Green Frontier Review
Reviews and Opinions
Green Frontier Review
Reviews and Opinions

Green Frontier Review

Green Frontier/Frontera Verde

Network: Netflix Original Limited Series

8 Episodes

Creators: Jenny Ceballos, Mauricio Leiva-Cock Diego Ramirez- Schrempp

Airdate: August 2019

Juana del Río, Nelson Camayo, Ángela Cano, Marcela Mar, Mónica Lopera, Miguel Dionisio, Bruno Clairefond, Andrés Crespo, and Gabriella Campagna as various supporting cast members

One the most extraordinary miniseries ever produced in recent times and that is also deserving of a second season is: Green Frontier–or Frontera Verde (Spanish)– featured by Netflix. Its a new supernatural mystery and is the latest series to come out of the streamer’s relationship with Colombian creators and Academy Award nominated director Ciro Guerra that takes viewers deep inside the Amazon and beyond that created this unforgettable mystery thriller. Even though this series is not exactly new having premiered in August of 2019, the fact that this was such an unusual story that mixed in various cultures to tell it, as well symbolic mysticism interwoven usage of a complex subject matter within a ancient spiritual context leaves an indelible mark that is hard to forget.   Normally I don’t do such in-depth reviews such as this, however due to the myriad of complex symbolism’s and story narratives used in this miniseries origination, along with the intelligent and well thought out subplots, I felt that it made for a compelling deep dive analysis to which a better understanding of its meanings was needed. Not only that but having a personal connection to this story the very process of going through each episode scene by scene as well as studying each character themselves to find their purpose, their meanings was a religious experience itself This Mini series is like no other that I have seen before and its one that can be watched over and over again and you’d still come away each time with a different revelation. Therefore I put forth a more detailed break down of the story in a longer narrative version with visuals to give you the idea what this story is about.  Also the ending left a lot of unresolved questions, so many that for awhile there was hope that with the success of the show will be followed up with a new 2nd season. However no such announcement has yet been made and Netflix in its tagline suggest that this is a limited self contained mini-series.

The are eight episodes in total, and each one is as good as the last as the story slowly burns with exposition leaving audiences captivated inside a world they very rarely get to see, which is an almost modern day look inside the culture of the Amazon.

The first episode starts with an opening shot of a fade-in from white as the camera pans through the jungle, the sounds of the Amazon ringing out of cackling birds can be heard and shots of the trees, foliage of a dense jungle is in view as the camera slowly moves lower to the ground and a soft voice starts with poetic form and a deep lament can be heard saying:

“The deep green, the animals song, the flow of the river full of life, mother jungle, you are my home no matter how much I flee although men wish not to see. You are home of the World. Mother of the jungle, you are the origin of everything. The spiral, the seed, and the skull. Eternity is yours.”   

The camera eventually reveals a lifeless body faced down after that other other bodies strewn about the forest where apparent fatal wounds suffered from arrows can also be seen.

The lifeless bodies is later determined that they were a group of women missionaries when, CTI ( sent from Bogota Columbia equivalent to FBI) agent Helena Poveda (Juana del Rio) is sent to a remote location to investigate. The location of the bodies is so remote that it takes a helicopter and a private boat just to reach the crime scene, which is inside of the middle of the jungle. When her helicopter finally lands in its final destination a local member of law enforcement Reynaldo Bueno (Nelson Camayo), is there to greet her as she exits the Helicopter who then gives her a brief rundown on the suspects: members of an un-contacted tribe.

What makes this a daunting task for Agent Poveda to track down a member of said tribe is the fact most of the local authorities are resigned to calling them ghosts and don’t show much interest in finding them due to the fact they think its waste of time and a futile effort. One particular snarky and dismissive cop who is known as Ivan meets Poveda after a long boat ride had already disrupted the crime scene by moving the bodies and didn’t even bring a real camera to take photos.

The tension between Poveda and Ivan starts in its early stages when she puts on a white hazmat suite to begin her investigative procedure. He and his men begin to snicker at the sight of her wearing this white suit due to appearing out of place and awkward. This is when agent Poveda and officer Bueno realized that they were on their own.

After the other law enforcement officials leave the scene due to limited sun light and a long boat ride back, Poveda is free to press further and explore the surroundings of the crime scene looking for any other clues that may help her piece together a string of theories that may lead her to further answers. In the process of walking further, deeper into the jungle, she discovers another victim, a woman who hasn’t been moved yet, as Poveda and Bueno discover her hanging from her hands on an indigenous made platform within a ceremonial cemetery. The victim is wearing the same sky blue uniform of the other missionary women found dead, but when Poveda and Bueno look for a closer examination they discover that she has tattoos and piercings on her body identifying her as one of the un-contacted tribe members. When they further exam her body they make a startling discovery that her heart was taken from her chest with no trace of blood within her entire body, not even on her clothes or anywhere around her.  

When the story later evolves we come to know her as Ushe who will become a key figure in unraveling the mystery of this story. Unbeknownst to them as they decide to cut her body down and wrap it in the white hazmat suit that Agent Proveda was previously wearing, begin to walk Ushe’s body out of the jungle, and as they doing so, unaware they were being watched by an unknown indigenous man who we later learn through a series of flash backs that is a lot older than he looks. This mysterious shawman who holds much power of the forest will later be known as Yua, who before Agent Poveda arrived was connected to Ushe.

From there things get stranger as Agent Helena Poveda and Reynaldo try to get Ushe’s heartless body to the right tribe so she can undergo a proper funeral, as they deal with hostile locals and a Arupani Mystic (who we learn is Yua) comes face to face with some modern enforcers hunter types who indicate that they are familiar with each other ends up running for his life as he and the uncontacted tribe members known as the Ya’arikawa start to chase him by shooting arrows and bullets. This is the first time in the story we get a look at who the antagonist is but we don’t know why.  

Along this same journey, Agent Poveda learns from a local elder named Wilson, a older tribal member of authority, with a bald head and dark skin tells Helena about the legend of the Eternals, an ancient tribe that lives without blood and walks among the trees. The agent is skeptical, about the whole “no blood” thing but oddly Ushe becomes familiar to her in a unexplainable way as if she knows something within her soul but its suppressed by emotional trauma of some sort.

Wilson the elder somehow identifies Helena as having a soul that is part of the jungle leaving a clue that Helena and her suspicions of Ushe is somehow connected.

We get a glimpse of this as she is later looking at writings by her mother who use to be some kind of research scientist who specialized in the study of plants from the jungle. Later when Helena is sitting by a body of water in a bathing suit we learn a little more about her past when the camera reveals scar tissue on her back to suggest that she suffered burns at one time.

Next scene, we learn more about the character Reynaldo Bueno who reveals that he is from a local indigenous village known as the Nai where he and Agent Poveda take the body to. Leading up to this scene his demeanor suggests that he is a tormented soul and holding onto something that pains him.

