End of the Road
In the first episode of La Casa De Papel Season 5, Lisbon enters the bank and the Professor promises they’re going to war. Of course, that’s before Sierra finds the Professor’s hideout and holds him up at gunpoint. She’s not going to fire though, instead remaining determined to make sure he’s sentenced to life behind bars to pay for what he’s done.
The Professor’s predictions come true and Lisbon is well-prepared for this. He relays his message to the others, telling them the plan has changed. They’ve got a window of about 3-4 hours and in that time Tamayo is going to bring in the army. He rings his contact, Sagasta, and orders the man to jump into the fray along with his operational team.
The group is divided over how to handle the situation with Arturo. Some members believe he should be killed, while others think he should be allowed to die. The situation has become desperate as the group focuses on extraction rather than waiting for the gold. Following Nairobi’s death, everything is on the line. ..
Lisbon tries to communicate with the Professor, but he’s being held hostage by Sierra. Unfortunately, this also means Sierra is aware that Raquel is inside the bank. This gives her enough ammunition to interrogate the Professor, holding a gun up to him and shooting him in the thigh. ..
As the Professor struggles to speak, Sierra takes one step closer, suspending him over a precarious edge. She forces him to reveal his entire plan, and he refuses to do so. However, she seems eager to fire him. “I’d love to,” she whispers before walking away.
In the middle of all this chaos, there’s a really nice moment between Tokyo and Lisbon. With the latter in the bath, she reflects on the romantic implications of the Professor doing everything he could to get her into the National Trust. Given Tokyo’s past, involving her partner Rene killed during the heist prior to season 1 beginning, she understands that same sense of sacrifice.
In a flashback, we see more of Berlin’s past and meet his son Rafael and walk with him through the quaint streets of Copenhagen. As they sit down to eat together – following a run-in with Berlin’s wife Tatiana – he propositions the boy to join in the heist as an engineer. As Berlin puts it, he’s offering up a “guaranteed path to liberation.”
The Professor has been planning this for a while and has been working with the army to get it done. He knows that if the police catch up to the helicopter, they’ll think it’s just another abandoned vehicle. He also knows that if they find out the truth, they’ll be so angry that they’ll probably take him down. So he’s decided to use Benjamin as his decoy and let Marseille go. It’s all part of a plan that he’s been working on for months.
Inspector Sierra interrupts the Professor, demanding to know what he means by there being no extraction. The Professor looks at her with a mix of confusion and sadness, before finally answering that they’re all going to die. ..
The National Trust is in trouble. The army has shown up outside their headquarters, and it looks like there’s no way out. The gang is on the brink of extinction. ..
The Episode Review
La Casa De Papel is back and the first episode sets things up nicely for the season to come. The blend of classical music with the action serves up a pretty stylish cocktail, while the drama works well to ease us into the main conflicts this year. ..
As the opening chapter opens, we are left with a cliffhanger as to what is going to happen next. Sierra seems in control and the Professor seems to have no plan B. With the army arriving, how are our gang going to escape?
Nairobi’s death has given the show a new focus, and following his death there is still a lot of unresolved tension and drama to come. What will happen next? We’ll have to wait and find out!
