Narcos: Mexico first-look review – Diego Luna is compelling new drug lord Felix Gallardo as Netflix drama begins afresh Narcos: Mexico has chosen a serendipitous time to tell the blood-soaked story of the nation’s terrible drug war

Even with its commitment to historical fact, the first three seasons of Narcos was always gripping drama, covering the rise and fall of Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar and the Cali Cartel that succeeded him.

With that story coming to a natural end, showrunner Eric Newman has decided to take the show in a (slightly) new direction: by moving the action to Mexico.

So Narcos: Mexico on Netflix has been billed as a “reset”, with a new cast of characters, a new story, and a new cartel. Or at least, the beginnings of one.

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Once upon a time in Mexico…

Fans may have been hoping for an immediate return to action for charismatic DEA agent Javier Peña, played by Pedro Pascal. After all, the conclusion of season three saw him back in his native Mexico at his father’s home by the Rio Grande, contemplating the depressing reality that the drug money had simply moved north with the demise of the Colombian cartels he’d fought to bring to justice.

However, it now seems clear that this coda was written as a precursor to the geographical direction of the show, rather than Peña’s arc.

That’s because the opening episode of Narcos: Mexico jumps back in time to the early 1980s, when drug trafficking in the nation was still in its disorganised, fragmented infancy.

We’re introduced to the first of two new main characters, Félix Gallardo (played by Diego Luna, of Y Tu Mamá También and Star Wars: Rogue One fame), as he strikes out on his own from the Sinaloa Cartel.

First he fools an entire squad of soldiers that he’s a police officer (in fact he had been one in his younger days) in order to free his brother Rafa, who is an expert marijuana farmer. Then he leaves Sinaloa along with Rafa and a cynical senior associate, Don Neto, to set up a new drug farming operation in the more civilised Guadalajara.

The rationale is that the army is far less likely to act with brutal impunity against the drugs traffickers, with the full glare of the media upon them (Sinaloa is portrayed as a rural backwater by comparison).

A new agent in a new DEA

Meanwhile, 1,700 miles north in Fresno, California, DEA agent Kiki Camarena (Michael Peña) has reached an impasse in his career. Fed up of his low-level undercover work, not to mention his colleagues’ casual racism, the final straw is a rejection for a move to Miami.

Instead, he’s offered the less-than-enticing destination of Guadalajara. Eventually, his pregnant wife acquiesces and they move south of the border, where Camarena is immediately faced with the corruption and lack of jurisdiction he’ll have to get used to.

It’s also a relatively new DEA (the agency was only set up in 1973), so it’s clear that Kiki and his new colleagues – including Matt Letscher as his boss Joaquín Cosio – will have their work cut out when Mexico’s new cartels inevitably get their act together.

So the scene is set for another high-stakes game of cat-and-mouse between the DEA and the cartel, and this time the backdrop is the sun-scorched hills of Mexico rather than the colourful streets of Medellín.

Whether Narcos: Mexico can match the cinematic ambition and compelling twists and turns of the first three seasons remains to be seen, but this hour-long opener is a very solid start, and Luna’s Gallardo seems to be more cool-headed and enigmatic than Wagner Moura’s tempestuous Escobar.

What’s not in doubt is that we can expect the same faithfulness to fact that was such a feature of the first three seasons – and much of the English language dialogue of the show is uttered by an American narrator who sets out the historical context.

With Mexican kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán’s trial just getting underway in New York amid unprecedented security, Narcos: Mexico has chosen a serendipitous time to tell the blood-soaked story of the nation’s terrible drug war, and the human toll that it’s taken over the past few decades.

Narcos: Mexico is released on Netflix on Friday 16 November

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