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How is Netflix celebrating its 10th anniversary in Spain? By turning up the heat in investment and production values and throwing a hell of a big party.
On June 10, Ted Sarandos, Netflix co-CEO, announced in a wide-ranging if brief speech at a Madrid press presentation that the U.S. streamer will invest over €1 billion ($1.14 billion) in Spain over 2025-28.
That figure is a shade up on Mexico, where Netflix pledged this February $1 billion for series and films over 2025-28. Pointedly, the commitment ranks on a broad par with France where investment in French series, movies and documentaries now stands at an annual €250 million ($285.1 million), Netflix VP of content in France, Pauline Dauvin said in April.
Also June 10, Netflix held a party to celebrate its first 10 years in Spain, closing off central Madrid from its Plaza de Cibeles to Puerta de Alcalá – which is after like closing Paris’ Champs d’Elysées – to roll out a 500-yard carpet for Netflix Spain creatives and stars, from “Money Heist’s” Álvaro Morte to Úrsula Corberó and “Elite’s” Ester Expósito. “The biggest streaming social event in Spain,” its concert saw Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo announce a fourth season of their showbiz mock doc “Paquita Salas.”
Meanwhile, Netflix Spain has just released a mock promo for the refuge featured in “Billionaires’ Bunker,” the latest series from “Money Heist” creators Alex Pina and Esther Martínez Lobato, set to bow on the service on Sept. 19.
“In budget, narrative language, the genre mix, structure and format, it’s the most ambitious series I’ve seen in the history of Spain,” Diego Ávalos, Netflix VP of content, Spain, Portugal and Turkey, commented to top Spanish newspaper El Pais.
In high-profile titles, “Billionaires’ Bunker” is not a current one-off. Netflix is currently positioning one of Netflix Films’ major projects in Spain for 2025, “She Walks In Darkness” (“Un fantasma en la batalla”) as Spain’s contender for the 2026 Oscars. This could give its Netflix in Spain and its producers, Sandra Hermida, J.A. Bayona and Belén Atienza their first Academy Award, their having come close with the Bayona-directed “Society of the Snow” in 2024.
Such titles are not coincidental. What sets Netflix Spain apart from most of the U.S. streamer’s international operations is its ambition, based not on quixotic dreams of grandeur but the record a first decade record of generating key titles which perform well on home ground but break out spectacularly abroad.
That is seen in Netflix Spain figures. In subscriber terms, Spain ranked just No. 11 in Netflix markets, with 8.7 million subscribers in a market where pay TV of any kind had had an uphill battle.
Yet, over the last 10 years, Spain has scored more entries in Netflix’s Top 10 greatest non-English language hits ever for TV shows and movies – eight – than any other country in the world.
Among TV series are three “Money Heist” seasons – all in the top six – and spin-off “Berlin” (No. 10). Three Spanish movies make the top five most watched films: “Society of the Snow” (No.3, 98.5 million views), “Nowhere” (85.7 million), “The Platform” (82.8 million); “Through My Window” (61.1 million) ranks No. 9.
In 2024 alone, Sarandos said on June 10, Netflix titles made in Spain generated over 5 billion viewing hours. Netflix rarely breaks out figures for single countries, but by estimates made by analyst Omdia Spain’s global audience last year near doubled viewing hours for French-language titles (3 billion views) and is way above German-language stats (2 billion).
Spain also leads in volume of Netflix E.U. production. From Jan, 1 2024 -through April 30, 2025, of 802 Netflix premieres – first-run commissioning, both new & returning shows, 338 were produced in the U.S. (42%), 47 series were produced in the U.K., 45 in Korea, 35 in India, 31 in Japan and 29 produced in Spain, estimates Caroline Servy at The Wit.
“The big pivot for us is becoming a great local producer, working well with local producers rather than being Hollywood to the world,” Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings said at the 2018 Series Mania TV festival.
Galvanizing interest in Spanish series, Money Heist also provided spectacular proof that Netflix was on the right strategic road. It came in late December 2017. As recounted by Variety, bought by Netflix at Ávalos’ recommendation just days before it began to air on Spanish network Antena 3 in April, “Money Heist” was released on Netflix in a recut version on Dec. 20. Its original Spanish version, which ended Nov. 23, had begun well, then souffléd to so-so ratings. Its cast had moved on.
10 days later, “I was in Uruguay celebrating New Year’s Eve with my in-laws,” Corberó recalled to Variety of the “Money Heist” debut.
“We were on the beach, and some people walked up to me shouting, ‘Tokyo, you’re a goddess!’ I joked with my partner saying, ‘Look, we found the only four people here who have seen the show,’ because in my brain it was inconceivable what was happening.”
What was happening was that “Money Heist” was going viral. By April 2018, in its first quarter results, Netflix declared ‘Money Heist’ to be its most-watched foreign-language series ever. It had become, in effect, its first non-English global blockbuster.
