If You Love Something Let It Go
S4E7 If You Love Something Let It Go
A silhouette enters a dark hallway at night. He flicks the light switch and two guys with tommy-guns riddle him with bullets. A newspaper spins it’s headline “Gang War Breaks Out In Berlin” while bullet holes pierce a car windshield. The Jan 14th editions are flying off news stands as even in 1931 Germany “if it bleeds it leads.” More tommy-gun murder, this time in a cat-house. Newspaper reporters yammer for a quote from Buddha with Jacob hanging close. “Four bloody murders in one night!” “No comment” says Buddha. Eventually Buddha has had enough reporter yammer and in no uncertain terms explains he can’t speculate on anything except that “the Berlin police will establish order in the city.” So have a nice day.
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Iris opens on one of Dr Anno’s experimental substances filling me with dread and I have to confess I’m still having weasel nightmares. He loads a syringe with Pervitin and it’s Gereon getting stabbed in the neck now. Back to a clean glass booth, instead of a large wolf we see a large hulk of a man with considerable size and weight over puny Gereon. Frankly I don’t like Gereon’s odds, but then that same weasel hate-look washes over Gereon’s face as the invisible checkered flag is dropped. After spasming a bit, Gereon leaps savagely and gets a bloody mouth in return. Undaunted, he persists, climbs up on the dude and starts eating his face. The sound effects are making me queasy. Dr Anno passively checks all this out, not even taking notes. Gereon prevails with a headlock that knocks the guy out cold. Which makes no difference because Gereon’s not done pummeling the guy yet and now he screams out a banshee yell which wakes him up from his nightmare. Whew! While I really love these creative nightmare sequences this is not quite the post-coital glow I would have predicted after Gereon’s first sleepover with Lotte. I’m thinking he’d be way more relaxed than this.
Wendt pulls on a medium grey turtleneck sweater that suits him well. He walks out of the bedroom and the camera pans back to MaLu still sleeping. Or pretending to be. The housekeeper brings him tea while Wendt phones the Reich’s defense ministry to check if maybe they’re missing any negatives I guess. MaLu evesdrops and I covet her spectacular art nouveau pillowcase. Wendt reports about the found negatives. MaLu tiptoes in while Wendt blabs on about the prints of the negatives he made showing “detailed data on unofficial troop strength and armament plans from the Reichswehr’s staff of command". Wendt concludes, "I’m happy to help you find the leak, General” During this, MaLu casually scans his desk and cooly palms one of the negatives while Wendt promises the phone he'll destroy all the negatives immediately. True to his word we see 3 negatives burst into flames over his marble ashtray, but not 4. . .
Gereon is making coffee in his kitchen and I’ve been tipped off by Reddit’s /Babylon Berlin that he’s a bit of a coffee nut so let’s zoom in. There are an impressive number of chrome canisters, coffee packets and a coffee grinder plus 2 white porcelain pour-over funnels similar to the Melitta one I use. (1) Cool that they have #4 paper coffee filters in 1930’s Berlin. Gereon is totally out of anything useful as breakfast and they share a laugh at that. Lotte’s face is literally glowing, so she probably had happier dreams than Gereon did. Gereon wants to know if Lotte will stay in all day pining for his manly return featuring athletic encores, but ever the modern woman she has stuff to do but might possibly return, if he really wants her to. Oh, the games lovers play. They kiss and exit in light rain to Gereon’s car.
Tina’s ride is not as happy as her sister’s. She’d been loaded into a van with the rest of the family urchins. Renate is very unhappy also and gazes at the guy handcuffed on the bench across. They’ve been driven to “Youth House Sonnenborn” where I expect they’ll see Willie. A female warden greets Toni and Renate and her brief welcome promises “healing your body as well as your mind” which I find unsettling from the stern look on her face. Dr Anno’s glass booth looks more welcoming.
It’s Jacky’s sleep shift back at their shared flat. He wakens seeing Lotte changing clothes. She treats Jacky to a glimpse of her bra which he’ll memorize for later. But reality spoils everything when it comes to paying rent which Jacky nags about. She looks thru some clothes pretending she’ll find some cash in pockets, but Jacky doesn’t have the heart to press so she’s good for the rest of January. Lotte was just about to use her feminine wiles on him but he knows that game and would rather not have his heart strings tugged on just then. It’s complicated for both of them and they know it.
