‘Number 24’ Ending Explained & Full Story: Did Gunnar Share The Truth With Erling’s Family?

The crude, merciless reality of war prompts people to put themselves through extreme situations, to take decisions they’d otherwise abhor. As differences in ideals create rifts, the equations of once cherished relationships change rapidly. The transformative potential of war and its tragic aftermath is captured in Norwegian war drama Number 24, which primarily acts as a biographical account of Norway’s celebrated war hero, Gunnar Sonsteby, who played a major role in the country’s anti-Nazi resistance movement during the Second World War. While the first two acts of the movie follow a generic war narrative progression, director John Andreas Andersen adds a unique spin to the final act, which serves as the commentary the movie wants to address. As a period piece, Number 24 showcases neat production design, which captures the 40s with a high level of authenticity, reflecting the dread and desperation of the Second World War. The most memorable aspect of the movie turns out to be the intriguing way it opens up conversation about the oft-overlooked human cost of war, which exacts a heavy toll irrespective of which side of history one might find themselves on. 

Spoilers Ahead

War On Two Fronts

The narrative progression of Number 24 follows two timelines—one in the past during the Second World War, which chronicles the efforts of Gunnar Sonsteby and his band of resistance fighters, the Oslo Gang, to thwart the Nazi control in Norway; while in the present timeline an elder Gunnar is seen recounting his war days in the presence of university/college students during a meet-up session. 

In the year of 1937, Gunnar is seen venturing to the snowy mountainous terrain outside his hometown of Rjukan, along with his neighbor/good friend Erling Solheim. While Gunnar appears alarmed reading the news of the unchecked Nazi aggression, Erling remains unbothered, as he believes the Nazis are merely rooting out the ‘evil’ of communism and it shouldn’t be their concern. Gunnar believes the modus operandi and ideals of the Nazis are a blot on humanity, and their advances must be quelled. Three years later, as Nazi Germany takes over Oslo, facing almost no resistance, and the then Norwegian government flees to England, the truth in Gunnar’s words is realized. The former Norwegian Prime Minister, Vidkun Quisling, decided to shake hands with the Nazis (hence the term ‘Quisling’ gaining notoriety), and defectors like police chief Karl Marthinsen assisted him to weaken the nation from within. Gunnar joined the resistance movement with some of his close associates; it was soon apparent that they needed to take the battle to both the foreign invading forces and their fellow countrymen who sold their souls to the tyrannical Nazi regime. 

The Heroics of Agent 24 and the Oslo Gang

Gunnar’s journey in the resistance movement began with him operating a ragtag team from a local bakery, running an underground press with the aim of unifying the masses against the diabolical forces in power, but soon enough he rose to prominence as an adept spy by joining the greater anti-Nazi forces at work. By joining British SOE in Sweden, Gunnar was trained to become Agent 24, and his unparalleled skills in infiltration, evasion, and intel extraction resulted in significant contributions to the combined intelligence efforts of the Norwegian and British Resistance forces. As the movie highlights, some of the crucial operations, like obtaining Kroner currency plates from Norwegian banks and sabotaging Nazi outposts, were led by Agent 24. Over the course of more or less three years, Gunnar continued to move across Norway, Sweden, and England to build up a strong intelligence network and himself acted as a link between foreign and native Nazi resistance movements. During this time, a number of Gunnar’s associates were caught, tortured, and killed by the Nazis, but Agent 24’s exceptional skillset and instincts made him so elusive that even SOE suspected him of being a Nazi defector at one point. 

The reason Gunnar was so efficient as a spy, as shown in the movie, is because of the way he was able to emotionally dissociate himself from everything else. There was no personal life for him to go back to; he dedicated himself completely to his monomaniacal zeal to liberate his country. Gunnar’s family was harassed by the Nazis on one occasion after his real identity was exposed to them; despite that, Gunnar didn’t allow his personal relations to become a vulnerability, and evaded capture. 

