Chapter 7: Strange Frequencies

General
**Gallery**

This article is about one of the episodes from the Netflix-exclusive television series.
You may be looking for the graphic novel series of the same name.

## Credits

### Head Writer

Stephanie Simpson

***Strange Frequencies*** is the seventh episode of the third season, and the thirty-third episode overall, of the Hilda TV series. It was released on December 7th, 2023 on **Netflix**.

## Synopsis

Frida holds a town hall meeting to figure out why the nisse keep stealing from each other while Hilda tries to decode her radio's cryptic messages.

## Summary

 This section contains spoilers of an episode, movie, or book.

It is night, when Hilda’s radio in her bedroom suddenly turns on and begins to broadcast a strange signal.

A few days later, Frida is woken up by the Nisse in her house. He drags her into Nowhere Space because he needs help; his timer has been stolen. Frida finds it ironic since the Nisse always steals from her too. The thief is revealed to be another nisse. And this is no standalone incident; all over Trolberg nisse have picked up the habit of stealing from each other.

Frida talks it over with David and comes up with the plan to hold a townhall meeting. Then all Nisse can talk things over and stop stealing from each other. They go to Hilda in hopes that she will help, but Hilda has other things on her mind. She is convinced the strange signals picked up by her radio are a coded message from her dad, and that might mean he is in trouble. Frida and David are naturally skeptical, but Alfur agrees with Hilda. Then Tontu takes her radio for himself, dragging Hilda, Frida and David with him into Nowhere Space. The radio signals are even stronger there, implying they may be coming from within Nowhere Space. Then another nisse breaks into Tontu’s nowhere space and steals the radio. Hilda and Tontu fail to get it back, and Hilda realizes Frida’s idea of a townhall meeting may not be so bad after all.

So the kids get to work to prepare, going around Trolberg to get the Nisse interested in attending. At David’s suggestion, they promise there will be free food to bribe the nisse into coming. Hilda uses the opportunity to also ask the Nisse if they have seen her father, but they haven’t. The kids choose Scout Hall as the location, and prepare everything. At first it seems no nisse is going to come, but then one by one they show up.

The meeting however does not go the way Frida hoped. The nisse don’t trust each other, and keep accusing each other of theft. Frida tries various ways to retain order, like holding a roleplay session and introducing a talking stick to indicate which nisse is allowed to speak. But the nisse are ultimately too stubborn to cooperate. When Hilda then spots the nisse that took her radio and tries to take it back, the situation escalates and a massive fight between the nisse breaks out. In the fight, Hilda reclaims her radio, after which she, David, Frida, Twig and Tontu abandon the meeting, just before Raven Leader enters scout hall and finds the fighting nisse. She gets dragged into the fight too.

The kids return to Hilda’s house. Frida is angry with Hilda for ruining her meeting. Hilda at least has her radio back. When she turns it on, she picks up a broadcast from Victoria Van Gale. Naturally, everyone is surprised to hear from her again considering she vanished into a nowhere space void. Hilda however is also disappointed as this likely means the messages were not from her father after all. She has to accept Johanna was right and Anders simply abandoned them again. David and Frida leave, and Frida’s look makes Hilda realize she screwed up big time.

The following morning, Hilda allows Tontu to have the radio. For Tontu, the idea of someone willingly sharing something with him is a new experience, since Nisse usually don’t do this. This gives Hilda an idea to solve the problems of Frida and all the nisse. Together with Frida and David she creates a lending library, where Nisse can borrow anything they want as long as they also bring the stuff back. It is a great success.

With that problem solved, the kids decide to have some fun at Hilda’s house. Then Tontu asks them to be quiet so he can listen to his new favorite radio show, about a man looking for his daughter. It turns out Hilda was right after all; her father is with Victoria van Gale, wherever she is, and is trying to reach her through the radio. And he may be in trouble; Victoria warns her listeners about ‘hooded figures’ that they need to watch out for. Then Alfur returns home. He claims he has been traveling around, using elf radios in various locations to trace the source of Van Gale’s transmission. With his research, Hilda discovers the radio broadcasts are coming from Tofoten. And combined with Victoria’s warning about the hooded figures, she concludes Anders is somehow in the Fairy Mound.

Hilda decides she has to go back there. Frida and David come along as backup to pull her out of the fairy mound again. Alfur and Tontu don’t like the idea at all, but Tontu ultimately helps Hilda and friends get to the train station. After they’re gone, Johanna comes to bring Hilda and friends lunch. And when she finds the kids are gone, she demands Tontu and Alfur tell her where they are.

## Features characters

### Humans

* Hilda
* Frida
* David
* Johanna
* Raven Leader
* Gerda Gustav (cameo)
* Kaisa (cameo)
* Victoria Van Gale (voice only)
* Anders (voice only)

#### Nisse

* Tontu (alpha)
* Tontu (Frida's House)
* Tontu (David’s house)
* Tontu (tiny)
* Tontu (omega)
* Tontu (radio stealer)
* Tontu (egg timer thief)
* Various unnamed Nisse.

## Goofs & Errors

* Hilda's beret can be seen on the hanger even though she was wearing it already.

## Trivia

* This is the first and only episode of the series not to have "The" proceeding the main title.
* The song played during the scene where Hilda, Frida and David are going around Trolberg to inform the Nisse about the townhall meeting is “Talking to myself” by The Linda Lindas.
* The song played over the radio by Victoria van Gale is an original song named “Van Gale’s Lullaby”.
* This episode reveals that, despite the fact he frequently interacts with Alfur, Tontu never actually signed the paperwork.
* At 15:16, when Hilda angrily begins to take down all her research, two papers are briefly seen hanging next to each other on the wall; one contains a substitution cipher, and the other a secret message written in this cipher. The encoded message reads "Hilda's Dad is Harry Potter". Considering who Hilda's dad actually is, this was likely just a joke from the shows writers.

Secret message (right) and the cipher to translate it (left)