'Van der Valk' Recap: Season 4 Episode 1

Van der Valk airs Sundays at 9:00 pm and is available to stream via the PBS app and wttw.com. Recap the previous and following episodes and previous seasons.
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A safehouse should be safe – but it’s not for Gregor Albers. The driver for drug kingpin Bibi Franken for decades, he has now turned on her and is under protection as he waits to testify in a preliminary court hearing. A policewoman, Kalie Tenkers, is with him in a house in the woods to keep him safe. Gregor seemed troubled by something he had done in the past when he went upstairs to go to bed – and was then strangled to death in the bathroom.

When Van der Valk arrives at the crime scene, he immediately blames and even suspects Kalie – an ex with whom he has a contentious relationship. She says she followed Gregor upstairs after about five minutes and found his body, and then more police officers arrived soon afterwards. The bathroom window is open, so perhaps the killer entered there.

Van der Valk doesn’t think the killer could have escaped unnoticed before additional officers arrived, so he and Lucienne search the house even though Kalie already has. Van der Valk notices a light switch on the cramped top floor that doesn’t seem to do anything, and then realizes it is turning on a light behind a false wall. Suddenly shots break through the wall and a man sprints out. Hendrik, the coroner, is waiting hidden around a corner down the stairs with a syringe full of a sedative drug, and takes out the fleeing killer with it. As Hendrik leaves the house after a job well done, he coughs blood into his handkerchief.

Jacko Gallas, the killer, must have been hiding in the safehouse even before Gregor and Kalie arrived – there’s food in his hidden room, as well as a hazmat suit that he presumably was planning to don so that he could pass for a crime scene investigator, thus allowing him to escape without notice. But Kalie says the safehouse was vetted and carefully examined.

Jacko worked for Bibi Franken. But he won’t say a word under questioning by Van der Valk and Lucienne.

Gregor’s wallet might hold a clue: a year-old death notice for a young woman named Sofie Lommel. She died in mysterious circumstances, but what is her connection to Gregor? All his known children are abroad with his ex-wife.

Gregor was not the only witness preparing to testify against Bibi. Her son Daan, who seemed poised to take over her criminal enterprise, has also turned on her. He’s still alive in a different safehouse, guarded by a top-flight private security person he hired named Baz van Zijl and kept company by his and Gregor’s lawyer, Anton de Haas. Anton is not that high-profile or experienced of a lawyer, but others were afraid to take on the case. Van der Valk sends Eddie to watch the safehouse from a neighboring roof. (Citra has left Amsterdam to work for Europol.)

Daan wants to go through with testifying in the hearing the next day, regardless of Gregor’s murder. He just needs to make it to the secure facility where the hearing will take place. To that end, Dahlman assigns Van der Valk to accompany Daan to the facility. Baz doesn’t like the intrusion upon his plans, but Daan accepts – he knows that Van der Valk has long been a thorn in his mother’s side, so he can trust him. Whether they can trust the judiciary – Bibi has bought off judges before – remains to be seen.

Before going to Daan’s safehouse, Van der Valk goes with Lucienne to speak with Xavi Franken, Daan’s brother. Xavi runs some vegan cafes rumored to be started with money from Bibi, but otherwise doesn’t seem to be involved in her criminal enterprise. Nevertheless, Van der Valk tells him to call his mother and tell her that Van der Valk is on her case.

Xavi later calls the detectives back and says that his mother wants to meet Van der Valk. Van der Valk turns her down. So she goes to the bar that he and his team frequent and demands his phone number.

Van der Valk notices a van with muddy tires – an oddity in the city – parked near Daan’s safehouse, and sends Eddie to check on it. Eddie sees that there’s no one inside and casually opens the rear door, which is unlocked. He’s then knocked out by a man and pushed inside the van. He drops his phone on the street in the process.

Van der Valk and his team eventually worry that Eddie is not responding, but they have pressing matters like the security of Daan to occupy them. Baz is good at his job: he changes the route to the hearing facility last minute, without even telling Van der Valk (although he figures it out), and puts Daan in the second of three cars instead of the expected first, which Anton takes. When a car seems to be following the caravan, Baz takes an unexpected turn and cuts off the follower with men who put a construction sign in the street.

Baz and Van der Valk accompany Daan in the second car, and Van der Valk takes the opportunity to ask Daan about his mother’s business. Daan says that he wanted to take it over and make it legal, but Bibi resisted and didn’t keep her word. Van der Valk also asks Daan a second time about Sofie Lommel, the woman whose death notice was found in Gregor’s wallet. Both times Daan hears her name, he flinches but doesn’t say anything.

Lucienne visits Sofie’s mother Maud, who complains that there was little investigation into her daughter’s death after she was hit by a car coming home from work around 1:00 am. Even though she was in a well-populated location, there were supposedly no witnesses or CCTV footage of the accident. Maud doesn’t know what Sofie’s job was; Maud threw her out five years ago when she became rebellious, and they have been estranged ever since.

The detectives learn that Sofie was a manager of some bars owned by the Frankens.

When Daan’s caravan arrives at the secure facility, Anton is stopped by the guards. Baz and Van der Valk tell Daan to wait in his car and go to speak with the guards and then escort Anton inside. As Daan’s car pulls up to the entrance, it explodes.

Van der Valk is injured, Baz is hurt more, and Daan and the car’s driver are killed. Bibi calls Van der Valk and tells him that he should have met her earlier. She’s waiting for him now.

When Van der Valk asks Anton about Bibi, the lawyer tells the detective that Bibi will be waiting for him in whatever location would mess with his head the most.