Netflix has released a full-on trailer for Narcos season 4 that delivers much more than the brief teaser and news of enormous shakeups within the setting (moving away from Colombia) and cast. Also paramount within this explosive trailer is the series’ decision to make a reverse time jump to the 1980s to take on the Guadalajara cartel in Mexico, where the newly installed Michael Pena and Diego Luna go to war as real-life figureheads. Pena plays undercover DEA agent Kiki Camarena, and Luna steps into view as Miguel Felix Gallardo, the cartel head who ruled over Mexico-United States border corridors and launched the Mexican drug trade.
The massive overhaul of cast and setting could be viewed as risky for Netflix, given that Narcos is speculated to be one of the streaming service’s most successful projects (though no one knows for sure, given that Netflix keeps actual viewing numbers quiet). However, the trailer promises a thrilling ride for viewers as Kiki arrives in Mexico to “meet the snakes.” To his wife’s inquiry, “You gonna bust his ass?” he calmly grunts in response. Yet Luna’s portrayal of the bloodthirsday Gallardo reveals that Kiki has never seen a challenge quite like this one. Gallardo presides over his budding empire with ruthless efficiency, and this season appears to have upped the stakes on the action front as well.
Also promising? Alejandro Edda (Fear the Walking Dead) will play a young Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman at some point during this fourth season, which showrunner Eric Newman previously confirmed to the Hollywood Reporter. It’s really too bad that Netflix couldn’t send a young Sean Penn back in time to fart next to a drug lord in the ’80s as well. Now that would be explosive.
Season 4 of Narcos will arrive on Netflix on Nov. 16.