We are introduced to a second conflicting issue, when as is custom to the local indigineous tribe is to burn the body of the deceased. When the local Nai villagers begin preparations to burn Ushe’s body on a funeral pyre, Helena (Poveda) objects to the Elder Wilson and insists that Ushe’s body must be taken back to the police station for a proper autopsy, but he refuses her request and tells her that it is Nai law and custom and that she had no power here.

Just in that instance one of the caretakers comes in with a tiki torch and begins to light the funeral pye, when suddenly a gunshot is heard stopping everyone in their tracks out of fear due to Reynaldo holding a gun.

In a aggravated tone Wilson Nai, the elder asks what he is doing. Reynaldo still holding the gun in the air pleads with the villagers that he doesn’t want to hurt anyone but that he wanted to seek justice for Ushe’s death. Wilson Nai, then tells Reynaldo that if he goes through with taking Ushe’s body that he will no longer be permitted to return to the village and that he will forever be banned. Reynaldo emphatically says to the elder that he has to do what is right in finding who killed this woman and asks him to forgive him as Helena and another man take the body and start exiting, soon followed by Reynaldo.

Next we cut to a scene where Reynaldo and Helena with Ushe’s body are riding back on the long narrow boat on the river back to the Amazon town. Reynaldo is sitting stewing in stress of what had just happened with his village elder and seems visibly upset. Helena asks him about his village ban as she tries to console him by telling him he did the right thing. He respond by telling her that no one could know especially his boss, Helena assures him that it would be her that would take full responsibility for taking Ushe’s body.

The story then shifts to focus on Helena as she sets out to investigate on her own while also being haunted by Ushe. Slowly we begin to learn that she has a connection to this place when she starts to unravel her own tortured personal story where her mother was murdered when she finally starts to connect the dots. Images of a fire through a series of flashbacks of when she was a child and the death of her mother being no accident, and the woman who saved her begins to emerge as being Ushe who at the time before her birth was a friend of her mothers who acted as a care giver at the time. However, what begins to emerge even more wildly is the supernatural power that Ushe possessed that gave her power from the jungle. This power was somehow passed onto Helena during an encounter in which a hunter known as the white demon named Joseph who was seeking to usurp this power from Ushe had burned down the house of Helena’s parents killing her mother in the process. Helena as child was trapped inside the burning house but was saved by Ushe who carried her away and hid in the jungle while evading Joseph who had spotted her and began to hunt her down.

In the next sequence Helena then goes to the women’s ministry to interview the head missionary who may have known Ushe. When Helena walks into the main chapel a funeral mass is in progress where the pictures of the other victims known as the sisters are displayed on an alter, a tribute with candles.

After the head Sister notices Helena standing there by the doorway, she speaks to her in a welcoming gesture encouraging her to come in.

Later Helen and the Head Sister have a moment to converse Helena starts to probe her for answers as she hands her a picture of Ushe and asks if she knew her.

However the head sisters tells Helena that she doesn’t recognizes her, even when Helena tells her that Ushe was found wearing he same uniform as the other victims, the head sister rebuffs her theories suggesting lots of people from the jungle come and go through the ministry and that it would be hard to tell who Ushe was. The head sister proves to be cagy and not very helpful and somewhat suspecting that she may know something but doesn’t want to tell. Helena notices a plant in which she remarks to the Missionary Head sister that the plant is sometimes mistaken for a coffee bean tree due to having similar appearances in its beans. The head mistress wondering how she knew to have such familiarity with plants, Helena responds by telling her that her mother was a plant expert that specialized in plants from the Amazon. The head sister then becomes curious suggesting that maybe she knew her mother then asks what their names were. Helena tells her that she wouldn’t her and that she died in a fire long ago. The head sister with a sympathetic look on her face then presses further by asking about her father and she responds that he too died leaving an awkward pause of silence between the two of them. With a polite smile Helena thanks her for her time and proceeds to exit. As Helena is seeing herself out through the chapel, she notices a young indigenous woman who was part of the missionary sitting in a pew who turns around to look at Helena as she is passing and says to her that: “she was the jungles daughter, she belongs in the jungle” referring to Ushe which catches Helena off guard with a response of “What?” The sister further responds that “her secret must not be revealed” before another sister who is of a authoritative figure enters the room and the girl then turns back and looks down in an attempt to remain anonymous again to avoid getting in trouble. This is when we first learn that perhaps the Missionary was hiding something but was still remaining silent for some unexplained reason.   

As the story evolves we see a shot of Reynaldo digging deep into the investigative archives late at night involving history of various deaths of tribal people when he comes across a drawn picture of a person who is depicted hanging similar to how he and Agent Poveda found Ushe, which plays an important role in understanding how Ushe died.

The next day, the grandfather, the Elder from the village, his wife, and their daughter walk into the police station demanding to speak with the deputy. Reynaldo immediately meets them with much resistance from the grandfather insisting that he was no longer Reynaldo’s grandfather after what he did by taking Ushe’s body.

Reynaldo emphatically explains to Wilson Nai that as an law enforcement officer he was obligated to solving her murder, that by burning her body they wouldn’t be able to catch her murderer but Wilson was still angry and was not having any of it. Accusing Reynaldo of not caring anymore of his people and their ways.

Reynaldo then goes back to his desk and retrieves pictures of Ushe, and the missionary women’s lifeless bodies crime scene photos and hands them to the grandmother.

The grandmother looks at the pictures with anguish on her face and looks up to Reynaldo and tells him that Ushe was her older sister. She begins to explain further that Ushe left their tribe because she fell in love with the leader of the Arupani Tribe and that she never saw her again

She then tells the grandfather that she wants Reynaldo to investigate the murder, because she was one of them and that Ushe was her sister. When she hands the pictures back to Reynaldo, it was confirmation that she was on his side where he quietly nods in agreement with a solemn face as their eyes meet one another.

When she hands the pictures back to Reynaldo, it was confirmation that she was on his side where he quietly nods in agreement with a solemn face as their eyes meet one another. The camera then reveals a younger woman who Reynaldo recognizes where their eyes meet but he then looks away downward in shame and in pain. The grandmother then tells the grandfather that it was time to leave, and as the three of them exit the police station, the young woman looks at Reynaldo again in one lasting parting stare without saying a word.

In the following sequence we are then watching Helena as she decides to follow the sarcastic cop Ivan into town where he leads her to a bar to meet some mysterious man to inform him that Bogota had sent an investigative cop to look into the murders, meaning Helena herself. Helena tries to look inconspicuous as she hides behind a payphone on the wall while intent on spying on the two men to learn new information. The establishments barmaid who suspects Helena didn’t belong there asks Helena if she can help her then interrupt Helena. Helena replies that she is looking for the bathroom even though it’s a lie, she plays it off casually without revealing why she was really there. Later after the two men leave, Helena approaches the barmaid and inquires about the Mysterious man and if she could find out his name. The barmaid was not very helpful due to the fact she was suspicious of Helena’s motives.