In July 2018, Netflix announced it would open its first European Production Hub in Tres Cantos, a half-hour drive north of Madrid, where Netflix has built its biggest, 10 soundstage studio complex in Europe.
However extraordinary “Money Heist’s” success, some of the writing was already on the wall, however, Ávalos observes. A few titles acquired in 2014 – ‘The Serranos,’ ‘Velvet,’ ‘The Time in Between,’ ’Grand Hotel’– underscored “a large appetite in Latin America and the U.S” for Spanish series.
Bowing Aug. , Club of Crows, Netflix’s first fully non-English-language production, “was so massive for Mexico. You just saw how huge something could be when it’s done locally, made locally relevant and connects with local audiences,” Ávalos recalls. Crucially, too, “Club de Cuervos” was “a different type of storytelling” in its pace, nuanced characters, and mixed genre dramedy. Netflix Spanish-language series’ success is often part put down to a Spanish-language market of 600 million viewers. Especially for a younger generation, they are also a cool manifestation of modern entertainment.
Released Nov. 2016, Brazilian dystopian thriller “3%,” traveled throughout the world. France, Spain loved it,” Ávalos recalls. “What we saw all of a sudden proved that our scale of distribution, and bowing series simultaneously across the world, meant they could connect globally Now we’re making series in 50 countries.”
What ‘Money Heist’ Meant for Netflix
What’s groundbreaking about “Money Heist” is not only its pace – the heist begins just 17 minutes into EP. 1 – but that a global blockbuster could be rampantly local: Latin and proud of it, part melodrama, sluiced by disruptive passion, and redolently Spanish Spanish-language.
“From Dalí masks and red jumpsuits to ‘Bella Ciao,’ these Spanish shows have become global cultural phenomena.The reason they resonate is clear – they are all, in their own way, authentically Spanish. Made in Spain by Spanish creators with Spanish cast and crews, Sarandos said on June 10.
“The main milestone is definitely “Money Heist,” which was Netflix’s first non-U.S. global hit and paved the way for local originals around the world,” says The Wit’s Caroline Servy.
International expansion was already in motion before “Money Heist’s” results with Netflix planning 30-35 non-English originals for 2018. But “Money Heist” proved Netflix could embrace local without thinking that meant giving up on global. “Without Netflix, Hollywood could have gone on producing in Hollywood and the U.S. or in London. Netflix decided that to reach global audiences, it had to produce locally,” notes “Gangs of Galicia” producer Borja Pena.
“Netflix is definitely the No. 1 platform in terms of globalized production, with local originals representing 58% of its premieres, much above other streamers,” notes Servy.
“We are truly unique, the only ones that have done this at such scale and have developed so much local expertise. No other streamers produce in 50 countries around the world. That’s super unique to Netflix,” Ávalos explains. “We had great storytellers in these countries, great artistry and great technical abilities, they just haven’t had the ability to be distributed at scale yet.”
Post-Money Heist: Production Values
Post “Money Heist,” Netflix has grown dramatically along various axes. One, which kicked in on “Money Heist” itself, was an increase in production values.
“Money Heist” Parts 1 and 2 shot entirely in Madrid. Upping the ante, Part 3, Ep. 1 features locations in Dec. 2018 on Gorgidub Island in Panama’s Guna Yala archipelago, in Pattaya, Thailand and a monastery in Italy, as the gang gets together again. Similarly, “Cable Girls’” first season largely shot in a reduced number of interiors, by Season 5, however, 60% of “Cable Girls” was filmed in location, around Madrid.
That growth reflects that of Netflix itself. When Cable Girls was announced in 1Q 2016, it had 77.7 million household accounts and a $100 share price. By the time the series bowed out, In July 2020, Netflix was trading at $485 a share and boasted 182.9 million clients worldwide. The Spanish crew utilized two basecamps, an enormous backlot, three units, a 300-person crew, and another 300 personnel for post-production.
The first leg of the shoot took place in the Andes at the real accident site in the Valle de las Lágrimas where a unit shot landscapes and light conditions at all possible hours. The idea was “not to even invent a single rock,” says Féliz Bergés, at Spain-based VFX company El Ranchito.
Set in a luxury bunker designed to endure any imaginable catastrophe, “Billionaires’ Bunker,” Pina and Martínez Lobato’s first production since “Berlin” encompasses 4,800 extras and 7,000 square meters (75,000 sq. feet) of sets and more than 120 set pieces, requiring over seven month construction, plus a 30 x 6 meter virtual screen and an 8 x 4 meters ceiling screen, Diego Ávalos, Netflix VP originals, Spain, Portugal & Turkey, told Variety. Its atrium set is so large that it allows in-studio drones.
