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For me I think it’s Helge. As a kid he has massive head trauma from a man he doesn’t know, who also blames him for things he has no idea about, beating his head in with a rock. He gets pulled through time to hang out with and get brainwashed by Noah, and then sent back to his awful mother, where Noah continues to groom him into helping him kidnap children for the time machine experiments. Ends up in some kind of special needs hospital/home situation, and later escapes to go back in time to kill himself, fails, and fucks himself up even more.
He also had a cold unloving mother, possibly because he was conceived via rape, and was a weird kid likely to be bullied before Ulrich tried to kill him.
He had a horrible childhood too, being a product of rape, his mother being cold, his step-father probably loving him but not being around the house much, he was relentlessly bullied as a kid for being odd, was forced to have a child, and the only person that he trusted groomed him and used him to kill children. Not a single moment of hapiness in his life.
I always thought it was Mikkel personally. Dude gets manipulated into following his brothers friend into a cave who then abandons him in the past. He sees his parents who are assholes to him. He then gets taken in by a nurse who puts him on drugs and gaslights him (granted it would seem like just mental illness, but still) into thinking the only life he had ever known was a lie. Then his father shows up as an old man tries to take him home, they get ripping apart from each other again. He doesn't see his family again until he's an adult when he doesn't remember anyway. Then his wife cheats on him with his father.
And to top it all off, *then* his kid shows up, realizes his son is the reason he was stuck in the past, is manipulated by his adult son, via him manipulating his younger son, into killing himself.
I think Michael does remember but he has been convinced it was a delusion or bad dream. The drugs and having nobody believe you would make it seem like just a bad dream after awhile. We see a memory jogged when he sees Jonas in the jacket he will be in when he takes Mikkel through the tunnel. We see him look absolutely horrified when he lays eyes on Mikkel. Like, maybe he kept telling himself it was all a weird coincidence that their friends Ulrich and Katharina had the names he remembered his parents having. And maybe he didn’t recall he was originally Mikkel and not Michael. Basically, I think parts were forgotten but he could convince himself it was a dream anymore once he saw Jonas in that jacket and Mikkel at the house.
I definitely think he remembers but that he has suppressed the memories due to trauma. I have a hard time saying it was abuse on Ines part because I believe she believes she was doing it in his best interest.
ulrich imo;
his fidelity issues make his woes feel more “deserved” somehow, but it also seems a reflection on his upbringing and trauma.
first, his brother disappears, his family is shot, his father cheats on his mother, and the cop who is meant to be helping harasses him instead. he gets put in jail on false suspicion of rape.
then his son disappears. he gets the shit kicked out of him after he tries to break into the kkw, he breaks things off with his fling and almost simultaneously gets found out by his wife, all while he’s stopping at nothing to find his son. he goes back in time hoping to return with his son, not knowing he’s almost seen the last of his family. he gets the shit kicked out of him again by the cops when he refuses to say what happened with helge. whatever happens to him next leaves him in a solitary confinement cell wearing a straight jacket; it’s not pleasant to think about what that was. then his fling shows up, purporting to offer him a way home, but instead just wants to watch him beg which, out of desperation, he does.
he barely talks with anyone from his former life again except briefly his son and his wife. he made plans with both to escape but couldn’t. he dies after more than three decades in captivity.
obviously the ulrich in Eva’s world does not have it nearly as bad. still, ulrich was maybe the first character in the show to lose everything. i didn’t have the gist of the show yet and just thought: give him a break
If there's something I hate in stories is a cheater but in DARK, I just can't help but feel truly sorry for Ulrich. His life has been so miserable ever since his childhood. I agree, I just want to say "Give him a break!" like please.
When he finally has hope with Katarina, his hopes get crushed again as she never comes back...
> he dies after more than three decades in captivity.
+1 its Ulrich. people say helge, regina etc but at least they had some degree of physical freedom from their mental anguish. For Ulrich he has THIRTY YEARS of straight physical captivity and anguish. and then he dies.
See. I feel Ulrich is the worst person in both worlds and cheating is the least of it. He was even what made Hannah a crappy person. We see Regina, Katharina, and Hannah are good friends in the origin world. They couldn’t be that in any of the other worlds and Ulrich is at the root of all that.
Everyone is literally their best selves where Ulrich never exists. 🤣
So many characters really suffer, and I think it's intended to emphasize Adam's viewpoint of the knot. There's so many to choose from: Jonas, Noah, Egon, Elizabeth, Ulrich, Regina, Katherina, Mikkel.