Meanwhile the camera at cuts to Reynaldo interviewing an old Tribal person who is laying in a hammock explaining that the picture Reynaldo shows him of a hanging woman is a method of torture of the rubber mill workers and what they did to the indigenous people as a form of punishment. Reynaldo tells him about the Arupani people and how his grandmother told him about her sister being 80 years old suggesting that she looked a lot younger than her age but it was a great mystery. In that moment we learn more about the mystique of Ushe and Yua and how their people were referred to as guardian of the Tree Walkers also known as the Eternals and how they just seem not to age but eventually that they would vanish without explanation, cease to exist as the man explains to Reynaldo.

When the camera cuts back to Helena, she is seen back at the police station looking for Reynaldo when she encounters the sarcastic cop Ivan who begins to ask her about how the investigation was going. Suspecting that he was fishing and probing her for information, Helena is smart enough to catch on, so she asks him if he was drinking. In a smug retort he says yes and offers to bring her some special drink to help her relax, intimating something else in a passive aggressive way.

Later that day, as Helena is walking up the stairs that leads to her hotel room, as she walks in a hall way she notices the Head sister from the Missionary is waiting there for her.

When she approaches her she then asks what she was doing there? The Head sister replies that she wanted to find her, but when Helena then asks her how she knew where she was staying, the head Sister just smiles at her as if to suggest it wasn’t that hard. The head sister then inquires about information about Ushe’s investigation and Helena looks at her rather suspiciously and responds with “fine” without divulging too much information.

A silent pause between them becomes noticeable as the sister just smiles at her before telling her that she will pray for her, and with an awkward smile and being polite Helena says thank you. As Helena walks away from her, the Head sister gives her a pink container and tells her that it’s a balm that is good for scars, the ones that can be seen on Helena’s hand.

The story then weaves into another shift in time to Fifty years prior of  Yua and Ushe giving contextual history of their tribe while living in the jungles as guardians of the Tree Walkers, the Eternals also known as the Arupani tribe who were connected to a certain tree that held all the power and secrets of jungle. Yua saves Ushe’s life after being shot by Joseph’s men and through her recovery after also contracting a high fever teaches her the way of the jungle by making Ushe his protégé

However we begin to learn of Yua’s age when a fellow tribal member refers to him as grandfather who asks to speak with him in private. The tribal member begins to ask Yua if he was sure that his emotions was not clouding his senses to making a mistake by choosing and trusting Ushe with the secrets of the jungle. He tells him that the Jungle speaks to her. The tribal member then asks Yua why not let her go on her own?

It is in that moment Yua with great intensity says to the fellow tribal member that there was no more time and that a dark evil force not felt before was present in the jungle. (This is in reference to his battle with Joseph and his men.)  It was also in this same scene where Yua summons Ushe and requests her to lead the way as the two of them alone begin a journey through the jungle together

Along the way Ushe starts having visions of trees being chopped down and the sounds of a chain saw can be heard causing her distress along the way. We get the sense that the tension and the inevitable conflict is slowly building up as Ushe continues her walk through the jungle while seeing and hearing the chainsaw and the crashing down of the trees which is suggesting that she is seeing the future.
Eventually after teaching and preparing Ushe of many things, Yua had prepared her to find the one sacred tree by following her heart, and when through her own spirit is able to find the one tree that held all the secret power of the jungle, Yua knew that it was time for Ushe’s final test which was to partake in a concoction that Yua prepares for her to drink
A hallucinogenic type of drink that Ushe slowly drinks that puts her into a trance like state and enters another dimension that is part of the jungle.
This place she enters is a door way, a mystical place where her essence is made of particles that can take any shape but is also a place filled with different powers. She is not able to understand at first, and starts to see other visions that were quite stressful that causes her to awaken from this trance like state. This is when she sees the images of events of past present and future that suddenly awakens her to new realizations.
Through various parts of the series we see Helena struggling with getting to sleep at night often at times staying up late, wrestling with her thoughts and feeling haunted about questions that continue to persist in her head about the case, which makes her sort of an insomniac at one point. On one occasion where she is unable to go to sleep, she looks at her clock reading 5:45 am as the local sounds of people starting their day of work can be heard in the back ground.
She then rolls to her side and tries to go back to sleep until late morning is awaken by a loud knock on her door, and when she answers it in a disheveled and half awaken appearance, Reynaldo is standing there who tells her that he found the correct identity of Ushe as he hands her a police report with her picture on it along with her full name.
Up until this point Ushe’s name was unknown, however Helena recognizes it, and goes back to her bed to sit and opens up a diary written by her mother and reads a passage from it where Ushe’s name is directly mentioned by her mothers handwriting. She hands the diary to Reynaldo and in this moment there is a nervous realization that things just got weirder due to the un-seemingly connection between her, Ushe and her mother that were unexplained.
This weird eerie realization is acknowledged between Reynaldo and her as they make eye contact with each other.  Helena then ask Reynaldo’s help to find someone, which at this point we have no idea who. While still in Helena’s hotel room, he makes a call to someone who probably is behind a desk somewhere and looking into his information given. He is heard talking to the person about drugs and confirming that it wasn’t drugs. giving him some new information. After he disconnects from the call, he tells Helena that her father is not in jail, however we left wondering what this scene means as it cuts away to another flash back.
The next sequence is an emotionally driven scene with Helena is cautiously walking into a hospital hallway as she slowly approaches a certain room. As she begins to enter the room she is hesitant as she see’s her father laying in a bed while in a coma.
A nurse who is standing beside her encourages to enter further while also handing her a package of her father’s belongings. It is obvious that Helena is feeling hurt, confused and unsure what to do next but the nurse encourages more insistently to enter to her fathers bedside. Reynaldo who looks at Helena with sympathetic eyes stands by in the Hospital room hallway. As Helena slowly walks further, the camera reveals a man in a coma state being kept alive on a respirator. When Helena sees her father for the first time in this state, she then begins to break down in a well of emotions that overcome her.

Reynaldo seeing her pain comes in and puts his arm around her to console her.

In the following scene her and Reynaldo are sitting at a near by cantina having a beer and talking about their earliest memories. The both of them dealing with their own struggles of emotional pain find camaraderie in their acknowledgements to one another’s personal circumstances by engaging in sarcastic humor in an attempt to lighten the mood. Helena is trying to cope and process the news of her finding her father, his condition and where will this story take her next,. as its obvious there is much to still learn.

In a sequence of short cuts of scenes Helena pays a visit to a bar where a woman that knows a man by the name of Marquez who is the local smuggler and who is very well connected requests a meeting with him. The woman reluctantly agrees to set it up but not before warning her to be careful about Marquez being a dangerous man.

