Detective Forst follows the titular detective who’s a bit of a maverick when it comes to his approach to solving cases, which is also what gets him suspended while he tries to track down the serial killer terrorizing Zakopane, Poland.
An elderly history professor’s naked dead body is discovered at the mountaintop in Giewont. He’s tied up by ropes and hung from a tower.
Detective Forst, a maverick and unruly individual, got on the case and immediately looked for any evidence he could find.
He found a coin in the corpse’s throat and soon deduced that it was the work of a serial killer. Soon, more corpses are found in the same condition, and the killer is termed the “Beast of Giewont.”
The blood brothers
Wiktor and Iwo Elijah grew up together in an orphanage. The director of the orphanage was the stern Halina Sznajderman.
They had sworn loyalty and brotherhood to each other with a blood handshake.
Inseparable, the two had a strong bond that eventually got broken, giving rise to a man driven by revenge.
Iwo was always the one who took the blame for any shenanigans they pulled.
Wiktor was also quite comfortable with this arrangement and is shown to not have been an equally selfless friend to Iwo.
One day, the two snuck inside Halina’s office because Wiktor was very curious about her locket.
When she came running to the office, Wiktor handed the locket to Iwo immediately.
They were kids and only really curious, but Halina was furious and went on to treat Iwo, who had taken the blame as usual, with severe punishment.
Betrayal
Iwo took inhumane levels of beatings and punishments, while Wiktor watched from a distance. Then something happened that scarred Iwo worse than the beatings.
The Forsts came and adopted Wiktor, not Iwo, who was a petty little thief.
It was because of Wiktor that he got branded that, and yet Wiktor left him all alone at the orphanage.
He saw this as an ultimate betrayal, and this idea of betrayal was further solidified in his head by Halina, who is shown to have witnessed a young Iwo slashing Wiktor’s throat.
Wiktor survived that injury and went on to be raised by the Forsts, eventually becoming Detective Forst and returning to Zakopane.
A puppet for revenge
Iwo remained in the orphanage, where his mistreatment continued, as Halina brainwashed him and groomed him to become her puppet.
She saw him as a means of revenge that she always wanted to exact upon the Nazi collaborators who treated her mother in the most abhorrent ways.
They raped and abused her, driving her mad for a few years before she finally died. Halina was a result of Leon Lowotarski’s crimes.
Leon headed the collaborators and the brothel where they committed heinous crimes and subjected numerous young girls to their depravity.
Halina raised Iwo as her machine for revenge, controlling him to take the lives of the collaborators and even their descendants who still live.
I had strings but now I’m free
However, Halina erred in the presumption that she controlled Iwo. He grew up with his own desire for vengeance against Wiktor festering inside him for years.
He started taking the descendants out one by one. Wiktor got on the case as a detective but Halina used her power to take him out of the case, as he could recognize Iwo.
Detective Forst was eventually suspended but he continued investigating outside his jurisdiction, along with the headstrong and relentless journalist Olag Szrebska.
Iwo plants Aureus coins in each victim’s throats, as a hint for Wiktor, because the stealing incident in their childhood involved Halina’s locket, which was one such Aureus coin.
Wiktor’s investigations eventually take him to Halina, who reveals Iwo has been the Beast of Giewont all this time. Iwo soon kills her because she’s the offspring of Leon Lowotarski.
Damning detective Forst
He then continues to make life a constant suffering for him. He kills his colleagues and friends but fails to kill him during their big climactic fight in the Detective Forst finale.
Before the credits roll, he’s gravely injured, in a quasi-conscious state, being driven somewhere unknown by Olga, in her car.
Meanwhile, Detective Forst is at the center of all the crime scenes, with blood in his hands, fingerprints on the weapons, and heroin in his system.
All signs point to him being the serial killer in the eyes of the law, but the real one is out of the grasp of the authorities, and the story isn’t over yet.
Also Read: Halina Sznajderman: Detective Forst character explained