“The Signal” (Season 1) is a sci-fi mystery drama about two German astronauts who are sent to the ISS for a research project funded by an Indian billionaire. Paula and Hadi are the German astronauts who make their way to space. Paula has lived a unique life, believing that bigger things are out there in the universe. During her mission, she comes across a strange signal. This leads to uncovering many mysteries and complexities of the human condition.
This article contains spoilers.
The Signal (Season 1) Recap:
Episode 1 – Vanished
The episode begins with Sven waking up from a dream about his wife. He realizes he is late and wakes up his daughter, Charlie. She has hearing loss, and they converse in sign language until she puts on her hearing aid. They rushed to the community screening, and they make it in time. They watch the astronauts land on Earth. Charlie’s mother, Paula, is part of the crew. While watching the TV, Charlie is worried about why the parachute isn’t yet deployed. Charlie has read all about space and knows a bit about rocket launchings and landings.
Paula is hesitating to deploy the parachutes and her co-astronaut is yelling at her to push the buttons. Paula seems to be in a state of trance and comes back to her senses and, at the last minute, deploys it. They successfully land on Earth. Paula and her co-astronaut struggle to get out feeling the power of gravity. Benisha Mudhi, a billionaire from India, is waiting to greet them. She has funded the mission. Mudhi is an inspirational figure of sorts for Charlie as the woman has helped many people overcome poverty. Charlie desired to be like her.
Paula calls that night and starts to say that something weird has happened up in space, but she notices something is wrong with the phone and gives Sven some clues. She talks about the Fox and Hare game. The following day, Charlie and Sven leave for the airport to receive Paula. Charlie meets Paula’s boss, Rainer, and he promises to discuss about the space with her some other time. Paula’s co-astronaut is Hadi, and his wife Mira and kids are also waiting for him at the airport.
The boys notice that the flight is delayed. Sven visits the washroom, and a petrified Japanese woman comes in sobbing. He gets out to see cops everywhere. Everyone waiting for the people on Paula’s flight was taken separately and told that they had lost contact with the flight. They provide rooms for the families. Sven talks to the kids and gives them hope that their parents will be fine. Sven tries to keep it together in front of Charlie but visits the washroom and breaks down.
In a flashback, we see Sven, Paula, and their friends hanging out together. Sven teases Paula that she always loses to their daughter while playing the board game Fox and Hare despite having such a high IQ. In the present, Sven is hanging out on the balcony, and their neighbor gives him alcohol. Sven says Paula was right about feeling angry, and he knew it. When the lady asks what he is talking about, he apologizes and calls it a night.
The people in charge call for a conference and inform the families that they have found wreckage in the Atlantic Sea, which implies that there were no surviving passengers. In a flashback, we see Paula and Hadi getting along well with the other astronauts. Paula had helped set up a radio so she could talk to Charlie while up in space. At present, the Federal police have questions for Sven.
They ask what he meant by him knowing Paula was right. His neighbor in the hotel had ratted him out. He leaves the building, calling the police sick. Sven takes Charlie and leaves the hotel to go home. He sees that his credit card is declined at the parking, but Nora, Mudhi’s assistant, helps him out and gives Charlie a box saying it is from Mudhi. Inside the box, there is a quote about death being a new beginning, but Sven translates it as ‘everything will be fine’ for Charlie.
Sven comes home to see preparations that they had made to welcome Paula home and cleans it up. Sven listens to a voicemail from Paula before boarding the plane. In the voicemail, she says they need to celebrate their 10th anniversary on St. Nicholas Day, as that was the day they met. He calls Mira and asks her if Hadi sounded strange. Mira says, of course, he was, as he had just come back from space. He tells her about the voicemail, and Mira asks him to be grateful for having to have heard her voice one last time.
He mentions that the weird thing is they had not met on St. Nicholas Day. Subsequently, Sven watches the TV clip and realizes the alleged live telecast has a 90-minute delay. He calls Rainer, but he does not help Sven much. In a flashback, we see Paula talking to Charlie, and she asks her about how space smells, but the radio connection dies. The next morning, Sven wakes up to the news about the missing passengers, and he sees Charlie watching the news.
She is heartbroken when Sven says that Paula may be dead. Some people visit Sven and inform him that the air traffic control people sent them a recording. Paula is heard sending a message to Sven saying she loves him. The woman asks Sven what Paula was doing in the plane’s cockpit. The episode ends with Paula hearing someone say hello through the radio, but it isn’t Charlie.
