charlotte, Peter, and Helge.

Mikkel’s disappearance: All the events in Dark started to unfold when during the night of November 4, 2019, Mikkel went to the woods with his siblings Magnus and Martha and their friends Jonas, Franziska and Bartosz. Everyone got freaked out and left the place when they started hearing a strange sound. And it was at that time Mikkel disappeared. Later, we found out that he went 33 years into the past and was adopted by Ines Kahnwald and raised as Michael Kahnwald who is Jonas’s father.

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Mikkel was not the first one to disappear: A month before Mikkel disappeared, a boy named Erik also went missing and we later found out that Helge was doing experiments with him in the bunker in 1986, we also got to see his dead body alongside another boy Yasin’s body in 1953 at the soon to be nuclear plant premises. Before them, in 1986, Ulrich’s brother Mads also disappeared and his body was found in 2019, after the disappearance of Mikkael. He died because of the same experiment as Erik and his death was covered by Peter and his own father Tronte.

June 21: June 21, 2019, holds a great significance in the show as Michael (Mikkel) hanged himself at this date and left a suicide note for his mom with instructions to not open it till November 4 at 10:03 p.m., that is exactly when Mikkel disappeared.
Jonas eventually burned the letter after reading it.

The 33-year cycle: We also found out midway during the show that the universe returns to the exact same position every 33 years where everything is exactly the same as it was at one particular period of time in the cosmos. We have seen the show’s narrative taking place at four of those 33-year timelines by now, in 1953, 1986, 2019 and 2052 in the final moments of Season 1.

How the wormhole came to be: The wormhole which allows them to travel back and forth in time was created from an explosion in the nuclear plant back in 1986. The incident also created radioactive materials which were stored in the caves. Claudia shut the doors to the caves soon afterward as she took over the management. When Charlotte found the cave in 2019, the barrels were not there.

Noah: Noah is a pastor who we have seen in 3 of the time periods by now, he is always at the same age. We also saw him for the first time midway during the first season where he met Elisabeth, Franziska’s sister and shortly after that, Helge kidnapped her friend Yasin and took her to Noah. Noah’s vision seems to be controlling the events of the world by creating a time machine. When we saw him last, he recruited Bartosz by manipulating him.

Future Jonas: Throughout the show, we see a mysterious man traveling through time, which is revealed to be the future version of Jonas. He was the one who sent younger him, the letter Michael wrote alongside some useful items which present Jonas will use to explore and travel through the caves. When Jonas first saw Mikkel in 1986, he was so sure to bring him back to 2019 but it was future Jonas who persuaded him to let the events play out as it should and not erase himself from existence.

Ulrich tried to kill Helge: Ulrich in 2019 follows the elder Helge into the cave and travels to 1953. He soon realizes that Helge is involved in the disappearance of the young boys and tries to kill the 1953 version of him, in which he fails to succeed. He was then arrested in 1953 for the murder of the young boys and disappearance of young Helge. We also see his photo in a 1953 newspaper which was later found by Charlotte in 2019. Not just Ulrich though, even old Helge attempted to kill the 1986 version of him but failed and ended up dying himself.

Where the series left off: In the concluding moments of Season 1, Future Jonas has gotten his hands on the radioactive isotopes from the cave and he decided to use a device by clockmaker H.G. Tannhaus that future Claudia had asked him to make in 1953 to stop the wormhole by creating a black hole. Jonas succeeds in closing the tunnel but was not able to destroy it and it all went exactly as Noah had planned. The event also ends up sending present Jonas to 2042 in a post-apocalyptic future.

Are you also excited to see Netflix’s Dark returning on June 21? Season 1 is currently streaming on Netflix.