Warning: Spoilers ahead for The Dead Girls
The Dead Girls (Las Muertas), a Netflix series premiering Sep. 10, tells the story of the Baladro sisters, Serafina (Paulina Gaitán) and Arcángela (Arcelia Ramírez), who operate a network of brothels in Mexico in the 1960s. Over six episodes, The Dead Girls reveals how the sisters maintain an empire built on exploitation, manipulation, and fear—and what happens when their criminal activities attract scrutiny from both the authorities and the girls who are forced to work for them.
The period piece presents the sisters as calculating and strategic, yet brutal in their enforcement of control. Serafina handles supervision and discipline in the brothel, while Arcángela manages finances and connections with local officials. Their rise to power, driven by pure ambition and fueled by the corruption around them, eventually falls apart when police begin to investigate and learn the the scope of their operations and the extent of their abuse.
The early empire and its challenges
From the beginning, the Baladro sisters establish control over their brothels, which span many cities in Mexico through strict rules and systematic exploitation of the girls who work for them. The series highlights how they navigate social and legal pressures, bribing officials when necessary to maintain operations. The sisters’ ambition is matched by their ruthlessness toward the girls in the brothel, who they have trafficked and continue to abuse.
The sisters are riding high; however, cracks in the empire soon appear. Arcángela’s son Humberto becomes involved in criminal activity and meets a tragic end, which forces the sisters to relocate to the Casino Danzón and invest in a ranch. These events reveal just how vulnerable the sisters’ operations are, and mark the beginning of their slide downward.
The tragic fate of the girls
Blanca, a young girl sold to the sisters, becomes a central figure in the series. After a medical procedure goes wrong, she dies, and her death triggers subsequent fatal incidents involving other girls, such as Evelia and Feliza, who both die during a fight over Blanca’s possessions, highlighting the lethal consequences of the sisters’ management and the dangerous conditions within the brothels.
The show also details the harsh punishments and manipulations imposed on the girls. They endure confinement, physical abuse, and neglect while the sisters continue to profit from their labor.
Rebellion and internal conflict
By late 1963, tensions rise among the girls. Discontent with confinement and mistreatment, some attempt to escape and even attack their peers. Bedoya, the sisters’ ally and enforcer, administers punishments mirroring their methods of control. Meanwhile, Teófilo, the husband of Eulalia Baladro, one of the sisters’ relatives who helps manage the family’s ranch, struggles with the property’s finances, leading to further disruption and fatalities.
Serafina’s desire for revenge against Simón Corona, a baker and her former lover, resurfaces during this period. Serafina orchestrates a shooting at Simón’s bakery after he leaves her for the third time. Her actions are driven by a combination of obsession and vengeance, reflecting the extremes of her personality. Although the shooting causes alarm and triggers police investigations, Serafina initially escapes direct consequences by going into hiding.
Investigation and arrests
In January 1964, law enforcement closes in. Serafina is investigated for the bakery shooting, as it’s discovered she had orchestrated the attack against Simón. The sisters flee to the ranch to avoid arrest, taking precautionary measures to conceal themselves. Police soon discover multiple bodies on their properties, including Blanca, Evelia, and Feliza, along with other evidence implicating the sisters and their associates.
Authorities arrest the sisters and 17 accomplices, including Bedoya, Nicolás, Teófilo, and Ticho. During the trial, witnesses among the girls testify to abuse, neglect, and exploitation. Serafina and Arcángela are convicted on multiple charges, including homicide, illegal imprisonment, abuse, and complicity in clandestine abortions, receiving 35 years in prison. Other accomplices receive sentences proportional to their involvement.
Aftermath and epilogue
The epilogue documents the outcomes for those involved. Simón Corona opens a new bakery after his release, while Nicolás, Ticho, and Escalera rebuild their lives in various ways. Eulalia resumes selling sweets outside prison, and Bedoya maintains influence even from incarceration. Arcángela and Serafina remain in the women’s penitentiary, continuing to operate illicit businesses and accumulating wealth, but without hope of freedom.
The surviving girls, now considered victims, receive compensation, although their individual fates remain largely unknown. The series concludes by illustrating the consequences of the Baladro sisters’ empire: legal repercussions, exposure of systemic abuse, and the enduring trauma inflicted on everyone involved.
Are the Baladro sisters based on real people?
The Baladro sisters are inspired by a real-life group known as Las Poquianchis, four sisters who became infamous in Mexico for running a criminal network of brothels, human trafficking, and murder between the 1940s and 1960s. The series, while fictionalized, draws heavily from historical accounts of their crimes, including the exploitation and killing of dozens of women, many of them minors.
The story is adapted from the 1977 novel Las Muertas by Jorge Ibargüengoitia. Ibargüengoitia used the real-life events of Las Poquianchis as inspiration but created fictional characters and storylines to explore the broader context of prostitution and human trafficking in Mexico during that era. The Poquianchis recruited young girls from nearby towns and farms, deceiving families with false promises of work or abducting girls when alone. Victims were forced into prostitution, abused, and often buried in clandestine graves once they became ill or could no longer work. The series captures this dark legacy while weaving a fictional narrative that highlights the scale and impact of the sisters’ criminal empire.
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