Gereon and Czerwinski climb stairs speaking of something that was just “sitting there” and they come to a floor where there is a 3.5 foot square wooden box guarded by cops and someone is crouching to take a good listen. The OSHA mandated safety-orange and white sawhorses are an hilarious touch. It’s not ticking, evidently, but Henning offers that it’s definitely “cheeping.” The mystery mounts. The wooden box is addressed to Gereon personally which is why they haven’t opened it which I find enormously considerate. Henning again gives his imitation of the “cheeping” noise which makes me laugh. Dramatic music mounts tension. Gereon hears the “cheeping” also while Czerwinski alarms “there’s a living thing in there!” and I’m not sure how seriously to take all this. Neither does Gereon as he asks the cops to pry it open. Henning and Czerwinski pull out their guns preemptively and I’m about to die laughing now. Which I stop as soon as we see bloody dead Red Hugo once again, folded inside the box, rats cheeping happily gnawing on him. Walter’s guys at least pried out all the nailed betting slips but I’m frankly appalled at how Walter handled this so I suspect Fuch at work here. Everyone else is appalled also and Henning & Czerwinski aren’t the least bit embarrassed still pointing their guns at a dead man and a couple of disgusting rats. "It’s Rat-Robert giving us his regards" someone speculates. The scene thankfully closes with a close shot of the rat in Red Hugo’s mouth. Tough day on set for that actor. Yuck.
At Chez Walter, Esther hasn’t wasted any time since almost being blown up and has commenced packing up the household. <sigh> More boring marital squabbles I can live without. To Walter “We’re leaving.” They argue. Walter promises to take care of everything. Esther retorts “With Edgar, I always felt safe.” Walter points out she hated Edgar. “I wanted both of you.” Esther’s woman logic is in full force here, “or neither of you,” which makes my brain hurt. Finally at – “you’re the man who was left over.” she gets such a slap, I leap from the couch applauding. Thankfully, all this functions to lead us to flashback scenes so Walter can explain to all of us what he meant when he told Esther “He wanted to get rid of his best friend because he was incapable of sharing with anyone.”
Edgar and Walter drive to a building at night. Edgar exits the car to walk into an empty warehouse. We’re alternating shots with Esther & Walter as Walter explains “He wanted to have me shot dead.” Inside, Edgar looks thru the window at the parking area where Walter waits and sees his three tommy-gun toting henchmen walk menacingly towards Walter’s car. Walter appears very calm because a second wave of henchman arrives behind the first three and shoots them all dead. Walter apparently planned for all this but with his fears confirmed he regrets to follow through. We watch Edgar react to a noise behind him and see someone scurrying away from a bright sparkling fuse. A wave of red washes off Walter’s anguished face when the warehouse explodes in flames. Walter thinks, see what you made me do Esther? RIP Edgar. Again.
The kids leave the house to the packed car followed by Esther. Uncle Walter gets a hug before they leave in return for some folded cash. They return to the car which drives off.
It’s day time. A car pulls up to Jacob Grun’s jewelry store. It’s Alfred. Jacob greets Alfred in his car and apologizes that his store is being renovated which saves the producers and set designers some time and money on a jewelry store set they’ll use for only 2 minutes. They speak in the car instead and Alfred says “Call your jews in Amsterdam and tell them we need a diamond.” Oi vey that's rude. “One that looks like the Blue Rothschild.” It’s a desperate gambit but it’s Alfred's only shot. Jacob is sympathetic but no forgery would come close so he declines. Alfred is bereft and smashes his head on the car window, breaking it.
Abe enters his hotel room and answers the phone. It’s Jacob wanting to speak urgently so they arrange to meet at the hotel instead of continuing their conversation on the phone for some reason. Nah, Jacob prefers a cafe he read about on Yelp and tells Abe to write down it’s address.
Next is an interesting investigation montage with a suitable musical score. Lotte knocks on the door of a hovel and Mrs. Ahlrichs answers. She opens another door, “Are your parents in?” We’re crisscrossing scenes here - “I’m here about your daughter Albertine” “He met the wrong people. Didn’t come home for days.” A third mother shares “Of course, he ran away immediately.” Voss’s name gets dropped as well as Sonneborn. What Lotte learns is the dead urchins had a lot in common all pointing to Station 14. The montage closes with mom asking Lotte if she’ll follow up on all this and Lotte pauses a sec & perkily nods, “Yes!” Paging Chief Detective Buddha!
