★★★
“Turnabout is fair play”
We arrived here with Teresa Mendoza (Braga) having gunned down Don Epifanio, and made an implacable enemy of his estranged wife, Camila Vargas (Falcon). Epifanio had become the Governor of Sinaloa, a position Camila took over, using it to buttress her position at the top. She formed alliances on both sides to assist her further: notably General Cortez (Arias), who provided military muscle, and with DEA agent Alonzo Loya, to whom she fed intelligence about her rivals. However, Camila’s increasingly strained relationship with her teenage daughter ends up being used against her.
Meanwhile, Teresa is on the run after killing Epifanio, and is holed up in Malta for the first few episodes, before returning to try and set up shop in Arizona. This is a process fraught with difficulty, as she has not only to deal with La Comisión, the narco-committee who currently run things, but also corrupt local sheriff Jed Mayo (an amusingly thinly-disguised version of notorious actual Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio). Further problems ensure when her supplier, El Santo (Steven Bauer) summons her to Colombia in order to find and address a traitor, an encounter which leaves Teresa in need of a new supplier. Then, with the tables turned and the roles reversed, Camila being on the run, she contacts Teresa to make an offer of a replacement product source – in exchange for taking out Camila’s foe.
The first few episodes, when Teresa is faffing around in the Mediterranean are very disappointing. It feels more as if the cast and crew wanted a holiday somewhere pleasant, rather than it fitting into the gritty scenarios which were a strong point over the first two seasons. My other major complaint about this season is the feeble attempt to represent Phoenix and Arizona. As someone who lives there, I can assure you that Phoenix is nowhere near as… arboreal as is depicted here. Trees. Trees everywhere. It looks like the season was mostly filmed in Dallas, as for the first two series, which explains a lot and is rather irritating. Rather than fake it badly, come to sunny Arizona and film here, dammit!
Grumbling aside, it did improve in the second half, after the roles were reversed and it was Camila who was scrambling to find shelter from her enemies. It was a nice switch, and a harsh reminder for those living in the narco-universe, that you can’t trust anyone, no matter how close they may be to you. I was pleased to see a definitive resolution to the love-triangle between Teresa, James (Gadiot) and the boyfriend from her previous life, Guero. We also enjoyed the ongoing quirkiness of King George (Ryan O’Nan), though the final episode showed a VERY dark and vengeful side to his character. On the other hand, the guest appearances by rapper Snow Tha Product and her microbladed eyebrows… Well, we ended up derisively referring to her as “Miss Tha Product”.
It all finishes in a relatively tidy fashion, rather than the semi-cliffhanger which marked the end of series two, and it would be an adequate way to draw the line if that turns out to be the end of the show. The status of a fourth series is uncertain, a notable change from last time, where its renewal was announced before the season finale was broadcast. However, the rating for this series were only fractionally lower than the second set, and in the key 18-49 demographic it was USA Network’s most-watched renewal [as opposed to new programs]. I’d not be at all surprised to see Teresa return once more, and at least the strong nature of the second half bodes better for a fourth season than if it had gone in the other direction.
Star: Alice Braga, Veronica Falcon, Peter Gadiot, Yancey Arias
