Hernán

I was impressed by the historical accuracy of 'Hernán' in spite of what I thought were too many flash-backs and flash-forwards. The series presents what I think is a balanced approach to the Conquest (or Invasion) of México. The Spaniards are neither heroes nor villains, but men in search of wealth, and the Mexica (not 'Aztecs', thank God) are neither savages nor victims, but men defending their homes against superior fire power. I particularly liked the appropriate use of the Nahuatl and Mayas languages in addition to Spanish, even though all three must have changed significantly in the last 500 years (about the same period of time that English has evolved from Shakespeare) NOTE: the word 'Aztec' was not used by anyone at the time of the Conquest, but came into use almost 300 years later, ina history of México published in Italy by a Franciscan who had be expelled from México.

Apparently according to some who have commented on this series, every single indigenous American back in the 1500s practiced blood rituals and therefore that immediately renders every single one of the millions of indigenous Americans that lived back then as savages.

Following that logic every European was to blame for those responsible for burning witches and heretics at the stake, killing innocent people via Inquisitions, Roman gladiator blood sports, etc.. Every European can be tarred as a savage for the actions of a few people. It would be akin to blaming the average person in Spain for the gassing of Jews by the Nazis.

It is still highly contentious whether blood rituals existed based on so-called evidence that relies heavily on conjecture by academics and interpretations from various artefacts.

Assuming they did occur the majority of estimates bandied about by some academics are based purely on conjecture of some archeological findings that are open to a myriad of interpretations, and not on hard tangible evidence to support the views that indigenous Americans (especially those south of the US border) were basically blood thirsty savages committing mass murder either every day of the year or on a particular chosen week.

Any person with a modicum of common sense would realize that these numbers are simply not believable because the logistics involved to carry out an 'event' of this size and nature would be insane and astronomical.

The logistics even for a current modern society with the available tools to pull it off (electricity/power, machines, cars, guns etc..), would still pose a considerable challenge much less a civilization that existed 500 years ago.

Starting with bad points:

• They decided to use permanent flashback, there is no beginning, no middle and no end to the story, it is all messed up, unbearable. It is a very poor choice, specially because the history of the conquest was to slowly discover that there was a quasi mythical city in a middle of a continent.
• It is an amazon production, so they bend history a bit in order to fit their liberal stereotypes (Europeans bad, Christians bad, Muslims good etc ...) but not too much (and these strong women lovers forgot about Maria de Estrada).
• The production want us to believe that Spaniards massacred thousands of cholulan just for fun ...because "Europeans bad" I guess. The fact is that Cholula was a trap, the Spaniards were about to get massacred so they (over)reacted the way they did. Later on, Alvarado massacre was much more disputable however motivated by his hatred for local tradition (kid sacrifices etc ...).
• Obviously Cortes never had a muslin girlfriend, and if muslins weren't very popular in Spain, it was because Spaniards just liberated themselves from muslins after 8 centuries of domination (I wish liberal production mentioned that more often but .... "Muslims good" I guess).

Good points:

• Except few exceptions mentioned above, they really try to stick to the history even with tiny details. We got more of the point of view of the Conquistadors but there are a lot of fantastic descriptions of the very diverse pre-Columbian societies.

So it is fantastic to have a fairly accurate visual depiction of what were the fascinating pre-Columbian civilizations and this incredible moment of history. But in order to understand I recommend to study the history of the conquest before watching the show because of the permanent flash back/forward. I would have gave a 10 stars if the history was in order.

The show is entertaining and the actors do a good job. However, it is very unrealistic. Native Mexicas are depicted as good-hearted people (like Rousseau's Noble Savage) who accidentally sacrifice and oppress other humans without bad intentions. If you ignore this absurd premise, it is a good show.

Very much worth a binge. I watched it in Prime in two 4 episode nights.

At home, my mother was an avid reader of history and as a High Schooler she made me read the epic book "The True Story of The Conquest of New Spain" by Bernal Díaz del Castillo (2 volumes, written in XVI Century "Castellano", the term Spain hadn't been created yet).

As far as I know, the Aztec culture, as well as the events leading to the "Noche Triste" (Sad Night, the first defeat of Cortés by the rebellious Mexicas) are very well portrayed. Some parts of the series are made up and romanticized but nevertheless are fitting to the plot. Modern archeology and history scholars have also contributed much to our present day knowledge of the times, that the original Díaz del Castillo obligedly omitted from his much redacted revisions.

The series as historic entertainment is not only dramatic and gripping but also very much humane. It emphasizes the clash of two cultures with a crudeness that permeates any attempt of smoothing the tension the arrival of Cortés' group created among the nations then populating the area.

For people not familiar with Mexico's hirtory, it will show how far from "savages" were the people. Human sacrifices was a horrific custom that was accepted by all the nations of Mezzoamerica and in a way not much more shocking than Roman practices of crucifictions, circus and roman candles (tarred Christians set on fire to lit Roman streets). Yet, Romans are considered a great civilization while Aztecs are deemed savages.

The only reason that kept me from giving it a ten star rating is the casting of the main character, Hernán Cortés. From Bernal Díaz we know he was fair skinned and probably brown haired, as natives thought of him as Quetzalcoatl. Not as nordic as Pedro de Alvarado who was called Tonathiu (the sun) by the Mexica but certainly not as dark as Oscar Jaenada is. We must remember Moors had just been expelled from Southern Spain and Cortés was a Castillian, thus of Celt ancestry. The rest of the cast is perfect and comprised of great actors.

Script, direction, special effects, sound, acting --even Spanish accent- are all exquisitely delivered.

I cannot wait for the second season to be delivered.