A Dark Season 2 Guide to Germany

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On recommendation of my illustrious co-host, I watched the second season of Dark, and as with the first one, I'll provide you with a guide of miscellany about Germany as we go along. Given the time-sensitiveness of new shows on Netflix, I'll publish this one right now, so the next BLAP will be out at the beginning of August.

Episode 1

- Bycicles and cars. The teenagers are making heavy use of bycicles to get around, or walk. At the same time, the police officer having no driver's licence is highly unusual. There are two reasons for this. One, driver's licenses are obtained at age 18, usually. You can obtain one at 17 nowadays but only drive with an adult until 18. Distances in Germany are much smaller than in the US, though (the country is smaller than Texas!), so the bycicle is perfectly fine to get to most places in half an hour or so. Two, cars are expensive. Germany isn't exactly famous for producing budget cars, and you need expensive tax payments (ranging 100-1000 Euros per year depending on the type) and insurance (ranging from around 70 to 500 Euro monthly depending on the type), so two cars in a family are much rarer than in the US, which restricts adolescents to borrowing their parents' car, who usually use it themselves or "let the kids drive" when the family gets somewhere or groceries need to be done. In general, adolescents have way less access to cars than US teenagers, and German teenagers almost have none.
- Warning sign. There's a sign warning of radiation and not to past the point at the nuclear power plant in the future, written in German, English, French, Russian and Chinese. I think it's a callback to the signs that were put up at border checkpoints at the inner-German border and by the occupation forces in general. At least it's using the iconography, heavily implying occupation in the wake of whatever the events were. The fact that they added Chinese to the list makes little sense from the ethnic makeup of Germany, and the Russian and French is also not due to the number of native speakers but a remnant of the occupation after WWII. Fun fact: most signs today still show English and French translations, despite French being a non-entity, especially compared to Turkish or Arabic. Russian fell out of fashion, for obvious reasons.
- Adam's wounds. The facial wounds and respirator Adam look like WWI inflicted. As in Europe generally, disfigured veterans were a daily feature of society in the early 20s. Therefore, while they make him stand out for sure, this is a time where people could get away with it and blend in.
- "Ciao" as goodbye. Characters are often using the Italian "ciao" as "bye", as which it's also translated in the subtitles. This - in many variants, such as "ciao ciao" or "ciaoi" - is widely used, and not a particular quirk of modern days. My guess is that it is a product of the Italian work migrants from the 50s and 60s that has found its way in modern parlance, but given how ubiqitous French idioms like "Bonsoir" and "Bonjour" and "Au revoir" were before World War I, and how the German "Auf Wiedersehen" was seen as an alien invention, it's little wonder that it started to slowly fade out of use after World War II in favor of shorter phrases.
- The nuclear waste conspiracy. In the wake of "Chernobyl", this became a bit more topic, but to use this as a criminal conspiracy is not out of left field. Germany has a long history of anti-atom protests and distrust about everything connected with it. So that it's used here as the plot by the evil entrepeneur is fitting, since it speaks to a lot of fears, predjudices and bad experiences.
- Doors. Jonas from the future is, upon entering "his" house, immediately asked by his mum how he got the keys. In Germany, front doors are ALWAYS locked. They do not have a handle outside, and they can only be opened without a key from the inside. Just in case you're wondering why everyone always rings the bell or knocks.
- Disability. The attempts to include the deaf daughter into society are a reflection of a larger debate going on currently about "inclusion" (Inklusion). This term is derived from a recent UN resolution that mandates all states to do fully integrate physically and mentally disabled persons into regular life. In Germany, these persons have since been moved from special needs schools and facilities, while there has been a marked uptick in social workers to help them in daily life. Disabilities have become much more visible since then, so the parents and everyone around her adopting sign language is a sign of the times.

