Narcos star Diego Luna on the belief that TV series' 'glorify crime'

Like Mzansi, Mexico has a high crime rate and a section of the population is worried that TV shows "glorifying it" are making the problem worse.

TV shows such as Yizo Yizo which was based on the life of gangsters and The Queen's drug trade storyline has cast the spotlight on illegal activities over the years. 

Netflix's Narcos: Mexico which tells the story of the Mexican drug cartel and the rise of notorious drug boss Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo can be added to that list. 

While audiences will no doubt fall in and out of love with Miguel during the course of the show, the actor who brought him to life, Diego Luna says he does not believe the series glorifies crime or the drug trade.

"If you watch the series completely, you realise how dark it gets. Certainly there have been projects that glorify drug dealing but as audiences we are always looking for the twisted and dark. The characters that cross the lines you and I are not willing to cross. You cannot blame Narcos for that. That is Shakespeare. That is mafia films. That is westerns."

Diego said that shady characters did not turn people to crime.

"The dark and twisted has always been where our interests lie. I think it can be dangerous if done wrong, like if you structure it as if these figures are the heroes of the story but Narcos is done so well. It shows the complications."

He said that it was hopelessness and poverty that pushed people to crime, not TV series depictions.

"You have to ask why people are joining these organisations or fleeing over the border for a better life. They do these things because they are born in places where there is no other choice. Where they are just surviving. That absence of equality and justice."

It is this complication that fascinated Miguel, which he tried to bring through in his portrayal of Miguel.

"I wanted to recreate what Mexico was like back then remember it a little bit because I was a kid. I was like 10 years old when they caught him but the Mexico I remember was the Mexico I remember as a kid. I wanted to create a Mexico that was hidden from me."