Later in the day when Helena is back at her hotel when she gets a knock on her door from a messenger who gives her instructions as to where to go to meet this smuggler Marquez.
Later Helena is trying to commission a boat to go to a remote region on the Amazon river, but the person whom she is trying to charter the boat from refuses her due to it being too dangerous and out of the way for him.
Much later in the evening Helena then pays a visit to the pathologist Veronica in the morgue where Ushe’s body is still laying in state. She tells Helena that she had discovered some unusual cell patterns within Ushe’s body that suggested that cells in her body had the same identifiers as plants from the jungle
Suddenly a sound is heard from a near by room and Helena and Veronica who are the only ones present at the lab become startled. Helena then goes to investigate and cautiously walks down the hall with her pistol drawn.
Upon entering a dark room she un-expectantly gets knocked out unconscious. Several hours later, she wakes up dazed, confused and experiences pain to her head, asshe gets up staggering and attends to her friend Veronica who is also bloodied and unconscious until Helena revives her. She then notices that Ushe’s body has been stolen and decides to go find out by whom.
In the following scene Helena storms the police station to find the sarcastic cop Ivan in his office talking with another officer and begins to accuse him of stealing Ushe’s body from the morgue while also leveling other accusations things such as corruption with heated passion while swearing up a storm, calling him every curse word in the book.

Ivan stands there while Helena threatens to get him fired if he doesn’t get her a boat to go to the mills on the amazon before storming out of the police station. Ivan then stands there in a silence of rage as he watches her leave the room.

The following scene, Reynaldo is laying in a bed in his underwear with a local woman engaging in after sex small talk when suddenly Ivan storms the room. Reynaldo gets up to repel him but caught off guard Ivan gives him a blow knocking him down to the floor while kicking him a few times.

As Reynaldo is laying on the floor writhing in pain, Ivan gives him a few kicks before ordering him to take Helena to the jungles and make sure that she doesn’t come back, suggesting that he kills her. When Reynaldo says to him that he is not a murderer Ivan then threatens to kill his entire family if he doesn’t do what he says. Then Ivan pulls out a gun and points it directly in Reynaldo’s face to make sure that he understands and agrees to his demands. When Reynaldo nods in agreement, Ivan then finally leaves the room.
The next day Reynaldo and Helena are on a boat piloted by him and heading off to the jungles to even more dangerous territories to meet with Marquez the smugger. During the boat ride that was mostly in silence Helena discovers a piece of folded paper that was lodged behind a cover page in her fathers journal. When she opens the paper up she discover a picture Yua who at this point has no idea who he is.
Helena also begins to notice that Reynaldo is acting strange from the beginning as she asks him about the bruise on his face that was caused by Ivan, but he brushes it off and blames it on a woman problem.
When they get to a point in the journey where the two of them are taking a break to cool off from the heat of the jungle, such as Helena wading in water within a tributary, she asks him why he is acting so strange. Reynaldo’s cynicism starts to take over by labeling Helena a tourist and how he can never leave but she can. Its apparent that he is preoccupied with the ultimatum of Ivan’s threats and was thinking of a opportunity to when he would try to kill Helena.

This is also a moment where we learn about his family history as he starts to confess to Helena that he had a son that died and how the village blamed him for his death that led to eventually him being banned from his community. As he is standing there looking at Helena intensely for a brief pause, then telling her that he and her are not the same he suddenly pulls his side arm and points it at her, telling that her to forgive him.

She looks at him for a moment in confusion before deciding to tackle him in the water. He then gains control of her and starts choking and drowning her in the water with the intent on carrying out her murder.
For a while it looked like he was going to succeed had it not been for Helena being able to find a rock and knocking him unconscious with a blow to the head. After she turns him around to insure he doesn’t drown while regaining her composure, she decides to go on her own and traverse the jungle to find where it is that she needs to meet the guide to take her to Marquez leaving a unconscious Reynaldo floating in the water.
Next thing we see is Helena alone in the jungle, mosquito bitten and on edge as she is sitting trying to eat a meal in order to keep her strength up.

 Suddenly she feels a presence as if someone is watching her. Initially we sense that maybe it is Reynaldo catching up and wanting to kill her but as she gets up we keep hearing the name “Cachicamo” and she starts following this voice by trying to walk in a direction that she thinks its coming from but ends up tripping over a vine. When she looks up, she discovers a dead body of a white man stained by an ink like substance coming from his mouth laying in the brush. We can’t see his face as he is wearing an indigenous mask, dressed in khaki and drab olive clothing. She stares at it for a while in order to make sense of who it is but leaves the body alone as it only induces more fear for her as she practices more situational awareness.

The night falls and she is forced to sleep in the jungle alone while being terrorized by it’s nature sounds in the dark, and while doing so she keeps hearing the name “Cachicamo” which at some point has a calming effect allowing her to eventually fall asleep. 
The next day, she is walking further to find where it is that she needs to be as she appears to be wandering aimlessly until she gets to a point of being lost and having a complete breakdown.

That is when she sees Ushe through a vision beckoning for her to follow her, which Helena does and eventually is led to a very large tree in the jungle. When she pauses at this tree to collect her bearings she starts to recall memories of when she was a child and Ushe teaching her to havw the jungle in her heart. At this point it becomes very clear of the connection between Helena, Ushe, and the Jungle. Helena is suddenly met by an approaching young man wearing an eye patch who says to her that she is late, and that it is he that will take her to meet Marquez.  

