The newest Netflix limited series takes us back to World War Two as the Nazis roll their tanks across France all the way to the English Channel: All The Light We Cannot See is as much about hope as it is war though.
This new Netflix period drama follows French resistance radio operator Marie-Laure and a German soldier hunting down illegal radio operators, as they find their fates entwined in the coastal French town of Saint-Malo.
With only four hour-long entries, a lot happens in each episode of All The Light We Cannot See, so it's a good idea to brush up on what happened last time every time you sit down to watch another part of the drama.
So here's our All The Light We Cannot See episode 1 recap, in which we meet our main characters and the town of Saint-Malo.
The bombs of Saint-Malo
In 1944, the US Army Air Force 565 Bomb Squadron flies over the coastal French town of Saint-Malo (a real place that you can find on Google maps here). As this happens a young French girl Marie-Laure LeBlanc (Aria Mia Loberti) is conducting a radio broadcast, asking her Uncle Etienne as well as her father to return home, as both have been missing for a while.
A bomb explodes outside the house but Marie-Laure picks herself back up and carries on her broadcast, reading Jules Verne's "20,000 League Under The Sea" to her listeners. The book she reads from is in Braille, as she's blind.
Listening in on this as it airs is Werner Pfennig (Louis Hoffman), a German soldier stationed at the Hotel of Bees, a Nazi HQ in the town. His boss tells him to stop listening and take a drink, as they're both about to die. Werner confesses that, as a boy, he illegally listened to foreign radio broadcasts from the frequency 13:10, of a professor who used to give lessons. This radio channel cut out during the war but he's been picking it up again in Saint-Malo, admittedly with a girl talking instead of the prof. Then the bombs fall and the building collapses.
The planes fly away after depositing some pamphlets. There's one more figure we're introduced to though: Reinhold von Rumpel (Lars Eidinger) is a Gestapo officer eating mussels and drinking wine despite the bombing. He tells his waiter that he's hunting for precious gems for Hitler, and knows that a blind girl in Saint-Malo called Marie-Laure owns one of particular importance. The waiter refuses to give out the girl's address though, and Rumpel shoots him.
The Sea of Flames
Werner wakes up in the bombed-out building near his dead officer. His radio is broken, and so he starts wandering the streets of the town to find a wire to repair it, despite all the heckles and calls from the French townspeople. An officer confronts him for looting, but Werner insists that he's just doing his job.
Marie-Laure is having a gentler morning as she examines a wooden model replica of the town in her home. We flashback to ten years prior when her father Daniel LeBlanc (Mark Ruffalo) used it to give her directions to the park, where she'd be able to 'give a message for daddy'. He's largely helping the blind girl understand the town layout better though.
Then Daniel takes Marie-Laure to the museum as it's her birthday (and he's in charge of the place), where they listen to recordings of bird sounds and examine a diamond that he's exhibiting. At her behest he tells her that there's one more valuable gem in the museum: the Sea of Flames, however, he doesn't want her to touch it. Apparently, it's cursed, and if you touch it, a loved one will die. Marie-Laure asks Daniel if he touched it, but the lack of a mother figure speaks for itself!
In 1944, Marie-Laure leaves her home to try and find bread. At a store, she gets given a few crusts, but also a scrap of hope, as her uncle Etienne LeBlanc (Hugh Laurie) is hiding there from the Nazis. He's part of the resistance and tells her that the book she's reading over the air actually contains coded information that's useful for people listening. He directs her on what to read next.
We see another flashback, to a young Werner as he builds his first radio and listens to broadcasts from various other countries. The one he really enjoys is the professor at 13:10, which teaches him more about the world.
Trouble comes knocking
The officer who confronted Werner before comes to the Hotel of Bees, bringing him a brand-new radio and also a new associate who graduated top of his class at the National Political Institute of Education (or The Institute as we'll call it). Is Werner's secret listening to Marie-Laure's broadcasts in jeopardy? Perhaps, but Werner thinks this figure is hiding a secret.
Reinhold von Rumpel has been going around town trying to get information on Marie-Laure's location, but no one will spill the beans. Instead, he goes to a local prostitute and offers her money for the details instead.
Marie-Laure begins to talk on the radio about the professor, whom she evidently heard broadcasts from previously too. However as Werner listens his new associate comes for his shift, and Werner realizes that this channel is about to be discovered.
Instead, Werner confronts this associate as he was at The Institute and never saw this boy. The boy admits that he dropped out after two weeks, but decided to lie about his credentials rather than be sent to fight in Soviet Russia. But he also recognizes that Werner has a secret, so Werner spills the tea on shortwave 13:10.
After this, the boy decides he needs to kill Werner to protect the secret of his lies, but Werner disarms him and eventually shoots him to protect the secret of 13:10.
After her broadcast, Marie-Laure leaves home and goes to the catacombs under the town's coastal walls in order to eat the mussels that she finds there. However, Rumpel finds her there.
Rumpel tells her that he wants the Sea of Flames because one of the legends about it is that the gem apparently cures illnesses, and it's been implied that Rumpel has an affliction that is worsening. Marie insists that she doesn't know where it is, even when Rumpel points a gun at her. At the end of the episode, we fade to black and hear a gunshot.