Growing Diversity in Output
“We’re programming almost 700 million individuals. You have to have such diversity of storytelling,” say Ávalos. Since “Money Heist” first bowed, Netflix has diversified fast, into, for example, a broad gamut of thrillers, whether dystopian (“The Platform”), supernatural (“The Girl in the Mirror”) or centered on a sinister cult (“Welcome to Eden”) or gender-abuse (“The Mess You Leave Behind,” “Intimacy,” “Raising Voices”), or a genre-tinged period piece (“The Wasteland”) or missing girl mystery (“The Snow Girl”), drug gang investigation (“Gangs of Galicia”) or even a serial killer romance (“The Gardener”). Netflix had already shot in Galicia (“The Mess You Leave Behind”) and a godforsaken moor in the middle of nowhere (“”)
From its first thrillers, Netflix has moved into comedy, with hit “Alpha Males” bowing Dec. 2022, true crime dramas (“Burning Body,” “The Asunta Case,” now “A Widow’s Game”), medical dramas, its first foray in the genre being “Breathe,” renewed for Season 2, and now daily soaps, with “Valle Salvaje,” The Wit’s Servy observes. Netflix has begun to accept limited series, such as “Raising Voices.” “At the beginning we didn’t do limited series. We always looked for series that would be recurring. Then we saw great stories that only made sense in a single season and that audiences were really interested in that,” says Ávalos.
Also, “we started very much more with traditional TV producers and creators. Now, there’s a complete mix between young creators, coming from TV and movies. Narrative language between film and TV has merged so much in the last 10 years that the key consideration now is just great storytelling and then figure out the structure for the story as we work on it.”
Driving Into Local
Over May-June 2022, three distinctive thrillers hit No.1 in Netflix global non-English series charts in the space of two months, each distinguished by its setting, whether the black sands and volcanic landscapes of Canary Islands’ Lanzarote (“Welcome to Eden”), a hard-scrabble neighbourhood (“The Other Side of the Tracks”) or a gloriously shot Basque Country (“Intimacy”).
Settings can be used for social point, the contrast between majestic classical architecture and stunning new glass plate and steel buildings in “Intimacy” pointing up the divergence of old and new visions on female empowerment.
Stories and characters also vary radically, from “Tracks’” hardened war vet battling local hoodlums, to “Intimacy’s” female politician who pushes back against virtual abuse.
Spain has a stronger sense of regional identity than any other country in western Europe. Driving into local for Spain means driving into shows set in Spain begins and tapping into its talent, whether production houses and crew.
“Spain had a few different things [going for it ]from the very first, such as geographic diversity, which means story-telling diversity. Spain is a small relatively small country to have such an incredible diversity of producers around the country. Industry is not concentrated in a single city. There are production companies in each one of those communities and we’ve shot in every autonomous community. We don’t pay enough attention to how unique that is of the country. Andalusian stories can be very different to Galician stories and both regions have an incredibly experienced ecosystem in terms of behind and in front of camera talent,” says Ávalos. “We didn’t need to bring new skill sets to the market. We needed to bring support to allow them to become ambitious with their storytelling.”
“We have filmed in over 200 cities and towns across every autonomous community in Spain, said Sarandos, addressing Spain’s industry and press on June 10, noting that “Nowhere” filmed on the beaches of Sitges and “All the Truth Behind My Lies” is currently shooting in Murcia, southeastern Spain. “This has resulted in remarkable perspectives on screen. It has led to real economic benefits in communities across the country. And it has helped support more than 20,000 jobs in the Spanish audiovisual sector,” he added.
Upping the High Tech Ante
“Our impact’s been beyond commercial success. We’ve been catalysts for change for a whole industry,” says Ávalos. Netflix has also upped the technological ante. If you look at the quality and production values of all series in Spain, we’ve been pivotal in a lot of that,” Ávalos says. “We were the first to introduce HDR, Atmos Dolby, new post-production workflows and one of the first to use virtual sound and virtual productions,” he adds. “It’s incredible to see how all of a sudden technical challenges to create more unique storytelling were now being solved first by non-English language markets., and by people who have always had to make every penny count.”
“We’ve managed to do things as companies such as put the Guadalquivir River on a 30-meter screen, build a boat and shoot in a studio as if we were filming in Seville. This forms part of the volume of dreams which Netflix has allowed us to convert into reality,” Pina tells Variety.
The Future
There will be further big swings for the fences. “It’s hard to them every year, but the ideal is every couple years, moments where you either take an IP that is so beloved and well known or you create a new one,” Ávalos says, citing a Netflix’s Spain Julio Iglesias biopic, now at screenwriting phase.
Ávalos says he wants to bring on new voices even new producers. “It’s crazy to me that we’ve worked with 50 producers, independent producers to date. I already know in the next two years we have four more new producers we’ve never worked with that we’re going to be working with.”
