A new, fact-based drama out of Mexico follows four women who overcome the odds to form their country’s first-ever female police squad in 1971
As Mexico currently celebrates electing its first female president, screenwriter Fernando Rovzar wanted to chart this progress by harking back to a time when women were not so welcomed into governance. Women in Blue tells the story of Mexico’s first female police squad, showing the obstacles of being a pioneer through the eyes of four ladies who set out to make their mark in law enforcement, against significantly stacked odds. As this quartet realize that their new unit is simply a publicity stunt, they nevertheless use the resources at their disposal and their brilliant minds to hunt down a serial killer that is terrorizing their fair city.
In framing the women’s professional experience around this particular mystery, Rovzar found a rich opportunity to draw parallels between 1971 and 2024. “While we are about to have our first female president — so, in that respect, opportunities have improved — I also can’t ignore the fact that 10 women every day are murdered in Mexico because they’re women,” he says. “I wanted to bring this problem to 1971 and see how the first female police department could face a villain of this magnitude, but instead of calling it femicide, we created a serial killer that murders women who choose to go out and work.”
Heading up this clandestine investigation are four protagonists who all join the police for unique reasons. Maria, played by Bárbara Mori, is a stay-at-home mom whose opportunity to follow a childhood dream arrives right as her dreamy domestic life collapses. “When something happens that shakes her perception of reality, she has to face a new truth,” Mori explains. “She joins the police force and there she meets these women who change her for the rest of her life. They give her the strength and determination to follow a dream that she forgot, and Maria discovers that she is capable of doing so much more than being a wife and a mother.”
While Maria has spent her life to date pursuing societal norms, her sister Valentina, played by Natalia Téllez, is the family rebel who goes from protesting authority to joining it. “She’s the free spirit,” says Téllez. “She speaks against injustice. When joining the force, she finds an opportunity to identify herself through having a discipline, having a job and facing the macho society of Mexico — not just as a concept, but feeling and experiencing it at work.”
The two sisters are joined by Angeles, played by Ximena Sariñana, a brilliant analyst on the autism spectrum in a time where that diagnosis does not exist. “Angeles joins the police force for a very logical reason, but soon feels valued for who she is for the very first time in her life,” says Sariñana. “She’s not expected to change or to fit into what society expects of women. And she finds friends for the first time.”
The fourth member of their crew is Gabina, played by Amorita Rasgado, a woman from a long line of police officers who, maddeningly, see no reason for her to join the family biz. “Gabina is a girl who learned to be a police officer,” says Rasgado. “I have found it difficult [to imagine] how parents are teaching their daughter how to use a weapon and immobilize a criminal, but all of a sudden they say, ‘This thing I’ve been teaching you is not for you.’ When she sees the other three [women], she says, ‘Hey, you know what, this is for me, too.’ Gabina is a woman who discovers her own personal freedom and sense of community.”
While the characters and the central mystery are fictional, the Azules — the Blues — are based on real-life trailblazers. “Three years after the worst massacre in Mexican history, where the government was responsible for murdering student protestors on the Plaza Zócalo in Mexico City, Mexico opened its doors for women to join the police. It sounded too good to be true,” says Rovzar. “When I started digging into it, and spoke to some members of this first graduating class of police officers, they told me the truth — that Mexico didn’t have any intention of inviting women into the police. It was all a publicity stunt to distract people from the massacre. They thought that if they gave women uniforms, people would trust the police again, because women could be more trustworthy than men.”
Speaking to one of the real Azules, Rovzar discovered that within that scam these women saw an opportunity, which, with any luck, he and his creative team can now turn into a series that continues for years to come. “She told me this, almost laughing: ‘We weren’t given guns, we were dressed in miniskirts, we were dressed in knee-high boots. They didn’t let us arrest. They didn’t let us investigate. They put us in the park where we had to direct tourists. That was the extent of our responsibilities.’ But when they realized that this had all been just a scam, they had two choices: Either they left, offended, or they stuck around and changed the system from within. And I believe that it was that second choice that makes this a story worth telling.”
Women in Blue (Las Azules) begins streaming Wednesday, July 31 on Apple TV+