MovieChat Forums > Narcos (2015) Discussion > The american cop is the WORST character ...

The american cop is the WORST character of the show


Agent Murphy, the self-righteous american cop, here to save the day.

With his smug face and his perfect respect of human rights... because, you know, that's what americans are famous for around the world, especially in South America, LOL.

That's a terrible character, he's not realistic as a tough guy either. His voice as a narrator reminds me of Don Lafontaine, the action movie trailers guy.

Also, i don't care about he and his wife subplot. All around terrible.

~~~

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I'm pretty sure this show does anything but show America's "perfect respect of human rights". Murphy himself becomes a pretty cynical character, as is obvious from his narration. Hell, the opening scene of the entire series is them mowing down a whole bunch of people in the club just to get one of Pablo's sicarios and Murphy is pretty much okay with it.

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Murphy and his partner both should be in jail many times over. Nothing I hate worse than a cop who thinks it's ok for him to break the law because he has a badge and is after the bad guys. As far as I'm concerned it's one group of bad guys at war with another group of bad guys with innocent people all around getting hurt.



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That's one of the reasons Narcos is so engaging, you see the humanity and the evil of both sides. On balance though, I don't think there's any comparison between the actions of the DEA/Search Bloc and those of the Medellin cartel. Escobar was responsible for literally thousands of killings and terrorist acts that killed countless innocents. They went to extremes to get him, but Escobar himself was also extreme and unprecedented.

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If you are assuming the events as they are portrayed in the series are true, then yes, they absolutely should have been prosecuted. The real Murphy and Pena have both said the series was accurate for the most part, but had a Hollywood twist. Of course, no mention is made concerning which parts were fabricated for entertainment value.

You also have to take certain things into consideration - the target and his crimes, the international location, etc. Compare Escobar to Osama Bin Laden, if you will. Both were considered terrorists, guilty of the mass killings of innocent people. Both of their deaths are clouded in political mystery and conspiracy. But would anyone argue that both were necessary? Not likely.

Desperate times sometimes call for desperate measures, legal or not. Escobar was definitely a person that needed to be stopped. Were the tactics that lead to his eventual death questionable? They certainly were, but in the end no one is going to question the legality of his death or the tactics used to get to that point when it ended his reign of terror. Ask the families of any one of his many victims and I have no doubt they would agree.

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Killing Escobar did not really accomplish anything. It didn't stop the drug lords and it didn't stop the drugs. The only thing fighting that war with him did was to get more people killed faster.

Many of the victims on both side would not have happened if the useless war on drugs had not been pursued.


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Killing Escobar did not really accomplish anything. It didn't stop the drug lords and it didn't stop the drugs. The only thing fighting that war with him did was to get more people killed faster.


Maybe you should ask Colombians if they were happy that Escobar was killed. Escobar literally brought Colombia to its knees with his campaign of mass murder, intimidation and terrorism. It's true that there were still powerful drug cartels after Medellin, but they generally did not wage war directly on the Columbian government and civilians like Pablo did. He was a unique threat.

Many of the victims on both side would not have happened if the useless war on drugs had not been pursued.


In this I agree with you. But this is a separate question from whether killing Escobar accomplished anything.

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It seemed to me that he wasn't any worse than the other drug lords until everyone came after him. What it looked like to me was that he got to popular and it scared both the Colombian and US governments that he might actually have a shot at taking over. He had to be made an example of.

He was a bad guy. There are always bad guys. Killing Pablo was more about politics than it was about justice or stopping the drug trade. Besides the war on drugs is what gave birth to the situation in the first place.



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It seemed to me that he wasn't any worse than the other drug lords until everyone came after him.


He was worse because no drug lord had ever made the money that he made or had the power he had, because he had the good fortune to be one of the main players when cocaine really took off in the late 70s/early 80s. "Drug lords" weren't a thing before Pablo; everything was much smaller scale. This idea we have of drug kingpins with a fortune of billions, multiple mansions and an army of hitmen at their disposal started with Pablo, he was the first.

What it looked like to me was that he got to popular and it scared both the Colombian and US governments that he might actually have a shot at taking over.


It wasn't about his "popularity", it was about the growth of his power. Colombia had an "oh sh!t" moment when they realized that half their country's police, judicial system and government was either bought and paid for or scared into submission by the Medellin cartel. Something had to be done.

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I lived through those times. I was in the army. While not in Colombia, I did spend time in the overall area. I have a lot of first hand knowledge of how the US dealt with Latin American countries. So unless you were directly involved with the Colombian situation, you are just regurgitating information you have read or watched and presenting that information as facts.