The next big step in Gunnar’s life was becoming a prominent member of the Milorg group and forming the Oslo Gang by combining the forces of the SOE and Milorg. With ten extremely skillful intelligence agents working under Gunnar, who was the prime coordinator of the group, the Oslo Gang had taken part in numerous successful sabotage operations to weaken the grip of the Nazi forces in Norway. Some of the notable missions, like blowing up the city archive of Oslo to stop forceful Nazi conscription efforts (without putting any lives in harm’s way) and destroying the Kongsberg weapon factory, really rattled the cages of the Nazi occupying forces during the final leg of the Second World War. 

Fighting Fire With Fire

As the next phase of the resistance initiative, Gunnar and his operatives were assigned to take down Nazi collaborators and turncoats whose actions had resulted in the deaths of numerous resistance fighters and innocent civilians over the years. With clinical precision and absolute detachment, the Oslo Gang had no qualms about murdering their fellow countrymen, even in the presence of their families, as they placed sovereignty of their nation on a higher pedestal than their personal relationship or sense of brotherhood. As the narrative shifts back to the present timeline, an elderly Gunnar faces questions about the ethical ramifications of the actions of the resistance forces, who didn’t hesitate to kill Norwegians to uphold their ideals, and the veteran freedom fighter mentions how the horrid realities of war brought significant changes in perspective among the people involved, which cannot be measured in the context of the present time of peace. The resistance forces considered their actions, no matter how violent or similar to the Nazi forces they were fighting, justified, as they thought themselves to be on the right side of history. If killing a number of turncoats (over 80, to be precise) was what it took to act for the greater good, then it was worth the sacrifice. 

However, Gunnar’s confidence in his opinion gets shaken after one of the female students among the audience, who was continuously questioning him about the nature of the actions of the resistance forces, mentions Erling Solheim, one of her family members, who lost his life in an assault carried out by Gunnar’s comrades. She questions Gunnar about whether he is familiar with the name, which the elder resistance fighter denies, but unbeknownst to everyone else, a crippling sense of guilt and agony overwhelms him. Erling was his good friend who opted for a peaceful family life, and despite having a good relationship with Gunnar, he was planning to expose him and his comrades to the Nazis. Perhaps his anti-communist sentiments had clouded his judgment so much he had forgotten the bond he and Gunnar shared with each other, and he wanted to bring down the resistance forces by exposing them. Gunnar was shocked to learn about Erling’s collaboration with the Nazis, and despite the fact that it took a part of his soul away from him, it was Gunnar who ultimately sanctioned the execution of Erling. Even in the direst personal crisis, Gunnar didn’t betray his ideal—which made him a perfect soldier, but in his own eyes he became a wretched friend, to say the least. Gunnar had ensured that Erling’s family remained unharmed by the resistance forces, but the knowledge he was responsible for his friend’s death was a traumatic memory that remained coiled in the recesses of Gunnar’s subconscious ever since. It is commendable how the movie doesn’t engage in generic war hero glorification and raises discourse that doesn’t offer easy answers. Differences in ideals had families and friends turning on each other, resorting to violence, and in the end, it was just not worth it, as in war, everyone ends up losing.

Did Gunnar Share The Truth With Erling’s Family?

As Norway was liberated from the vice grip of Nazi forces in 1945, Gunnar and his comrades could rejoice at the prospect of their nation ushering in a new age where freedom for all is ensured and democracy is reinstated. The cost of freedom was heavy, and Gunnar’s remark about how he chose to shelve some of the sordid memories of the events that transpired before the liberation testifies to this. To live with the knowledge of what kind of person he had become, Gunnar needed to willfully forget that period of his life; otherwise, he might have ended up taking his own life like a number of his comrades did. However, that changed after Erling’s relative, the young student, made him face the ugly truth he was trying to avoid for so long, and as Number 24 comes to an end, an elder Gunnar is seen speaking with the student; his gestures make it seem he is trying to make amends with his past by apologizing to her. Even a former daredevil agent like him didn’t have the courage to acknowledge his part in the death of his dear friend during the meetup, but denying the girl the truth would have made Gunnar feel even more miserable in his own eyes. Whether or not Gunnar is able to find forgiveness by confessing his actions to Solheim’s relative will never be known, but at least the burden that shackled his soul for so long will be somewhat lessened by sharing the truth.