As she follows the young man with the eye patch to Marquez’s camp along the way she encounters loggers who begin to look at her strangely as if they haven’t seen a woman for months.
When Helena finally reaches the camp, she is told to wait until Marquez arrives. In doing so, she starts looking around and finds several things belonging to the Ya’arikawa tribe such as the mask that was on the corpse she encountered earlier in the jungle and some arrows. The Ya’arikawa is the same tribe that is under the command of Joseph known as the “White Demon.”
Eventually Marquez arrives with Reynaldo who at this time is holding a canister of water and intently looking at Helena as he sits down on a hammock to collect himself. We get the impression that perhaps it was Marquez who found Reynaldo on his way back to the camp. As the two look at one another you can sense the intensity that Helena is feeling at the mere sight of him arriving with Marquez.
Marquez walks up closer to where Helena is waiting and goes to a barrel full of water to clean his face off while Helena watches him patiently until eventually decides to approach him and requests to speak with him.
Marquez acknowledges her by showing her some crude hospitality when he offers her his used towel in order to clean herself off.
Later the two of them talk and he states that while he maybe a smuggler he doesn’t go around murdering women as he shows her a picture of him and another sister from the missionary to depicts a friendly previous relationship had with the sisters. He also reveals to Helena that he knew her father while they spent time in jail together and that it was her father who saved his life to which was the reason he was in a coma, even though he would not tell why or how her father ended up in a coma, only that he was paying for her fathers hospital bills for over a year. As Helena probes Marquez further about the corpse that she found in the jungle and that he was wearing one of the masks that were similar to the one he had in his shed. Marquez explains the Ya’arikawa have been starting trouble and refers to them as savages and whenever they hunt them down they keep their masks so they understand who is in charge. Marquez also discloses that not all of them are indigenous and that someone among them has been targeting him, and that he wants Helena to catch them.
He offers to help Helena and emphatically implores that he wants to catch who ever killed his sisters and that his business had nothing to do with their murders. He states to Helena she wants her to leave him and Ivan alone. When Helena asks him whether or not he is lying Marquez then surprises her by revealing that he was holding onto a prisoner whom he thought was responsible for the missionary women’s deaths. Marquez then opens a trap door in the floor when suddenly we see a weakened shackled Yua emerge from the dark looking up at them.
When Helena sees his face she then becomes sick and begins to throw up. After a few moments of feeling sick Marquez offers her a glass of water as she tries to collect herself suggesting that maybe she is pregnant. Helena then asks how does he know that he is the right guy who committed the murders, and he responded with an explanation that his men found him near where the murders happened. Helena then requests to take him in for questioning. Marquez reluctantly agrees on the condition that they have a deal that she won’t bother him and his men again, including Ivan (the sarcastic cop).
Later that same evening Reynaldo approaches Helena when she is sitting on her hammock getting ready to go to sleep in an attempt to try to explain his mistake but instead becomes startled with anger as she head butts him and starts yelling and cursing at him for what he did earlier to her thus creating a stir in the process within the camp employees. Marquez comes out from his cabin perch yells at them to knock it off with a few curse word expletives for extra emphasis.
The next day the both of them are carry Yua, who is suffering from fatigue and some unknown life threatening condition out on a stretcher from the jungle. They eventually reach the rivers shoreline and gently place Yua onto the boat. As they are readying the boats departure Reynaldo tells Helena that she is to go back on her own and that he was not returning back to Puerto Manigua. Helena asserts that as long as he was under her command that he is to follow her orders. At this point the two of them exchange terse words as Reynaldo reminds her that going back to Puerto Manigua would be putting his life in danger due to not carrying out Ivan’s request and that he needed to stay behind to insure his family’s safety. Helena calls him a coward for not carrying out murdering her. Reynaldo responds to her that while his family was being threatened that he was the only one willing to help her when everyone else refused to. Helena then becomes humbled by Reynaldo’s expressed discontent and frustration and the sober reality of truth. As he begrudgingly gets on the boat Helena in a show of sympathetic contrition tells Reynaldo to take her to Puerto Manigua and after that he can return to his village if he wishes.
When they arrive to Puerto Manigua, they struggle to unload Yua off the boat who is unable to walk on his own, he looks gravely ill and is starting to breathe shallow as Reynaldo and Helena lay him against a stump. Helena asks Reynaldo if he could stay a little while longer to look after Yua as she tries to figure out a way to get help.

Suddenly Yua grabs her leg and asks her in Spanish if she knew where Ushe was. Helena becomes momentarily stunned and confused before asking him if he knows Ushe.  Yua looks intently at her while struggling to breathe but non verbally confirms her answer while asking her who she is as if he knows her. This startles and peaks Reynaldo’s interest while witnessing this unexplainable exchange especially when Ushe’s name is mentioned. Reynaldo then tells Helena to wait instead and that he will be right back. Where everything changed is when Yua starts to communicate with Helena mentally, non verbally as Helena hears his voice inside her head, she starts to realize a supernatural element is at play suggesting that she is connected a lot more deeper than she initially believed.

Reynaldo then returns to retrieve Yua and Helena as he brings the both of them to a truck that he hotwires and drives the both of them to Helena’s hotel where they lay Yua down on a bed to rest.
The next morning while after Yua had significant time to rest, Helena is out on the balcony smoking a cigarette when she suddenly notices the jungle from across from the hotel members of the Ya’arikawa tribe begin to appear in an eerily way that can be seen watching her. She becomes rather unnerved by this sight and goes inside to find Yua only to find that he has awakened and is breathing heavy, as he already knows of their presence. He tells her that that they are the Ya’arikawa Tribe, Joseph’s men.
He then asks her who she is as he suddenly grabs her hand and places it on his heart. When he does this Helena suddenly experiences a jolt that places here in the jungle. She then hears Yua’s voice call her name “Helena” as he explains to her about the power of the jungle, and how it is in danger. He also explains that Joseph stole the key to the jungle and how he is not from the there and that he is the leader of the Ya’arikawas who must be stopped. Helena turns around and sees Joseph with the Ya’arikawa mask standing there with a menacing stare at Her. Yua’s voice can be heard describing Joseph as “the White Demon”. Just then Helena pulls away her hand and returns to her reality in the present in a frightened pose. Yua’s tells her to not fear the visions, that they always lead the way.  
This series plays out like one giant long continuous movie, telling a very consistent complex story like no other. All throughout the use of flash backs in time is also telling another story of the history of Ushe and Yua bringing the viewers to present day discourse. As we unravel this mysterious thriller, we begin to learn more and more of the deep entrenched symbolisms of the characters meanings that plays significance to the over all story telling of this unusual film series. One of the most important and perhaps the most poignant is the parallels between Christianity to that of a “God” presence of the jungle; Religious and spiritual contrasts that somehow become connected as the jungle being the source of reverence. Two worlds collide of past and present, religious vs, non religious, spiritual vs. non spiritual, linear vs. non linear modes of thought which is a pervasive inner conflict of humanity through out that persists and beckons in earnest to viewers for a peaceful resolve.  

Probably the most important symbolic message that is being conveyed throughout the story and maybe missed due to being so immersed in the many conflicts being played out in the subplots of the various characters portrayed is the sanctity of life. Although this message is conveyed throughout the course of this mini series with the many characters trying to do the right thing or for the beliefs that they stand for, however no where is it most apparent when we dive into the past of Ushe and Yau when their tribe is held captive by Joseph and his indigenous subordinates known as the Ya’arikawa.

In a violent scene where Joseph lines up Yua and his tribe the Arupani, where they are resistant to his overtures of joining his ranks, an army he calls them, is determined to show Yua and his klan who is in charge when he decided to slice the throat of one of his brothers. Ushe, witnessing this vile spectacle reacts in horrifying fashion by screaming out.
In a previous scene from Episode 3 that gives context on how Joseph is familiar with Ushe, is when Joseph finds Ushe who was swimming in a river ends up intruding on her solitary moment. She confronts him and asks him what he is looking for? Ushe in this moment knows of Joseph’s treachery when ends up forcefully grabbing her hand to find out that she has power and is connected to the jungle.
Later following Yua being in fetters separately from the rest of his tribe, Ushe is talking with Joseph who is demanding from her to give him secret of the jungle. Ushe demanded that Joseph set Yua free as a condition, but he refused, instead threatened Ushe that he would kill Yua if she didn’t relent to his commands.
Ushe then explains to him that he would have to drink the special concoction that she prepares in order to unlock this power. However Ushe would mix a poison instead, who herself would drink first in order to convince Joseph to drink it. When he does, he has an adverse reaction to it and collapses and dies from it. So it appears.
When Ushe goes to the hut where Yua is tied up, she frees him but is weakened by the poison that she drank. By the time she frees Yua, the other tribe members of Ya’arikawa noticed that Joseph was dead and begin going after Yua and his tribe members by killing them and setting fire to the other tribe members trapped inside another hut. Ushe urges Yua to do something to save them, but the hut was already engulfed in flames and there was little time thus resolved himself to believing there was nothing that could be done to save them despite Ushe’s plea’s. Instead he chose to save Ushe and himself due to the belief of protecting the sacred knowledge of the Jungle had to be at all costs including the lives of his entire tribe.
Later Ushe is visibly upset and heart broken over what had happened and is inconsolable. She blames Yua for not trying to save the other tribe members and refuses Yua’s help or his reasoning on why he did what he did. In one scene where a circle is drawn Yua tries to plead his case with Ushe, but desperate to overcome her emotional distress she leaves the circle and Yua thus signifying that their bond was broken. When Ushe uttered to Yua that she will search for a way out of the darkness she was feeling, it signified the time that she would eventually enter the missionary. One of the tenets that are sacred to the Tree walkers is the sanctity of life, to which taking of another life has consequences. Such as Yua when in a earlier scene he is hesitant about going to war when his tribe members were being injured and killed by local loggers, (a common issue in today’s real world in various parts of South America) but relents due to pressure from a fellow tribe member insisting something had to be done. When we see Yua leading his tribe to retaliate a local loggers camp, he ends up killing in violent fashion to which he forgets his basic tenets of where he came from, ultimately contributing to the evil of Joseph to fester inside the jungle. Ushe’s actions by poisoning Joseph was another to which she paid the ultimate price which was with her life when Joseph would tear her heart out from her chest. After Ushe’s death a contrite Yua tries to make contact with Ushe in the eternal dimension where she appears and tells him that he lost his way and had forgotten where he came from confirming the breech of violating the sanctity of life belief.