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So what is it you think they should have done differently? Just sit by and watch Pablo buy every politician and all the cops in the country, murdering whomever he pleased?

I understand you think the war on drugs is a horrible idea, I agree with you! But short of legalizing drugs, what was the answer?

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In my older years I've come to the conclusion that (almost) all vice laws are anti capitalism and anti freedom. We if legalized and regulated drugs, prostitution and gaming the we would eliminate way more problems than would be created and the country would be a safer and less dangerous place.



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So basically you don't have an answer besides something that was completely and utterly impossible. Got it.

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It's only impossible because of people like you who keep saying it can't be done. It's not really any harder than what Colorado has already done.



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You're saying it was possible to legalize drugs back in the 1980s/early 90s? Is that what you're actually saying?

I'm dealing in reality here and you are dealing in fantasy, that's the problem. You came in here saying it was a bad idea to go after Pablo, yet your only alternative is complete, unadulterated, 100% fantasy. Glad we understand each other.

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No. I came here to agree (mostly) with the OP and to say the cop was also a criminal.

After that my arguments have followed two themes. One was the war on drugs has always been a bad thing. That it is the true cause of most of the violence and other problems. Second, that we went after Pablo as hard as we did more because of politics than drugs.




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Politics? Are you trying to say that Pablo was actually popular in Colombia, and they were afraid he would get too popular? Looking at your previous posts that seems to be your argument. What is your evidence that Pablo was actually popular in Colombia and not just Medellin? He was locally popular in Medellin because he spent a LOT of money on community work and helping the poor, but nationally, Colombians loathed him for his criminality and terrorism.

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Wow! You spent a lot of time arguing with me for someone who didn't know what I was arguing about.

Believe what you want. I'm done with you.



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I think I've shown that I know exactly what you're arguing. And I've exposed your faulty thinking. But by all means, leave in a snit if you must.

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Straight up ownage if I ever saw it. The other dude should just own up to the fact that you figured him out and move past it.

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I'm thinking the person with a sketch of Escobar as if he is some sort of icon to look up to is not really going to be the most unbiased person in these arguments.

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Sorry, my mother drew that picture of me. It was drawn in the 80's but she was doing a age progression of what she thought I'd look like in my 40's.



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Is it though? Pablo Escobar and the like are to me very pertinent reasons why drugs should be legalised. You'll always have villains and criminals in society but the illegality of drugs are creating honest to God super villains. Narco terrorists who are capable of extraordinary levels of violence against the actual state itself. You have narco or mafia states where all business, public and state institutions are thoroughly infiltrated.

Escobar was a unique threat to Colombia because he was so enriched & empowered by the illegality of drugs that it gave him the means and power to wage such a war.
Salvatore "Toto" Riina waged a war against the Italian state in the 90s & again was able to do so partially due to the vast illicit income trafficking narcotics had provided him with.
We've all read the horror stories coming out of Mexico where anywhere between 40-80,000 have been estimated to have been murdered.
So yeah it might be technically a separate question but the point remains that the cons of keeping drugs illegal far outweighs the pros and Escobar or the Cali cartel never would have been so powerful to begin with if drugs were legal.

Hey, look at that! She's not crazy, she's being chased by a cheetah!

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def thought he was the worst actor of the series. aside from him I thought it was great acting all around, esp the pres y pablos lawyer. and you gotta love gachas portrayal by a great American actor.

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Wrong. The woman who played his wife was worse. She sucked ass

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It stopped that scumbag Escobar. Are you suggesting that if stopping 1 bad guy or his org doesn't solve the problem, the good guys should just give up?

Because that mindset doesn't make any sense because you'd be at the mercy of those animals that prey on others.

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No not exactly. I think the whole war on drugs was (and is) total insanity. That the war on drugs (primarily pushed by the US) was the root cause of most (but not all) of the negative repercussions. This is one area where libertarians have it right.



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I think you need to go back and watch from the beginning. It was ugly before the U.S. got involved.

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Don't agree with idiot liberal potheads.

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I don't agree that they went too far to take down a mass murderer. I agree that the war on drugs is a waste of money, when it comes to marijuana that is. The fight against legalizing marijuana is definitely one that has politicians being educated by the liquor and tobacco industries with a little cash swapping hands on top of that.

There is absolutely no reason for our government to classify marijuana as a schedule 1 drug. Especially since schedule 1 means institutes are even afraid to research marijuana for medicinal purpose, little alone just to research it to show long term side effects for national health concerns.

https://www.drugs.com/article/csa-schedule-1.html

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Then you're a damn fool. Sicarios and all these murdering criminals should be killed on sight. The Colonel had the right idea since day one.

