High Tides (Knokke Off) follows a group of young people enjoying their summer in the town of Knokke with their wealthy, dysfunctional families. The series is streaming on Netflix.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary
Daan and his mother move into a campsite near Knokke to spend their summer vacation in a town filled with wealthy families. Daan gets a job at a beach bar run by an older man named Jacques.
Lousie and Alex are a couple living in Knokke with their own issues. Louise suffers from bipolar disorder and has an overbearing mother while Alex has a tenuous relationship with his father Patrick.
Alex is also quite controlling with Lousie, but she brushes it off because of her love for him. Alex’s mother, Eleonore, is suspicious that Patrick is unfaithful and that is why they aren’t able to hold down a nanny for their daughter Olivia.
Melissa tells Daan that they’re on vacation but her true motive is to find out what happened to her sister Claudia, who visited Knokke 2 years ago and then disappeared without a word.
Melissa pretends to be a nanny and gets hired by Eleonore. Patrick is having an affair with Eleonore’s best friend, Christine, and Alex spots them in Christine’s office and records them in secret.
Daan is given a rough time by Alex and his friends on his day and Daan hits back. Louise finds Daan attractive and insists that Alex make up with him.
Daan meets his neighbor, an attractive young woman named Anouk, who invites him to the Casino Club where works. He is stopped at the door but Alex and the rest let him tag along with them.
They party together and Daan becomes friends with them even though he is warned that he cannot trust them since they come from completely different backgrounds.
Alex wants to open a gentleman’s club called Crazy Lulu but Patrick calls his idea ridiculous and him an imbecile. They get into a scuffle and Alex breaks Patrick’s nose.
Louise starts spending time with Daan and he suggests that she stop taking her medication so that he gets to know the whole of her instead of just a part. She grows closer to him and eventually cheats on Alex with Daan.
Melissa snoops around in Eleonore’s house and finds a necklace that belonged to Claudia. Her doubts that Claudia worked there are confirmed when Louise recognizes a picture of Claudia and tells Daan that she disappeared after stealing jewelry.
Louise finds her father’s care somewhere it isn’t supposed to be and discovers that he’s been in a relationship with his male colleague for 4 years and that his mother is aware of it.
Alex transfers the video of his father’s unfaithfulness to Patrick’s computer and Eleonore happens to see it. Alex opens up Crazy Lulu with some help from Jacques, after stealing some expensive watches from his father.
Patrick vows to close down the club within a week and pushes Jacques to give up his sobriety. Alex finds out about Daan and Lousie and beats up Daan.
Daan tells Louise that their relationship isn’t fair to Alex and tells her that they cannot be together even though he is in love with her. After a few glasses of wine, Melissa realizes that Eleonore must have been in love with Claudia.
After a pretty wild bachelorette party that Lousie hosted for her sister, she ends up overdosing on a beach but Alex finds her in time and takes her to hospital. She recovers but her mother is on her like a hawk to take her medication.
Daan tells Louise that they are there to find Claudia, and when he ends things with Louise, he tells Alex, who shares it with Eleonore. Alex gets panic attacks because he knows how Claudia died.
He suggests that Patrick killed her and she tells Melissa and Daan. Eleonore tells Melissa that she loved Claudia and wants to help Melissa get some justice by making Patrick confess.
High Tides ending explained in detail:
The death of a mentor
After orchestrating a raid on Crazy Lulu to put his son in his place, Patrick lets Jacques know that he bought the land where his beach club stands and he plans to tear it down.
Jacques had already had one hospital visit after falling over and hitting his head while drunk, and he spent another night drinking while going over the report that Patrick handed him.
It takes a toll on him and he drops dead from a heart attack and is found the next morning by Daan.
The chaotic party
Eleonore tells Melissa that she has a plan to make Patrick confess, and that involves his mistress Christine. She is having a party to celebrate 25 years of marriage with Patrick and threatens to release the video unless Christine helps her.
Alex arrives at the party in a horrible mood after getting into a fight with Daan as Jacques is being taken away by the paramedics. He also argues with Lousie because he still believes that she prefers Daan over him.
He chooses to share the video with everyone at the party and Christine leaves because that was not part of the deal with Eleonore. Patrick goes after Alex for ruining his name.
An accidental death leading to a tragic one
Olivia sees the video and curses her father. He tries to reconcile with her but Melissa gets in the way and brings up the topic of her sister and how he killed her.
He then tells her that she doesn’t know the whole truth. When Patrick found out about Claudia and Eleonore’s affair, he attacked them but when Alex tried to help, he accidentally pushed Claudia over the balcony and killed her.
Patrick helped cover it up and is incensed that Eleonore was going to use the secret to ruin Patrick. Olivia finds a gun in Alex’s room and while everyone is preoccupied, she points it at her father and kills him.
Two broken hearts
Louise pushes Alex away after he tries to force himself upon her at the party. She runs into her mother who once again pesters her about her medication and how she can be a burden.
Daan arrives at that moment because he needs to tell Lousie how he feels about her and she asks him to take her away. They ride out to the beach and share their love for each other.
However, Louise believes that she cannot truly be with anyone because of her disorder and apologizes to him before running away in anguish.
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