Upamanyu Biswas
Netflix’s ‘The Åre Murders‘ delves into two complex crimes set against the backdrop of the Swedish town of Åre. The show follows two police officers, Hanna and Daniel, as they strive to get to the bottom of the dark secrets lurking within their community. However, the peaceful environment of the township is challenged by the emergence of a local girl’s disappearance and a man’s murder, forcing the residents to question their trusted neighbors. By the end of the season, Hanna manages to navigate the twists and turns of both cases with relative deftness, albeit brushing against danger in the process. Still, the feeling of an incomplete journey remains, suggesting that the answers in her personal life are still far from attainment. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Hidden in Snow Plot Recap
The show begins with Amanda Halvorsen, a high school teenager in Åre, attending a party at her friend Ebba’s house. After her phone calls are ignored by her father, Harald, Amanda takes her bike and walks back home. A mysterious car stops behind her and honks at her. Amanda turns around to face the driver before the scene cuts away. Elsewhere, a recently suspended city cop named Hanna Ahlander arrives at Åre, still getting over a recent breakup with her boyfriend, Christian. She moves into her sister Lydia’s vacation home in the mountain town, hoping to find some respite from her city life. She runs into one of the town’s local police officers, Daniel Lindskog, who is suspicious of her presence but welcomes her all the same. When Amanda is reported missing the following day, Hanna gets involved in the investigation.
The protagonist sets up a meeting with Lieutenant Grip from the Åre PD, who helps her join the task force on a temporary basis. Subsequently, she begins pooling her knowledge and efforts with Daniel. The pair begin hunting down any leads relating to Amanda, learning that she was involved with someone named Viktor, a shady figure who may have seen Amanda before she died. Meanwhile, they also discover that the girl’s best friend Ebba is hiding something from her parents and the authorities. She responds to Daniel and Hanna’s questions cryptically, leaving them wondering what kind of conspiracy she is caught up in. At the same time, local business owner couple Annika and Bosse are struggling to maintain their situation with recent expenses burning holes in their finances.
Hidden in Snow Ending: What is Ebba Hiding? What Happens to Her?
As the story progresses, Hanna begins looking deeper into Ebba’s life, especially after a video emerges of the young girl having a heated conversation with Amanda during the party. She becomes concerned that Ebba may be in much bigger trouble than she is seemingly showcasing on the surface. The teenager even stops going to school following Amanda’s murder. Eventually, both Hanna and Daniel learn that high school teacher Lasse Sandahl is blackmailing Ebba into sleeping with him. He possesses private pictures of Ebba that could ruin her life if they are ever released. As such, he is using them as leverage to stalk her and sleep with her. Amanda found out about the affair and told Ebba that she would deal with him by herself, which made the latter anxious at the party.
Hanna begins suspecting that Lasse may have killed Amanda after she told him to stop seeing Ebba. She and Daniel go to his house to question him, inadvertently barging into a clandestine meeting between Lasse and Ebba. The latter was forcefully brought to his house while she was out with her mother. With the police knocking on his door, Lasse begins cracking under the stress and takes out his frustrations and anger at Ebba. Fortunately, Daniel is able to find a way into the house and saves Ebba from Lasse. He is subsequently taken in for questioning while Ebba tearfully asks Hanna if her affair with the high school teacher led to her best friend’s death. At the precinct, they get their answers when Lasse reveals that although he was angry at Amanda for blocking his access to Ebba, he never followed her that night and went back home.
Who is Amanda’s Killer?
After Lasse is found to be innocent of Amanda’s murder, Hanna has to retread the grounds covered by the investigation previously. The prospect of finding the killer remains bleak until Hanna realizes that Zuhra, the cleaning lady in her new house, is also a domestic helper in Amanda’s house. Hanna eventually connects the dots and figures out that the truth behind Amanda’s murder lies with Zuhra. She visits her at her home, where she learns that she works for a company named Fjallstad Cleaning, which Bosse and Annika own. The company has been using Zuhra in an elaborate human trafficking ring, taking away her passport and leaving her in a desperate position. Their conversation is cut short when Bosse arrives at her door with a shotgun.
Hanna protects Zuhra from Bosse and then follows him outside. They get involved in a car chase, which ends with Hanna being thrown off the road and left in a fatal condition. Fortunately, an alert Daniel manages to orchestrate a roadblock, which captures Bosse. He then rescues an injured Hanna. In the subsequent interrogation, Bosse reveals that he is the one who killed Amanda. Apparently, the young girl was good friends with Zuhra and always looked out for her. When she found out how Bosse had taken away Zuhra’s passport, Amanda visited his house after the party, confronting him about his abusive business practices. Bosse and Annika’s financial situation had become so dire that he had to adopt some harsh practices when employing people in his company, which eventually turned into human exploitation.
After Amanda left Bosse’s home, she was followed by him in his car. He promised her a ride back home and told her to put her bike in the back of the vehicle, which she did. Then, he drove her deep into the woods to clear up the situation about Zuhra and get assurances from Amanda that she would not spill the beans to anybody. When Amanda refused to listen to him, he let his anger take over and strangled her to death. Subsequently, he disposed of her body on the ski lift for everyone else to find. Thus, Amanda’s death was the result of her compassionate and brave nature and her ability to stand up for those less fortunate than her. However, it was her generosity that ultimately led her to her doom, even though it was for a noble purpose and the right reason.
