Netflix has a lot to criticize. This includes the overall very average level of films and series in its catalog; and films of dubious quality in which the platform invests a lot of money; and neglected old series, such as Black Mirror or Love, Death & Robots. But what Netflix deserves respect for is creating a platform that has helped the film and series industries of countries that are usually ignored by Western viewers to attract attention. Thanks to Netflix, we have seen such series as the German Dark, the Brazilian "3%", the South Korean Squid Game, the Spanish Money Heist and many others. Well, we can safely add to this list the Argentine series The Eternaut, which was released on the platform recently. This is an interesting show about ordinary people who find themselves in extraordinary circumstances.
| Name | The Eternaut |
| Genre | fantasy |
| Showrunner | Bruno Stagnaro |
| Cast | Ricardo Darin, Carla Peterson, Cesar Troncoso, Andrea Pietra, Ariel Staltari, Orianna Cardenas, Marcelo Subiotto and others |
| Channel | Netflix |
| Series | 6 |
| Year | 2025 |
| Link | IMDb |
One winter evening in Buenos Aires, a group of old friends are about to play cards. Suddenly, the lights go out and it starts to snow outside. It’s not that Buenos Aires doesn’t get any snow at all; big snowfalls have happened here three times in the past century (the last time was in 2007), but this time the snow is different – it kills everything it touches. Fortunately, the friends realized this in time, insulated the house and began to decide what to do next. The situation is made worse by the fact that everyone’s relatives, except for the owner of the house where they gathered, are in other places and their fate is unknown.
The series The Eternaut is based on the cult Argentine comic of the same name by writer Hector Herman Esterheld and illustrator Francisco Solano Lopez. The original comic was published in 1957-1959 and is a typical heroic fantasy of that period, created by men for men. In the entire comic, which is 370 pages with a fairly large amount of text, there are only three women - the wife and young daughter of the main character, who have only a few lines and are present only at the beginning and end of the comic, and another woman, to whom literally two spreads in the middle are dedicated. That's all. In addition, most of the original comic is a story like "we are in the army now". It's not that bad, but it's quite flat, one-sided.
Fortunately, the creators of The Eternaut were well aware that the story told in the original comic book would hardly appeal to modern viewers, so they significantly reworked the plot. They left the deadly snowfall and its cause, but added an atmosphere of uncertainty and danger, anxiety for loved ones and the madness of the end of the world. And of course, they diversified the choice of characters by adding women and teenagers. In addition, the creators changed the age of the main characters, making them already elderly, very down-to-earth, very ordinary people who are trying to survive in this snowy apocalypse and save their loved ones.
These changes only benefited The Eternaut. You immediately believe in the heroes of the series. They are just like you, not action heroes at all, but people who are afraid, who make mistakes, who are trying to find the right solution. And this applies not only to the main characters, even the supporting characters turned out to be memorable. Like the couple who robs the pharmacy; the people who seek shelter in the church; or the bald resident who takes over the management of an apartment building. They all came out really alive and very real. And that's captivating.
Here, of course, we must pay tribute to those who conducted the casting of the actors. The main role in the series is played by one of the most famous and titled Argentine actors - Ricardo Darin. He is at least 30 years older than the hero of the original comic, but that makes his character even more sympathetic. He is already an elderly man who has gone through the horrors of war, divorced his wife and is trying to cope with his own problems. Uruguayan actor Cesar Troncoso in the role of Alfredo Favalli complements Ricardo Darin well. If in the comic book Favalli was a typical know-it-all professor from science fiction of the 1940s-1960s (the comic book character is a professor in the literal sense), then Fivalli in the series is a simple electrician who is not always confident in his knowledge and decisions.
The first three episodes of The Eternaut are one of the best and most terrifying depictions of the apocalypse in movies or TV series. People are confused, people don't understand how to survive in these conditions, what to fear, what to hope for, who to trust and who not... You can't trust anyone.
Perhaps the most striking is the silent and quiet, covered in deadly snow Buenos Aires. The authors of the series managed to create a creepy ghost of the city, which everyone knows as the capital of carnivals and fun. Interestingly, despite a rather modest budget, and the series supposedly cost only $ 15 million, the authors did not spare money on real effects and computer graphics. Some general plans are impressive with very good detail, which even big Hollywood films can envy. The Argentines really tried to create a series that they can be proud of.
In the middle of the season, The Eternaut takes a sharp turn and the viewers become aware of the reason for the deadly snowfall. The mood, direction, and even genre of the series change. Some were surprised and even upset by this unexpected turn, but in the original comic it was exactly the same. Moreover, in the comic this change of mood and style occurred much earlier, the story of those lost in the snowfall is interrupted literally on page 50, the next 250 pages are a continuous science fiction action.
In fact, everything shown in the series is literally half of the first comic. Shortly before the kidnapping and murder of Hector Herman Osterheld, who was carried away by leftist ideas and was in illegal status during the Junta, managed to finish writing the second part of The Eternaut. After his death, the series was continued by other authors in 1981, 1997, 1999 and 2003. So the authors of The Eternaut have something to work on, and recently it became known that the series was renewed for a second season. And this somewhat justifies the fact that the first season of the show ends literally halfway through.
In any case, I recommend watching the first season of The Eternaut - it is truly one of the most worthy series of this year. If you like classic fantasy of the mid-20th century, I can also recommend the comic book by Hector Herman Osterheld, but don't expect it to be similar to the series. Also, beware of The Eternaut 1969. This is an updated version of the comic book, to which the author, under the influence of his own daughter, added leftist and even communist narratives. Thank God, the authors of the series ignored the updated version of the comic book.