Episode 2 – Paula
The episode begins with Paula hearing a hello from somewhere in the universe. She jots down the coordinates of the signal on her arm and tries to communicate, but the signal stops. She finds Hadi and tells him about the signal. They debate whether they should tell the other astronauts about it. If they do, the government will take over the mission. They try to find the signal again but don’t find anything.
At home, we see Sven and the police talking. Charlie hears Paula’s voice and starts looking for her, but Sven calms her down. Charlie’s grandparents arrive, and she is happy. However, the cops ask them the same question they asked Sven. The Federal police search through the entire house as they suspect Paula is responsible for killing all the passengers. In a flashback, we see Paula asking Sven to make a choice and destroy some papers.
Paula starts to see a bug on her hand, and she takes rest. The next day, she tells the other astronauts and plays the recording, but the clip does not exist. Hadi covers for her and says she is pranking. She starts to panic, and she stabs the bug, and she bleeds. Paula treats herself and goes to sleep. She wakes up after 20 hours and talks to Benisha, who calms her down and asks her to get back to work.
In a flashback, we see Paula, Sven, Mira, and Hadi hanging out, and Paula takes a drug and starts to have hallucinations. In the present, Sven is trying to explain to Charlie that Paula is dead and not to wait to hear her voice on the radio. Sven is talking to Mira, and they realize Paula has lied to Sven about taking the pills. He gets home and finds the pills hidden. Reporters and the family members from the plane crash are at Sven’s doorstep. They want answers. They get aggressive and throw stones at the house.
Sven lets Charlie’s grandparents take her out of the house, but she comes back. Sven lets her stay. Nora tries to calm down the situation, but the grieving family members attack her. Charlie says she spoke to Paula, but Sven can’t tolerate it anymore. In anger Charlie says she had wished he was gone instead of her mother. He helps Nora and asks her to help Mudhi send the people away. Meanwhile, Rainer calls and is about to say something about this being a cover, but someone rings the bell, and he hangs up.
Sven takes Charlie to Mira’s place and goes out to meet Rainer. There, he finds a confidential file in his name. His face lights up, and he drives to Mira’s house and says there is something incredible that Paula and Hadi found. He tries to find Charlie, but the man who attacked him is in a car, and Charlie is missing. In the flashback, Paula finds Hadi changing the tapes, and she realizes she wasn’t hallucinating, as the recording she heard still exists. Subsequently, she stays away from him.
Episode 3 – Black Box
The episode begins with a flashback. Paula and Sven are having a romantic time and discussing things that are out there that are bigger than them. In another flashback, we see Paula rush back to her station and pretend to sleep as Hadi checks on her. In the present, the aggressive man from the house is driving away, and Sven chases him, assuming he has Charlie. He beats him, and they both cry, realizing they have lost their loved ones.
Charlie, however, is walking somewhere alone. Sven thinks hard and realizes where she may be. The police greet him when he goes out. Sven decides to tell the lady cop about what he read in the file. She is shocked that something (an alien spacecraft?) is coming to Earth. Paula tells Benisha about what Hadi is doing, and she asks her to be careful. Charlie reaches the location, and someone grabs her.
Paula talks to Sven and asks about the board game again. She uses his tips to get one step ahead of Hadi. The alarm starts ringing, and the other three get to the safe area, but Paula uses an oxygen mask and tries to find the signal. She realizes it’s getting closer to them. However, she pretends to have not heard the alarm and lets the other astronauts take care of her.
Sven takes the cop to one location, asks her for help, and lets her go. He reaches the location and accidentally steps on a landmine. A strange woman stops him and takes him inside. He reunites with Charlie, and they apologize to each other. Paula talks to Benisha again, and she advises Paula that she is on her own and that the information should not go public, as no country is prepared for what is coming. She warns her not to say anything to anybody.
The strange lady removes a tracker from Sven’s car and puts it on a pigeon so nobody can track it. The lady reveals that for three months, she had been hearing the signal, and so did Paula. They are part of a small community that communicates through secret radio networks. The pigeon gets back, and the woman leads them into a bunker, but Sven and Charlie decide to leave as they realize that Paula wants them to make the information public.
The audio from the cockpit and the airplane are released. In it, they can hear Paula speaking. It is obvious now that Paula was not behind the airplane crash. The lady cop feels that Sven’s life is in danger, but they are not able to reach him. The military finds Sven and Charlie and takes them to their area. Sven finds Rainer there, and he explains that no country is prepared for what is coming. The military is preparing to destroy the alien spaceship since it’s better that no country gets hold of the alien technology.