Netflix Spain’s main priority, however, remains “just accessing incredible storytelling” and “bringing an Oscar to Spain. Nothing can unify a country like that,” Ávalos says.
Tapping great story making will depend also, Ávalos argues: “the talent experience.” “The talent experience is so critical, especially in the next 10 years with so much competition, with so many stories to be told. It makes a huge difference the way producers, writers, directors feel from the moment they pitch their movie or their series or their reality concept to the moment it releases and premieres on Netflix. That journey has to continue to improve and improve daily, and that’s a big focus for us for the next 10 years.”
How Netflix Changed the Global Perception of Spanish Content, Self-Perception, Careers, Lives
The faces, creators and producers of many of Netflix’s greatest hits sat down with Variety to discuss how the U.S. streamer revolutionised Spain. Here, according to them, 10 ways that Netflix has torn up the rule book:
Global Perception of Spanish Film, TV
“When we made films, we had the sense of being second, third division,” recalls Alex Pina, “Money Heist” co-creator. That sense came even when Spanish series – “our little Galia,” says Pina – from the 1990s blew U.S. fare out of prime time waters. “Money Heist” revolutionised Spain’s creative identity. “What’s changed most with Netflix is audience perceptions, both local and global, about the content we make in Spain,” says Emma Lustres (“La Unidad”). “We’ve gone up several floors.” Perception includes self-perception, “in emotional terms and sense of self-worth. We’ve begun to believe in our fiction and are making the big bold swings we’re making now,” Pina adds.
A New Spanish Star System
Before Netflix’s arrival, Spain already had global stars: Penelope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Antonio Banderas. Their ranks have now swelled. “‘Money Heist’ and ‘Elite’ have pretty similar timelines, target different audiences, and have a different age group of actors, Money Heist 25-40, Elite 20-25, but together they’ve created a new generation of stars for Spain, not just Spanish but global stars,” says Ávalos, noting “Élite” lead Miguel Bernadeau has got on to star in 1899, Ester Expósito in Netflix’s Mexican heist TV show Bandidos, Úrsula Cordero playing opposite Eddie Redmayne in Sky Studios’ “The Day of the Jackal.” Pedro Alonso even got his own show, “Money Heist” spin-off “Berlin,” which has punched views on Netflix.
Tokyo’s Úrsula Corberó, Berlin’s Pedro Alonso on Netflix as a Gamechanger
Corberó has starred since a teen in top Spanish series such as 2008-11’s “Física y Química.” “We weren’t accustomed to Spanish fiction going global. Series such as ‘Money Heist’ or ‘Paquita Salas’ have opened an enormous door for Spanish production to all countries. Netflix has meant a before and after in my life. Without intending it, I’m another person.” Blanca Suárez, star of “The Cable Girls,” agrees. “Thanks to Netflix, ‘Cable Girls’ reached places it probably would never have reached. “Before, there was a feeling in Spain, the Latin world, of being on the periphery of the real reference, the U.S industry, which, in film and TV, marked the 20th century” Alonso said.
He added: “Now there’s a new sentiment, that we can compete,” Alonso told Variety when ‘Money Heist’ first broke out. But no more. “Netflix has changed everything. It’s jaw-dropping. Now we’re part of a global competition, in another league,” he says now. The new Spanish stars are still adapting to their new fame. “It’s still surprising, to tell the truth, if you go to, say, Honolulu, and people tell you, ‘I’m watching ‘Paquita Salas’ in Argentina,’” says Corberó.
Netflix: Career Changing
“[Before ‘Elite’,] I was just as screenwriter,” says Carlos Montero. “Now I’m a creator and producer and I’ve also directed because Diego said: ‘Give it a go.’ Nobody at Netflix Spain ha talked him about algorithims, he added. We’ve spent years making shows and we’re rather demoralised by a lot of things, and Netflix was a revitalization for Laura and me, for a second phase career,” admits Caballero. “Netflix has broadened the spectrum, giving lots of opportunities to new talents, and a highly diverse range of hem as well,” says Manu Ríos, star of “Elite” and “Breathless” (“Respira”). “It’s completely changed my career, given me an incredible opportunity to explore my talent and go on working, which is what excites me.” Netflix has aslo changed career structures. “I’ve been one of the first Spanish actors who hasn’t had to go to live in Los Angeles and take back-to-back meetings to be able to get into the U.S. industry,” said Corberó.
