Narcos - Season 1 (2015)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2015
	Creators: Carlo Bernard, Chris Brancato, Doug Miro, Paul Eckstein
	Actors: Wagner Moura (Elite Squad 1-2, Elysium), Boyd Holbrook, Pedro Pascal (The Adjustment Bureau, Game of Thrones TV-series)
	Country: USA
	Genre: Polar, Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: January-February 2016, HD VOD, Home cinema
Synopsis: The rise of Pablo Escobar (Moura) as the leader of a drug-trafficking empire and the efforts by American DEA agents Javier Peña and Steve Murphy (Pascal & Holbrook) to stop him.
Review: Over the past few years I have been very careful to watch only TV-series that had been recommended to be my several friends, in order to perform a good selection and not spend too much time watch such series that I know can take a lot of it. After Battlestar Galactica I have mostly limited myself to Sons of Anarchy, Game of Thrones and Sherlock. Although having heard little about it, Narcos was one I had to see. The most interesting with it is how real it looks: from characters to clothes, sets, back-story and details like moustaches make you feel like you are watching a documentary. Note that there exists in fact a documentary on the same topic (Los tiempos de Pablo Escobar) and a Colombian TV-series (Pablo Escobar: El Patrón del Mal) that I am eager to watch. What also helps realism is that most dialogs are in Spanish (although Columbians complained about the accent of Pablo for example, I am not skilled to recognized such detail), uncommon for American series but necessary when your story takes place in Columbia. Only the scenes involving the American newcomer are spoken in English. Also a great idea to have the audience follow this guy for a better identification. The first episode (Descendo) is an introduction to how cocaine came to Columbia and I thought then that the whole series would be shot in this impersonal documentary style but instead we quickly settle to our main character (Pablo and the DEA partners) that will stay the main focus point. The next episode (The Sword of Simón Bolivar) settles the basis of drug trafficking: political corruption, police bribing, gathering in cartel and when this is not enough kidnappings, killings and even terrorism. The scenes when they have so much money they don't know where to store it also reminded me of the movie Blow with Johnny Depp and Penelope Cruz, depicting more or less the same events but from an American point of view focusing on another character. The following episodes show us how drugs wars engulfed the whole country, until the key Episode#7 (You Will Cry Tears of Blood) full of twists and a no-less satisfying end of season. It is obvious that the story was modified for dramatisation effect (in the dialogs and maybe relationship and existence of some characters), but it is also apparent that the true facts didn't need exaggeration: they are violent and horrible enough to provoke the audience reaction expected from such a series.
Rating: 8 /10