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More than welcome to that belief but I don't think the show is a credible source of evidence for a criminal conspiracy. If you have any evidence of wrong doing please contact the DoJ. Law enforcement isn't above the law.

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Typical couch potato monday quarterback moralistic idealistic unrealistic nonsense.

They might have been police on paper. But they were fighting a war against adversaries using heavy military weaponry. And wars are fought to be won, not to be nice.

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Exactly my thought. Morality has no place in war. Ethical agendas should not conform people to a fixed norm when it comes to stopping someone like Pablo. Besides, the OP and any other people bashing the character for this reason are foolish and ignorant for not heeding to his own words from the first episode, when he talked about the thin line between good and bad.

One day in the year of the fox came a time remembered well...

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That's why I always had more respect for a bad guy than I do for self righteous good guys. At least a bad guy is open with what he is, and is not some two faced goodie two shoes.

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That's why I always had more respect for a bad guy than I do for self righteous good guys. At least a bad guy is open with what he is, and is not some two faced goodie two shoes.


You have more respect for someone who murdered over 3000 people just because he admits he is a bad guy?

Anyway, Escobar was comparing himself to Nelson Mandela. When did Murphy or Pena ever do that?

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Yup. I hate two faced people more than anything. Doesn't matter the severity of the situation. I like and respect people that are upfront with who they are, good or evil. Even if I didn't like Pablo, I would still respect him on the count that he was honest with what he was.

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I can understand this as far as fictional stories go. But you do realize Narcos is based on real events? How can you think being a hypocrite is worse than being a terrorist and a murderer in real life?


Do you even know what honor is?
- A horse.

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Yes I do.

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Do you think that anyone who works for any law enforcement agency is "two faced" or a hypocrite?

You do realize that those jobs are necessary?

and for a lot of guys its just a job and one that they are good at. Being in that job doesnt necessarily mean that someone thinks that they are better than everyone else. I dont think Pena for example considers himself a "good guy"...although he definitely is a good guy compared to a terrorist like Pablo Escobar.

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Yes because LE is supposed to be held to higher (pun intended) standards.

As someone who was a victim of police corruption and harassment, I have no respect for any cop in general. I used to support cops until recently when i was stopped by one for no reason. Also I was stopped again because of something my idiot roommate did, and they were trying to hold me at fault. Sorry but that makes me lose any ounce of respect I have for cops.I'd would rather fight my own battles and not have a PD department than have one that is corrupt and fights dirtier than the "bad guys". Go ahead and call Pablo a terroist, but he doesn't have nothing on Bush, Obama, etc, who keep on bombing innocent countries for oil.

Also Pablo gave back to his own community. How many politicians do that? How many DEA agents ever help those in need? NONE. That's why their asses got kicked out of Columbia recently because the people there are fed up with DEA BS.

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Yes because LE is supposed to be held to higher (pun intended) standards.

As someone who was a victim of police corruption and harassment, I have no respect for any cop in general. I used to support cops until recently when i was stopped by one for no reason. Also I was stopped again because of something my idiot roommate did, and they were trying to hold me at fault. Sorry but that makes me lose any ounce of respect I have for cops.I'd would rather fight my own battles and not have a PD department than have one that is corrupt and fights dirtier than the "bad guys". Go ahead and call Pablo a terroist, but he doesn't have nothing on Bush, Obama, etc, who keep on bombing innocent countries for oil.

Also Pablo gave back to his own community. How many politicians do that? How many DEA agents ever help those in need? NONE. That's why their asses got kicked out of Columbia recently because the people there are fed up with DEA BS.



lol "corruption and harassment" because you were stopped? poor guy. maybe you should write the ACLU.

I picture a young kid wearing a $29.99 Che Gueverra shirt, typing on your $3000 computer, in your nice safe suburb.

It's ok, I wanted to "rage against the machine" when i was young too.

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And I picture a goodie two shoes that is dressed in some retarded yuppie clothes with oversized eyeglasses and pants pulled up to his chest. Obvious, idiot is obvious.

Also it's funny how you can resort to insults instead of debating logically. Guess we know who won this argument.

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Go ahead and call Pablo a terroist, but he doesn't have nothing on Bush, Obama, etc, who keep on bombing innocent countries for oil.


This is something I see from Trump supporters and a friend of mine who thinks Putin is generally pretty great all the time. They say "but Hillary said blaa blaa" and "Obama did blaa blaa blaa." Being not the worst of the worst doesn't mean you're automatically good. It just means there's someone worse out there. Not that I agree Hillary or Obama are "THE WORST" either, or that either Trump, Putin or Pablo Escobar are better, but my opinion on their relative positions on the suck scale is irrelevant vis-à-vis the point I am making.