Episode 2

- Last names. The police officer aks his partner whether she doesn't "find it unusual" that Aleksander Tiedemann took on the name of his wife when he married in the mid-80s. Until the progressive reforms of the early 1970s, wives were legally compelled to take the name of their husbands. The law was then changed to they could either keep their own name, for the husband to take his wife's or for the wife to take a double name (like Tiedemann-Müller). The latter option was the much preferred one for women intent on keeping some indepence in those decades, and the double names fell out of fashion dramatically in the 1990s, so today, you can almost bet money that if you hear a double-name it's a woman in her 50s or 60s. Husbands taking on the names of their women have been highly suspicious and marginal, and the practice is still relatively rare and noteworthy, however, it lost its social stigma since then.
- Weapons and equipment. Assault weapons and military grade gear are illegal in Germany and can't be purchased by individuals, so the armed bands in 2056 have to have plundered Bundeswehr stocks. The show is quite optimistic about the state of readiness of all that gear, given the current state of the German army.
- Forests. Unlike in the US, there's practically no wild forest in Germany. While some 30% of its land mass is (again, after decades-long afforestation) covered with forest, these forests are cultivated and controlled. Just in case you wondered about the lack of brush and underwood and the relative ease with which characters travel through the forest and regard it more as a resort than a wild and dangerous area next to their city.
- "Duzen". In German, when you adress someone, you need to decide between the formal "Sie" and the informal "Du". Adult strangers and persons of authority always merit "Sie", but even co-workers often stay on this formal level. To "offer the Du" ("Du anbieten") is a major step in any adult relationship, unless it's commonplace at the workplace (where it's oftentime used on the same level, but not always, and never between stations). So when Ulrich constantly and aggressively says "Du" to policeman Egon Tiedemann, it's a form of micro-agression, an insult. You don't say "Du" to a police officer, unless you're out for some major fight. Which Ulrich clearly is when it comes to Tiedemann.
- Toast Hawaii. I remember this from my own childhood; taking a slice of toast, putting a slice of ham a slice of pineapple and a slice of cheese on top and then bake it in the oven was a popular junk food that had been around for quite some time and was also often served when you hosted a party. Think Maccaroni and Cheese. Easily made, easily consumed, with a whiff of exotic place (in this case the US). It has dramatically fallen out of fashion since around 2000 or so.

Episode 3

- Homosexuality in the 50s. Of course, homosexuality wasn't legal anywhere in the 1950s, but in Germany, the whole legal side of it has an extra edge because the anti-gay-legislation stems from the Third Reich, and the prosecution of gays under Hitler's regime was legally upheld by the Federal Republic. There is a host of stories about gays facing the same judge for the same "crime" in the FRG as in the Third Reich. It was only in the 1980s that homosexuality got decriminalized, and until 2001 for the first major public figure, Berlin mayor Wowereit, to come out as gay.
- The Tiedemann haircuts. The Tiedemanns in the 1950s do not exactly prove a sense of fashion, even in an era as unenviable in that regard as 1950s Germany. Egon's uppercut was typical Nazi hairdress; Heinrich Himmler sported one just like it, for example. His daughter's round braids are also reminiscent of the Nazi's Girl Youth Organization (Bund Deutscher Mädel, BDM), marking the Tiedemanns as rather old-fashioned and conservative.
- Just for the files. When the old Egon Tidemann coerces Mikkel's new "mum" to give out the photo by telling her it's "just for the files", with both of them gravely repeating the phrase like a spell, it speaks to something very German. We love our files, and everyone instantly recognizes the need to have them in order. This isn't as bad it was, but still, you go a long way quoting procedure and files.

Episode 4

- Soldiers returning. Unlike WWII, WWI ended in an armistice, so most German soldiers were demobilized upon returning to Germany and not interned, so most of them didn't return home over many years (unlike WWII, where the last soldiers returned as late as 1955). However, those who were POWs before the armistice might have been interred longer, although it was unusual. Jonas tells the lie that he was stationed "in the East", and that carries its own implications. The farmers, telling him "they're animals, not humans" obviously refers to the Bolsheviks, who at this point were still engaged in a nasty civil war. German voluntaries, the Freikorps, had fought them after the war officially ended, so my guess is they put him in that camp, which makes him a rather extreme right-winger to these people. Let's hope Jonas had a good history teacher and paid attention in class. You never know when your time-travelling makes this come in handy.
- Municipal libraries. Libraries are one of the tasks that municipal governments need to do, so their state is heavily dependent on the economic fortunes of the city in question. Winden's very well equipped library fits the general theme of a middle-class city with good jobs provided by the local business, in this case the power plant. I remember that the library of my own hometown was always pioneering the newest digitalization techniques, with their catalogue becoming digital in the mid-90s, a development that other institutions like schools etc. were lagging much further behind, as evidenced by the archive in the school that Katharina is accessing and that's still catalogued paper. In general, public libraries are still very well-run pillars of each community and firmly in the hand of the municipality.
- Licence plates. The licence plates all show WIN, which is short for Winden. In Germany, licence plates always start with the county capital (mine own is WN for Waiblingen), followed by random letters and numbers. This implies Winden is the capital of its county, which is possible.
- Crossing the road. Claudia Tiedemann can't claim unfamiliarity with German streets when she's nearly run over crossing it, because cars in Germany go fast, and speeding is very common. Roads outside cities like the one through the forest are usually capped at 100km/h, but most people speed, so it's likely for a car to go 120km/h or more on such streets, making crossing them outside the designated crossing spaces really dangerous, especially since drivers tend to expect pedestrians to adapt to traffic rather than the other way around.

