Money Heist (2017–2021)

The first two parts of Money Heist follow a mysterious man in Madrid, Sergio Marquina (Álvaro Morte), better known as "the Professor", who recruits a group of eight people, who choose city names as their aliases – Silene Oliveira "Tokyo" (Úrsula Corberó), Andrés de Fonollosa "Berlin" (Pedro Alonso), Agustín Ramos "Moscow" (Paco Tous), Ágata Jiménez "Nairobi" (Alba Flores), Aníbal Cortés "Rio" (Miguel Herrán), Daniel Ramos "Denver" (Jaime Lorente), Mirko Dragić "Helsinki" (Darko Perić) and Radko Dragić "Oslo" (Roberto García Ruiz) –, to carry out an ambitious plan that involves entering the Royal Mint of Spain, and escaping with €2.4 billion. After taking 67 people hostage inside the Mint, the team plans to remain inside for 11 days to print the money as they deal with elite police forces.

In parts three to five, after the events of the heist on the Mint, the group's members are forced out of hiding after Río is caught thanks to an intercepted phone, and prepare for a second heist, this time on the Bank of Spain, with some additional members – Martín Berrote "Palermo" (Rodrigo de la Serna), Santiago Lopez "Bogotá" (Hovik Keuchkerian) and Jakov "Marseille" (Luka Peroš)–, to force Europol to hand over Rio and prevent his torture. After entering the Bank, they aim to escape with gold, as they deal once again with hostages and police forces.

Money Heist: Korea – Joint Economic Area (2022)

As a remake of Money Heist, Money Heist: Korea – Joint Economic Area follows a similar story to that of the original series. Set in a reunified Korea that came to be due to a Joint Economic Area built at the expense of the lower classes, strategist criminal mastermind Park Sun-ho (Yoo Ji-tae), nicknamed "the Professor", enlists a group of people, who choose city names as their aliases – Lee Hong-dan "Tokyo" (Jeon Jong-seo), Song Jung-ho "Berlin" (Park Hae-soo), Oh Man-sik "Moscow" (Lee Won-jong), Sim Young-mun "Nairobi" (Jang Yoon-ju), Han Joseph "Rio" (Lee Hyun-woo), Oh Taek-su "Denver" (Kim Ji-hoon), Ko Myung-tae "Helsinki" (Kim Ji-hun) and Lee Sang-yeon "Oslo" (Lee Kyu-ho) – to pull a ₩4 trillion heist on the Mint based in the Joint Economic Area. After successfully entering the Mint and taking the hostages inside, the team attempts to remain inside for enough days to print the money while the police tries to stop them.

Berlin (2023)

Set in an "undefined past" before the events of Money Heist,^[33] Berlin focuses on Berlin while at his prime, as he prepares one of his most extraordinary heists in his career as a robber: stealing €44 million in jewels as if it was an illusionism act. To do this, he has the help of one of the three gangs he has robbed with in his life, formed by Keila (Michelle Jenner), Damián (Tristán Ulloa), Cameron (Begoña Vargas), Bruce (Joel Sánchez) and Roi (Julio Peña Fernández).^[34]

Money Heist: The Phenomenon (2020)

A documentary involving the producers and the cast of Money Heist, titled Money Heist: The Phenomenon (Spanish: La Casa de Papel: El Fenómeno), was released to Netflix on April 3, 2020.^[35] Looking at "how Money Heist became a global phenomenon", the series focuses on the series' "unexpected rise in popularity", its acquisition by Netflix, and its impact on culture across the world.^[36][37] It breaks down the production of the series, and includes interviews with the creators, cast and crew of the show.^[38][39]

Money Heist: From Tokyo to Berlin (2021)

A two-part sequel documentary, titled Money Heist: From Tokyo to Berlin and focusing on the production of the 26 additional episodes and the overall creation of the franchise of a whole, was released on 3 September and 3 December 2021, respectively, simultaneously with the final season of Money Heist.^[40]

