‘Money Heist’ Part 5 Puts Arturo in the Crosshairs (SPOILERS)
Published Sept. 4 2021, 6:55 p.m. ET
The Netflix thriller Money Heist (La casa de papel) returned for Part 5 on Thursday, Sept. 3, with Arturo Román and the other bank hostages still in danger.
But did Arturo die in Money Heist Part 5?
Warning: Part 5 spoilers ahead, as well as plot points involving sexual assault.
The short answer is that Part 5’s first five episodes left the character in “critical condition,” so his life is hanging in the balance as we await the second half of Part 5, due for release on Dec. 3.
Here’s how it all went down…
Previously on ‘Money Heist,’ Arturo’s storyline took a dark turn.
Arturo, played by actor Enrique Arce, is one of the people the Dalí gang takes hostage at their heist at the Royal Mint of Spain, and by happenstance, he is also a hostage when the gang later robs the Bank of Spain.
Before getting caught up in the heists, Arturo was working as the general director of the Royal Mint, and we learn that he had an affair with his secretary, Mónica Gaztambide (Esther Acebo), and even got her pregnant. But Arturo refused to leave his wife, and Mónica eventually joined the bank robber gang under the alias Stockholm.
During Money Heist’s fourth part, Arturo drugged and sexually assaulted another hostage, Bank of Spain employee Amanda (Olalla Hernández).
And Enrique, Arturo’s portrayer, lobbied against that plot turn for his character. “I was disappointed and I did tell the creator and executive producer,” he told RadioTimes.com last month. “I said: ‘I think the character is miserable as it is already, in a joking, funny way.’ … What I tried to tell the creative team, I said, ‘You’re killing the soul of this character by doing this scene where he molests the governor’s secretary.’”
He went on: “I pleaded, I pleaded, I couldn’t sleep for days thinking about that scene, because I really don’t even believe in that as fiction. So, when that happened, and I had to do it… OK, fine, but then I was like, ‘Oh, you killed the character. You killed it.’”
Stockholm shoots Arturo, perhaps fatally, in the first half of Part 5.
In the first half of Part 5, Arturo manages to wrestle control of the armory and arms himself with a flamethrower and a machine gun, as RadioTimes.com summarizes. But Stockholm sneaks through the air ducts and corners him at gunpoint. And before Arturo has a chance to use the pistol concealed in his waistband, Stockholm shoots him multiple times.
Stockholm immediately has a crisis of conscience, though, and she and other gang members try to resuscitate Arturo. They finally restart his heart with a defibrillator, and the gang sends him out of the bank to receive medical attention.
The last we hear of Arturo in the first half of Part 5 is when Colonel Luis Tamayo (Fernando Cayo) says that Arturo is in “critical condition.” But we also know that Tamayo wants Arturo to die so the death of a so-called “innocent” would turn the public against the Dalí gang.
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