Sumith Prasad
Netflix’s teen series ‘Elite’ ends with Virginia shutting down Las Encinas after a series of murders and near-death experiences associated with the educational institution. The decision to put an end to its operation leaves the students puzzled as they are yet to write the final exams of the academic year. Virginia makes a deal with the public school in the place, Instituto de Enseñanza Secundaria (I.E.S.) San Esteban, for the students of the elite establishment to write their exams. Like Las Encinas, San Esteban is also a fictional establishment conceived by Carlos Montero and Darío Madrona, the creators of the show. Still, it is an integral part of the narrative’s fundamental theme!
The Significance of I.E.S. San Esteban
I.E.S. San Esteban does not have a real-life counterpart. It was conceived to serve the principal theme of ‘Elite,’ which is the class difference. Carlos Montero and Darío Madrona created the series to explore the consequences of a clash between teenagers from two different social classes. “The essential thing’s the clash between social classes. That’s what sets the series apart. It makes the [crime element] less artificial because it’s born from that warfare, organic, not the crime of a random psychopath,” Madrona told Variety. Las Encinas and San Esteban are representatives of these two different classes.
San Esteban also appears in the earlier seasons of the show, especially in the first installment. Samuel, Christian, Nadia, and Omar join Las Encinas because the public school’s roof collapses. The existence of the supposedly inferior educational institution was necessary for the writers to establish these main characters in the “elite” setting to explore the aforementioned clash. In the eighth season, Omar realizes that his second alma mater doesn’t deserve to exist because of the tragedies that happened in and around the same. With the support of Nadia, he advocates for the closure of Las Encinas, which ultimately happens.
The writers must have reintroduced San Esteban in the eighth season to draw a full circle. The show begins with Samuel, Christian, Nadia, and Omar arriving at Las Encinas, only to be treated as aliens in a supposed paradise. The eight seasons then establish that the exclusive private school is nothing but a hell that destroyed the lives of several teenagers. Finally, the students of the same institution are forced to go to San Esteban, only to be treated as aliens and save their academic lives by writing the exams.
The school scenes in the show were mainly shot using sets built in a production facility, with the European University of Madrid utilized for the exterior sequences. However, the production department might not have built San Esteban on filming sets since it would have been too much effort for a short scene. The crew must have used a building in the Community of Madrid to set up the public school for season 8.
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