The Osorio File
Episode 6 of The Kingdom begins with a heavy bit of exposition about our shadowy wiretapping agent, Ruben Osorio. He’s an informant and has been on the ground-level since 2001, where he was instrumental in giving information about student riots. This great work continued, right the way through to being promoted up to Level 4. Now though, it seems like he’s set his sights on breaking Julio and Emilio up. Tadeo arrives at a launderette, meeting his contact called Peg Leg. This is who’s creating these fake documents for him, and after handing over his share of cash, learns he’ll need to wait a week for it to be ready. This is particularly problematic given Elena has figured out the money has been taken from the Temple. Will it lead them to Tadeo as well? Back at the police station, Lamas and Roberta stumble upon Ruben Osorio courtesy of a couple of pictures from the rally. Osorio is clever, having maneuvered himself into getting promoted up to becoming Armando’s political advisor – despite not having much political experience. What he does have however, is knowledge of social media and how it can be manipulated. Specifically, he’s intent on turning each of his voters into a political and religious soldier. The biggest and brightest church among them is the Church of Light with Pastor Emilio and his dedicated team. This seemed like the perfect opportunity for Osario to exploit, hence his interest in all this. After all, if churchgoers are giving up parts off their wages for this, surely they’d be swayed over who to vote for? Julio arrives to see Emilio, telling him to release Ana from this web of deceit. He wants her to be dropped from the Board and to be free of any incriminating evidence that could be linked back to her. If not? Well, Julio won’t work for Emilio anymore. Julio even suggests doin this a day before his candidacy is announced; the perfect time to corner Emilio and force his hand. In the middle of the night, Tadeo heads over to see Emilio. He questions their faith and after the money fiasco, realizes that all of this is just one big lie. Elena pretends to be asleep through this but she listens intently to what’s going on. Well, Tadeo has had enough and he packs up his things, ready to leave. Meanwhile, Osorio starts to stir things up. After a meeting with Emilio, he does his best to cut Julio out of this deal, going on to mention Ana and her involvement with the finances. Given what he knows, Ruben tries to call a truce and an alliance. This is all a big ploy and a way of stirring things up further, something that’s put Julio in a very difficult position. At the police station, Candia is shocked to see Remigio has been let go on orders of the judge. Meanwhile, a mole inside the force finds a missing person report for a kid called Brian. This same kid, as it turns out, is the one currently seeking refuge in the church with Tadeo. When Osorio finds out this same information, he relays it on to Julio and wonders just what the Church have been up to. Given these kids are missing, it seems like there’s a deeper connection to all this. What could it be?
The Episode Review
The Kingdom continues to deliver decent drama, although this chapter does tend to hammer home the heavy-handed exposition with these flashback segments laid out like news reports. It does feel a little sloppy at times; a shoehorned exposition dump that feels ill-fitting in this series. Surely there could have been a more interesting way of showing this. Despite that though, the rest of the chapter does a decent job showing that the church itself seems to be a front for something far more sinister. How does the church and these kids play into this? I dread to think…