Critical reception

The first two parts of Money Heist received positive reviews from Spanish television critics.^[9] Nayín Costas of El Confidencial named the premiere a promising start that captivated viewers with "adrenaline, well-dosed touches of humor and a lot of tension," but considered it a challenge to maintain the dramatic tension for the remainder of the series.^[41] While considering the pilot's voice-over narration unnecessary and the sound editing and dialogs lacking, Natalia Marcos of El País enjoyed the show's ensemble cast and the ambition, saying "It is daring, brazen and entertaining, at least when it starts. Now we want more, which is not little."^[42] Reviewing the full first part, Marcos lauded the series for its outstanding direction, the musical selection and for trying to innovate Spanish television, but criticized the length and ebbing tension.^[10] At the end of the series' original run, Costas commended the series for its "high quality closure" that may make the finale "one of the best episodes of the Spanish season", but regretted that it aimed to satisfy viewers with a predictable happy ending rather than risk to "do something different, original, ambitious", and that the show was unable to follow in the footsteps of Pina's Locked Up.^[43]

After the series' move to Netflix for its international release, foreign critics also praised the series. Adrian Hennigan of the Israeli Haaretz said the series was "more of a twisty thriller than soapy telenovela, driven by its ingenious plot, engaging characters, tense flash points, pulsating score and occasional moments of humor", but taunted the English title "Money Heist" as bland.^[44] In a scathing review, Pauline Bock of the British magazine New Statesman questioned the global hype of the series, saying that it was "full of plot holes, clichéd slow-motions, corny love stories and gratuitous sex scenes", before continuing to add that "the music is pompous, the voice-over irritating, and it's terribly edited".^[14] John Doyle of The Globe and Mail praised parts 1 and 2 for the heist genre subversions; he also said that the series could be "deliciously melodramatic at times" with "outrageous twists and much passion" like a telenovela.^[45] Jennifer Keishin Armstrong of the BBC saw the series' true appeal in the interpersonal dramas emerging through the heist between "the beautiful robbers, their beautiful hostages, and the beautiful authorities trying to negotiate with them."^[46] David Hugendick of Die Zeit found the series "sometimes a bit sentimental, a little cartoonesque," and the drama sometimes too telenovela-like, but "all with a good sense for timing and spectacle."^[47]

The third part also received positive reviews, although they were slightly less so than those of its predecessors. On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, it received an approval rating of 100% based on 12 reviews, with an average rating of 7/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "An audacious plan told in a non-linear fashion keeps the third installment moving as Money Heist refocuses on the relations between its beloved characters."^[48] While lauding the technical achievements, Javier Zurro of El Español described the third part as "first-class entertainment" that was unable to transcend its roots and lacked novelty. He felt unaffected by the internal drama between the characters and specifically, disliked Tokyo's narration for its hollowness.^[49] Alex Jiménez of Spanish newspaper ABC found part 3 mostly succeeding in its attempts to reinvent the show and stay fresh.^[50] Euan Ferguson of The Guardian recommended watching part 3, as "it's still a glorious Peaky Blinders, just with tapas and subtitles,"^[51] while Pere Solà Gimferrer of La Vanguardia found that the number of plot holes in part 3 could only be endured with constant suspension of disbelief.^[52] Though entertained, Alfonso Rivadeneyra García of Peruvian newspaper El Comercio said the show does "what it does best: pretend to be the most intelligent boy in class when, in fact, it is only the cleverest."^[53]