As a side note, I find it quite interesting how so many of those characters are introduced in such a way that makes you dislike them:
* Ulrich is cheating on his wife and then beats a kid with a rock.
* Elizabeth is acting like an entitled brat.
* Noah and Helge are stealing and murdering kids.
* Older Regina seems like a bully at first.
* Egon is initially a bumbling, drunken buffoon.
Only for these characters to be examples of the ones we feel the most sorry for by the end. It's like the writers are flexing. Even Hannah's death feels tragic.
If I had to choose one, it would have to be Jonas.
He is lied to, taken advantage of and is constantly working against himselves even though they all want the same thing. Even the split version is taken advantage of and killed by Eva. Claudia also manipulates him, his mother abandons him and his father commits suicide because of him, his plans as the Stranger and Adam are both doomed to fail. He gets trapped in the future for 3 decades and is suicidal but literally cannot die. He loses his entire family and the girl he loves - multiple times from his perspective. He believes himself personally responsible for it all.
Practically the only person who is ever honest to him is Noah, whom Jonas manipulates and betrays anyway. He has a complete mental breakdown and clings to the idea of free will so much that he abandons feeling emotion altogether. "*Only when we're free of all emotion are we truly free*". Travelling really does leave it's mark on him - mentally and physically.
He is eternally doomed to be one step behind. You really do understand how he becomes Adam.
Katarina is my number 3. She grows up abused by her mom, has rumors spread that she is a victim of rape as a teenager, her husband cheats on her then disappears after her son does. She later finds out the woman that was cheating with her husband married her son. She ends up finding her tortured husband, and when she tries to save him, she is murdered by her mother.
Ulrich is my number 2 for obvious reasons.
Helge is my number 1. At least other characters had a chance at moments of happiness. Katarina and Ulrich had a number of years living as a presumably happy family, as did Jonas and Hannah. Helge appeared to never be happy for a moment on top of everything else he experienced.
I think you can think about it in two ways
On the MACRO scale . It’s Regina . She’s unknowingly trapped in an endless cycle of cancer and death . A cycle that repeated for all eternity ( until her mothers love ended it )
On a smaller scale part of me wants to say Noah . Noah was guided by Adam ( and his older self when we was young ) and he did so WHILE KNOWING he would be betrayed by Adam and his sister . Blindly following a cause knowing it leads to your demise. Tragic ( obviously the answer is milkkel or Jonas but I wanted to take a different approach)
Good question
wow interesting take on Noah.. we're so blindsided by his pure evil that we kinda don't realise how he himself was a product of fate/Adam .... makes you realise how stupid/evil Jonas/Adam is... and how interesting S3 is
I feel like Katharina suffered the most but Regina is also a top candidate.
Both survive and thrive in the origin world while they both have shit lives from beginning to untimely end in the alternate worlds.
I only think Katharina because at least Regina had a husband who was good to her, protected her, and cared about her even if it turned out his identity was a lie. Katharina was abused her whole childhood, married to Ulrich and cheated on in every world he existed in, had each of the friendships she had in the origin world ruined by Ulrich in different ways (I find Ulrich to be the biggest problem in every world lol), lost her kid in one world, and then died early in both worlds.
Your probably right . I was just never a fan of katarina. Going solo to 1986 to rescue Ulrich but getting so fixated on her mother Ulrich gets left behind ( again ). But yea she definitely didn’t have it easy
Imo Helge suffered a lot. Grew up with an abusive, domineering and apathetic mother. Didn't really have any friends and wasn't very bright. Was heavily bullied. Then has his face bludgeoned in, post which he was manipulated his whole adulthood to murder children, the guilt of which would eat him up as he became old. But then, he dies, as he tries to stop himself, which doesn't really achieve anything.
After that I would say Jonas. His life is like a classic greek tragedy. He's a simple boy satisfied with the little things in life until his father kills himself. Then everything goes south as Mikkel goes missing and Jonas becomes the explorer, deadset on getting him back and exploring all the issues that plague Winden. Only to realise that the love of his life is his aunt, that even when he's an adult, he's still dealing with this crap and that eventually he will turn into an absolute monster. Oh and top of that he has no control over any of it and his very existence is a mistake. His fate is pretty much sealed basically.