Gereon’s at his desk scanning mugshots again. Red Hugo, Iron-Else, Knife-Ede, Rat-Robert. Now he exits his car and walks thru another empty warehouse filled with rat cages. Further in there’s a man hanging from a girder and I’m guessing Rat-Robert for now. Gereon confirms that as the camera pans down to a passage underground where a silhouetted figure turns to walk away. The figure reveals himself and says “Detective, I’m glad you accepted my invitation.” (2) I can’t recall any invitation and I don’t recognize the guy from earlier seasons but Gereon acts like he knows him. Mystery-guy is asking for help in stopping the mobster murders and so suggests that Gereon mediate a meeting amongst the Ringverein heads. If Gereon guarantees safety all the heads would participate and work things out. Gereon ponders a bit, walks up to him and punches his face for even suggesting Gereon help out criminals and murderers. Gereon is about to arrest him on general principles but mystery-guy counters with a deal. “I will deliver you from your pain, from the source of your fear. I will free you of your anguish” in return for brokering a Ringverein meeting. “I will kill Dr Schmidt.’ And now my eyebrows go up as far as they can go. Mystery-guy continues his pitch saying that there are others who are also “submissive slaves of his stewardship” and want him gone. Gereon definitely wants in on this and insists that he’ll be there when it happens.
And now the mystery of the weighted chess piece thing Judge Voss took from his desk during Lotte’s visit is revealed as some variant of a shuffleboard puck. We see Voss fling his piece down the court for applause. Grun now walks up to a waiter and asks for the table he reserved. As it’s apparent Grun is jewish, the waiter’s memory has clouded somewhat. There’s some nasty antisemitic jawboning in the air that I’d rather not chronicle, but long and short, Grun got a bad tip from Yelp on his choice of coffee shops. Abe Gold arrives just after a youth assaults Grun and kicks away Grun's cane. I’m about to fast forward this ugliness, but Abe confronts the youth and boy does Abe have some ninja skills I didn’t see coming. In two seconds the young man is on the ground with a bloody jaw followed shortly by a second lad so that when Abe pulls out his pistol, it’s clear to everyone he’s made his point. “Anyone else wants to get beat up by a jew?” Heh. Once more at the kid’s groin and Abe returns the cane to Grun.
The two are walking the flea market now which happens to be where Grun lives. His neighborhood went downhill apparently. Grun is now lecturing the evils of kidnapping and the shame it brings on the community. Abe resists but Grun makes one last appeal to let the women go. “Nothing good will come out of bad.”
We finally check in on Alfred's gals biding their time in the barge. Helga is throwing rocks at the roof hoping to make noise that someone might hear. And on cue AnnMarie complains that it’s getting on her nerves. They bicker, which bores me, but I am so impressed with how mean-mom can get under everyone's skin so effortlessly.
Ceiling POV down to prone Alfred in that deliriously lush sitting room of his. I covet every single item inside it. Dr Anno is apparently doing a house-call and they chat about Alfred feeling helpless. Maybe having mom and wife killed off wouldn’t be so bad as you’ve always yearned for independence, suggests Anno. Huh? “You feel pretty powerless” which is an obvious understatement and Alfred agrees. “But you can do something. Let go and fear will lose its terror, its power” which all sounds like new age junk to me, but Alfred buys it. “Embrace that terror which you can’t change and it will disappear. In the notes of the Bodhidharma it says let go and if it is significant it will come back to you.” OMG now Ano is channeling the hippy 1960’s. But Alfred buys it showing us an enlightened look on his face warping to a madman’s ecstasy.
Gereon’s driving somewhere in the rain. Voices blend to a scene where he’s sitting with the Police President as well as Buddha discussing the Ringverein meeting. Buddha is eating again, which I find amusing, but more relevant is he’s arguing against the idea. Gereon counters that any action would be an improvement on the current war. But Buddha counters for tried and true police procedure. The Police President patiently sums up the debate and due to politics approves Gereon’s plan.
At the Sonnenborn Home for Wayward Street Urchins, Toni and Renate are washing dishes. Toni sees a grown-up inmate across the courtyard and has explained to her that they’re The White Hand’s prisoners. Lotte is shown pretending to be from Berlin Youth Court speaking to the Sonnenborn receptionist. She asks for the person in charge and now Helene Voss is speaking. The name freaks Lotte out and she hangs up. The Judges wife? Yikes. Another piece of the puzzle snaps into place.