I don't disagree with you on the corruption in the police force though, it is a real issue. When I was robbed (with guns, in a South American country) the police did nothing, and the officers on the station wouldn't even take my statement before my (local) boyfriend gave them "lunch money." And of course in the US for example police brutality and police unaccountability is a huge problem. But I can't believe the whole justice department in every country is inherently rotten, and worse than drug lords, terrorists and mass murderers. If we're talking about the CIA, the government of the US etc re: South America or the Middle-East then yeah, we're getting into murkier waters on this...but as Murphy and Escobar are presented on Narcos I don't agree that Murphy is worse - not in any way, shape or form (except as a character on a TV show.)


Do you even know what honor is?
- A horse.

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As opposed to those who get into bed with psychopathic death squads? Fine line between them both imo.

Hey, look at that! She's not crazy, she's being chased by a cheetah!

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I've always thought an honest bad guy is better than an dishonest good guy.



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The truth is much worse, what the Americans and the CIA did.

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With his smug face and his perfect respect of human rights...


I laughed at that too.

Americans never miss an opportunity to toot their own horn.

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Good to know that I'm not the only one who can't stand him. Dude sticks out like a sore thumb in this show with all this great acting. He's like a caricature.

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It's too pathetic. :-/

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You guys missed the big one. They had a shot of George Herbert Walker Bush on TV saying we have to get rid of those drug dealers and put them in jail. It kind of slipped his mind that his son GW was arrested in 72 for cocaine possession and it was swept-ed under the rug.

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LOL I bet you thought you were making a big point there didn't you- How excited were you when you realized you could add this irrelevant comment?

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They had a shot of George Herbert Walker Bush on TV saying we have to get rid of those drug dealers and put them in jail. It kind of slipped his mind that his son GW was arrested in 72 for cocaine possession and it was swept-ed under the rug.


Right! Showing that hypocrisy is what makes this series excellent.

Susan, "but I was thinking..." Leo, "STOP! Thinking is for losers!" - Scandal's satirical message.

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Wow you'd really hate him in real life- he is one of those men who is hard as nails, honest, trust worthy even now at his age realistically a dangerous man if he needed to be.

The real Steve Murphy is as they say a tough hombre. And just because our politicians have lied, cheated etc etc over the decades doesn't mean that someone like SA Murphy has to compromise his own integrity. Some of us don't care what the larger world is about we care about acting with integrity in our own life and that is all one can do right?

And the real Javier Pena is a good decent man who took his oath and duty to our country seriously. We'd be better off if there was more of that.

PS you do realize there are two American cops right? Actually more than that but Pena and Murphy two main characters.

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Yeah, nothing screams decency like power sex/raping your controlled informants who are desperate for visas and cosying up to loopy death squads as well as other cartels who are every bit as ruthless and evil as the cartel you're trying to bust, Pena was completely decent.

Murphy definitely didn't compromise his integrity by letting a nightclub get shot up in order to get a few sicarios, too bad about the innocent bystanders, or by watching a kid get summarily executed or by being accessory to two guys getting thrown out of a helicopter. Cuz it's a war. Never mind it's a subjective war that could be solved very easily, it's a war and as long as you're on the winning side, then you're a good guy.
I also admired Murphy's ethics via his posing over Escobar's body, like he was a big game hunter, grinning away from ear to ear.

Hey, look at that! She's not crazy, she's being chased by a cheetah!

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Sarcasm is difficult and even more difficult in writing. I'll simply say when you are dealing with animals you must act like an animal. I know that doesn't fit your playbook in your safe burb but if you have a better way to deal with people who skin DEA agents live or who murder people in drug treatment because they don't want o lose a customer or any of the thousands of atrocities they have committed. I am all ears.

And please don't say make it legal because that is horribly naive and won't stop the violence- not even a little. In fact it would likely make it worse as they compete over a much smaller population of users. Legalizing drugs will not stop people from buying illegal drugs just like legalizing booze didn't stop the sale of untaxed, unlicensed, booze.

so please continue your bad attempt at sarcasm others have work to do. Work you obviously disagree with because you cannot understand.


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I'm from a drug & crime infested "burb" mate and have never seen any good come from the illegality of drugs from either end of the food chain. Just people I'd gone to school with- good decent people who would give you the shirt off their back- make a stupid mistake and get hooked and end up in and out of prison for the rest of their lives if they didn't die of overdoses or get murdered due to drug debts. On the other end I saw low life scumbags who I would consider nothing more than corner boy thugs become enriched and empowered beyond their wildest dreams which btw drastically increased their propensity for even more savagery and extreme violence.