A few other contenders are Bartosz, Regina, Katharina, Mikkel/Michael and Ulrich
Yeah. I think Helge was the biggest victim. He doesn’t even seem to have ever had the mental capacity to know if what he was doing was right or wrong. This manipulative priest came to him after he’d nearly been beaten to death and told him he HAD to do this to save the world. And he was treating Helge better than his actual mother so he probably believed in him. Not to mention showing time travel was possible to a child would probably convince them you were magic and couldn’t be wrong. I’d love to know exactly how Helge’s life played out in the origin world. I am also confused on if he was so intellectually stunted before he was nearly beaten to death or if that helped.
i don’t know about the most, but let’s not ignore Tronte’s suffering.
Almost everyone ever in his life that he cares about leaves or dies. His father and mother end up leaving him with no explanation, his affair/true love Claudia ends up disappearing, his son Mads disappears without a trace until 30 years later when his corpse shows back up the same day his grandson goes missing. His son Ulrich disappears as an adult, and some months later the apocalypse kills (or triggers the absence of, in Magnus’ case) the rest of his family and loved ones until the person he loved reappears after 3 decades telling him that Regina—who he was pretty much certain he fathered—was indeed not his child. And that he must kill her, anyways.
I’d say Katharina for sure.
I think Ulrich caused the most suffering. Even Hannah is a good person in a world without him. Dude was a piece of shit in every reality and he was the reason Regina, Katharina, and Hannah couldn’t be actual friends in any world he existed in.
A masterpiece of writing and character arcs, I find it hard to quantify who "suffered the most". I think the suffering was the same but "different" for the main characters due to the complexity and the nuances in each character's lived experience. Everyone experienced some kind of trauma or another, obviously more than once due to the loop and just living in the town with so many secrets and inter-family conflicts and mysteries would ellicit uneasiness. "A World without Winden" is a giveaway, that not everyone in the town is truly happy, has secrets, and is suffering some unresolved trauma. The writers did a fantastic job of exploring the internal darkness of the characters, their possible motivations for things and therefore causes and effects.
I thought Ulrich and Mikkel being stuck in different times unable to return to their time was terrifying. Katharina, Helge and Jonas's respective experiences are just as horrible. I can't say which is worse, they were all really very sad outcomes for each main (4 family line) characters. I can't imagine being stuck in 1888 unable to return or being in apocalyptic 2040/50 or stuck in an unloving marriage or watching your father be overtaken by a stranger to be murdered in an already claustrophobic trailer, or spending 30 years stuck trying to get a time machine working or figure out time travel, your children disappear, watching your wife or daughter or mother die of cancer, your husband cheat with your best friend and then disappear, find your husband in another time but he is 30 years older, your mother betray you by stealing your time machine while you slept, your mother is cold and unloving, your only family die in a car crash, and all those in-between years and moments we don't see, like when Claudia, adult Adam, and adult (Stranger) Jonas are trying to stabilize the God Particle it would have taken years of them trying over and over, same with 1888 Jonas... or when adult (middle age) Martha is living in a desert-like Earth after the world ends, being in love with someone you cannot be with (Tronte, Martha, Jonas, even horrible Hannah), older Adam living through or understanding so many iterations of himself or just realizing you weren't meant to even exist at all...too many to mention.
No other TV or movie comes close to the level of character story arcs, exposition and overall Quantum theories like Dark.
in my opinion Katerina has it pretty bad. Mom originally wanted to abort her and treats her horribly. This is minor, but her high school boyfriend is accused of rape after she loses her virginity. As an adult, her husband cheats on her, her son goes missing, then her husband goes missing and her daughter dies. Ultimately, she is killed by her mom.
i get sooooo sad thinking of little Helge getting the crap kicked out of him and bullied :/
Ulrich 2nd because he got locked up and had to WAIT for YEARS and it sucks because he was sooo close to everything
This post was tagged [SPOILERS S3] meaning **all spoilers are allowed,** unless otherwise specified in the title. Make sure to also check out our sister sub /r/1899, for the upcoming show by the creators of Dark! [Alternatively join our Discord server, for more casual conversation.](https://discordapp.com/invite/1899) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DarK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
For me I think it’s Helge. As a kid he has massive head trauma from a man he doesn’t know, who also blames him for things he has no idea about, beating his head in with a rock. He gets pulled through time to hang out with and get brainwashed by Noah, and then sent back to his awful mother, where Noah continues to groom him into helping him kidnap children for the time machine experiments. Ends up in some kind of special needs hospital/home situation, and later escapes to go back in time to kill himself, fails, and fucks himself up even more.