An Economic Powerhouse
Netflix has helped turn back history. “Spanish cinema is a mixture of art and a lack of money,” José Isbert, the rasping mayor of “Bienvenido Mr Marshall” (1951) said back in the 1950s. He could be talking about nearly any time of the first 120 years of Spain’s making-ends-meet film and TV showmaking. Compounded by the launch of first Movistar Plus+ series in 2017, and the later arrival of other global streamers, Spain has finally emerged from its hand-to-mouth past. When Netflix arrived, Spain was just emerging from a double-backed recession. “Many friends were finding it difficult to find work,” Corberó recalls. “There are now far more people in work than in the past,” Suárez agrees. “My best illustration of the before and after with Netflix is a conversation we had with Diego during ‘Alpha Males,’ Season 3, when we were talking about its budget and Diego said, ‘Alberto, no, no, no, the budget adapts to the context and not content to budget.’ I’d never heard that in my life, and didn’t know how to get my head round that.”
A Creative Revolution
Netflix revolutionised storytelling, says Ramon Campos, at StudioCanal co-owned Bambu Producciones, behind major hits before (Grand Hotel, Velvet) and after (Cable Girls, “Fariña”) its advent. Before Netflix, Spanish series required 70 minutes of script for a 90 minute primetime episode. Series could run to 36 episodes. “Netflix’s norm was a 42-minute episode. Beyond that, suddenly, with Netflix’s arrival we could tell stories which we had’t even imagined telling, and we could now tell them in an original way,” Campos says. “Before, when we made fiction, there was something of an idea that it had to be made in a specific way,” concurs “Money Heist’s” Ester Martínez Lobato. “Now, opening up to the world and feeling part of it, you can see a myriad ways of taking on a production.”
A Sense of Global Relevance
Spanish creators have discovered a global language or, rather that their language can be global. How to connect with global audiences. One way is through genre, understood worldwide. Another is character’s emotions. “When you make a series which moves you, but feels very local in Spain, suddenly you discover people on the other side of the world embracing your seres with equal fervour, suffering, laughing or crying at the same things. It very moving to have the sensation that everybody on the planet can feel the same emotions,” notes Martínez Lobato.
Netflix More Than Money Muscle
Netflix isn’t about just injecting money. “It’s transformed into a potential companion in all stages of project creation,” says producer Sandra Hermida. “Its support, professionalism, excellence in every department, from development to production, post-production, its legal are, promotion through to premiere, and understanding of audiences, has been decisive for our productions such as ‘The Innocent,’ Oriol Paulo’s ‘The Last Night at Tremore Beach,’ ‘The Girl in the Mirror,’ from Sergio Sánchez, Paco Leon’s ‘Rainbow’ and J.A. Bayona’s Society of the Snow.’”
A Huge Fillip for Spanish-Language Creation
“Last century, it was as if you didn’t shoot in English, you were second, third, fourth division. Now it’s been demonstrated that it isn’t true,” says Javier Tomás, at Komodo (“I Am Georgina”).
“Korean and Spanish-language content continue to dominate as the second and third most-watched languages on Netflix globally, based on total hours viewed,” says Omdia’s María Rua Aguete, with Korean content scoring 8.19 billion viewing hours 1H 2024, Spanish-language 6.69 billion. At 4.94 billion, “Japanese content—driven largely by anime—has shown rapid growth over the past two years, signalling its rising influence among global audiences,” Rua Aguete added.
Bulwarking Regional Industries
“Since Netflix, you can conquer Los Angeles or Bogotá, working from Galicia,” notes Javier Tomás, at Komodo (“I Am Georgina”). Netflix has also bulwarked regional industries, Lustres argues. “In Galicia, it’s made it much easier to have a career product film and TV, without coming to Madrid. Netflix has helped our stability as a company in economic, financial terms and in terms of our capacity to produce. And this is true of the sector around us,” Lustres says.
Timeline
*2014: Critically, Netflix first experience of Spain was not as a market but an export power, when then a small U.S. streamer began to licence its first Spanish series for Latin America and the U.S. “Netflix was very naturally focused on Hollywood. But we bought a few titles – ‘The Serranos,’ ‘Velvet,’ ‘The Time in Between,’ ’Grand Hotel’– and we saw there was a large appetite for in Latin America and the U.S,” says Ávalos, hired by Netflix’s as senior manager of content acquisition, Latin America, in August 2014.
*2014-2025: That belief in Spanish series’ international market potential remains to this day. Netflix Spain is sometimes local for local, wants its series to be grounded in Spanish culture, whether IPs, language, settings or social focus, but only South Korea can rival Spain in its number of international breakouts.
*Sept. 2014: Netflix launches in France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium and Luxembourg. It already operates in the U.K. since Jan. 2012 and Scandinavia from Oct. 2012 , and from way-back in Sept. 2011 in Latin America, which means that Latin America – not Europe nor Asia – soon becomes a testing ground for non-English-language production.
*Aug. 7, 2015: Netflix’s first Road to Damascus moment. Aug. 7 2015, Netflix bows Mexican soccer dramedy “Club of Crows,” its first fully non-English-language production. “Club of Crows” was so massive for Mexico. You just saw how huge something could be when it’s done locally, made locally relevant and connecting with local audiences,” Ávalos recalls.