Paula is working at her station, and Hadi locks her in and stops the oxygen flow. He blackmails her into giving the coordinates, and she gives in. She tells the coordinates and also that a strange spaceship will land on Earth in September. Hadi gets her out and Paula tells him that the entire world heard this message and he can’t do anything about it. Charlie and Sven hear a rumble, and they get outside, it turns out a strange object had come to earth, and the military destroyed it.
Episode 4 – Departure
The episode begins with Paula and Hadi descending. Hadi says he is just a pawn in this game, and they had his children, and he didn’t have a choice. Paula says it is over now. In the present, Sven’s phone is given back, and he is free to go. Upon asking, Sven and Charlie are informed that they were carrying the state secret, and hence, they had to keep them hostage, and now that the object is destroyed, they are free to go.
Back home, Sven puts Charlie to sleep, but he notices some numbers on her arm. He checks the notebook she transcribed while talking to her mother, and he realizes that these are the right coordinates. In a flashback, we see Benisha greeting Paula and Hadi. Paula asks her what had happened to the information she gave. Benisha says the government had taken quick action and decided to destroy it. Paula laughs and says that she is glad she didn’t give the exact coordinates.
Furthermore, Paula asks her for a favor. She asks her to let her off the hook after she plays along with the people. She also says the real coordinates are the family’s secret. In the present, the news shows that nothing was found in the place the military bombed. Nothing extraterrestrial has ever landed on Earth. Sven realizes they are in trouble. They try to run away, but they see the military approach the house.
Sven’s neighbors came to their aid, and they escape, but on the way, a truck causes an accident. Sven uses the remote Nora had given him to reach out if he needs help. Sven and Charlie wake up in a beautiful house, which turns out to be Benisha’s house. They have a meal together, and Charlie is star-struck. She asks why Paula was chosen for the mission, and she says it’s because she was really smart.
Sven reveals that he has the real coordinates and lets Charlie decide whether she wants to tell Benisha or not. Charlie decides to tell Benisha, but they realize they have very little time. In the flashback, as the astronauts are recording the video, Paula notices something. She confronts Benisha and asks her if Hadi is the pawn and then who the queen is, implying it was all Benisha’s doing. Benisha, Nora, Sven, and Charlie are on a helicopter flying to the destination.
Sven turns his phone on and sees lots of missed calls, and he receives one message that says Benisha is the one who had bombed the plane. His phone is bugged, and Nora can also read the message. She tells Benisha who asks Sven not to create a fuss and scare the child. Sven calls her a murderer, and Sven tries to ask Charlie to come sit next to him. Charlie manages to get by his side.
They reach the location and wait. Benisha calls Charlie inside the circle, but she says ‘screw you’ in sign language. The time is ticking, but there is no sign of any extraterritorial spacecraft. Sven finally understands Paula’s message. Benisha calls Charlie ahead and asks her to stop playing games and tell her the real coordinates, but Charlie says she doesn’t know. She threatens her by shooting Sven’s leg, but Charlie breaks down, saying she didn’t know.
The Signal (Season 1) Ending, Explained:
Can Benisha be trusted?
Sven says that Benisha trusted a mentally ill woman who was hallucinating, and there is nothing coming to earth. Charlie asks in sign language if he thinks her mother is mentally ill, but he says they need to be two steps ahead of the fox. Benisha asks Nora to put everyone else on the helicopter and asks the bodyguard to kill both Sven and Charlie. Nora is against this idea, and Benisha asks her to do the job. Nora fires two bullets and rushes to the chopper.
We see her tell them not to move until they leave. They do as they are told. Sven cracks the code to the coordinates. Three months later, they reach the location and wait. A strange item falls from the sky, and it turns out to be NASA’s Voyager. Meanwhile, Benisha and Nora have been arrested, and the world now knows of the Voyager’s arrival back to Earth.
In the end, Paula does not outsmart Benisha completely, but she dies a hero and for a greater cause, as she always believed. Charlie is a smart girl, just like her mother. We don’t know what happened to the strange lady or the lady cop. Those characters don’t have a clear-cut ending. The series opens up interesting conversations about our perception of extra-terrestrial beings and how we usually approach them because of fear, lack of knowledge, and uncertainty. It tries to send out a message about human unity.
