"Everything Is Now" is the ninth episode of Season 1 of Dark. It was written by Jantje Friese and Marc O. Seng, and directed by Baran bo Odar. It premiered on December 1, 2017 along with the rest of the season.
Synopsis
Ulrich runs afoul of the law, Helge tries to dodge Egon Tiedemann , Claudia harnesses the cave's powers, and Katharina lashes out at Hannah .
Plot
1953
Helge is missing. Is he another victim of the murderer who already killed two boys found at the construction site or did he run away? Greta Doppler wonders whether she scolded him too much about his dirty clothes. Bernd goes to inform the police. He tells Egon to do whatever it takes to find his son: Nothing is more important to him.
Claudia and Tronte walk through the forest, looking for Gretchen. Claudia compliments Tronte on his hair and says all the girls in Winden will be after him. She asks him if he has a girlfriend? He shakes his head. She then asks him why they moved? He says that his mother just wanted a change.
Doris asks Agnes about her husband, who she says was a pastor but not a good person and she sometimes thinks it is better that he is dead.
Greta Doppler confides to Father Noah that she never wanted her son Helge and prayed to God to rid her of him and after he was born, for something to happen to him, as he may not be Bernd's son.
Egon sees a blood-covered Ulrich walking. When Ulrich realizes he has been spotted, he runs through the forest toward the cave. Egon cuts him off just as he nears the cave and fires his gun in the air, telling Ulrich to put his hands up. He asks him what he did to Helge and the two boys found at the construction site. Ulrich is surprised about the two boys, believing that killing Helge would have changed that. Egon tells Ulrich he is a maniac. He places Ulrich in handcuffs.
In the bunker, a bloodied Helge suddenly wakes up.
1986
Hannah asks Katharina if Ulrich is still in jail. She asks if Teidemann said who turned him in. Katharina shakes her head but says if she finds out she will finish them. Hannah suggests it might have been Regina, Teidemann's granddaughter. Egon reluctantly releases young Ulrich to his mother, who slaps Egon and tells him to stay away from her family, she will have him taken off Mads' case. Ulrich grins at Egon as he is led away by his mother.
He reunites with Katharina. She asks him what Tiedemann has against him. "He thinks I'm the antichrist," he responds. She spots Regina. She shoves her and assures her they would never have left her in the forest all night. They didn't realize she was so fragile. She shows her the bruise on her face which her mother did because of what she told her grandfather. Regina denies she did that but Katharina knees her in the chest, even after Ulrich tries to pull her away. A young man passes by and tells her to leave her alone. Katharina tells him to piss off and keep out of it but the boy produces a gun and tells them if they hurt her again, he will hurt them. Katharina and Ulrich leave. The man tells Regina everything will be OK and touches her arm. She thanks him. He suddenly collapses, clutching his chest, which is bleeding. Earlier he is seen running through the forest, clutching his shoulder, head in a balaclava, bag in hand. She tells him he should see a doctor. He says it's not that bad. She offers to bandage him. She asks his name: "Aleksander."
Claudia climbs into the cave and sees many yellow barrels, which her Geiger counter detects are radioactive. She is startled to see a dog come running toward her, barking. She realizes it is Gretchen.
She goes to the Doppler mansion to meet Bernd. She asks him about the incident. He tries to avoid the subject but Claudia says that isn't good enough. He tells her a very small amount of radioactive material leaked. The floor was replaced and everything stored in a safe place. Only a few people know about it and won't talk as they were paid well. He tells her not to make a big deal of it. The story of what happened is now in her hands. She must decide what story to tell.
Helge emerges from the bunker with a belt, wearing gloves. His elderly 2019 self watches on. He has not kept his 10.30 appointment with Egon, who then decides to come to see him at the cabin. He knocks on the door. Helge hides. Egon eventually gives up, to Helge's relief.
He returns to the bunker, which has been decorated with bright blue wallpaper, a chair is in the centre of it. He asks Noah why it doesn't work. He tells him to be patient. They must not give up. Helge says he won't do this any more. "Why would God want to do this?" Noah tells him there is no God, there is no plan, nothing but chaos and pain. People are evil. The world is doomed to be destroyed. The chair is the Ark and he is Noah. We can decide the world's fate, removing all evil and pain by creating a time machine that reorders everything.