We then return to Helena and Reynaldo who are back at the hotel discussing what it is that they will do next while keeping a low profile. Helena then decides that she needs to go to the police station in order to call her superior in Bogota to call for added back up and to give them a progress report. Cell phones for some reason don’t work well for making long distance calls on official business.

When Helena returns to the police station it is the first time that the Sarcastic cop Ivan sees her since ordering Reynaldo to kill her, so he realizes that he is in big trouble because if she is alive then she also probably knows about his plot to have her killed. He watches Helena talk on the phone knowing that she is calling for back up.

Ivan then comes out of his office and stands behind Helena just as she is finishing her call and faces off with him. He asks her if she just called for back up and she tells him that she did. As gets in closer he tells her that he will protect her in an almost sinister way. Helena then tells him that the police force would call in the army if they had knew what he did. In this moment they look at each other knowing that the game had change between them and Ivan realizing that he is in trouble left to cursing Helena as she leaves the police station.

When upon closer examination of the antagonist Joseph, through the expose of Helena’s actions of taking a deeper look into the police archives in search for clues, Helena discovers a person of interest by the name of Joseph Schultz a member of the Nazi party from 1940 who was visiting with a team of expeditionary scientists at the time. We learn about this detail when Helena pays a visit to the Missionary head sister again to confront her on the missionary’s history of hiding Nazi’s during that period in time but to acknowledge that she was also hiding the truth in order to protect Ushe. The sister also gives Helena a photo of her parents with Ushe, confirming the connection between them. Also why the discovery of the Nazi period is significant because just like the Tree Walkers it would suggest that Joseph too was much older than what he appears if by chance he survived the night when Ushe had poisoned him, then gaining entry into the Eternal Jungle’s dimension just a Yua suggested would be an explanation that was giving him such longevity. The other significance that makes the Nazi angle much more compelling is the fact that in real life South America in general is no stranger to playing hosts to former Nazi members escaping the war in the late 1940’s where it is believed many went to escape the hangs mans noose and justice of the wars aftermath. Joseph was obsessed with gaining control of the Eternals secret to the point that it drove him mad and he didn’t care whose life or lives he destroyed to reach that end, including Ushe, whose heart he took in order to fulfill that goal. Her heart is seen encased in a glass sphere like shape that had tubes running through it and connected to Joseph’s veins in order to gain access into the mystical world.

The next following scene Helena is returning to hotel late at night when suddenly she is attack by Ivan who is intent is to kill her. Realizing that he had no choice and that he probably was going to end up in prison he decided that by eliminating her would bury any evidence that she had against him.
Helena fights him off and struggles with Ivan in order to buy more time, but he over powers her with his size as being much bigger than her and stronger. Just when we think that he has her at gun point and is about to finish her off, the camera cuts away to an out side angle of the Hotel where a single gun shot can be heard ringing out into the late night silence. The camera cuts back with a dead Ivan on top of Helena and a fatal gun shot wound in the back. The camera cuts to Reynaldo standing on the top of the stairwell pointing a gun.

The very next scene we see an underwater shot with colors of red, yellow and two shadowy figures looking down from the surface. The camera cuts away revealing Reynaldo and Helena standing beside the river where they just fed Ivan’s body to a school of piranhas having a feeding frenzy leaving pools of his blood dissolving in the water.

The story then shifts in the form of a flash back to a time of when Ushe was with the Missionary sisters and how she came to meet Helena’s parents. This was also a timeline that picks up after Ushe left the circle bond with Yua connecting the sequence of events where Ushe is still trying to heal from her own tragedy. We learn several things not only about Ushe, but about Helena’a parents and the bond that they shared with one another before and after Helena’s birth. The fist thing we learn is that at the time Ushe was both in the Convent and spending time with Helena’s parents it is revealed that she is at least 60 years of age at the time. We know this when Joaquin, Helena’s father recognizes markings on her body are similar to a tribe of people that he had helped relocate and resettled four years prior. He then shows her a video tape of a tribe of people standing around a fire in the jungle and Ushe immediately recognizes who they are as she utters the word “Mananuc” and in a brief flashback we see Her with Yua along with other tribe members escaping hunters that were after them. She begins to explain about the slave trade of the rubber mill workers and how they had to escape the hunters while becoming teary eyed as she is telling the story of being freed when we see an image of Yua invoking the spirit of the Jungle that made them invisible. This was a powerful moment that made Ushe teary eyed as we sensed that she had not only missed Yua and but her lament and realization who she is after spending so much time with people outside her culture she begins to come back to true self as she then becomes quiet. Joaquin then tells her that her story happened 60 years ago in regards to the rubber mill workers and the slave trade. Joaquin looks at Helena’s mother with a look of curiosity of Ushe’s story.

Another detail that we learn about Ushe is her time with the sisters in which she formed various bonds with to which they had learned from her and changed their lives forever. The fact that she was from the jungle and had vast amounts of knowledge when it came plants, and healing remedies along with her unassuming demeanor endeared the sisters to her to the point she became one of them in many ways. Another clue about Ushe and its a detail that many will miss when watching this story for the first time is that we see a woman by the name of Racqel who befriends Ushe. Racqel is the Head Sister at an young age who knew Ushe before most did including Helena. So the interesting interactions as an adult when she speaks with Helena is that she did know a lot more about Ushe but for some reason was guarding her secret and withholding information from Helena.

