Netflix’s Kleo is a German spy thriller that revolves around a former Stasi Agent named Kleo Straub. Kleo, who is introduced at the height of her career as a top assassin, was found guilty of treason for which she was arrested and put behind bars by her own countrymen. Kleo always knew that her arrest was a part of a wider conspiracy, but she didn’t have the proof to prove her innocence. Fast forward to the fall of the Berlin Wall. Kleo, now a political prisoner, got released after three years. Fueled by anger and a thirst for revenge, she goes out to find those responsible for her unjust imprisonment. Kleo is determined to uncover the truth, no matter the cost. Throughout her journey, Kleo faces numerous challenges and confronts her former allies. Will she be able to take her revenge? Can she uncover the real reasons behind her imprisonment? You’ll find all the answers in the recap of Kleo season 1.
Spoilers Ahead
Why did Kleo kill her grandfather?
Kleo and her grandfather, Otto Straub, had a relationship filled with strict discipline and love. Kleo knew that her grandfather was a high-ranking Stasi officer. When Kleo’s mother, Bridget, disapproved of her father Otto’s strict socialist upbringing, he abandoned her. Otto even arranged for the higher authorities to arrest Bridgett. For the longest time, Kleo believed that her mother was against their way of life. Her grandfather made Kleo think that her mother had chosen the wrong side by aligning with the wrong people in West Germany and had betrayed their cause. He even convinced Kleo that her mother had died, though this was far from the truth. Bridgett was very much alive but wanted a different GDR. This was the sole reason Otto reported her. Living with her hardline grandfather, Kleo felt she had to prove herself as the best of the best Stasi agents. She started training and successfully completed twelve missions where she secretly eliminated all threats in West Berlin. In 1987, on what she thought would be her last mission before becoming a mother with Andi Wolf, another Stasi operative she was romantically involved with, Kleo was sent to kill a man in Big Eden via overdose. She believed him to be a CIA agent and completed the mission successfully. However, things took a dark turn when Kleo was arrested and sent to prison, accused of betraying state secrets. She was confused and couldn’t understand how this could happen.
Eventually, she realized someone had framed her. She had bumped into a man on the road, an enemy agent from West Germany, and someone had photographed her. She thought her higher-ups, especially her grandfather, would support her. But to her shock, Otto, the Colonel, and other agents had given statements against her. Her prison days were awful; during a physical confrontation, she lost her child. But eventually, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of East and West Germany, Kleo, being a political prisoner, was released from jail after three years. And guess what she did after getting out of prison? She was set to find out who had conspired against her and why. To her shock, she discovered her grandfather, Otto Straub, was involved. The man she had looked up to and trusted the most had badmouthed her, calling her mentally unstable like her mother and claiming she was never an unofficial Stasi agent. When Kleo confronted Otto, he said he was protecting the firm and had to follow orders from higher-ups. He couldn’t expose their operations. Kleo was shocked to see her grandfather’s selfishness and how protecting himself was more important to him. Furious and heartbroken, she decided to kill him. From that moment on, her journey of revenge against those who wronged her began as she searched for personal justice.
What happened to Comrade Colonel?
Naturally, Kleo started feeling she couldn’t trust anyone, except maybe Andi, her ex-lover. Why ex? Because when she went to his house after all these years, she found out he was about to become a father with his partner, Anja. She was naturally heartbroken. But she still managed to get a piece of valuable information from Andi. He told her that Comrade Colonel Ludger Wieczorek had killed himself and his wife. Kleo thought she had one less problem to deal with until she found out he was very much alive when she went to kill Party Secretary Blum, another conspirator against her. At Blum’s house, she discovered that the Colonel was now living in Mallorca with his wife, under the name Señor Fritz Grossman. When she met him there, she saw how the Colonel was embracing a new life where he completely denied ever being part of the Communist Party. He was now aligning with capitalist West Germany and planning on building an indoor ski center. Not only that, he had paid someone named Alexander Belov from the KGB to help him hide in Mallorca. Seeing her former comrade align with the “enemies” fueled Kleo’s rage. To make him pay, she poisoned his wife with tetrodotoxin. When it was time to confront him, she found out that he had nothing to do with her imprisonment; it was ordered by Minister Mielke. That name was enough for Kleo. With an explosive, she killed the Colonel and took her revenge.
What happened to Andi?
I think by now you can guess that she was going to kill Minister Mielke too, and she did. But before doing so, she discovered that it was her grandfather who’d pulled the strings to imprison her. With Mielke dead, she still had no idea why she was sent to prison. Meanwhile, Kleo learned that, just as she was hunting those responsible for her imprisonment, three people were after her: Uwe, who was her ex-comrade and a former Stasi agent; Sven Petzold, who was a German police officer; and Andi, her ex-boyfriend. Sven was trying to solve the mystery of why Kleo killed the man in Big Eden. why? Because he was a witness and had seen her with a knife that day and suspected her of the murder. As he followed her investigation, he realized she had killed her grandfather, Captain Blum, and the Colonel. Also, he worked for Min Sun, a former spy with BND, who agreed to help Sven track and capture Kleo in exchange for his protection and immunity, about which Kleo knew nothing. On the other hand, Andi, whom Kleo trusted the most, warned her that Uwe was out to kill her, but little did she know that Andi and Uwe had conspired to kill her together. When Kleo discovered Sven was after her, she initially planned to kill him too. However, she decided to use him to find out the truth about her imprisonment. Sven, in order to help her and get to know more information and the intentions of Kleo, started investigating the “CIA agent” Kleo had killed. From the place where the agent bought the suitcase, the shop owner revealed to Sven that the agent had been carrying a bright red suitcase, which seemed to hold significant secret information. Before they could solve the mystery of the suitcase, Kleo received a phone call from Uwe, who pretended to be allied with her and wanted to expose secrets to her about whatever he knew regarding her imprisonment and the suitcase, but it was a trap set with Andi’s help.
