Summary
Bandidos Season 2 adheres closely to the standard heist ending playbook in Episode 7, leaving a couple of doors open for more.
The ending of any good heist/treasure-hunting show isn’t as much of a will-they-won’t-they as it seems. Nobody ever gets the loot, really. It’s either cursed and has to be destroyed or belongs to someone else and has to be returned. These things are about the lessons learned along the way, and Bandidos Season 2 is a little like that. In Episode 7, “The Heist”, the Tear of Fire is less important than foiling Regina’s plans and then finding out what everyone else will do next.
I don’t know if they’ll be doing it on Netflix in Bandidos Season 3, but one should consider the possibility since I thought the ending of the first season didn’t really warrant a follow-up, so I obviously can’t be trusted (although, to be fair, I was right about Season 2 being ill-advised.) It’s hard to argue there aren’t plenty of directions a new season could go in after this finale, even if I’m quietly hoping they don’t bother.
Regina Lures Lili With the Tear of Fire
The entire second season of Bandidos is a cat-and-mouse game between Lili and her stepsister Regina, who by the time the finale rolls around has managed to acquire the coveted Tear of Fire and is displaying it rather provocatively at a gala.
This is one of those obligatory sequences in this genre where Lili knows the whole thing’s a trap but can’t resist the confrontation. The crew is divided into three teams of two in an effort to cover all the bases, but as soon as Lili is lowered into the display room, the trap is sprung. There’s a little deliberate ambiguity over who has survived – Miguel, Ines, and Lucas all seem to have been killed in an explosion – but this is also par for the course we can later learn the real truth of how everyone got away with it.
In the meantime, though, Lili is caught and taken to the police station, where she confesses to Carmen but refuses to sign anything. It’s almost like this is all a scheme too…
Regina’s Stupidity Lands Her In Trouble (And Jail)
Lili is on the hook for killing Regina’s father, Ramon Valdes, and Spain wants her extradited so that she can be tried for the crime she obviously didn’t commit. This makes the true culprit, Regina, rather smug, so she can’t resist a bit of last-minute in-person taunting of Lili that proves to be her own undoing.
Regina had killed her own father out of jealousy – she had hated Lili ever since she was brought into the household. When her father cut her out of his will in favor of Lili, that was the final straw. She never realized that Lili was actually Ramon’s biological child.
Lili pokes at Regina’s ego by asking if she needed help to kill her father – she’s so adamant that she did it all by herself that she inadvertently confesses to the crime in a police interrogation room. Oops. I’m not sure whether this evidence would realistically stand up in court, but it has the intended effect.
The Fate of the Tear of Fire… and Everyone Else
Thanks to Mano letting Xime know that the gala presentation was a trap, Miguel, Ines, and Lucas were obviously saved from the explosion, snuck into the morgue in body bags, and were able to subsequently escape.
The Tear of Fire is given away, as is standard practice in these shows. Ariel displays it in a museum, but it’s not a charitable gesture – the Bandidos get millions in return, including a little more from Regina’s safe. It’s a decent haul. But what will they do with it?
Pachita plans to use her share to pay off some of the more unsavory prison inmates so that they do Regina some damage on the inside. Lucas and Citali are heading for China – which might provide a new avenue for changing the third season’s scenery – and Miguel and his father are going to Turkey. Ines rejects Carmen’s offer to resume her old job and their relationship and takes Alex on holiday instead.
The ending of Bandidos Season 2 is, of course, a cliffhanger. While Lili is examining the brooch her father gave to her, her eyes light up with excitement at having discovered something – possibly a clue leading to the Valdes inheritance.
