Whether it’s Y tu mamá también or Casa de mi Padre, it’s always a delight to see long-time friends and collaborators Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna on screen together. Hulu’s first Spanish-language original series, La Máquina, sees the duo reunite in the boxing ring this time to bring to life an idea that they first conceived of over a decade ago. While the concept may have been the brainchild of Bernal and Luna, Marco Ramirez, who wrote the series, is better known for his work on scripts for Sons of Anarchy, Orange Is the New Black, and Daredevil, which led to him creating The Defenders and the short-lived Twilight Zone reboot.
La Máquina isn’t the first time Ramirez has found himself swept up by the world of boxing, as he previously penned the award-winning play The Royale, and it’s clear that it’s a sport that means something to him. In La Máquina, boxing isn’t just a career or an event to attend, it’s a living, breathing character whose presence takes up every inch of the screen. The series also benefits from having a singular director in Gabriel Ripstein, who skillfully guides the audience through Ramirez’s twisty mystery that is far more than meets the eye. Ripstein previously directed on Here on Earth, which Bernal co-created and starred in.
La Máquina throws its audiences right into the pre-match chaos, as Esteban “La Máquina” Osuna (Bernal) prepares to go up against a younger and more skilled competitor. The ensuing loss sets into motion a series of events that no one could have foreseen, not even his best friend and manager, Andy Lujan (Luna), who does his best to ensure that they all come out on top. Unlike modern-day wrestling—which most people understand to be a scripted form of entertainment—boxing has a long and sordid history with corruption and match-fixing allegations, even as recently as 2018. This seedy underbelly serves as the driving plot of La Máquina. When Andy pushes for Esteban to have a rematch to reclaim his reigning title as a champion, the pushback from a nefarious, scheming organization has deadly consequences for everyone in the friends’ lives.
Gael García Bernal Is Exceptional in ‘La Máquina’
Gael García Bernal is an incredibly underrated actor. A decade after audiences swooned over his troubled conductor in Mozart in the Jungle, his name still isn’t part of mainstream conversation, despite his performance in Cassandro garnering critical acclaim last year, and his Marvel debut in Werewolf By Night being hailed as one of the best MCU films of the decade. His work in La Máquina is exceptional. Esteban is a very complex character, and boxing’s answer to the “tortured poet” trope. His career as a boxer has wrecked his marriage, facilitated his addiction, and ruined his body, and yet he’s still eager to get back in the ring and prove his prowess. Out of all the characters, Esteban feels like the true lead of the series (which makes sense, as the titular “La Máquina”). The script gives Bernal the most to work with, as it vacillates between the past and present, letting viewers look inside Esteban’s troubled and broken mind. He is endlessly compelling as he navigates these extreme highs and lows.
‘La Máquina’ Shows Diego Luna in a New Light
The last time Diego Luna was on our television screens, he was fighting against the oppression of the Empire and leading Narkina 5 prisoners to salvation in Andor. Here, the only thing he’s fighting against is a low sperm count and an overbearing mamacita hogging his tanning bed. Luna completely vanishes into the role, and it’s a credit to his acting abilities that he was able to craft a character that fully gave me the “ick” throughout 95% of the series. Andy is a showman through and through, and in the first episode, La Máquina shows us his morning routine as he prepares for the performance. He dons a hairpiece, plumps his lips with injections, lathers himself in a Trump-tinted self-tanner, and swans around in an ostentatious wardrobe that matches his lavish home. It all feels like a façade for a deeply insecure man. While Esteban isn’t without his (glaring) faults, Andy is a bad manager and an even worse friend. But it isn’t just Esteban that Andy treats with indifference.
Throughout the first five episodes of the series, one of the main subplots is about Andy and his wife Carlota’s (Karina Gidi) attempts to have a baby. While it is clear that Andy cares for his wife, their relationship feels like part of his carefully crafted façade. She is an extension of the public persona he needs to be a successful manager, and a child would be the next missing piece of the puzzle. Their marriage never feels like a partnership of equals, and that’s partially due to how the series frames the relationships around Andy and Esteban. The women often feel underwritten and their existence within the plot hinges solely on the man that they’re connected to. Or, in the case of Andy’s mother, Josefina (Lucía Méndez), they exist to be a nuisance. Josefina is a fascinating character. She largely hovers on the periphery of Andy’s life, drifting in and out as the plot requires. She invades his home and uses his tanning bed; she coerces doctors to give her information about her son’s sperm count, and she gives Andy advice on how to properly bed his wife after she eavesdrops on their “passionate” lovemaking. She feels like an extension of the “tyrannical mother” stereotype that telenovelas are rife with.
Eiza González Is Criminally Underused in ‘La Máquina’
The women in Andy’s life aren’t the only women that La Máquina doesn’t seem to know what to do with. Esteban’s ex-wife Irasema (Eiza González) is an ever-present part of the series, yet, despite being a journalist who is investigating the dark side of the boxing world, it often feels like her subplot only has value when it directly intersects with the trouble that Andy and Esteban have found themselves in. At times, her storyline is the most compelling part of the series, but González remains underused and underserved by the overarching plot. Instead of really narrowing in on this gritty story that she’s chasing, as she returns to her roots as a journalist, Irasema is often reduced by the plot to being concerned with Esteban’s failing health and erasing behavior. She feels very one-dimensional, despite the writing telling us so much about her, which González never gets to bring to life.
‘La Máquina’s Pacing Issues Ultimately Hold the Series Back
While the six-episode seems to suit La Máquina, the ensemble cast could have benefited from a longer season that would have allowed the audience to become more invested in their characters. As it stands, three episodes are simply not enough time to feel any emotional reaction when the first member of the ensemble goes for a swim with the fishes. The stakes are high, but they can only mine so much emotion from an apathetic audience.
Most of La Máquina’s issues are rooted in the series’ pacing choices. Each episode has a similar structure to it after the premiere, which is: spending the first twenty minutes reacting to whatever happened in the last five minutes of the episode prior, before doing it all over again. Hooking audiences with the last five minutes is a clever writing style that worked a decade ago when series regularly debuted week-to-week, but it falls flat with the bingeable streaming model. Instead, it leads to feeling like you’re on a rollercoaster with a few occasional drops. The final episode was not made available for review, so it’s difficult to judge whether La Máquina is able to tie up all of its loose ends, but by the penultimate episode it feels as though there are even more story threads for the series to address, and very little time to do so.
La Máquina may have its faults, but it stands alongside Becoming Karl Lagerfeld as a bold departure from what American audiences have come to expect from Disney-backed streamer Hulu. It isn’t an IP-driven prequel or even based on a true story: it’s a wholly unique series, crafted by a creative team that cares, not only about the story it seeks to tell but about the people—the community—that they brought together to make it. This industry needs more bold, unexpected storytelling that forces its audience to wonder “who” the series was made for. Corporate bottom lines might tell you that art needs an established audience for it to exist, but art will always find its intended viewers. Bernal and Luna are a force to be reckoned with when they share the screen together, and that alone will draw folks in. The execution may be shaky at times, but the unraveling mystery threaded throughout La Máquina will keep the audience clicking “play next episode” until the end.
La Máquina premieres with all six episodes October 9 on Hulu.
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