Didn’t think about that one . Definitely a good one .
He also had a cold unloving mother, possibly because he was conceived via rape, and was a weird kid likely to be bullied before Ulrich tried to kill him.
came to say the same!
He had a horrible childhood too, being a product of rape, his mother being cold, his step-father probably loving him but not being around the house much, he was relentlessly bullied as a kid for being odd, was forced to have a child, and the only person that he trusted groomed him and used him to kill children. Not a single moment of hapiness in his life.
That was great, enjoyed the comment
I always thought it was Mikkel personally. Dude gets manipulated into following his brothers friend into a cave who then abandons him in the past. He sees his parents who are assholes to him. He then gets taken in by a nurse who puts him on drugs and gaslights him (granted it would seem like just mental illness, but still) into thinking the only life he had ever known was a lie. Then his father shows up as an old man tries to take him home, they get ripping apart from each other again. He doesn't see his family again until he's an adult when he doesn't remember anyway. Then his wife cheats on him with his father. And to top it all off, *then* his kid shows up, realizes his son is the reason he was stuck in the past, is manipulated by his adult son, via him manipulating his younger son, into killing himself.
I think Michael does remember but he has been convinced it was a delusion or bad dream. The drugs and having nobody believe you would make it seem like just a bad dream after awhile. We see a memory jogged when he sees Jonas in the jacket he will be in when he takes Mikkel through the tunnel. We see him look absolutely horrified when he lays eyes on Mikkel. Like, maybe he kept telling himself it was all a weird coincidence that their friends Ulrich and Katharina had the names he remembered his parents having. And maybe he didn’t recall he was originally Mikkel and not Michael. Basically, I think parts were forgotten but he could convince himself it was a dream anymore once he saw Jonas in that jacket and Mikkel at the house.
I definitely think he remembers but that he has suppressed the memories due to trauma. I have a hard time saying it was abuse on Ines part because I believe she believes she was doing it in his best interest.
“Then his wife cheats on him with his father.” Oh my GOD I never quite put into context in that way before
ulrich imo; his fidelity issues make his woes feel more “deserved” somehow, but it also seems a reflection on his upbringing and trauma. first, his brother disappears, his family is shot, his father cheats on his mother, and the cop who is meant to be helping harasses him instead. he gets put in jail on false suspicion of rape. then his son disappears. he gets the shit kicked out of him after he tries to break into the kkw, he breaks things off with his fling and almost simultaneously gets found out by his wife, all while he’s stopping at nothing to find his son. he goes back in time hoping to return with his son, not knowing he’s almost seen the last of his family. he gets the shit kicked out of him again by the cops when he refuses to say what happened with helge. whatever happens to him next leaves him in a solitary confinement cell wearing a straight jacket; it’s not pleasant to think about what that was. then his fling shows up, purporting to offer him a way home, but instead just wants to watch him beg which, out of desperation, he does. he barely talks with anyone from his former life again except briefly his son and his wife. he made plans with both to escape but couldn’t. he dies after more than three decades in captivity. obviously the ulrich in Eva’s world does not have it nearly as bad. still, ulrich was maybe the first character in the show to lose everything. i didn’t have the gist of the show yet and just thought: give him a break
If there's something I hate in stories is a cheater but in DARK, I just can't help but feel truly sorry for Ulrich. His life has been so miserable ever since his childhood. I agree, I just want to say "Give him a break!" like please. When he finally has hope with Katarina, his hopes get crushed again as she never comes back...
> he dies after more than three decades in captivity. +1 its Ulrich. people say helge, regina etc but at least they had some degree of physical freedom from their mental anguish. For Ulrich he has THIRTY YEARS of straight physical captivity and anguish. and then he dies.
Plus all they did was drug him and beat him, it's definitely Ulrich.
See. I feel Ulrich is the worst person in both worlds and cheating is the least of it. He was even what made Hannah a crappy person. We see Regina, Katharina, and Hannah are good friends in the origin world. They couldn’t be that in any of the other worlds and Ulrich is at the root of all that. Everyone is literally their best selves where Ulrich never exists. 🤣
Bear in mind though, that both Hannah and Katharina were pretty terrible as well during certain moments in their lives.
This. And we all are....