Episode 5

- The BKA. German police is usually organized on state level, but there is also a federal police. Criminal cases (unlike border police, for example) that involve several states or require certain skills are handled by the Bundeskriminalamt (BKA). Clause belongs to that, so his presence communicates the importance of the case, whereas Doppler is a regular police officer in employ of the state rather than the fed.
- Campaign 1987. When the kids come to the bus station in 1986 for the first time, they see a poster of Helmut Kohl from the Bundestag campaign 1987. Those elections were a solid success for the conservative chancellor, cementing his grip on power against Johannes Rau (Social Democrats), who challenged him. The poster says "Save the Creation", which is a conservative take on environmental politics. The Green Party had entered the Bundestag for the first time in 1983, and environmentalism was huge in the 1980s, forcing all parties to adopt some stance on how to protect it. The Conservatives folded it into their general id of conserving all of society for future generations.
- Modern Talking. Another poster at the bus station instantly signalling the age is the tour ad for Modern Talking, a German pop duo. The blond man to the right is Dieter Bohlen, who, after the duo broke up (it's music is nothing to write home about, frankly) made a career in the privatized TV market (another one of chancellor Kohl's decisions from 1987, breaking the ground for the wasteland that is modern German TV) as an entertainer, with his greatest time in the 2000s when he moderated the German version of "American Idol" (Deutschland sucht den Superstar). He still does, but the show has reached its popularity peak a long time ago.
- Green police cars. Due to a standardization across the EU, the German police adopted blue as its new color in the late 2000s. Before then, they had been green for decades, as evidenced in their cars in 1987.

Episode 6

- Klett Lektüreschlüssel. The yellow book Martha is reading at the lake looks like a Klett Lektüreschlüssel to me, but that may be projection. Klett is a publisher for school books and associated things, and their Lektüreschlüssel offer interpretations for novels, dramas and the like for school. Due to my profession (literature teacher), I use them quite often.
- House Parties. This is the first time I'm seeing a house party like this outside the context of an American movie. I don't know anyone who did it in Germany, but that may my social circle. The occasion for the party is weird as well, using their marriage anniversary. Never knew someone celebrating this other than with their partner, much less by inviting the whole town.
- Alcohol. Just a reminder, in Germany, the legal drinking age for light beverages like beer or prosecco is 16, so Bartosz drinking with his parents isn't noteworthy. Hard alcohol has a legal age limit of 18.
- Murder. There is no statute of limitations on murder, so the police searching for "Aleksander Tiedemann" after 33 years is legally sound, if slightly unreasonable a time-frame. Originally, the statute of limitations was 30 years, but in the early 1960s, with a lot of Nazis never put on trial and the public only slowly awakening to this dark stain of the not-too-distant past, the statute was lifted to allow Nazis to be put on trial in perpetuity, which is why today Germany still tried 90-year-olds for their crimes in the Holocaust.

Episode 7

- "European race". Claudia's dead boy is classified as of "European race" in 1954, which is of course a callback to Nazi terminology. Old habits die hard. Wonder if the police also used "semitic" or "slavic" in their description. "European" seems to be their new catch-all phrase in order to avoid using the old stuff, but of course, it's hardly better.
- Emergency call. In Germany, emergency call numbers - as the one Claudia dials when Egon falls - are 110 for police and 112 for the other emergencies. Unlike in the US, they always work.

Episode 8

- Reisepass. In Hanna's box, aside from the pistol, is a Reisepass, which is an id that, unlike the Personalausweis, not every German is required to have. So, in Germany, when you turn 16, you're requires to get a Personalausweis, which is an ID the size of a credit card. Contrary to popular believe, you do not need to carry it around at all times, but it's highly advisable. As long as you're travelling within the EU, this document is all you need, thanks to the Schengen agreement of 1995. If you wanted to travel before, or if you want to travel outside the EU, you still need a passport, which is the Reisepass. I personally don't own one, but it's not a huge deal to get.