[Ed. note: This post talks in detail about the end of season 4 of Babylon Berlin; es gibt spoiler! (“There are spoilers!”)]
In many ways, Babylon Berlin season 4 was the best season yet for Inspector Gereon Rath. Sure, he had to go deep undercover with the Nazi Party, resulting in him getting ostracized by both coworkers and his girlfriend, Charlotte. He tried to get all the criminal kingpins of Berlin together to declare peace, and ended up playing right into the hands of the guy who wanted to kill all of them. And yeah, as per usual, he weathered a fair amount of dangerous exploits, near-death encounters, beatings, and, of course, weird brainwashing sessions.
But in the end, he pulls through: He is happy and dancing with Charlotte, with the Nazi threat abated for now. It is, as Gereon actor Volker Bruch notes, a totally new place for Volker to be in.
It’s a fool’s folly to say that love conquers all in a story set in Weimar Republic Germany, but there’s no way Gereon could know that. For him, he’s just starting to feel like himself, strong enough to stand up even to his brother, who’s been experimenting on him for years. And with love coursing through his veins, he manages to find something better than fratricide. Gereon simply tells his brother he doesn’t need him anymore.
Image: MHz Choice
It might not seem like enough — this is the brother who’s been dosing him up to fight and even kill people. But as Bruch sees it, Gereon’s choice to forgive and move on is something that has built up through the whole season with Charlotte.
“I think this accepting love thing with Charlotte — the easiness of it is something that empowers him. Because he’s not afraid anymore,” Bruch tells Polygon. “This moment of realization of not being dependent on fear is very powerful.”
It might seem naive for Gereon (we’ll get to that in a minute), but for Bruch, it feels like honest-to-God growth in a side plot that’s brought a lot of pain to Gereon’s life.
“I know that there’s a lot of speculation about it — what is it? What does it mean? Is it real? It’s very real! And his brother… [Gereon] can’t really live without him. He’s a part of him,” Bruch says. “I think he realizes that by hating his brother he will not be able to let him go, because that still [binds] him to him.”
In Berlin in 1931, that’s about as much as one can hope for in terms of a positive emotional journey. Especially when it seems Gereon’s brother was one step ahead of him the whole time, and now has what appears to be a massive army at his disposal. One can only imagine what the deal with these troops will be in season 5 — Bruch bucked any questions, saying with a laugh: “Yeah, it’s something we need to figure out.” But as Babylon Berlin heads into its final season, Bruch wants nothing but the best for Gereon, who right now he sees as very trapped between the light that Charlotte brings to his life and the darkness of his brother’s forces (not to mention the rising Nazi regime).
“It’s rare that you see him loving something, and something being easy,” Bruch laughs again. “If you play a character for so long you wish him luck, and you want him to be happy. But you know he will go through hell.”