Finally, Season 2 of Dark dropped arrived on Netflix! Typically, Netflix gives screeners for an entire season to reviewers but, with Dark, they decided to only dish out four episodes — half of the season — and I was scared.
After all, it either means two things: some whacked up sh*t happens that they want to surprise people with, or, the second half is not that great, and Netflix is trying for good early reviews.
Luckily, Season 2 of Dark falls into the “whacked up sh*t” category, and everyone can sit down now and binge away happily.
SPOILER ALERT: As to be expected in a recap for Season 2 of Netflix’s Dark, I will be discussing what happens in great detail. So, if you don’t like spoilers, now is the time to turn away and watch the series instead of reading about it.
Season 1 of Dark saw the disappearance of Mikkel (Daan Lennard Liebrenz) as the catalyst for all the timey-wimey stuff that goes on.
Jonas (Louis Hofmann), at this point in the game, is naive and has no idea what is going on and mostly stands around staring at stuff. By the end of Season 1, though, you realize just how much of a key player this character is as he struggles to bring Mikkel back to the real-time.
This is even though Mikkel grows up to be Jonas’ dad, and that will mean Jonas never exists.
And, yes, that also means his mom was f*cking both Ulrich (Oliver Masucci) and his son — something Ulrich’s wife is happy to point out in Season 2 of Dark.
Jonas struggles throughout Season 1 of Dark to comprehend, well, everything. However, by the end, he starts to figure sh*t out thanks to his older self who is trying to fix the big old mess.
However, by the end of Season 1, viewers discover that maybe the on-going theme of fate as a permanent fixture versus free choice means that Jonas is running around stressing out about everything for no good reason and perhaps he should sit back and enjoy the ride.
But, then he ends up in the future after an apocalyptic event, and now we move forward into Season 2 of Dark.
As I’ve said previously, Season 2 is. Just. Messier.
But that is totally in a good way. Not only are we dealing with 1953, 1986, and 2019, we now have some extra timeframes to deal with, and that leads to viewers having to put their memory caps on regarding all the versions of the characters to remember who is who.
Luckily, I came across this chart on Reddit that will help as you settle into Season 2.
Although, if you want a more comprehensive guide, Netflix has released an online interactive version of the above.
Season 2 of Dark opens with six people now missing in the summer of 2020 and a task force forms. This task force is headed by a man with a hidden motive.
Remember how Regina (Lydia Makrides) met that injured guy in the woods and ended up marrying him? Well, viewers will get to find out more about his backstory as the task force tries to sort out the whole mess without using the words “time” and “travel.”
The task force is also the very reason the apocalypse happens.
Meanwhile, Jonas is stuck in 2052 and trying to get home. During this time, viewers discover that the leader of this group is actually Elizabeth Doppler.
Jonas has to battle against Elizabeth as he tries to get inside the nuclear power plant. Of course, he manages to do this and discovers a hot mess of time that needs stabilizing to send him back to his real time.
This happens, but because there is no way to program destinations and dates like in the Delorean, Jonas ends up back at the start.
Like the very start.
This is back before the passage has even been dug out in the caves and now Jonas has to wait until someone turns up with a time machine. Or, literally, wait until the passage has been dug.
It needs to be noted here that everyone seems horrible in this timeframe and, if I were Jonas, I wouldn’t be waiting to get old in that place either.
Noah’s (Mark Waschke) storyline is explored further in Season 2 of Dark, and the series manages to continue to make me hate characters I thought I would always love and love characters I previously hated.
Noah falls somewhere in the middle by the end of Season 2.
Also, the character of Adam is introduced as the new bad guy to replace Noah. He is even worse than Noah and Jonas discovers just how bad when it reveals Jonas is a younger version of Adam.
Man, it sucks to be you, Jonas.
Throughout Season 2 of Dark, the apocalypse is looming overhead. Some of the characters know about it; others don’t.
As a result of this cataclysmic event, Jonas continues to try and mess up the timeline to fix everything. This leads to him discovering that he is Adam and is sent back to just before the suicide of his father, Michael (Sebastian Rudolph), to try and “fix” things.
Except that Adam is totally lying to himself and what he is really doing is giving Michael the information required to kill himself. Which he does and Jonas is sad about that and, thus, determined to not end up as Adam.
Which, considering the theme in Dark is that you can’t change what will happen, means that Jonas is screwed before he even starts.
As Season 2 of Dark progresses, it becomes apparent that Jonas and Martha are the important players in this game. However, there are some surprises to be had, also. Viewers discover that Hannah (Shani Atias) will do anything — including time travel — to be with Ulrich.
However, once she arrived in 1953, she quickly ditches Ulrich because being a b*tch is her other character trait.
Claudia (Lisa Kreuzer) continues on her 1986 journey and still doesn’t get from that version of herself and up to the kicka*s 2019 version.
Helge (Tom Philipp) returns and his mother, while initially thankful, returns to being horrible pretty quickly. And, if you are wondering who Helge sleeps with to produce Peter (Stephan Kampwirth), you will have to hang on until Season 3 of Dark for that information.
However, we discover Peter’s wife, Charlotte (Karoline Eichhorn), is much more messed up timewise than first thought. By the end of this season of Dark, viewers discover that Noah is her father and her mother is … actually her daughter, Elizabeth!
So, if Jonas thinks he has the corner on messed up family trees, perhaps Charlotte can now sit him down and have a little chat.
Magnus (Moritz Jahn) and what I am currently assuming is Franziska (Gina Stiebitz) end up in Adam’s timezone and working on his side. How this happens will likely be explored further in Season 3 of Dark but, for now, fans will have to speculate on the how or why regarding this.
Katharina (Jördis Triebel) continues to be a hot mess in Season 2 of Dark as she tries to work out where her son, Mikkel, is. Her children call her out on this repeatedly, but Mikkel appears to be the favorite child, and her other children run amok as they try to work out what the hell is going on with Jonas.
Can we just take a moment to appreciate how well Jonas summed up Season 8 of Game of Thrones? #Dark2 #Dark #GoT pic.twitter.com/Vt6NfaDMZq
— Rachel Tsoumbakos (@mrszoomby) June 21, 2019
As Refinery 29 points out, Season 2 of Dark draws the viewer into the awkward relationship that Jonas has with his aunt, Martha (Lisa Vicari). It becomes apparent that given enough alone time together, this couple would totally shag like there is no tomorrow — which, with the looming apocalypse, is likely the case.
However, by the end of this season of Dark, it becomes apparent saving Martha and not having her die in the apocalypse is somewhat of a big deal, and not only to Jonas. Season 2 closes in much the same way it did in Season 1 — with more questions than answers.
And, by that, I mean that a different Martha has introduced a new time machine mechanism. And, not just an older or younger Martha, a Martha who comes from an entirely different world!
Which sets up the premise for Season 3 of Dark just nicely, thank you very much.
Oh, and if you think that you will find out what happened to Woller (Leopold Hornung) regarding his eye, you can guess again. Either his eye patch is nothing more than a character device, or it will mean everything in Season 3 of Dark.
Season 2 of Dark is currently streaming globally on Netflix.