*Oct. 20, 2015: Netflix bows in Spain, Italy and Portugal, just after Japan (Sept.) and Australia/New Zealand (March)
*May 5, 2016: “Marseille,” Netflix’s first French-language original, drops on the service, written off as cowshit by Le Monde. Foreign critics – The Guardian, for instance – were more enthusiastic.
*Nov. 25, 2016: Netflix’s second Road to Damascus moment. It drops Brazilian dystopian thriller “3%,” its third-ever non-English language production. Produced with Brazil’s Boutique Filmes, “3%” proved Netflix’s first eye-turning international breakout.
*April 28, 2017: “Cable Girls,” Netflix’s first Spanish Original series, premieres on Netflix worldwide, is a hit.
*April 28, 2017: It’s now part of Netflix legend. Variety has told the tale. Alex Pina, a director of famed Spanish for-all-the family series made for free-to-air TV, plus the far edgier “Locked Up” (“Vis a Vis”), meets Diego Ávalos at his hotel, shoves a pen-drive into his hand. ‘You have to watch this — it’s my new show,’ and then he rushed off just as quickly.
After the frantic rendezvous, Ávalos boarded a plane to Los Angeles and popped the drive into his laptop. When his feet hit the ground in California, he knew his next Spanish acquisition had to be “Money Heist.”
*July, 2017: Netflix greenlights “Elite,” its second Spanish Original series, produced by Francisco Ramos at Zeta Audiovisual.
*Sept. 1, 2017: “Suburra: Blood on Rome” Netflix’s first series world premieres at the Venice Film Festival, drops on Netflix on Oct. 7, drawing universal critical acclaim, IndieWire hailing it “Netflix’s Italian answer to ‘Narcos.’”
*Oct. 2017: Netflix acquires exclusive rights to actors’ agent mock doc series “Paquita Salas,” previously on Atresmedia’s Flooxer, written and directed by Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo, who go on to create “Veneno” and “La Mesías.” Season 2 and 3, now Netflix originals, bow June 29 2018 and June 28 2019.
* Dec. 20, 2017: The before and after in Spanish TV history. Netflix releases the first part of a re-cut “Money Heist.” By New Year’s Eve, it was going viral on the service. “Some of my friends who hadn’t caught ‘Money Heist’ on Antena 3, when Netflix bowed it, called me to complain I was ruining their quality siesta because they couldn’t stop watching ‘La Casa de Papel,’” Pina recalls.
*April 2018: In its first quarter results, Netflix declares ‘Money Heist’ to be its most-watched foreign-language series ever. It is, in effect, its first non-English global blockbuster. “‘Money Heist” “really galvanized interest in Spanish series,” Hastings said.
*April 2018: “The big pivot for us is becoming a great local producer, working well with local producers rather than being Hollywood to the world,” Hastings says in a keynote at Series Mania’s first Lille Dialogues.
*July 2018: Netflix announces plans to launch its first European Production Hub in Madrid, targeting Spanish-language original content, located at the Secuoya-run studio complex, a half-hour drive north of Madrid.
*Oct. 5, 2018: “Elite” opens worldwide and becomes one of Netflix’s most popular non-English shows ever. Seeing the results, Netflix reups the same month for Season 2. Variety calls Season 1 a “tantalizing and whipsmart entry to the teen show pantheon” which “proves itself worthy of the spotlight.”
*March 6, 2019: Bela Bajaria replaces Erik Barmack as head of original series in Latin America, EMEA and India, as Barmack segues to launch Wild Sheep Content.
*March 2019: Diego Ávalos transfers from Los Angeles to Madrid to spearhead its Spanish office, appointed director of original content, Spain & Portugal.
*March 22, 2019: Netflix releases Oriol Paulo’s parallel universe mystery drama “Mirage” (“Durante la Tormenta”), a Netflix pick-up co-produced by Atresmedia Cine, seeing “broad viewing across the world,” Netflix comments in its 1Q 2019 letter to shareholders.
*April 4, 2019: A symbol of Netflix’s shift to original content and far larger focus on international as 80% of Netflix’s new subscriber signups coming from foreign, Netflix opens its Madrid Production Hub, its first European production center. It is inaugurated by Reed Hastings, with its first three sound stages up-and-running – one then housing the shoot of “Money Heist” Part 3. Netflix’s strategic drive into original production from Spain is clear. “It turns out that not all interesting stories come from Hollywood. We’ve been investing in Europe… particularly in Spain,” Reed Hastings comments at the inauguration, announcing Netflix had 24 global originals in some phase of production or development in Spain. Living up to its name, the Hub goes on to host international Netflix shoots such as “Kaos” and the French, German and U.K. parts of “Criminal.”
*July 19, 2019: “Money Heist” Part 3 receives a sneak peek screening in Madrid where Alex Pina is received like a rock star. The season heralds a newly empowered, and highly ambitious Netflix in Spain.
