A Narcotelenovela’s Schatology: Visions and Versions

Abstract

This essay explores the inheritance that the Colombian narcotelenovela received from three narrative aspects of different order: melodrama, thriller and neo-police. We will, through the rescue of these heritages conceptualized from the academy, see the articulation and transformation of one of the popular genre into a specific product which attempted to narrate day by day the other side of a hegemonic story that, used up, gave way to its own parody. The result is that narcotelenovela are a conceptually complex product, but also capable of opening a democratic reflection on ignored responsibilities. The essay concludes that this exercise has allowed the telenovela, mostly understood as an entertainment genre, to advance, in one hand, in the reworking of a pending chapter in Colombia´s history and, on the other hand, to extend this demystifying analysis to biographical series, which have replaced/continued narcotelenovela in television offerings.