'Fugue State 1986' Netflix Review: The Ryan Murphy-fication Of A Colombian Mass Murderer

Serial killers and murderers have fascinated storytellers as well as audiences across every medium of entertainment for generations. If you think about it, especially since it’s a topic that’s addressed by Fugue State 1986, some of the detective classics that we read as kids that were written by Arthur Conan Doyle, Satyajit Ray, or Agatha Christie dealt with pretty gruesome killings. Since it didn’t exactly traumatize us, we can say that reading them was fine, but the fact of the matter is that we’ve all consumed narratives centered around death from a very young age. Yet, there’s something about the analysis and fictionalization of real-life incidents through books, movies, and TV shows that has always irked me, especially if they don’t outright chastise the criminal in question and just say something flaky like, “Oh, they were just a little misunderstood by society.” And nobody has done that nonsense more than Ryan Murphy through his Monster series. Since that IP has been so popular, I suppose other storytellers are drawing inspiration from Murphy, and the results are as troubling as his shows.

Ana Maria Parra’s Fugue State 1986, which is based on Mario Mendoza’s Satanas, opens with a man named Jeremias slaughtering the staff and customers of the San Marzino restaurant and supposedly dying by suicide or at the hands of the law enforcement authorities soon after. The focus of the show then shifts to Leon, who learns of what his friend, Jeremias, has done. All evidence points to the fact that Leon was aware of the fact that Jeremias was going to do something like this. Then why didn’t he do anything to stop him? Was he Jeremias’ accomplice in this mission? And more importantly, why doesn’t he have any memory of the night the dreadful incident occurred? Well, that’s because he has dissociative amnesia. But that’s not enough to clear his name, and with Jeremias dead, the police might just arrest Leon to assure the public that they have made significant progress in this case. That’s where Indira comes in. She is a disgraced forensics expert who drives a taxi for a living and helps Mario, her friend in the police, with low-key cases now and then. She takes a particular interest in Leon, and the journey that she embarks on with him leads her to some dark and disturbing places.

I am not kidding you when I say that after spending over 6 hours on “fleshing out” the fictionalized version of a real-life mass murderer, who exhibits pedophilic, misogynistic, and downright satanic tendencies, when Leon and Indira said that there’s no concrete explanation for why he was so evil, my jaw nearly hit the floor. And I don’t mean that in a positive way. I was genuinely surprised that, for some reason, the writers of Fugue State 1986 were trying to shove Jeremias into this morally gray space, even though they had gone above and beyond to portray him as the spawn of Lucifer. Either they are too weak to take a stand, or they are trying way too hard to emulate Ryan Murphy and his team, who have gained immense popularity for presenting some of the most morally reprehensible figures in human history as these pariahs who were judged too harshly. Whichever the case may be, it’s disgusting. The only thing that’s worse than the way the writers tackle the themes and historical references is the nonlinear storytelling. I don’t know who has convinced all these Netflix showrunners—maybe Christopher Nolan—that convoluted storytelling can create the illusion of complexity, but it’s clearly not working anymore. If your story doesn’t have any substance or depth, no amount of timeline jumping is going to make it interesting.

Ryan Murphy’s influence on Fugue State 1986 isn’t limited to the misrepresentation of facts (in the name of entertainment); its visuals and stylistic choices emulate the maestro’s shows as well. There are these unpredictable pangs of fetishization and objectification of certain characters that just come out of nowhere and leave you with a rancid taste in your mouth. Thankfully, it’s due to those moments that you are able to question the intent behind this whole project. I mean, any sane-minded person will instantly critique the objective of a heavily fictionalized biopic of an individual as dangerous as Campo Elias Delgado. But since media literacy is at an all-time low right now, I think that you need such instances of bluntness to stop and wonder what shows like this are getting at. If all that doesn’t ruin the viewing experience for you, I’m sure that the pacing will undoubtedly get on your nerves. I don’t know if I can put all the blame for that on the showrunners, because Netflix wants more shows and fewer movies. Hence, narratives that can barely make for a feature film are regularly stretched into these episodic affairs. Therefore, even if directors and editors can spot the repetitiveness of the storytelling, which is mostly a result of efforts to pad the runtime, they can’t do anything, because “The Algorithm” prefers TV shows over movies.

Andres Parra, Jose Restrepo, and Carolina Gomez carry Fugue State 1986 on their shoulders. There’s no doubt that they are all incredibly talented actors. But it seems like, in their minds, they are in three completely different shows. I don’t know if it’s the writing, the direction, or the artistic choices that the actors made; however, the tonal whiplash I kept getting from all three of them was wild. Parra, in an attempt to make Jeremias as awkward and weird as possible, makes it seem like he is one of those absurdist political satires. Gomez, with her over-exaggerated ocular movement and animated cigarette drags, turns Indira into a parody of fictional detectives from the ‘50s. Restrepo is the only one whose acting is relatively grounded, which obviously makes Leon somewhat relatable. Consuelo Luzardo, Camila Jurado, Alvaro Bayona, Juan Sebastian Calero, Paulina Diazgranadoz, Cesar Mora, and the rest of the supporting cast are fine. None of them are allowed to do anything to make the character they are playing somewhat memorable. So, I don’t think I can really critique their talent. With all that said, do I recommend giving the show a watch? Umm… no. I don’t think we need any more shows and movies about mass murders and serial killers, especially if they’re in the style popularized by Ryan Murphy, because it’s evident that society is taking the wrong lessons from them. If you want information, that’s available in the news; read it. Fictionalized and sensationalized versions of such incidents are no way to educate yourself about the darkest chapters of human history.