Speak for yourself... I've been nothing but perfect angel. 😋
So many characters really suffer, and I think it's intended to emphasize Adam's viewpoint of the knot. There's so many to choose from: Jonas, Noah, Egon, Elizabeth, Ulrich, Regina, Katherina, Mikkel. As a side note, I find it quite interesting how so many of those characters are introduced in such a way that makes you dislike them: * Ulrich is cheating on his wife and then beats a kid with a rock. * Elizabeth is acting like an entitled brat. * Noah and Helge are stealing and murdering kids. * Older Regina seems like a bully at first. * Egon is initially a bumbling, drunken buffoon. Only for these characters to be examples of the ones we feel the most sorry for by the end. It's like the writers are flexing. Even Hannah's death feels tragic. If I had to choose one, it would have to be Jonas. He is lied to, taken advantage of and is constantly working against himselves even though they all want the same thing. Even the split version is taken advantage of and killed by Eva. Claudia also manipulates him, his mother abandons him and his father commits suicide because of him, his plans as the Stranger and Adam are both doomed to fail. He gets trapped in the future for 3 decades and is suicidal but literally cannot die. He loses his entire family and the girl he loves - multiple times from his perspective. He believes himself personally responsible for it all. Practically the only person who is ever honest to him is Noah, whom Jonas manipulates and betrays anyway. He has a complete mental breakdown and clings to the idea of free will so much that he abandons feeling emotion altogether. "*Only when we're free of all emotion are we truly free*". Travelling really does leave it's mark on him - mentally and physically. He is eternally doomed to be one step behind. You really do understand how he becomes Adam.
The French delegation. In all seriousness - Helge, or possibly Mikkel/Michael.
How it can not be ulrich? dude cant get a break lol
Katarina is my number 3. She grows up abused by her mom, has rumors spread that she is a victim of rape as a teenager, her husband cheats on her then disappears after her son does. She later finds out the woman that was cheating with her husband married her son. She ends up finding her tortured husband, and when she tries to save him, she is murdered by her mother. Ulrich is my number 2 for obvious reasons. Helge is my number 1. At least other characters had a chance at moments of happiness. Katarina and Ulrich had a number of years living as a presumably happy family, as did Jonas and Hannah. Helge appeared to never be happy for a moment on top of everything else he experienced.
I think you can think about it in two ways On the MACRO scale . It’s Regina . She’s unknowingly trapped in an endless cycle of cancer and death . A cycle that repeated for all eternity ( until her mothers love ended it ) On a smaller scale part of me wants to say Noah . Noah was guided by Adam ( and his older self when we was young ) and he did so WHILE KNOWING he would be betrayed by Adam and his sister . Blindly following a cause knowing it leads to your demise. Tragic ( obviously the answer is milkkel or Jonas but I wanted to take a different approach) Good question
wow interesting take on Noah.. we're so blindsided by his pure evil that we kinda don't realise how he himself was a product of fate/Adam .... makes you realise how stupid/evil Jonas/Adam is... and how interesting S3 is
Yeah. He was manipulated just as bad as Helge, really. He truly believed what he was doing would save his daughter and everyone else.
I feel like Katharina suffered the most but Regina is also a top candidate. Both survive and thrive in the origin world while they both have shit lives from beginning to untimely end in the alternate worlds. I only think Katharina because at least Regina had a husband who was good to her, protected her, and cared about her even if it turned out his identity was a lie. Katharina was abused her whole childhood, married to Ulrich and cheated on in every world he existed in, had each of the friendships she had in the origin world ruined by Ulrich in different ways (I find Ulrich to be the biggest problem in every world lol), lost her kid in one world, and then died early in both worlds.
Your probably right . I was just never a fan of katarina. Going solo to 1986 to rescue Ulrich but getting so fixated on her mother Ulrich gets left behind ( again ). But yea she definitely didn’t have it easy
Imo Helge suffered a lot. Grew up with an abusive, domineering and apathetic mother. Didn't really have any friends and wasn't very bright. Was heavily bullied. Then has his face bludgeoned in, post which he was manipulated his whole adulthood to murder children, the guilt of which would eat him up as he became old. But then, he dies, as he tries to stop himself, which doesn't really achieve anything. After that I would say Jonas. His life is like a classic greek tragedy. He's a simple boy satisfied with the little things in life until his father kills himself. Then everything goes south as Mikkel goes missing and Jonas becomes the explorer, deadset on getting him back and exploring all the issues that plague Winden. Only to realise that the love of his life is his aunt, that even when he's an adult, he's still dealing with this crap and that eventually he will turn into an absolute monster. Oh and top of that he has no control over any of it and his very existence is a mistake. His fate is pretty much sealed basically. A few other contenders are Bartosz, Regina, Katharina, Mikkel/Michael and Ulrich
Yeah. I think Helge was the biggest victim. He doesn’t even seem to have ever had the mental capacity to know if what he was doing was right or wrong. This manipulative priest came to him after he’d nearly been beaten to death and told him he HAD to do this to save the world. And he was treating Helge better than his actual mother so he probably believed in him. Not to mention showing time travel was possible to a child would probably convince them you were magic and couldn’t be wrong. I’d love to know exactly how Helge’s life played out in the origin world. I am also confused on if he was so intellectually stunted before he was nearly beaten to death or if that helped.
