# The Dandy (2015)

> A law professor goes undercover as a cartel operative in Mexico City and struggles to keep his true self from being swallowed by his criminal alias.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/57118

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 70
- Episode runtime: 42 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: crime, drama
- Created by: Mauricio Cruz, Chava Cartas
- Network: Sony Channel
- Cast: Itahisa Machado, Dagoberto Gama, Damián Alcázar, Alfonso Herrera, Luis de Alba, Aleyda Gallardo, Claudio Roca
- TMDB rating: 7.7/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4551116/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: brisk
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: accessible
- Violence: moderate
- Tone: tense, melodramatic, gritty, seductive, morally unsettling

## What critics say

Audiences rate the Colombian-produced undercover crime drama positively, with its lead performance and tense infiltration plot central to its appeal.

## Synopsis

El Dandy (2015-2016) is a Colombian national-television crime drama series created by Mauricio Cruz and Chava Cartas for Sony Channel, filmed in the telenovela tradition and running for one season of seventy episodes. Alfonso Herrera plays Daniel El Dandy Bracho, a law professor recruited by the Attorney General for a special operations program that sends him undercover into one of Mexico City's most notorious drug cartels. Under a false name he must identify every member of a clandestine network, but his sharp police instincts are matched by a growing appetite for the danger of the life he is pretending to lead. Damian Alcazar plays Juan Antonio Ramirez El Chueco, a petty, loyal and corrupt criminal who befriends Bracho and repeatedly comes close to uncovering his identity, while Dagoberto Gama and Itahisa Machado add pressure from within the operation and beyond it. Each episode is built from meetings, favors, betrayals and escalating risks, and the season draws its engine from the question of whether the professor can return to a respectable life or must fully embrace the criminal world he has entered. The mood is tense and melodramatic, with soap-opera loyalties layered over gritty cartel violence and moral unease. Fans of Donnie Brasco, Narcos and Breaking Bad will find resonance in its undercover tension and slow moral slide.

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