Aside from the obvious religious connotations throughout, there is the mere thought of two prevailing themes that is being inserted under the surface is the feminist assertiveness over the masculinity one. Again some will catch it and some will miss it, however at first glance of the Patriarchy vs the Matriarchy narrative that we keep hearing about from liberal advocates when it comes to social issue, it would be easy to castigate the writers of this series of having an agenda of wokeism and purposely inserted such notions into the dialogue. This is pretty evident when Ushe approaches Raquel in a moment when she is cutting her hand with a knife while praying in a chapel before a crucifix of Christ at the alter. While Ushe observes Racquel’s bleeding hand, she asks why she would try to harm herself? Racquel’s explanation is that because Christ died so man can be free and suffered while doing so, that she too must experience the same suffering by shedding her blood. When Ushe gently grabs her hand and looks at it, she states while looking over at the crucifix of Christ that ‘Man is a cult and that women are the cult of life.” In this instance one can assume that Christianity is being denigrated and made to look like a flawed religion if one were to view from the lens of “son of man argument, however when viewed from the perspective of human history there is some truth that “man has been the more destructive species such as taking life, through subjugation and wars is a representation of death. As opposed to women who give birth, are nurturing creatures to become mothers are representations of life. The symbolism being invoked in this scene is too uncanny to ignore and some would even suggest that Ushe is being celebrated as a Christ like figure however with one flaw; that is Christ never took another life only he gave up his own and lived sinless. Whether these two views are intentionally being inserted in the the narrative is rather a subjective one and certainly provides another rabbit hole to dive into when discussing such topics. I am willing to give the writers a pass on this because Ushe is not a mere representation of a Matriarchal super hero, but one that elevates above such superfluous narratives but to be inclusive of all life in all of its forms.

During the same sequences Ushe prepares a medicinal remedy to apply to Raquel’s cut hand, as a bunch of her sisters watch in amazement of her ability and knowledge of plants to heal wound. It is then a head nun of the order enters the room and asks what is going on. She then realizes that Ushe is using her old ways and is determined to scold Ushe by stating to her ” in the house of the Lord you stop learning to be wild.” The Nun then forcibly yanks Ushe by the arm and escorts her out and puts her in a solitary confinement box structure in order to punish her. This scene can also be construed as depicting the ignorance of the hegemony by suppressing natures knowledge of providing organic medicine and reducing it too superstitious and witchcraft.

The turning point for Ushe is when she met Helena’s mother Aura one day and was able to determine that she was pregnant unbeknown to her at the time, only to find out that Ushe was correct and decided to pay her a visit to thank her. Helena’s mother immediately knew that there was something special about Ushe so she decided to invite her to her house for dinner and from there she would start spending more time with her. In another scene that served as a flash back and a personal turning point for Ushe is when she returns to her Dormitory late at night after spending time at Helena’s parents house, Racquel is waiting there for here and asks where she has been. In this particular scene the viewer is able to learn more about Ushe that lends and builds more to her mysterious character. Racquel tells her that she has observed that she never sleeps, eats or has periods, something that a group of young women living together for a longer period of time might begin to notice. Also one the ironic details about Racquel herself is the fact in an earlier scene from a previous episode we witness Racquel as the head sister paying a visit to Helena at her hotel when she gives her a balm ointment for Helena’s scars is suggestive that she learned one Ushe’s medicinal remedies and still holds on to her connection to her. Lastly Raquel begins to tell Ushe that the Head missionary sisters think and suspect that maybe Ushe might be a witch again reinforcing a previous narrative of contempt for rigidity and conformist doctrine. This marked the time that Ushe tells Raquel that the Missionary will no longer be for her. This is a moment that Ushe decides to go back to her former self and accept her natural state as a Mananuc, Arupani native of the jungle.

In the following next sequence of images tells more of the story of Ushe, and her connection to Helena’s parents, as well as Helena herself after her birth is revealed. We begin to further understand the undeniable bond that Ushe has with Helena and her parents as well as seeing one of the very rare times that Ushe is able to be herself and smiles when she shares a lighthearted moment while dancing with Helena’s parents. The fact that Ushe was there before, during and after Helena’s birth and spent time with her as she was of a walking, talking age as a child signifies the unmistakable spiritual bond that Ushe is able to forge with Helena at such a young age which in many ways marks the profound connection for the entire story itself as it unravels the mystery of who Ushe was as a person as well.

The story starts to connect every part of the mystery when we learn that it was the Missionary who stole Ushe’s body from the lab and had it on display in the chapel in preparation for a funeral. Tua suddenly sensing this awakens from a deep sleep with a deep resolve to finding Ushe’s body. In many ways his determination to find her is a way to mend his already broken heart by seeking closure in returning Ushe back to the Jungle where she belongs. Yua eventually after regaining his strength is able to find Ushe’s body and with the assistance of the Sister who earlier told Helena about Ushe being the daughter of the jungle is able to take Ushe’s body out of the Missionary and meet Helena and Reynaldo at the boat later.

 Yua, Helena and Reynaldo bring Ushe’s body back to the jungle to be properly buried, with her people, with their customs and rituals bringing closure to her passing. The lay her body down in front of a grove of very large trees whose presence is ominous, dignified and a symbolic sacrilegious site to which Ushe’s body is offered to.  Other tribal members show up to pay their respects including the grandmother who holds Yua’s hand to share in the sacred spirit that feeds the trees with Ushe’s passing. It was quite the seminal moment to which gave a peaceful resolve that Ushe, a daughter of the jungle was finally going to be part of it in another way.

While the grandmother is singing a ceremonial song, Yua looks at Helena and nods to her to suggest it is time. Helena walks over and sits next to Yua as he holds a black and white picture of her parents with Ushe taken before she was born. Yua looks at the picture and finally realizes that its Helena who has the seed of the jungle within her as he looks up at her with an intense stare in knowing this truth.

We see flash backs of Helena and Ushe teaching her as a child about how to see in the forest while her mother at the time was busy working on a book, and other times when they are playing in the forest a game of come find me where Helena accidently encounters Joseph through her visions. When the scene shifts to Ushe confronting Joseph in the Enternal world, a solar eclipse darkens the skies over the jungles to which everyone around starts to experience and looks up at the skies darkning around them. Yua explains that its Ushe shutting off her heart and we see this as Joseph tries to usurp Ushe’s particle like essence but fails when Ushe takes away the key. The scene shits back to the solar eclipse passing allowing the sunlight to come through again and the elders leaving Ushe’s body thus concluding the funeral.

After all the other tribe members leave Helena and Yua sit around a fire where they discuss her visions. At this point Yua tries to encourage to not fear but accept what is in front of her, to look at fear in the eyes. He also tells Helena that she is one of the walking spirits confirming that she holds the key and the door to the entrance in which earth and all of humanity is at stake and that she will play an important role in what is to come such as defending it against Joseph aka “the White demon”.

