What is the success of the five seasons of ‘La casa de papel’?

Four and a half years after its modest results on the Antena 3 television network, the series The Money Heist (Money Heist) premiered its last five chapters on Netflix this Friday and with them ends the most successful Spanish fiction of all time, which has forever changed the Spanish audiovisual scene.

I think that: He who kills iron, dies iron in ‘La casa de papel’

At the end of 2017, with its actors thinking that everything would end there after the robbery of the Mint and audiences plummeting, Netflix bought its rights, put it in its international catalog and word of mouth managed to turn it into a worldwide phenomenon, and Today it is the second most watched series in the platform’s history.

It was one of the first displays of the global power of the streaming. But, what has fiction to have liked so much, from Tokyo to Bogotá? After a series of interviews with his team, his cast and fans, here are the keys.

Powerful Symbols: A Color, a Mask, and a Song

The Money Heist (Money Heist) would not be the same without its iconography. A red jumpsuit, a symbol of rebellion, passion and revolution. A mask reminiscent of that of V for Vendetta de Guy Fawkes, adopted by Anonymous activists, but nationalized with the face of Salvador Dalí, the symbol of resistance and surrealism. And a hymn song, the Bella Ciao, proposed by the screenwriter and co-executive producer, Javier Gómez Santander. The anthem of the Italian partisans that encouraged the anti-fascist resistance in World War II.

The phenomenon Robin Hood

It is not the same to steal from a company or someone rich, than from an entire system. In a climate of social exhaustion, political disappointment and global crisis, citizens soon embraced the symbol of resistance. The symbiosis was such that the mask, the monkey and the Bella Ciao soon they began to be used in different social protests throughout the world. From the military coup in Myanmar, to the yellow vests in France, to the marches against gender violence throughout Latin America.

A global show …

The city names of the characters emerged from a T-shirt of Álex Pina who said “Tokio”. As a result, they all arrived in a row: Nairobi, Denver, Bogotá, Rio… A wake-up call to the citizens of the five continents. And it is that, despite his initial disappointment in hearings, The Money Heist (Money Heist) was always an ambitious and global project, say its creators. After the arrival of Netflix, globalization was sought even more and the budget allowed to shoot seasons 3-5 in places like Thailand, Italy, Panama, Denmark or Portugal.

But Castizo …

The local is hooked in Spain and powerfully draws attention abroad. The topics of the Spanish, the traditional and the traditional, the passion although bombs fall, the black humor, the jokes in tense moments. The paella as a symbol of truce between the Government and the robbers.

Some characters stained, identifiable and full of emotions

Álex Pina, its creator, tells that the environment that surrounds the series arises from mixing two opposing concepts, action and intimacy, and from breaking the rule that “action movies are empty and superficial and intimate ones are boring” . This is where their characters, stained and imperfect beings that have nothing to do with the typical good white protagonist, but that have a strong emotional charge that brings them closer to the viewer. Those who look at them establish links with them, feel them deeply close, identify themselves.

The theory of Alba Flores

The actress Alba Flores (who plays Nairobi in the series), has his own theory, the football theory, that his partner remembered Úrsula Corberó in an interview with Efe: “She said, what is it that attracts people the most internationally? Football. And, if you realize, this is like football because there are two teams, also some dressed in red and others in blue (the policemen), there is an anthem, which is the Bella CiaoThere is a game strategy, there is politics embedded in it, there is a referee, who would be the teacher… ”.

The realism

That everything the scripts tell, no matter how crazy it may seem, be realistic and possible. For this, the members of the series’ documentation team say, documentation is key. Learn from a real workshop how to melt gold (which in the series is brass) and turn it into shot or design with a naval engineer an interconnection antechamber to access the vault of the Bank of Spain.

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The duration

In Spain the episodes of series of prime time traditionally lasted 70 minutes, a time much longer than usual in the rest of the world. When Netflix acquired the rights, it adapted the duration of the episodes to 45-50 minutes and that is why the first two seasons abroad have more episodes than in Spain. In seasons 3-5 the chapters are already 45-50 minutes long, a more suitable duration for the narrative rhythm and also for the marathons of series that many viewers love. (I)