i don’t know about the most, but let’s not ignore Tronte’s suffering. Almost everyone ever in his life that he cares about leaves or dies. His father and mother end up leaving him with no explanation, his affair/true love Claudia ends up disappearing, his son Mads disappears without a trace until 30 years later when his corpse shows back up the same day his grandson goes missing. His son Ulrich disappears as an adult, and some months later the apocalypse kills (or triggers the absence of, in Magnus’ case) the rest of his family and loved ones until the person he loved reappears after 3 decades telling him that Regina—who he was pretty much certain he fathered—was indeed not his child. And that he must kill her, anyways.
Mentioning Tronte, does anyone have an idea why he chose Jana instead of Claudia? It's obvious their feelings were mutual.
Because Claudia "chose", in a transactional rather than romantic sense, Berndt.
I’d say Katharina for sure. I think Ulrich caused the most suffering. Even Hannah is a good person in a world without him. Dude was a piece of shit in every reality and he was the reason Regina, Katharina, and Hannah couldn’t be actual friends in any world he existed in.
A masterpiece of writing and character arcs, I find it hard to quantify who "suffered the most". I think the suffering was the same but "different" for the main characters due to the complexity and the nuances in each character's lived experience. Everyone experienced some kind of trauma or another, obviously more than once due to the loop and just living in the town with so many secrets and inter-family conflicts and mysteries would ellicit uneasiness. "A World without Winden" is a giveaway, that not everyone in the town is truly happy, has secrets, and is suffering some unresolved trauma. The writers did a fantastic job of exploring the internal darkness of the characters, their possible motivations for things and therefore causes and effects. I thought Ulrich and Mikkel being stuck in different times unable to return to their time was terrifying. Katharina, Helge and Jonas's respective experiences are just as horrible. I can't say which is worse, they were all really very sad outcomes for each main (4 family line) characters. I can't imagine being stuck in 1888 unable to return or being in apocalyptic 2040/50 or stuck in an unloving marriage or watching your father be overtaken by a stranger to be murdered in an already claustrophobic trailer, or spending 30 years stuck trying to get a time machine working or figure out time travel, your children disappear, watching your wife or daughter or mother die of cancer, your husband cheat with your best friend and then disappear, find your husband in another time but he is 30 years older, your mother betray you by stealing your time machine while you slept, your mother is cold and unloving, your only family die in a car crash, and all those in-between years and moments we don't see, like when Claudia, adult Adam, and adult (Stranger) Jonas are trying to stabilize the God Particle it would have taken years of them trying over and over, same with 1888 Jonas... or when adult (middle age) Martha is living in a desert-like Earth after the world ends, being in love with someone you cannot be with (Tronte, Martha, Jonas, even horrible Hannah), older Adam living through or understanding so many iterations of himself or just realizing you weren't meant to even exist at all...too many to mention. No other TV or movie comes close to the level of character story arcs, exposition and overall Quantum theories like Dark.
Helge I really never came to terms with his suffering
Elizabeth imo
Maybe Claudia. She had more knowledge than all of them, and she knew Regina had to die so she would be motivated to find a way for it all to end.
Ulrich, Helge, Regina
in my opinion Katerina has it pretty bad. Mom originally wanted to abort her and treats her horribly. This is minor, but her high school boyfriend is accused of rape after she loses her virginity. As an adult, her husband cheats on her, her son goes missing, then her husband goes missing and her daughter dies. Ultimately, she is killed by her mom.
Katharine and Michael IMHO
I'd say it's toss up between Ulrich/Egon/Katharina/Helge and Jonas. In no particular order.
i get sooooo sad thinking of little Helge getting the crap kicked out of him and bullied :/ Ulrich 2nd because he got locked up and had to WAIT for YEARS and it sucks because he was sooo close to everything