Helena is overcome with fear however, and decides that she is going back to Puerto Manigua to retrieve her father and bring him back to Bogota where he can get better health care and perhaps he will wake up from his coma. She is expressing this to Reynaldo as she starts walking out on her own to leave the Jungle, as he tries to stop her, but Yua tells Reynaldo to let her go, and that she must find her own way. When Helena begins to walk deeper into the jungle, she encounters a glowing tree root something that she hasn’t seen before, and bends down to touch it, and when she does is suddenly bitten by a poisonous snake on her forearm which essentially signifies that the jungle is not going to allow her to leave. We see a cut back of Yua praying over a prepared medicinal application while holding a bowl and the moment Helena is bitten by the snake its as if Yua knows what had happened. Helena reacts to the snakebite in great pain but walks further into the jungle becoming disoriented from the snakebite, until she starts to get lost. Along the way while wandering she encounters a stone phallic structure ruin. When she walks up to it to get a closer look at it, she pulls away the leaves and plants obscuring its base, only to discover a half Nazi symbol at it base to which startles her and acts as a signifier that draws her closer to Joseph.

When she reaches the rivers edge, the toxin of the snakebite has gotten worse to the point it weakens her and obscures her vision. She then falls into the river and floats in it while struggling to stay afloat until eventually she manages to get to a sandbar of some kind where she sees visions of her mother, strolling in a long flowing dress singing some sort of lullaby. Helena struggles for a while as she watches her vision of her mother walk further out of view. She manages to crawl until she sees another glowing root and decides to touch it and enters the Eternal dimension.

Once Helena enters the eternal dimension, Ushe appears and tells her that she has been waiting for her and that she has finally arrived. She also begins explaining that the jungle is her home and that she has always been here and that the jungle brought Helena to protect her and that her spirit was worthy of it. This is where Helena realizes what her mission is which is to destroy Joseph within the Eternal Dimension. When Ushe touches Helena’s heart to tell her where the Jungle belongs, this is the moment Helena understands and its confirmed what it is that she has to do. When Helena leaves the Eternal Dimension, her clouded sight is surrounded by the Ya’arikawa tribal members who eventually carry her back on a stretcher bringing her to where Joseph is. While passing by other tribal members at the camp she notices Ushe passing by her assuring her to be strong. Helena also notices another Nazi symbol displayed in a shrine as they carry her into a camp. The tribal men put her on a table and proceed to strap her down while she tries to fight them but its futile as a doctor of some sort is seen giving her an injection from a dirty syringe to sedate her.

Later in the story Helena awakens from her sedation and free from her shackles in a locked room that appears to be furnished with the writings of Joseph’s research materials including Ushe’s heart displayed in a glass case. Helena then looks around the room, looks through some of Joseph’s things such as drawings, and a diary consisting of a bunch of scribbled math and art work where she notices a burnt picture of her parents that was probably recovered from the fire and closely looks at it. Joseph then quietly enters the room and she comes face to face with a man who is now much disfigured with leprosy but still determined to capture the power of the jungle. He starts to talk to her about his necessity to harness the power of the jungle and how such power would heal the world n the name of science. Helena rebukes his overtures but knowing what Ushe had said to her previously she knew what her mission was and thus letting Joseph into the Eternal Dimension where she is to defeat him was the only possible way, so she plays along and agrees to allow Joseph to use her blood through a transfusion process as a way to get into the Eternal Dimension.

The scene cuts away to the tribal elders and Yua pleading to all of village leaders that they will have to go to war to defeat the White Demon in order to save their way of life. In doing so Yua lets them know that they will all have to prepare knowing sacrifices will have to be made by putting their lives on the line to protect the knowledge of the jungle.

Reynaldo explains to his wife about the guilt he felt about the loss of their son and how such it consumed him rendering him into a ghost, which was the reason he left the village. But now he looks at his wife and seeks to heal from the past in order to reconcile with her. Along with asking for forgiveness, a contrite Reynaldo is then seen standing before an audience in front of the village tribe when he states his reasons on wanting to return to his roots pleading his case with Grandfather Wilson listening intently as Reynaldo expresses his desires to fight along side with his brothers.

The entire story reaches it final climax when Yua leads the tribal members in a showdown with the Ya’arikawa led by what appears to be a masked Joseph holding a pistol in his hand. He says to Yua that he is all alone, but when Yua slams his staff on the ground while his tribe had disguised themselves in the brush, immediately start to charge to engage in a violent war with each other. When Yua engages the White demon to fight he ultimately prevails by slicing his throat with a machete. Yua then unmasks him only to find that it wasn’t Joseph at a climatic point when the rest of his tribe resoundingly defeat the rest of Ya’arikawa tribe in this epic battle in the middle of the jungle.

The final scene that left viewers with a sense of ambiguity in its meaning is one that is one that has left many questioning whether or not it is out of place in terms of fitting in with the rest of the story. We see Helena and Joseph in the Eternal dimension where Joseph once again attempts to take away her atomically particle essence with sinister intent. When Helena finally realizes what Joseph is trying to do, she regains her power with the aid of Ushe who utters the name “Cachicamo” and takes away Joseph’s essence ultimately absorbing him completely that culminates into a blinding bright white light that bursts to a final explosion flashing the screen to white. The next scene we can hear a song by Love and Rockets being played in a nightclub with a strobe light effect flashing where Helena is walking toward the camera through a crowd of blurred out dancing people to face off with Joseph again. The scene flashes back and forth of their faces looking at one another as Helena wipes her eyes and looks at her fingers where she notices a black liquid substance on them, the same that is poring out from her eyes before the camera goes to black.  

In conclusion    

Green Frontier is a beautifully shot, totally immersive look at a world that we very rarely get to see such as authentically portrayed life of the indigenous culture within the Amazon. The first episode drops you into a world that’s very much established, with roots possibly stretching back to an ancient existence, and manages to balance exposition and world-building to tie multiple story –lines into one narrative.

The story, the mystery and the acting is flawless, the cinematography is well thought out with each shot methodically placed, to the point the viewer can feel the oppressive heat of the jungle’s humid surroundings and the intensity of the audio soundtrack that propels the driven discoveries is also perfectly paced throughout the series.

While the basic plot of Green Frontier is a murder thriller mystery, it warps and expands through a mind-bending experience over an eight-episode run to incorporate the region’s history, culture, and superstitions, while being pliable with its genre and tone. The acting is real and organic as a lived experience, and the story itself is a deeply well choreographed premise that hits on every thought provoking detail that takes you deeper into a world beyond the story itself. This entire production executes every facet to perfection and despite what other critics may have said about it, this mini series is well deserving of a 5 star rating.

On a parting note:

Lastly the ending concluded with ambiguous connotations that are rather subjective, leaving open the possibility that a second season might be forth coming. However as Netflix states that the series is a limited one meaning a self contained series leaving any further speculation that this story will continue. Another explanation for the ambiguity at the very end might be what the creators actually intended, leaving it up to the viewers to decide what the ending means or what endless possibilities of scenarios would play out to where the story continues. While there are many unresolved aspects of the characters themselves such as what happened to Helena’s father, or Helena herself? What about the Smuggler looking for Ivan, and what did his visit to the hospital mean? What about the police from Bogota? All of these questions and many more are not necessarily a need to be answered and perhaps left forever open to interpretations and further discussions.