Netflix's Dark Quietly Gave Away Its Greatest Twist In The Very First Episode

Warning: spoilers for Dark season 1

One of the best sci-fi thrillers on Netflix is Darkwhich had many twists, but its greatest one was hinted at in the very first episode. Netflix has brought a variety of movies and TV shows under its Netflix Originals banner. Shows like Stranger Things and Squid Game are some of the best Netflix Originals of all time, as is Dark.

Created by Baran bo Odar and Jantje Friese, Dark is Netflix’s first German-language original TV series and one of the platform’s biggest successes. Dark was released in 2017 and quickly made it to Netflix’s Top 10, and it stayed for a total of three seasons, ending in 2020. Dark takes the audience to the town of Winden, with season 1 set in 2019.

Collage of Magnus, Jonas, and Adam in Dark

30 Best Quotes From Netflix’s Dark

Dark, the first German series produced by Netflix, brought a lot of complex mysteries and the most profound quotes on time and fate.

When pre-teen Mikkel (Daan Lennard Liebrenz) mysteriously disappears, the search for him leads his father, Ulrich (Oliver Masucci), and others close to him to make a shocking discovery: a wormhole in a cave that allows them to travel in time. This brings some shocking twists, but the best one was subtly given away in Dark’s first episode.

Mikkel Gave Away Dark’s Time Twist In The Show’s Very First Episode

Mikkel Disappeared Due To Time Travel

Dark season 1 episode 1 Mikkel and Ulrich at the table

Dark begins with the suicide of Michael Kahnwald, Jonas’ (Louis Hofmann) father. Months later, Jonas returns to school after two months in a psychiatric facility, but he’s still struggling with his father’s death. Meanwhile, local drug dealer Erik disappears, and Ulrich is assigned to the case.

Jonas, his best friend Bartosz, his girlfriend Martha, her brothers Magnus and Mikkel, and Magnus’ girlfriend go to a cave to look for Erik’s secret stash. However, they are frightened by strange sounds and their flickering flashlights and flee the cave – however, Mikkel is no longer with them, and so the search for him begins.

Mikkel is revealed to have accidentally traveled back in time to 1986.

Ulrich begins to suspect that the disappearances of Erik, Mikkel, and his brother Mads back in 1986 are connected, while Mikkel is revealed to have accidentally traveled back in time to 1986. It’s later revealed, through Ulrich and Jonas’ separate investigations, that the cave is a wormhole, and, due to Mikkel’s travel in time, he’s actually Jonas’ father.

The twist in Mikkel’s story and identity is the one that unleashes everything in the rest of Darkand it’s a shocking one that immediately invites the audience to go back to see the clues they missed – and, as it turns out, Mikkel’s twist is subtly but cleverly hinted at in the first episode, in one of his first scenes.

Mikkel, known for his love for magic tricks and looking up to Harry Houdini, is having breakfast while rehearsing one of his tricks. Much to the annoyance of his mother, Mikkel shows a trick to Ulrich where he switches the location of a pin under a cup.

Ulrich is impressed and asks how he did it, with Mikkel simply saying that “the question isn’t how, the question is when.” This seemingly unimportant line takes on a completely different meaning when knowing that’s the key to learning what happened to Mikkel when he disappeared.

The Netflix Show’s Foreshadowing Is What Made Its Plot Twists So Great

Dark Perfectly Used Foreshadowing

Louis Hofmann looking off to the side in Dark

Mikkel’s line about the question being when, not how, when magically moving a pin from one cup to another is just an early example of many foreshadowing moments throughout Dark. During that same scene, Mikkel wears a skeleton outfit, which can be seen as a hint at his actual state, as by then, Michael Kanhwald had already killed himself.

Throughout the entire series, the infinity loop appears many timesand one of its first appearances is in Mads Nielsen’s grave, which, instead of having a date of death, has an infinity loop. Of course, this is a hint at the connection between all characters through time travel, as is the tree by the lake, which is linked to events in different timelines.

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There’s also a connection and subtle foreshadowing through Jonas’ signature yellow raincoatwhich is also used by Martha later on, and they are connected through Mikkel (meaning that Martha is actually Jonas’ aunt). These are just some examples of hints and pieces of foreshadowing throughout Darkwhich were key to the show’s success and popularity.

The writers of Dark were very careful and strategic with the visual and narrative clues and foreshadowing they added to the show, as they are subtle and invite the audience to revisit what they had already watched. Dark has been praised for its creativity, performances, themes, and complex storytellingalong with its clever use of time travel, all of which made its twists even greater.

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Even though time travel is impossible right now, the science of it is understood, and no other TV show or movie has done it as well as Netflix’s Dark.

Dark Is The Sort Of Sci-Fi Show You Need To Watch A Second Time To Appreciate

Dark Is A Clever & Rewatchable Show

Dark has many strengths that, combined, made one of the best TV shows of the decade and, arguably, one of the best of all time. Dark’s visuals, tone, dialogue, themes and more made the show one of the highest quality Netflix Originals to date, and it’s also one of the most rewatchable TV shows in recent years.

Dark is worth watching a second time (and more) not just because of how engaging it is, but also due to its many twists, shocking reveals, moments of foreshadowing, and its complex (and many times confusing) family trees. Viewers will surely find something new in every rewatch, further proving why Dark is one of the best sci-fi thrillers.