The Final Problem

 

tags: murder mystery, Netflix, Spanish

4 less than an hour episodes

⭐⭐⭐⭐

An isolated hotel. A mysterious death. Thirteen guests under suspicion. And only one person capable of solving the enigma. The game is afoot!

The Final Problem is the period mystery thriller starring Jose Coronado, María Valverde, Martiño Rivas and Maribel Verdú, based on the novel by Arturo Pérez-Reverte. Premieres September 25, only on Netflix.

Spring, 1959. A storm cuts off a small island near Mallorca. At the hotel where the guests take shelter, Elisa Mander, a quiet English tourist, is found dead. What looks like a suicide soon turns out to be something far more disturbing: a murder. Basil (Jose Coronado), a retired actor who once played Sherlock Holmes on the big screen, is drawn — almost against his will — into unravelling what happened. Alongside Adela Figueroa (María Valverde) and Foxá (Martiño Rivas), he searches the halls of the luxurious hotel for answers, testing the composure of the hotel's manager, Mrs. Ausländer (Maribel Verdú).

In a place no one can leave and no one can reach, every guest and every member of staff becomes a suspect in a crime that grows more complex by the minute.

An actor who played Sherlock Holmes was invited by a producer to an island in Mallorca to discuss possible future projects. When a guest was murdered, originally ruled as suicide, the actor Benjamin Basil started to investigate just like his role as Sherlock. He keeps saying he's just an actor but he can't help himself when 2 more guests were murdered. 

The mystery is good and has a different angle than other Sherlock Holmes or Agatha Christie mysteries. It has a little bit of similarity to And Then There Were None. I guessed correctly the murderer but not the twist and the reference to a famous Sherlock Holmes adversary.

Highly recommended.

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I recognize the actor Martino Rivas playing the young novelist Foxa who acts as Benjamin Basil's Dr. Watson. I saw him in the 2007 Spanish telenovela El Internado with the young Ana de Armas, Blanca Suarez, and my idol, Yon Gonzalez.

A Private Affair (Un Asunto Privado)

tags: Amazon streaming, comedy, crime, murder-mystery, Spanish series

8 episodes

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From Amazon

1940s, Galicia. Marina Quiroga, a bold upper class girl with the soul of a detective, decides with the help of Héctor, her loyal butler, to trap the killer who has been terrorising her city.

My favorites Aura Garrido and Jean Reno are the leads, how can I not watch. I like the first two episode so far and will rate when I am done watching the complete series. Amazon is showing interesting series [at least to me], at last.

Update September 24, 2022: 5 stars.

Highly recommended. Watch in original European Spanish with English subtitles. Dubbing in English is always atrocious.

Jaguar

Jaguar

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

6 episodes

tags: 1960s, action, Nazi survivors, Netflix streaming, revenge, Spanish series, thriller

From IMDB

In the 1960s, Spain became a home to hundreds of survivors of the Mauthausen camp. Isabel, a young Spanish woman, is one of them. She is looking for Skorzeny, Europe's most dangerous man, but she is not alone.

Jaguar is a highly entertaining and binge worthy 6 episodes European Spanish thriller series set in the 1960s about a group of Nazi survivors trying to capture, shame, and punish Nazis sneaking into Spain and other European cities. The lead female actress Blanca Suarez as the title character Jaguar is enough reason for me to watch when the series started streaming yesterday. I first saw Blanca when she was just 18 years old together with Ana de Armas who was 19 in the 2007 Spanish melodrama El Internado. 

Highly recommended. Watch in European Spanish with English subtitles.