Elite - the Spanish show that deserves international attention

Netflix’s Elite has been described as Spain’s answer to Gossip Girl, but with fresh themes, nuanced characters, and hidden depths, it’s in a league of its own

Sun-drenched mansions, a state-of-the-art school, and glamorous cliques - welcome to the rich world of Elite. This Netflix Spanish-language teen drama has been compared to Gossip Girl and Riverdale thanks its privileged cost of characters with model good looks and seasons centred on murder mysteries. But labelling this highly addictive show as a derivative of these well-past-their-prime US series does it a disservice. In fact, Elite has hidden depths and deserves international attention.

The show revolves around a group of teens from different socio-economic classes, brought together at prestigious academy, Las Encinas. The school’s wealthy clique - made up of mean girl Lucrecia (Lu), adopted brother and sister Marina and Guzman, childhood sweethearts Polo and Carla, and Ander, the headmistress’s son - is thrown into chaos by the arrival of scholarship students Samuel (Samu), Nadia, and Christian. A non-linear narrative is used to let us know straightaway where we’re heading: the murder (spoiler alert) of Marina. We spend the rest of the first season switching between the events that led to Marina’s death and the police interviews that followed it.

Of course, with a cast this good looking, the central mystery shares the spotlight with love triangles and forbidden romances. As the three tightly-paced seasons unfold, the destruction of Polo and Carla’s relationship by Christian, and later Samu, the triangle between Lu, Guzman and Nadia, and Ander’s coming out and subsequent romance with Nadia’s brother Omar all add an extra layer of drama and some very steamy scenes.

So far, so Gossip Girl right? Elite definitely shares that show’s glossy sheen. The rich teens live in sprawling mansions with conveniently absent parents, travel in chauffeur-driven sports cars, have wild parties in the VIP section of a local club, and wear school uniforms that wouldn’t look out of place on the catwalk at Madrid Fashion Week.

But dig a little deeper and Elite has a lot more to offer than consumerist fantasy. In fact, the glamour serves to emphasise the deep class divisions between the original clique and the scholarship students. And that separation remains, even when the group is brought together by the ensuing drama.

It was easy to forget that Gossip Girl’s Dan Humphrey was meant to be the ‘ultimate outsider’ when he was also living in a multi-million dollar Brooklyn loft, getting short stories published in the New Yorker at 17, and dating a Hollywood actress. Elite doesn’t make similar concessions. The two groups of students inhabit very different worlds outside of school; contrast Samu’s dimly lit apartment with its shades of dull yellow and brown with Marina and Guzman’s glistening all-white hilltop villa with its crystal-clear outside swimming pool.

The two groups do spend time in each other’s worlds but always feel authentically out of place. Christian in his loud Hawaiian shirts failing to blend in at Polo’s parties, Carla awkwardly eating Same’s leftover pasta, and Guzman clumsily stacking shelves in Nadia’s family shop - the audience is painfully aware that these are temporary forays into how the other half lives rather than characters truly embracing or understanding one another’s lives.

But Elite is too smart to be a series that just offers rich vs. poor. The characters aren’t defined by their class, but their family situations and backgrounds do influence their actions. Poverty isn’t romanticised but wealth isn’t shown as the solution either. Samu lives with his single mother and ex-con brother and has to juggle school work with a dangerous part-time job and a relationship where it’s automatically assumed he’s not good enough because of his background. In contrast, Carla is a marchioness and heiress, but that doesn’t stop her parents from essentially selling her to teen tech millionaire Yeray in return for an investment in their company.

Adults don’t come off well in the world of Elite. Carla’s father is arguably the worst but Lu also has to deal with a mostly absent father who doesn’t see her worth, Ander’s mother gives in easily to the demands of parents with money, and Polo’s mothers throw their weight around to try and help their son but just end up making things worse.

Difficult parents aren’t limited to the wealthy. Nadia, a practising Muslim, constantly comes up against her domineering father. It's frustrating - and one of the show’s flaws - that its only Muslim family are portrayed as strictly conservative and intolerant to a fault, but family and religion are central to Nadia’s character. Her fear of shaming her parents and desire to make the most of the opportunity presenter by the scholarship drives much of the conflict she encounters in her new school and keep the stakes high in her will-they-won’t-they relationship with Guzman.

And nobody is innocent. Over three seasons, every character makes at least one morally grey choice. Elite thrives on drama and epic reveals but one its most impressive twists is making its killers truly sympathetic characters. And I don’t mean in a Dexter way. When it’s uncovered that it was Polo who killed Marina, he doesn’t become an anti-hero or an instant villain. He makes a lot of bad choices: asking Carla to lie for him, letting Samu’s brother Nano take the blame, and deceiving his best friend Guzman, but he still evokes sympathy.

He may not up in jail but Polo doesn’t escape lightly. And he’s not evil. He made a rash, spur-of-the-moment decision and had to live with guilt slowly poisoning him from the inside out. And thanks to Elite’s world-building, the audience comes to understand his actions. Bullied by his friends, coddled by his mothers, confused about his sexuality, and painfully insecure, he’s a pathetic figure. So, when Guzman finally forgives him as he lays dying, it’s virtually impossible for the viewer not to forgive him too.

The same can be said of his killer, Lu. Season three makes a lot of mistakes, it keeps the core couples apart for too long, introduces unlikeable new characters and destroys others (Omar, how could you?), but it does provide a great redemption arc for Lu. When her father cuts her off, she shows that she’s resilient and can survive without her family’s wealth and support. She also finally cuts both Guzman and Valerio loose and maintains her academic competitive streak while finding a new respect for Nadia.

When Lu confronts Polo in the bathroom and learns that he’s the reason she’ll lose her scholarship to the US, her only option for college and the thing she’s worked for against all odds, it’s understandable that she snaps. And that Polo would forgive her for it. After all, no one could relate more to what happens when you lose control for a moment and have to deal with the terrible repercussions. When Lu gets her happy ending, it’s hard to begrudge it.

While Elite certainly shares traits with Gossip Girl and Riverdale, those shows aren’t in the same league. It’s campy, over-the-top, and loses its way in the third season, but it also tackles themes that aren’t discussed in a lot of US teen drama, especially when it comes to class and privilege. It remains to be seen whether it will continue to build on these topics in the next three seasons, especially as it will have an almost entirely new cast, but its first three are certainly worth a watch. Just make sure you choose the subtitled version, not the dubbed!