Decoding the irresistible appeal of Money Heist: Nothing ever goes according to plan. Just like my life.-Entertainment News , Firstpost

When the going gets tough, we turn to our favourite guilty pleasures. But when entertainment is concerned, is there even any guilt to what gives one pleasure? In our new series Pleasure Without Guilt, we look at pop offerings that have been dissed by the culture police but continue to endure as beacons of unadulterated pleasure.

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*Spoilers ahead*

It was the wink that did it for me.

The concluding scene of Money Heist’s latest season saw my jaw hit the floor, because the producers did something no one expected. I knew the show – which follows a group of Robinhood-style robbers attempting heists – would kill off main characters. I didn’t expect this main character to die.

The scene was heroic: an injured Tokyo (the narrator thus far), unable to escape, is shot by a hail of bullets. She takes down her shooters, including the much-hated guard, Gandía, by detonating grenades on her chest. And she winks at him before doing it. It was exciting.

But then, there’s nary a dull moment in Money Heist/ La Casa de Papel.

The Spanish show arrived on Netflix in 2017 after a tepid run in Spain, and soon became a global hit. The Salvador Dali masks sported by the robbers started trending worldwide, showing up at protests. The catchy anti-fascist song ‘Bella Ciao‘ became an anthem in the first two seasons. At one point, the show was the most popular non-English series on Netflix. The popularity meant Money Heist was renewed for three additional seasons. Season 5 (part 1) dropped in September; the concluding part will be aired in December.

Money Heist follows a group of misfits/ criminals, led by the quiet and methodical Professor. Their first heist, which is successful, is in the Royal mint of Spain. In Season 3, the arrest of one of their own brings them out of hiding, and they take over the Bank of Spain.

I started watching the show because I had just seen a few heist films, and was in the phase of watching Spanish telenovelas. Besides, I wanted that push towards learning Spanish — there’s nothing like hearing the characters emote in Spanish. On a side note, the English voiceovers and translations of non-English content on Netflix is really awful, and doesn’t take into account slang, and the little nuances of the language. I barely know Spanish, but it’s easy to make out the translations don’t do it justice.

The Spanish show ticks off all the boxes for an addictive watch. The show has love, tension, drama, money, comedy, too many explosions and bullets, and of course the ubiquitous masks and those red jumpsuits. And nothing, nothing ever goes according to plan. Just like my life! Bonus: you get to allow people on Twitter to prove they’re morally superior because they don’t like the show. It’s a good deed, if there was one.

Money Heist could easily be a Bollywood film, either starring the actor who popularised passing on crimes to other people, or the one whose patriotism extends to being a citizen of another country. It is mindless, there’s too much drama (much of it unnecessary), there are a clutch of good-looking people – fit and sexy, there is emotion, and there is even singing and dancing. The exception:

I won’t watch those Bollywood films but I will watch Money Heist again.

I enjoy the show. It is incredibly annoying, at times. It doesn’t make sense. It is mindless. There are glaring bloopers and errors. The action isn’t great and often over-the top in a manner that would leave Rohit Shetty taking down notes. It helps that Spanish people are beautiful, and the language, even when they’re fighting, is pleasing to the ears. The first two seasons are gripping.

Its popularity proved to be its own downfall. The second heist got complicated and bogged down by too many issues. If the first two seasons worked on the ‘heist’ aspect, the following seasons abandoned it altogether. The focus, like Spanish telenovelas, turned to emotion rather than action. Characters got detailed backgrounds. They touched upon military torture and PTSD. Sadly, the few women characters who start out strong seem to lose their way. And they get killed. Season 5 is a good indication that the show has lost its plot, and the actual heist appears to be forgotten.

I started watching Season 5 (Part 1) at a particular low point, and finished it in a day.

Money Heist works because of its characters (each named after a city). They aren’t the best. In fact, they highlight the worst qualities in any person: prone to f*ck ups, quick to pass on the blame, always out to prove they’re better, sometimes incredibly selfish. They’re a mess, and make incompetent decisions. Who cannot identify with those very base flaws?

There isn’t one character that is completely good, and it’s the precise reason to love them. They fall in love, get their hearts broken, and yet continue fighting. They lose loved ones, and pick up guns in the next moment. They debate homosexuality and consent. They play mind games. When irritated, they make frequent quests for power. They confess their feelings in the middle of a hailstorm of bullets. They even turn guns on each other! They prod people at their weak points, and rile them up needlessly. They bounce back after every f*ck up.

I, and most fans, can get behind every character, except one. No, it isn’t the man who forced a hostage to have sex with him, or the one who changed sides on being ousted as leader, or the ruthless killer who shoots a robber point blank in the head. It is Arturito/ Arturo Roman – the director of The Royal Mint of Spain who had an affair with his secretary, and then wanted her to abort the child. He has a hero complex that makes him do mean, despicable things. In the documentary on Money Heist, executive producer Jesús Colmenar says people love to hate on Arturo because “he represents the meanness within all of us. You recognise certain base passions of the viewers themselves in Arturo, and that’s why you can’t stand him.” It’s unanimous that he is the most hated character in the show despite the presence of other caricature-ish villains.

The show is over-the-top, and doesn’t pretend to be otherwise. Money Heist works well when detailing the unusual relationships: the mentor-mentee one between the professor and Tokyo, the warm friendship between Helsinki and Nairobi, the bonding between the two main female characters, Tokyo and Nairobi, and the brotherhood between Berlin and the Professor.

When Season 5 (part 1) launched in September, it became the most in-demand series globally; the show’s top market was India. It’s become something people love to hate, like a C-Bag novel or the latest Rahul Gandhi press conference. At this point, most of us are just watching it to see how it ends.

Money Heist is undoubtedly my guilt watch. Though, to be honest, I have no guilt about watching it.

Read more from the Pleasure Without Guilt series here.

Joanna Lobo is an independent journalist from Goa, who enjoys writing about food, her Goan heritage, and other things that make her happy. By the side,  she co-owns a food publication: But First, Food and sends out a freelancing newsletter: It’s All Write.