Aleksander later returns to the forest. He takes his gun and two passports out of his pocket. One passport has his picture and is in the name of Boris Niewald, 172 cm tall. The other has a different man's picture and the name Aleksander Kohler, born January 21, 1965, 175 cm tall, which he memorizes. He places them in a bag and buries it. Watching him do this is Hannah.
He goes to the power plant to see Claudia about a job, telling her he is a friend of Regina, who thought she might be able to help. He tells her he is a trained metal worker and can learn fast. She tells him they don't need anyone at the moment. Later she tells him she has work for him but he can't speak of it to anyone. He has to seal the doors linking the caves.
2019
Hannah takes out the bag with the gun and passport of Boris Niewald that she has stored in her house.
Charlotte listens to Ulrich's voicemail. telling her he believes Helge kidnapped the children in 1986. Katharina bursts in, demanding to know where Ulrich is. She tells him she thought it would be better if he was with her since being suspended. Katharina assumes he is with Hannah. She storms out, slamming the door hard. She goes to Hannah, banging hard on the door. "Where is he?" she demands. "Who?" "Ulrich, don't act stupid"."Why would he be here?" She shoves Hannah, calling her a liar. She demands to know how long their affair has been going on, where they had sex. She asks her whether she enjoys destroying other people's lives. Hannah tells her it's now over. She tells her she ended it, though he wanted it to continue and leave Katharina. He didn't love her any more but loved Hannah. Katharina starts sobbing.
Meanwhile, Magnus and Franszisca are together in bed. He gives her a necklace of hers he found. She tells him that even though they are having sex she is not telling him everything about her. Martha calls Jonas but he doesn't answer. He stares at the red string that was placed on his bike (which appears to remind him that Martha is his aunt). Franszisca leaves and greets Martha. Magnus follows her and sits with Martha, who asks him why they keep secrets from each other. "Some things are best kept private", he answers.
Bartosz sees a very old woman (seen in the bunker looking at all the photos in the preceding episode) walk through the back yard. She introduces herself as Claudia, his grandmother. This surprises Bartosz, who had been told she had died before he was born. She gives him a photo of her with Regina to give to his mother. She understands that Regina must think she was a bad mother. She says she made a lot of mistakes and would do things differently if she could turn back time.
Hannah is giving Aleksander a massage. She shows him the bag he buried. She tells him she expects him to destroy Ulrich in return for keeping the contents of the bag safe. She reminds him of his true identity: Boris Niewald.
Jonas arrives home and is dismayed to see Martha waiting for him. He tells her he has to go. She asks him why he hasn't responded to all the calls she made to him for several days. She asks him whether their kiss after the rehearsal (Truths) meant anything. He looks ahead, unable to speak. Finally, he tells her that was wrong, that they're just not a good match. Martha kisses him but he doesn't respond. He walks away, apologizing.
Aleksander calls police officer Torben Wöller, and asks him to dig up what he can on Ulrich, and in a few days, after everything clams down, to bring the truck back with the barrels.
Regina at the hotel is cleaning. She enters the Stranger's room and sees on the wall all the articles related to time travel he has put there, including the article "Where is Mikkel" changed to "when".
Bartosz again meets with Noah. He tells him everything he predicted has happened. He agrees to accept his offer.
1953
The young H.G. Tannhaus works on a battery to power Ulrich's smartphone. The elderly Claudia enters and shows him the blueprint for the machine she wants him to build for her that will alter the course of time.
Quotes
- Claudia: You almost look like James Dean with that haircut. The girls in Winden will be after you in droves, you'll see…. Do you have a girlfriend?
- Greta: I prayed to God to get rid of the child before it was ever born. And after I had him, I prayed every day that something would befall him. Because he may not be Bernd's child. Because maybe he wasn't a child created out of love, but… That's what's in my head. Every day. I can't escape it. It's my fault.
Noah: We are all full of sin. No pure human being exists. But no matter what we do, we never fall any lower than into God's hands.