The South Korean remake, Money Heist: Korea – Joint Economic Area, also enjoyed mixed-to-positive reviews from professional critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, it had an approval rating of 83% based on 12 reviews, with an average rating of 6.40/10.^[54] On Metacritic, the series has a weighted average score of 55 out of 100 based on 5 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".^[55] Joel Keller of Decider appreciated the performances of Yoo Ji-tae as the Professor, Jeon Jong-seo as Tokyo and Kim Yun-jin as Seon Woo-jin, writing, "each providing just the right tone to make the show less an over-the-top heist series and more of a layered treatise on the economic gap that everyone is suffering through at this stage in world history." Keller concluded, "If you're a fan of Money Heist, you'll like Money Heist: Korea – Joint Economic Area."^[56] Pierce Conran of the South China Morning Post rated the series with 3.5 out of 5 stars and wrote, "the purpose of Money Heist is to entertain rather than educate, and entertain it does with a story that hums along with all the thrills and twists required of a well-planned and inventively thwarted heist narrative."^[57] Daniel Hart of Ready Steady Cut graded the part 1 of season 1 with 3.5 stars out of 5 and wrote, "The production is impressive, the script is punchy, and the characters do well to represent their original counterparts." In conclusion Wilson wrote, "this remake is worth the time and investment, at least for the purely invested performances and production. Money Heist is back, so we shouldn't grumble."^[58] Kate Sánchez writing in Butwhythopodcast rated the part 1 8.5/10 and praised the cast writing, "Money Heist Korea is a phenomenal series because of its cast," Sánchez liked the chemistry between cast, writing, "chemistry that crackles between each and every cast member that pushes Money Heist Korea to be a dynamic show with uncertainty running through every scene." Concluding her review Sánchez wrote, "Ultimately Money Heist is expertly crafted to push tension and showcase action while also managing to investigate the way people interact with each other."^[59] S. Poorvaja of The Hindu wrote, "The first season of Money Heist: Korea - Joint Economic Area gets right in terms of its setting and characters, but here's hoping the makers push the envelope and take some risks in the second season."^[60]

Public response

After the move to Netflix, the series remained the most-followed series on Netflix for six consecutive weeks and became one of the most popular series on IMDb.^[13] It regularly trended on Twitter world-wide, largely because celebrities commented on it, such as football players Neymar and Marc Bartra, American singer Romeo Santos,^[61] and author Stephen King.^[62] While users flooded social networks with media of themselves wearing the robbers' outfit,^[61] the robbers' costumes were worn at the Rio Carnival, and Dalí icons were shown on huge banners in Saudi Arabia football stadiums.^[13] Real footage of these events would later be shown in part 3 as a tribute to the show's international success.^[50] The Musée Grévin in Paris added statues of the robbers to its wax museum in summer 2018.^[14] The show's iconography was used prominently by third parties for advertising,^[63] sports presentations,^[64] and in porn.^[65]

There have also been negative responses to the influence of the show. In numerous incidents, real heist men wore the show's red costumes and Dalì masks in their attacks or copied the fictional robbers' infiltration plans.^[14][61][66] The robbers' costumes were banned at the 2019 Limassol Carnival Festival as a security measure as a result.^[67] The series was used in an attack on YouTube, when hackers removed the most-played song in the platform's history, "Despacito", and left an image of the show instead.^[68] In unrelated reports, a journalist from Turkish TV channel AkitTV and an Ankaran politician have both warned against the show for supposedly encouraging terrorism and being "a dangerous symbol of rebellion".^[14]

Spanish newspaper El Mundo saw the public response as a reflection of the "climate of global disenchantment" where the robbers represent the "perfect antiheroes",^[69] and the New Statesman explained the show's resonance with international audiences as coming from the "social and economic tensions it depicts, and because of the utopian escape it offers."^[14] Viewer response was especially high in Mediterranean Europe and the Latin world, in particular Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, Brazil, Chile and Argentina,^[16] so Spanish as a common language did not appear to be a unifying reason for the show's success.^[12] Writer Javier Gómez Santander and actor Pedro Alonso (Berlin) rather argued that the Latin world used to feel at the periphery of global importance, but a new sentiment was coming that Spain could compete with the global players in terms of media production levels and give the rest of the world a voice.^[12][70] The series was one of two Spanish language TV series to be featured in TV Time's top 50 most followed TV shows ever, currently being the fifth most followed series on the platform.^[71]

Accolades