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Elite Season 1 Review

Elite is a Spanish thriller teen drama television series created for Netflix by Carlos Montero. Its first season premiered in 2018 and it consists of eight episodes.

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“We have always relied on good times and bad times“

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I had never expected that I would be watching and actually enjoying a full-on soap opera, but here I am in 2021 watching Elite and just loving it to pieces. Yes, it’s a guilty pleasure. Yes, it’s quite manipulative and overly contrived in some plot developments. And yes, the murder element itself was very much like ‘Big Little Lies’, but even trashier. Still though, the show does so many things so right that I ended up appreciating it despite its trashy framing.

Following the many students and their relationships as they enroll in a very expensive school and the class differences that quickly make themselves clear, the show is much clever than it had any right to be. First and foremost, it deals with classism and class war in Spain, and getting a glimpse into the titular elite was both disturbing and important. The show also explores homophobia, xenophobia, drug problems and many different sexualities and kinks, making it both juicy and very modern in that regard.

The character work that the show does makes it very unique. We’ve all seen these archetypes and their typical stories that are walking clichés in some examples, but the series creators do something really special with these tired elements by elevating them with amazing character development and a fantastic focus put into every single soul inhabiting this school. We get fresh and differing perspectives throughout, thus making it easy to get wrapped up in all the drama when it arrives.

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Let’s talk about these characters and their arcs throughout this season. Marina is a tragic figure. She is the one who ends up dead in the end and her entire story of her struggle with her HIV status and her rift with her rich family was so well done. The only thing I did not like at all was that love triangle between her and the two brothers, which was both tasteless and very clichéd. But the character herself worked for me and her death I felt in the end.

Samuel is your straightforward protagonist of sorts and is too much of a goody two-shoes for now. I also did not care for Nano as I found his entire criminal background and arc overused and boring, though some of those moments were thrilling. The adult characters were also solidly realized, especially the teacher one, but most of the focus is rightly put squarely on the adolescents.

Christian, Carla and Polo. Wow, is this threesome arrangement/relationship steamy and juicy. This is by far the most entertaining part of the season. Christian is such a fun, arrogant dude while Carla will do anything to save her family and her cold, imposing nature is intimidating. Polo himself is a fragile soul and him ending up being a murderer made sense in the context of the story and the character. This dynamic between the three explores not only bisexuality, but also jealousy, class differences and the inherently problematic nature of such an arrangement.

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The other LGBT couple are Ander and Omar. The whole story with Ander and his parents being overly ambitious was a bit tiresome, but Omar hiding from his father and feeling the pressure to marry was very well done. I would have gone without that drug dealing part, but still these two worked and the show not making a big deal out of their sexuality in the context of their friends was refreshingly modern.

Probably the most extensive arc is the love story that develops between Nadia and Guzman. He is very full of himself as this rich, almost obnoxious kid. But he’s got an extra personality trait of being very loyal and committed as a friend and family member. She is the typical Muslim girl at first, but her growth was commendable as she finally learned to break free from the grips of her domineering father.

How they deal with Muslims and Islam was problematically positive at first, but thankfully they did end up acknowledging just how horrendous the parenting from these countries is and how restrictive their religion is toward youths in particular. Lucretia is the most soap-opera type character as this rich, confident, smart and beautiful girl who’s got it all and the rivalry that develops between the two is familiar, but unabashedly fun.

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