Ms Benhke is gluing pieces of crockery together that deceased scumbag Peter left broken. A section of the newspapers she covered the table with to protect from glue catches her eye. “Major General von Seegers with von Schleicher and Dr Gregorius” means nothing to me, but with “Anselm from Breslau” Elizabeth rushes to the phone anyway to tell MaLu. She answers in Littens’ office and Benhke requests a meeting later with MaLu and I continue to wonder why people can’t simply speak on the phone instead of in person.
It’s dark now and Lotte has returned to Gereon’s place for their daily debrief. Ms Benhke has called for Gereon and she needs help from both of them. Gereon drives up as Lotte is dancing to the “A Day Like Gold” record she bought seemingly ages ago. He enters to the welcome sight of her perky dancing derriere. Lotte shrieks in surprise. Caught! “You still owe me that dance” after being stood up New Years Eve. “It’s statute-barred” whatever that means, but Lotte takes that as no and drops an item of underwear on the floor then exits to the bedroom where Gereon cautiously enters and embraces Lotte. They get naked and adult stuff happens.
Lotte asks who runs the Sonnenborn reformatory and answers her own question confirming that Judge Voss’s wife does. She then connects the dots for Gereon of the urchin murders from Sonnenborn to Station 14. Its not enough, insists Gereon, there’s no evidence. Lotte ponders that nakedly and we cut to . .
Alfred makes a easy corner billiard shot as I wonder why he always wears a coat and tie in his own home with no one else around. Well except for Wegener who knocks and enters with no new developments on either mom or spouse. Alfred could not care less about that, then makes an even harder corner shot. Wegener is confused so Alfred summarizes what he learned from Anno earlier and neither of us are buying it. “Letting go is the order of the day” and then sinks another one.
Wegener exits fuming in quiet seething rage, he’s in his bedroomette and while washing up mutters “We’ll see about that.” Wegener continues with a bizarre monologue which feels like he's quoting some play or book (3). Gollem-like, he pulls out a box from under the corner of his mattress showing us his precious. The Rothschild Diamond! There’s got to be some hallucinogens in the water at Chez Alfred. To punctuate this lunacy, Wegener declares bitterly “He can kiss my ass.” Credits.
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So, long ignored Wegener is a playa now! Didn’t see that coming because I was convinced mean-mom had stolen the gem and was simply being coy about it. This was an enjoyable episode as a lot happened and no one I liked got killed. (I can’t shed too many tears for Tom - Rat guy.) We’re finally delving more into where the White Hand tentacles are leading us. And at least for now Lotte has a backup place to crash should Jacky finally get the message (She’s using you, dude!) and toss all her stuff outside on the sidewalk. One significant scar-faced gangster made an interesting debut and started off what promises to be an entertaining Ringverein conference set piece. And I wasn’t kidding that so much has happened in the last two weeks that it feels like much longer. We finally learn how Edgar died and it puzzles me that European actors aren’t always contracted for the entire run of a series as Edgar apparently wasn’t. Violent death is often the writers’ payback for bailing early- just ask Matthew Crawley. I am past bored with Esther and Walter’s relationship issues but I hope “Cabaret of the Nameless” is still on as I’m due an uplifting dose of Moka Efti as long as I can catch a glimpse of Squid-girl. We’ve made slight progress on the Russian spy thread but are still clueless about the boxer, Rukeli Trollman that Lotte might be related to. As per usual, umpteen proofreads and revisions and I’ll have to pad the headshot page a bit as we’re rapidly running out of new characters. And if you’re still reading this far, thanks!
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Footnotes!
1) “ In the 1930s, Melitta introduced the cone-shaped filters that we are familiar today.”
https://perfectdailygrind.com/2019/01/melitta-chemex-more-a-history-of-pour-over-coffee/
https://shop.melitta.ca/collections/pour-over/products/1-cup-porcelain-pour-over%E2%84%A2-coffeemaker?variant=31410321555508
2) [SPOILER!] Last minute save by the folks at /Babylon Berlin. Their sharp eyes figured out that Mystery-mob guy is --------------last chance!---------------------------not-dead-anymore Edgar. (<–– name) Only now he's beardless. To salvage some shred of self respect, I did notice the scar on his face, but I'm leaving all of his recap un-corrected as penance plus a hunch the writers wanna keep this a mystery for a while. Apologies.
3) Thanks to "Kya_Bamba" at /BabylonBerlin who knew what Wegener was quoting!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6tz_von_Berlichingen_(Goethe)
"It can be translated as:
