The Netflix German series Murder Mindfully, starring Tom Schilling, is witty and entertaining. The strange blend of murder and mindfulness is unique, and surprisingly, the blend does make sense. If one commits a crime in haste, they are bound to leave traces, but what if the criminal practices mindfulness? Well, that’s a whole different story. Bjorn Diemel, a defense lawyer, struggled to find work-life balance. His client was a mafia boss, Dragan, who kept him on his toes, and Bjorn always felt he was not appreciated enough for the risks he took. The distance between him and his wife widened, and it broke his heart whenever he missed an important day in his daughter’s life. He regretted not having the time to be there for his daughter, and one day he decided to take control of his life. He met a mindfulness coach, and all of a sudden his life drastically changed. But how did he become a murderer? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
What happened to Toni?
When Dragan publicly killed Igor, the right-hand man of his rival, Boris, Bjorn suggested that he go underground. Video of the murder had already made it to the internet, and both Boris and the police were after Dragan. The entire fiasco had interrupted Bjorn’s weekend plan with his daughter. Dragan was hiding in the trunk of his car, and Bjorn had to drive him to a safe place. But as soon as Bjorn reached Dragan’s lake house, he remembered that mindfulness taught him to be present in the moment. He had planned on spending the day with his daughter, and he decided to do just that. Naturally, Dragan suffocated to death, and Bjorn had to deal with the consequences of his decision. But instead of feeling overwhelmed by the situation, Bjorn thought he was completely in control. He dismembered Dragan’s body and got rid of him, but he was smart enough to keep the mafia boss’s thumb–it had a special inscription that he used to mark every deal with–to convince his associates that he was still alive. While Dragan’s henchman, Sascha, figured out that his boss was dead and Bjorn was running the business, he did not mind the arrangement. Bjorn was far more intelligent than the short-tempered mafia boss, and Sascha felt seen by the lawyer. But not everyone felt the same way about it. Dragan’s right-hand man, Toni, refused to believe Bjorn. After Dragan’s severed finger was discovered by the police, Toni was convinced that his boss was dead. But Bjorn continued lying about Dragan’s whereabouts, and one day Toni tied Bjorn to a chair to force him to speak the truth. Thankfully, Sascha came to Bjorn’s rescue.
While Toni claimed to be Dragan’s most trusted man, as it turned out, he was the one who had plotted against his boss. Toni was responsible for instigating Dragan against Boris, which ultimately resulted in all the chaos. But he lost his cool when his plan did not work out. Bjorn had videotaped the confession of Toni’s errand boy, Malte. He had confessed that it was Toni who had dragged Dragan to the parking lot, planning to blow up Dragan, Sascha, and Igor and blame it all on Boris. With both Dragan and Boris out of his way, Toni thought he would take the crown, but it all went haywire when a school bus showed up at the spot. When Toni found out that Bjorn had Malte locked up in the basement of Walter’s security headquarters and that the lawyer was planning on questioning him soon, Toni arrived at the basement. He killed Malte in the hopes that his secret would die with his errand boy. But soon Toni figured out that Bjorn had trapped him in the basement. The lawyer had lured him to Malte and locked the door when Toni entered the room.
Bjorn contacted Boris and explained Toni’s role in the misunderstanding between him and Dragan. Boris was ready to forgive Dragan when Bjorn told him that the mafia boss had agreed to hand Toni over to him. Boris thought it was a fair deal considering Dragan had killed his right-hand man and now he was allowed to kill Dragan’s right-hand man. Toni died a tragic death; he was tied to a cross by Boris’ men, and his body was disintegrated in a grenade explosion.
How did Bjorn handle the Boris situation?
While Boris was happy with the way Dragan had handled the situation, he wanted to meet him in person. All this while, Bjorn was his only point of contact, and after the lengthy misunderstanding, Boris thought it was time that he met Dragan face-to-face. The only problem was that Dragan had died a long time ago, and Bjorn could not bring a dead man to life. So, the lawyer had to come up with another clever plan to tackle the Boris situation. Even though Bjorn had to deal with one problem after another, he remained extremely calm. Instead of letting all the problems overwhelm him, he concentrated on solving one problem at a time. Throughout the crisis, Bjorn ensured he spent enough time with his family. It was his desperate need to spend quality time with his daughter that resulted in the messy situation. He could not afford to lose his family in the aftermath, and he did everything in his power to keep his wife and daughter happy.
After Boris and his men killed Toni, Bjorn had Sascha secretly fly a drone over them. After the drone was destroyed, Bjorn explained that it probably belonged to the police, which meant that the police had video-recorded the entire incident. He hinted that Boris was in trouble and he needed to go underground until the situation settled down. Since Bjorn had helped Dragan escape from the police radar, Boris thought it would be safe to follow the lawyer. Bjorn asked Boris to hide in the trunk of his car, and he asked Boris’ men not to follow him because one way or another the police would end up finding his hiding spot. His men obeyed Bjorn’s instructions, and once again Bjorn ended up with a corpse in his trunk. According to Bjorn, he did not have any other choice. Boris was adamant about meeting Dragan, and Bjorn could not fulfill his demand. Boris had threatened to kill Bjorn if he failed to organize a meeting between him and Dragan. So, Bjorn did what he thought would be the best for him and his family.
How did Bjorn distract Nicole?
Police inspector Nicole had become obsessed with Dragan’s disappearance. She was somewhat convinced Bjorn had a role to play in his disappearance, especially after Dragan’s severed finger was found at a hotel near the lake house. The only people who had been there after Dragan’s disappearance were Bjorn and his daughter, so naturally she suspected him of killing Dragan. But there was barely any hard evidence. Nicole and her team had recovered a belt buckle from the lake, but that was not enough to convince the court that Dragan was murdered there.
Bjorn and Nicole shared a romantic past, and Bjorn knew very well how to divert her attention. Bjorn met Nicole at his new office, and he told her that she was completely off track. He reminded her that a mass-produced belt buckle and a severed finger were not good enough for her to waste her resources on. He did not hesitate to claim that Nicole was after him because of their shared past. He believed she wanted him to falter, and it barely had anything to do with the case. He added that instead of focusing all her energy on finding a mafia boss who had gone off the grid, she must pay attention to her personal life. This was not the interaction Nicole thought she would have with Bjorn, but she felt seen when he sympathized with her. She was overworked and was constantly under stress, making it difficult for her to spend quality time with her son. She wanted to be there for him, and as a single mother, she knew how important her presence was in her son’s life.
Nicole started questioning her decisions, and she could not agree more with Bjorn. She had been obsessing over a case with barely any potential leads. Bjorn handed her a letter of admission for a kindergarten that his gang had recently acquired. He knew she was struggling with the admission procedure, and a little help from him could go a long way. Nicole thanked Bjorn for going out of his way to help her. While she continued to investigate the case, she had stopped obsessing over it. She enrolled her son in the kindergarten Bjorn had suggested, and they often crossed paths. Bjorn helped Nicole become a mindful individual. He repeatedly asked her to be mindfully present in the moment instead of carrying the baggage from work back home. But Nicole could not help connecting her colleague’s death with the sudden disappearance of gangster Toni, and she did not know what to make of the whole situation. Bjorn advised her not to overthink it, but she was a cop, and connecting the dots was her job.
Will Bjorn Get Caught?
Nicole felt hopeless about the case. A part of her perhaps wanted to arrest Bjorn and interrogate him, but then again, their recent conversations made her think that maybe he had simply changed and he was truly as innocent as he claimed to be. While going through all the evidence at her desk, Nicole noticed the talking toy bird that belonged to Bjorn’s daughter, Emily.
In Murder Mindfully’s ending, when Nicole had pressed the plush toy, it repeated a message: “I… and I’ve never felt more free…ha ha ha.” Nicole knew it was a confession; it had to be, but the message was distorted, and once again she had her hands on evidence that was not good enough. If only there was a way to fix it, then maybe Nicole stands a chance in nabbing the murderer, but if not, then Bjorn has successfully carried out the impossible. Bjorn was handling Dragan and Boris’ businesses, and suddenly he had become the mafia boss of the town. He was intelligent enough to handle all the operations, but can he fool Boris’ men as well? One day or another, someone will obsessively try to find out what happened, and since Bjorn was the only point of contact, he would be the primary suspect. While he has managed to come so far with mindfulness, I doubt he will manage to fool everyone around him. He will either be arrested by the police or killed by a gang member; there seems to be no other way.