*Nov. 8, 2019: Netflix debuts Sergio Pablos’ “Klaus,” made at his Madrid-based SPA Studios and Netflix’s first original feature-length animated film to score an Academy Award nomination. The Santa Claus origins story is seen in its first 28 days by 40 million Netflix members.
*Nov. 21, 2019: Netflix seals a long-term strategic partnership with CJ ENM’s Studio Dragon as Netflix ramps up heavy investment in original content in Korea, which begins to rival Spain as the biggest non-English language production powerhouse for the U.S. streamer.
*Sept. 17 2019: Basque director Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia“The Platform,” a futurist dystopian sci-f and redolent social allegory wrapped in a brutal survival thriller, is the subject of a high-profile acquisition by Netflix just after the 2019 Toronto Film Festival, engineered by CAA Media Finance, XYZ Films and sales agent Latido Films. The Midnight Madness People’s Choice Award goes on to shoot to the near top of Netflix’s chart of non-English film hits on record, now featuring as No. 5 with 82.8 million views.
*March 20, 2020: Netflix releases “The Platform” (“El Hoyo”), an acquisition made off Sept. 2019’s Toronto Film Festival. A “terrorific mix of futurist dystopian sci-fi and redolent social allegory wrapped in a brutal survival thriller,” Variety has written, the film still figures at No. 5 of Netflix most viewed non-English language films ever.
*April 3, 2020: “Money Heist: Part 4” bows to be seen by 65 million households in its first 28 days, and punching 106 million all-time views, making it the most watched of the franchise’s seasons and, as of June 2025 the third most popular Netflix non-English language TV show in history, after two seasons of “Squid Game.”
*April 15 2020: COVID-19 ravages Spain. One month after Spain’s government issues shelter at home orders as the pandemic sweeps the country, Netflix, Acción Cultural Española (AC/E), the Spanish Film Academy and film agency ICAA to create a €1 million ($1.14 million) hardship fund. “We want to help those who need most in these unprecedented times,” says Ávalos.
*May 2020: Backed by the Netflix Fund for Creative Equity, which looked to invest $100 million worldwide over five years in companies and institutions encouraging diversity, Cima Impulsa launches in Spain, partnering Netflix and Spain’s Association of Women in Film and Audiovisual Media (CIMA). Its aim is to enhance the development of screenplays by women writers. “Encouraging female talent is vital for ever more people see themselves reflected on screens,” says Verónica Fernández, Netflix Spain director of original contents.
*July 30, 2020: Netflix releases the last five episodes of “Cable Girls” Season 5. No other Netflix original series made outside the U.S. had yet made it to five seasons, and only a few had been so popular. It also shows how Spanish series and Netflix itself – is evolving. The first season of “Cable Girls’” action largely focused on a number of fixed sets — the telephone exchange, the girls’ pension, the bar opposite — built at the Adisar Studios in Villaviciosa de Odón. By Season 5, however, 60% of the series had been shot in exteriors at, for example, Toledo’s Lillo airport, Segovia’s former prison or villages outside Madrid. “It’s been a case of each day, a different location, mounting lorries all the time. We had to take that step forward, and Netflix allowed that journey,” Teresa Fernández-Valdés told Variety.
*Dec. 11, 2020: Netflix’s first series made entirely in Galicia, “The Mess They Leave Behind,” bows on the service, produced by Vaca Films and the directorial debut of “Elite” co-creator, the Galician Carlos Montero, adapting his own novel.
*March 19, 2021: “Sky Rojo,” from Money Heist creators Pina and Martínez Lobato, launches worldwide. Made for a more limited adult audience with “a brightly colored, grindhouse aesthetic and a mix of genres its creators have dubbed “Latin Pulp,” Variety wrote, the series trades the hour-long episodes of “Money Heist” for eight punchy, 25-minute episodes and one narrator for three, confirming the creators determination to experiment in big pop culture swings.
*2021: Season 4 of “Elite” from Spain draws 37 million member households in its first 28 days. “‘Elite’ revealed the appeal of YA content in Spain,” comments The Wit’s Servy.
*Jan. 6, 2022: David Casademunt’s “The Wasteland,” (“El Páramo), from Rodar y Road and Fitzcarraldo Films, hits No. 1 in Netflix’s global non-English language movie chart.
*Jan. 27, 2022: Netflix bows “I Am Georgina,” a TV reality show about the daily life of model, influencer and wife of Cristiano Ronaldo, which has now run to three seasons.
