Review of the seventh season of the Netflix series ‘Elite’

During the first scenes of the seventh season of the Spanish teenage glamor series Elite The thread from the end of last year is picked up again and the question of who the characters were arises again. It’s never a good sign that they faded so quickly from recent memory. Little by little the memories return, but the temporary attack of amnesia indicates the complete interchangeability of the characters.

The series by Carlos Montero and Darío Madrona was never really realistic. Filthy rich teenagers who go to a luxury private school in Madrid and experience more in a year than an adult does in a lifetime. They hardly fight with their popularity, but mainly with themselves and each other. They attend decadent parties, keep their keepers at a distance, and copulate more frequently than a bunch of rabbits. Wonderful escapism, even a guilty pleasure. But the formula is getting really boring now.

The previous season took some bold turns in working with important themes like gender identity and domestic violence. Season seven’s eight episodes build on this uninspiredly, but the conflict is largely missing. The power couple of influencers Sara and Raúl still pay more attention to the likes than to their toxic power relationship, in which he has a free hand.

The sixth season ended with a shooting, the death of an important character, and Iván, the Brazilian son of a top-level soccer player, who ended up with his leg in a cast. He still plays an important role, because his ex Patrick has taken his heels, but Ivan finds new love in pizza delivery boy Joel and his cubic belly. However, this Joel turns out to tell about his blockages in his free time with Omar, a character we know from the beginning. Elite continue.

As an “too old teenager” with a unibrow, Omar has little interest in the elite Las Encinas school, but he is recruited to support a new communications app. This subtheme, meant to draw attention to depression among teenagers and highlight another love triangle, dies an untimely death. More interesting is the mission of the school’s new director, an undercover police officer who aims to clarify the shooting. During his assignment, this Luis discovers a major scandal.

The main newcomer is a rather nymphomaniac redhead. This Chloe learned the art of seduction from her mother and she solves everything with sex. Without any feeling of self-worth, she sews and even circulates her own sex tape. In addition to Chloe, we are introduced to Eric, the cousin of transgender character Nico. Eric comes from the world of squatters and, like Omar, is quite conflicted with himself.

The adults play a more prominent role this time, but instead of interfering with their children, they pit the teenagers against each other. This apparently follows a bad example, because there are quite a few twisted souls at school and it can be a mystery when teenagers, actually actors sometimes in their twenties, receive lessons.

It is notable how Elite he got away with so many improbabilities for so long. There was an almost incomprehensible attraction that emanated from the overly handsome teenagers (some models taken straight from the catwalk) and their improbable lives. By far the most interesting character seems to be Chloe for a long time, because there must be something behind her tactic of ignoring her concerns. The young woman seems to be developing, but the writers do not follow her and leave the character floating in the void.

The latter applies to many themes and characters. Previous seasons often began with a crime that was revealed in later episodes. None of that in this seventh season. The element of suspense has not been forgotten, but is added with the excessively combed hair. An eighth season will arrive next year. Elite and then the creators think it was nice. They should have come to this conclusion sooner. Even beautiful people, their flashy suits and extravagant lives end up boring.

★★☆☆☆

Elite can be seen in Netflix.