Hidden in Shadows Plot Recap
A few months after Amanda Halvorsen’s case, Hanna is a permanent police officer at Åre PD, having made the transition at the end of the previous story. She and Daniel are partners working together in the small mountain town and close confidantes in both their professional and private lives. The latter is preparing for a parental leave with his entire family. However, those plans are put to rest when a disturbing murder case pops up. A resident’s dismembered body is recovered next to a train track. After forensic testing and a call from his partner, Marion, the identity of the victim is found to be Johan Andersson, a former skier who works at J&L Event. They also learn that the killing blow was delivered on the back of his head before he was thrown onto the train tracks.
Daniel cancels his parental leave while his wife Ida leaves by herself to attend her course. As such, he is left to deal with his infant child while also juggling the responsibilities of the case. After a brief investigation, Hanna and Daniel establish a connection with a local pastor named Ole Nordhammer, who they believe is tied to the case somehow. Meanwhile, they also look into the J&L Event company, trying to figure out if the murderer happened to be someone Johan knew in his professional life. Police officer Anton even gets involved in an intimate affair with one of the company’s members, Carl Willner. Apparently, the company was leasing land from the church for a ropes course, which was being handled by Johan. This is how he became involved with pastor Ole.
Hidden in Shadows Ending: What is Rebecka’s Connection to Johan? Does Ole Kill Her?
Hanna and Daniel visit Ole’s home to ask him questions about Johan. Although they don’t learn much about the case, they realize something is off within the household, especially when Hanna discovers Ole’s wife, Rebecka, peeking from upstairs. It turns out that Ole is an abusive husband who mistreats his wife constantly. She endures grave physical, emotional, and mental torment at his hands all the time. Tired of his behavior, Rebecka decides to leave him. However, her plan is discovered by Ole, who confronts her about why she wants to leave him. He hits her several times and decides to take it even further. Fortunately, Hanna arrives at his doorstep once more to stop him from going too far. She subsequently forces her way into Rebecka’s room and asks her if she wants to leave. She desperately says yes.
In the aftermath, Rebecka moves into the Granen Hotel, where she and Hanna begin discussing Johan’s death. Rebecka reveals that she and Johan were in love with one another and were seeing each other behind Ole’s back. Johan was also aware of Ole’s abusive attitude and wanted to free her from his clutches, especially as her expected child was his and not Ole’s. After learning the truth, Hanna worries that Ole may have killed Johan as retaliation for him sleeping with Rebecka. She leaves Rebecka in the hotel to bring in Ole for questioning. However, he is not at home. In reality, he figures out Rebecka’s whereabouts and visits her at the hotel. When the staff refuses him entry, he stages a fire drill to evacuate the establishment before following Rebecka to her room.
Rebecka shuts the door in Ole’s face. She then tells Ole to leave her alone, revealing that the child in her womb is Johan’s. It enrages him, and he breaks into the room with an axe and abducts her. Subsequently, a search and rescue mission is set up by the Åre PD to locate Rebecka. Hanna takes it particularly hard on herself, as she feels responsible for Rebecka’s ordeal. The team finds her at an abandoned warehouse site a few miles away from the central town. In the middle of a storm, both Hanna and Daniel rush to save Rebecka, who slips out of Ole’s grasp and is cornered by her captor outside. While Hanna hesitates to pull the trigger, Daniel does it for her, saving Rebecka and killing Ole. Although his death saves Rebecka, the crew eventually learns that he is not the person responsible for killing Johan.
Who Kills Johan?
The actual identity of Johan’s killer turns out to be a tragic revelation – he was killed by his adopted son, Leo. It turns out that Johan’s relationship with Rebecka had been discovered by his partner Marion. She and Johan argued one night in the living room about his infidelity and how he no longer prioritized his family over Rebecka. Tired of the conversation, Johan walked away from the house and went into the car to get into his car. While bending down to pick up his keys, he was bludgeoned on the head by Leo, who was angry at Johan for his betrayal and for hurting his mom. Subsequently, Marion found Johan’s body in the garage and consoled her son about the whole incident. She called in Jens, Leo’s biological father, and the two carried Johan’s dead body into Carl Willner’s car and drove him to the train tracks.
Both Jens and Marion were accomplices to Johan’s murder, as they were the ones who threw his body onto the train tracks and let it be dismembered. Meanwhile, the actual culprit was, shockingly, Leo, who felt increasingly guilty the longer no one had been caught in the affair. Hanna is stunned by the truth and has the entire family apprehended, along with Jens, and taken away for questioning. She then sits down for a breather at a nearby bench, where Daniel joins her. Clearly, the fact that an out-of-scale family misunderstanding led to Johan’s death takes the wind out of her sails as it is more tragic than she expects. Daniel seems to share her sentiment as well, which he exemplifies by keeping her company on the bench, showcasing how much the two are able to understand each other after only a few months of working together.
Do Daniel and Ida Reconcile? What About Hanna?
At the end of the season, Daniel and Ida have a frank conversation about their familial responsibilities and their duties as parents. As Daniel’s work-life balance is completely out of order, he constantly finds himself being an absent father unable to take care of his child. It reminds him of his own father, who was absent himself. Daniel does not wish to repeat the same mistakes as his dad but finds himself doing it all the same. However, in the final moments, he ignores a call from Hanna and tells his wife that the cops will have to do without him for the day, showcasing his resolve to change his ways if necessary. However, his decision to commit to his family life means that Hanna is left alone and lonely in her own personal life. She clearly has no one to confide in except Daniel. Therefore, seeing how their dynamic evolves in future seasons will be interesting.
Read More: Is The Åre Murders a True Story? Are Amanda Halvorsen and Johan Andersson Based on Real Victims?
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