The series does a very good job of highlighting the hypocrisy of the war on drugs, as the DEA agents constantly guzzling hard liquor and smoking cigs which kill more people each year than all illegal drugs combined.

if you have a better way to deal with people who skin DEA agents live or who murder people in drug treatment because they don't want o lose a customer or any of the thousands of atrocities they have committed. I am all ears

Yes I will say legalise it- Legalise it tax it and stick a gov health warning on it. That way criminals will never be empowered to the point where they will skin federal agent and have billions at their disposal. There won't be narco states where the actual state itself is attacked and criminals can spend three million dollars on an escape tunnel like Chapo Guzman did.

Nobody is saying their won't be illegal drugs but you'll always have criminals and crime in society, illegal drugs won't make them anywhere near the vast income illegal drugs are making them now, not if they're legalised. Do you really think that people who buy illegal alcohol is a serious epidemic?You have people illegally buying cigarettes today and anything else.
Spare me your man of the world routine, you're advocating for a lost cause and unwinnable war so I'm not particularly interested in your irrationality or arrogance. You honestly think killing Escobar or busting the Cali cartel made so much as a dent in the drug trade, in the grand scheme of things? You're hopelessly naive if you do, seriously. Just got worse and 20 years later it's bigger than ever and you'll never stop it.

You fail to realise that there never would have been an Escobar or Cali Cartel or Guzman if they had have been legal to begin with.

Yes I get that you think that monsters are needed to fight monsters and it's just too bad when innocents get mown down in nightclubs thanks to good ole liquor swilling cig smoking Steve and 14 year old kids get tortured and murdered due to their crooked lawyer dads, I get it.
I find your advocacy of this- regarding human lives as pawns in a game for the "Greater Good" of course- as quite disturbing.
We're not gonna make any headway here but the war you advocate is a crock and doomed to consistently fail. You're simply too myopic to see this. People like you are dangerous and can justify anything, long as the cause is one you consider as for the greater good.
'Bye.

Hey, look at that! She's not crazy, she's being chased by a cheetah!

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Just wanted to put....

You *beep* owned him with that response.

Nice one.

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I agree! In fact, I have never seen someone so punchable in any tv-series or movie, and that's saying a lot. He's either a great actor, or he just has an unfortunate face.

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His character was quite bad, yes. I couldn't care less about his wife and his kid or his personal problems. The character was self-righteous as you say. It also bothered me that he never learned Spanish properly. Maybe the real DEA cop didn't, but this is a TV show and showing him not being able to speak Spanish tells me that he (i.e. the character) doesn't give a crap about the people or Colombia just that he's out to get Escobar.

Overall I'd say that his character did not lower my final rating of this series as everything else was so good but there were quite many momement where I couldn't bare to watch because his sub-plots and his face annoyed me too much.

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That's the point, I think they were careful not to show a "yay, American agent comes in to save the day!" point of view, as so many American-led shows do --- no, this american agent did his part, was a part of a team, had problems, did some bad *beep* and ultimately got the job done with blind and arrogant determination.

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That was refreshing, they were careful to emphasize the primarily Colombian role in taking down Pablo, but obviously the Americans were heavily involved too.

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and i found he mumbled so much and was hard to hear i had to turn the volume up all the time....eventually i just zoned him out and hardly paid attention to him...thankfully he was mostly doing desk work and not seen too much lol

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If we're bagging on people who don't bother to learn the country's native language...then you must really dislike illegal immigrants...

But hey, Murphy wasn't planning on staying there forever, it's just a job right? Is that the excuse illegal immigrants use? 'No es necesario aprender Inglés , que sólo cortar el césped'

Am I right?

I also love how people managed to turn a dislike of the actor, into something about western politics.

Seriously, give it a rest.

Escobar was a psychotic, narcissistic animal and he got what he deserved. If anything let's talk about his cu*t family and how they got off without a scratch. You can thank the compassion of the west for that, because in many other places, they wouldn't have been given any quarter.

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Is that the excuse illegal immigrants use? 'No es necesario aprender Inglés , que sólo cortar el césped'



What makes you think illegal immigrants are only Hispanics? Are you a f---ing racist, dude?

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I visited Australia one time and had no idea that a lot of Germans illegally immigrated there in the 90's. Also, supposedly, there are quite a few English and Aussie illegal immigrants in the US, I've heard. It happens everywhere.

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His role was less significant this season, with Pena taking a more prominent role. That was a wise choice.

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