- Warning: Spoilers ahead for all three seasons of "
Dark ." Netflix 's German sci-fi series "Dark" follows an extremely complicated series of events.- Insider has charted all the major events in chronological order, following Jonas, Martha, Claudia, and the other characters as they weave in and out of different decades.
- See the complete timeline, following 1888 to 2053 in all three seasons, below.
Netflix's "Dark" premiered its third and final season on June 27, leaving fans with an overload of new revelations about the time-traveling cast of characters. Not only were new decades and time-twists introduced, but we learned that there were two whole other worlds with their own knots of events.
To give people a closer look at the chronology of "Dark," Insider has made a timeline spanning from 1888 to 2053.
Below you'll find four separate mini-timelines, breaking up the events of "Dark" from 1888 to 1954, then 1971 to 1987, next 2019 to June 27, 2020 (the day of the apocalypse), and finally everything else from September 2020 to 2053.
The timeline shows events from what we're calling "world one," or Jonas' world, where he controls the Sic Mundus group as his alter-ego Adam. Then there's "world two," or Martha's world, where she controls the Erit Lux group as her alter-ego Eva.
Finally there's the origin world, which is the world where H.G. Tannhaus' family died in a car accident, leading him to invent time travel and accidentally split his world into the two corrupted world's where Jonas and Martha existed.
Since we see most of the characters as teenagers, adults, and elderly, we've specified when a character was "young" or "old." Where needed, we've also specified if a character from Martha's world crossed over into Jonas' world by marking them with the number two (e.g. Martha-2).
The first timeline: 1888 to 1954
We begin in this chronology with 1888 — the year Stranger-Jonas, Bartosz, Franziska, and Magnus arrived in the past.
"Stranger-Jonas" refers to the middle-aged Jonas who had been working with Claudia for decades (in season one, he was referred to as "The Stranger" before it was revealed that he was really Jonas). Anytime you see just "Jonas," the timeline is referring to Jonas as a teenager.
This section of the timeline also refers to multiple versions of Martha. "Martha-2" is the Martha from world two who rescued Jonas from the apocalypse in world one, working on behalf of Adam until he eventually killed her. "Martha-3" is the Martha from world two who didn't rescue Jonas, but instead was intercepted by the Erit Lux group and gew up to become Eva.
Eva's unnamed son, who time-travels in a group with the young, adult, and old versions of himself, is simply called the Unknown.
If you need a refresher on the other character names, read our full character guide here.
The second timeline: 1971 to 1987
This section of the timeline introduces events from the origin world and world two.
In the origin world, we have multiple realities layered into the same world. In the first reality, Tannhaus' family dies. In the second reality, Jonas and Martha-2 (who was herself splintered into a yet different reality) save the family and therefore stop Tannhaus from ever inventing time-travel.
This is also a period of time in which the three Unknowns, who split apart temporarily, go into world one and world two and trigger the nuclear power plant malfunction that leads to the God Particle's creation.
If you need a refresher on the other character names, read our full character guide here.
The third timeline: 2019 to 2020 (the day of the apocalypse)
At the start of this section, we've marked that the final scene in "Dark" season three happens sometime in 2019 in the origin world. This is working off the fact that Hannah, Katharina, and the rest of those characters appear to be the same age they were in Jonas' world in 2019.
At the very end of this section is when quantum entanglement kicks in. Just as the apocalypse was happening in world one, time stood still for a fraction of a second.
In that moment, multiple realities were created in the same world:
- In the first reality, Martha-2 saves Jonas and brings him to world two. Then she travels back to 1888 and eventually is killed by Adam in 2053.
- In the second reality, Martha-2 is intercepted by Bartosz-2 (the Bartosz from world two) and brought to Eva. That is the reality in which Jonas will eventually become Stranger-Jonas.
- In the third reality, Adam returns and saves Jonas himself. That's the reality in which Jonas and Martha-2 are able to save the Tannhaus family.
If you need a refresher on the other character names, read our full character guide here.
The fourth timeline: Post-apocalypse in 2020 to 2053
The final stretch of time shown below starts in world one on September 22, 2020. This is where season three picked up with Claudia, the dying Regina, and other Winden residents who survived the apocalypse. We follow more of Claudia as she meets her world two self (Claudia-2), and chart how Jonas and Martha-2 traveled into the future in Eva's world.
Our timeline ends when Adam travels back to 2020 for a final time, leading to the end of both Jonas and Martha's worlds.
If you need a refresher on the other character names, read our full character guide here.
For more deep dives into "Dark," read our breakdown of the best foreshadowing, references, and other details you might have overlooked in the whole series.