Greta: And what if they aren't God's hands? What if they are the hands of the devil?
Noah: God sent me to you. Did he not? We don't meet the people we meet by accident. - Egon: I've been a police officer for over 40 years. Your face. Your stare. I know that stare. I know that you've got something to hide, that you've got something to do with all of this. I can feel it in my bones.
Ulrich: Maybe it's cancer. You might want to get that checked out. - Katharina: Why does Tiedemann have it in for you?
Ulrich: He thinks I'm the Antichrist. - Bernd: Do you believe that Hannibal marched over the Alps with elephants? There are no truths, just stories. And the story of this city is now in your hands.
Claudia: Is our power plant safe? Can something like Chernobyl happen in our plant?
Bernd: You decide what story you want to tell. - Helge: I don't want to do this anymore. Why would God want any of this?
Noah: Yes. Why would God want any of this? After looking into hell, as you have, it can never be forgotten. It becomes a part of you. And the idea of God, of Jesus the Savior, becomes a thread of hope you cling to. All of us who know the darkness long for the light—but there is no God! God didn't make this hole among us. God doesn't have a plan. There is no plan at all. There's nothing but chaos out there. Pain and chaos! People are bad, malicious, evil; life is nothing but a spiral of pain, and the world is doomed to be destroyed. But this here, this is our ark. And I'm Noah. If we can harness this energy, we can change everything. Then we decide the world's fate, far removed from all the evil and from all pain. We'll create a time machine that reorders everything, the beginning and the end. - Franziska: Just because we fuck doesn't mean you have to know everything about me.
- Bartosz: Why did Mom tell me you're dead?
Claudia: For your mom, I'm sure I am. I wasn't a particularly good mother, you know.… I made lots of mistakes back then. Believe me, if I could turn back time, I would do lots of things differently. - Hannah: Why do some people have everything and some nothing? Why do you and Regina have a beautiful home and I can't even pay my electrical bill? Why does fate predestine a good life for some and not for others?
Aleksander: Do you want money?
Hannah: I don't want any money, I want you to do me a favor. I want you to destroy Ulrich. I want him to lose everything. Everything. - Jonas: It was wrong.
Martha: What was wrong?
Jonas: The thing with us. It wasn't right.
Martha: Because of Bartosz?
Jonas: No, not because of Bartosz. Because of us. It… We're just not a good match, okay?
Martha: We're not a good match?
Jonas: Yeah, we're not a good match.
Analysis
- This episode moves through all 3 time periods. Everything is connected. Noah appears in all 3 (unchanged), as does Claudia.
- After Ulrich beats Helge, Gretta tells Noah she never wanted him, revealing a vulnerable person who he can manipulate into helping him. If Ulrich did not do this, Noah might never have known about Helge.
- Ulrich was certain that killing Helge would prevent the deaths of the boys but he did not succeed in killing him. He believed he could change the future but could not.
- We find out that Katharina was assaulted by her mother, perhaps after finding out she had sex with Ulrich
- What was Aleksander running from? Why did he change his identity?
- Egon tells Ulrich in 1986 that he knows his stare, that he is involved in this thing in some way, appearing to sense that he had been involved with him before
- How has Gretchen, lost in 1953, still in the cave unchanged 33 years later?
- Helge still has scars on his face and a deformed left ear from Ulrich's assault
- The bunker in 1986 is the torture room. Wallpaper remnants were found by Claudia in 2019 (episode 7). Erik (and probably Yasin) appears to have time travelled from 2019 to 1986 and then to 1953 where his body was left at the construction site. Mads appears to have been taken from 1986 to 2019.
- Aleksander begins work at the power plant in 1986, marries Regina and eventually takes over from Claudia
- Hannah lied about Ulrich in 1986 and lies about him again in 2019. She also blackmails Aleksander. She does seem to destroy other people's lives.
- Jonas, realizing Martha is his aunt, believes he has to end their relationship but cannot tell her the real reason
- Is the machine that Tannhaus takes out after the Stranger leaves in the preceding episode the one Claudia asked him to build in 1953?
Gallery
- → See 109 images from Everything Is Now at Images from Everything Is Now.