*April 2022: “Society of the Snow” shoots in Andalusia’s Sierra Nevada, mainland Spain’s highest mountain range, using the 15,000-pound fuselage wreckages of three Fairchild Hiller FH-227 passenger aircrafts: one in a hanger, another surrounded by artificial snow, in an olive grove, and a third at high mountain tarn La Laguna de las Yeguas, at around 10,000 feet up the mountains, allowing J.A. Bayona to vary film days according to weather conditions. The production worked like clockwork. “I was astonished at the precision with which everybody worked, their speed and coordination. I never had such an idea of what I was going to do on a trip, minute by minute,” recalls Enzo Vogrincic, who played Numa in “Society of the Snow.”
*Nov. 2022: Netflix launches lower-priced ad-supported plan in Spain.
*Dec. 30, 2022: “Alpha Males,” created and written by Spanish sitcom royalty Alberto and Laura Caballero (“Aquí no hay quien viva,” “La que se avecina.”), in which four best buddies battle mid-life and the collapse of patriarchy. A global hit, it becomes a successful scripted format adapted in Italy, Netherlands and France by 2024.
*Jan. 27, 2023: Another thriller scores audiences, shooting in a Spanish region: Global No. 1: Missing girl mystery “The Snow Girl,” produced by Madrid-based Atípica Films but much shot in Andalusia’s Málaga, including a stunning opening scene in its 2010 Cavalcade of Magi.
*1Q 2023: Paid sharing introduced in Spain.
*Sept. 8, 2023: Starring Úrsula Corberó, for which she won an Ondas best TV actress award, “Burning Body,” dropped in Spain, a fictionalized account of the notorious Crime of the Guàrdia Urbana, produced with Arcadia Motion Pictures (“The Beasts”). “Burning Body” “paved the way for more true crime dramas with excellent results,” says The Wit’s Caroline Servy.
*Sept. 23, 2023: “Society of the Snow,” J.A. Bayona’s take on the Andes flight disaster, closes Venice to critical acclaim. “Thirty years after ‘Alive,’ Bayona makes the case for an authentically Spanish-language telling of the story with his signature technical verve and full-volume sentiment,” writes Variety’s Guy Lodge.
*Sept.2023-Jan. 2024: “Society of the Snow” goes on to win the Audience Award at September’s San Sebastian Film Festival, scoring the highest rating ever for the award, scoops two Oscar nominations, wins 12 Goya Awards, and, dropping Jan. 4, 2024 on Netflix, pushes in viewing hours, making it the most watched – and third most viewed – Netflix non-English language movie ever.
*Jan. 30, 2024: Film Constellation announces it has boarded worldwide sales on Oscar winner Alejandro Amenábar’s “The Captive,” an adventure epic and Miguel de Cervantes origin tale on which Netflix has Spanish SVOD rights, but not for the whole world. “We used to always say we’ll take second run Spain, first run everywhere in the world and saw that that might not be the most beneficial to producers or even audiences. So now we’re very tailored approach to each one of the opportunities,” Ávalos comments.
*Feb. 8, 2024: Netflix announces it has reached a deal with Julio Iglesias to take his life to the screen. The project will be made with the full participation of Iglesias in the creative process for the first time. Netflix’s scale was a deciding factor in Iglesias’ decision to collaborate on the series. “For the first time I have decided to tell the truth about my life to a universal company like Netflix. A very touching letter sent to me by Bela Bajaria [chief content officer at Netflix] was enough to convince me that Netflix was the ideal company to develop this project. I feel grateful to a lot of people from many countries who have supported me and have boosted my life,” the 80-year-old is quoted as saying.
*April 16, 2024: Producers Belén Atienza, Sandra Hermida, and J.A. Bayona, behind “Society of the Snow,” go into production on “She Walks in Darkness” (“Un fantasma en la batalla”) which releases a first on-set photo. The movie comeback of writer-director Agustín Díaz Yanes, a Best Picture Goya winner for “Nobody Will Speak of Us When We’re Dead,” it tells the story of Amaia, a young civil guard who works as an undercover agent in Basque separatist group ETA for more than a decade. A suspense thriller, it will also turn on the unlived lives which could have been and were not at all for its characters, said Díaz Yanes.
*Sept. 18, 2024: Spanish public broadcaster RTVE begins to air “Valle Salvaje,” produced with Netflix, Bambú Productions, and France’s StudioCanal, Netflix’s first daily soap/telenovela which will air in Spain and all Latin American Spanish-speaking territories. In Spain, “Valle Salvaje” can be seen on both RTVE and Netflix. “Part of our DNA is making sure we give our audiences the choice and power to choose where to watch and how to watch, but we want to have the best storytelling,” Ávalos reflects.
*May 6, 2025: Netflix announces “El Problem Final,” a period mystery thriller shot at Lloret del Mar on Spain’s Costa Brava, directed by Felix Viscarret (“Patria”) and produced by MOD Producciones (“La Fortuna,” “Los Farad”), marking a “sophisticated adaptation” of the same-titled novel from Arturo Perez Reverte (“Queen of the South”).
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