When Uwe attacked, Sven saved Kleo by shooting Uwe, but Andi escaped. During the time Kleo was in the hospital after being hurt by Uwe, she remembered that a woman named Lobrecht, the minister’s assistant, had carried a red suitcase when she was awarded the Order of Merit. When she and Sven went to confront Lobrecht, she had killed herself to protect the secret about the suitcase, but Kleo found it in her house, filled with newspapers. Together, Sven and Kleo pieced together the truth. The man Kleo killed was Frey, an East German who exchanged the original red suitcase with secret information for this ordinary one filled with newspapers. He might have offered the original suitcase to the West Germans. When the firm discovered the betrayal, Kleo was sent to stop Frey from handing over the suitcase. She was successful in killing Frey, but the suitcase was not returned. They had no idea of its current location. But in the meantime, Kleo confronted Andi after finding out from Sven that Andi had conspired with Uwe to kill her. Before killing Andi, she learned from him that Frey had offered the suitcase to the BND (Federal Intelligence Service), but a double agent named Anne Geike got it. The suitcase contained explosive documents which could be used to blackmail powerful people. But before he could reveal more, Andi was killed by his partner, Anja, who was actually a top Stasi assassin named Ramona, who’d hid her identity all along to keep a close eye on him.
Did they find the suitcase?
Kleo and Sven eventually broke free from Ramona’s hold and tracked down Anne Geike to learn more about the suitcase. After she accidentally set herself on fire, they discovered that Anne had been in Chile in 1987 and had connections with Comrade Jorge. Determined to find the truth, Kleo and Sven traveled to Chile to confront Jorge, but he was killed in a road accident before they could get any answers. Meanwhile, Ramona was hot on their trail and tried to prevent them from uncovering the suitcase’s secrets. But Sven managed to track down the exact location of the suitcase from Ramona’s hotel room. The suitcase was hidden inside a statue located in the middle of a desert. However, getting there was extremely dangerous. Kleo and Sven’s car crashed into Ramona’s during a high-speed chase, but miraculously, they all survived. In the middle of the desert, we get to witness an unexpected event: Ramona gave birth with Kleo’s help. Maybe the mother in Kleo, who had lost her own child, felt compassion for Ramona and helped her deliver the baby. This sudden turn of events made Ramona lose interest in the suitcase, which was a bit odd but worked to Kleo and Sven’s advantage. Now comes the crucial part—what was in that suitcase? When Kleo and Sven opened the suitcase, they couldn’t believe their eyes. They found photos of Minister Honecker and President Reagan together which proves a secret pact between the U.S. and East Germany where America had been secretly helping East Germany with money during twhie financial sruggles. From Margot Honecker, Kleo’s aunt, they further knew that when East Germany’s economy was in bad shape, Reagan’s financial help was crucial to keep stability and prevent the Federal Republic of Germany from losing its influence in Europe. This news turned Kleo’s world upside down: the country she had faithfully served and sacrificed so much for was secretly working with their supposed enemy all along, naturally she could not handle that.
At the end of the series, Margot Honecker wanted the suitcase back from Kleo and Sven. In exchange, she offered Kleo her mother’s address, revealing that she was still alive. Feeling like a failed soldier after all these revelations, Kleo decided she wanted nothing more to do with the suitcase or her personal vendetta. She gave the suitcase to her aunt Margot and eventually met her mother. During this whole journey, Kleo and Sven grew closer, and she began to trust him deeply, eventually falling for him. They even ended up sleeping together. However, Kleo had no idea that Sven was actually working for Min Sun under the BND. He managed to take the suitcase from Margot and give it to Min Sun. Kleo’s world shattered when she discovered this betrayal. She felt Sven had used her all along to gather information, and he had no genuine connection to her. Min Sun managed to deliver the suitcase to America and got money in exchange for the valuable information it contained. Realizing she never should have given away the suitcase or trusted Sven, Kleo was filled with resentment. She wanted to shoot Sven, but he managed to escape.
Remember when Sven shot Uwe in the café to save Kleo? Well, in a post-credit scene as the series ends, we see that Uwe survived. Knowing Uwe, it’s pretty clear that he’ll definitely take revenge against Kleo in the next season, or at least he will try. There’s also the anticipation of whether Kleo will manage to get the suitcase back. And what about Sven? Will he return to her life? Will she be able to forgive him? From my perspective, I think Sven did fall for her along the way. We can expect them to team up in the next season, where they will try to uncover the truth and defeat the enemies together. It’s going to be interesting to see how their relationship evolves and if they can truly trust each other again.