EXCLUSIVE: Prison Code is a breakout hit for Netflix. The Brazilian motion drama, based mostly on actual occasions, has landed effectively at house and internationally. Season 2 drops quickly and Deadline received a while with sequence director and showrunner Heitor Dhalia. We are able to additionally solely share the primary photos from the upcoming season.
Prison Code scaled Netflix’s prime 10 in 70 nations, together with the U.S. and Canada. On house turf, it was the most-watched Brazilian sequence within the second half of 2023 when it launched, and in addition one of many most-watched reveals by means of 2024.
Set within the crime world in and across the Triple Frontier, a three-border space the place Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay meet, the drama was impressed by a theft that passed off in 2017 and ensuing real-life occasions. The brand new season entails a jail break and follows a felony group, the Phantom Gang, enterprise extra daring heists whereas being pursued by the cops.
“We realized lots in Season 1 and expanded the scope of the sequence on this second season,” Dhalia mentioned. “The success of the primary season motivated us to take extra dangers in exploring the depth of the crime universe within the Triple Frontier.”
Dhalia and the Prison Code group are breaking new floor with a Brazilian motion drama impressed by true crime. The group went to lengths to ensure their sequence, though fictionalized, felt genuine.
“Crime sequence should respect the codes of the universe we painting; this is among the secrets and techniques that captures the viewers’s consideration,” he mentioned. “We researched and deeply understood the crime universe, working with actual consultants, police from all forces, and former criminals, ex-bank robbers, and ex-international traffickers.”

Alexandre Schneider e Ana Pazian/Netflix
Prison Code stars Maeve Jinkings, Rômulo Braga, Thomás Aquino and Alex Nader. The story is advised from totally different viewpoints and Dhalia added: “The power and conflict of views make the sequence what it’s and provides it the reality it holds. We’ve many former inmates within the solid, which brings a singular fact to the present.”
Dhalia is a Associate on the manufacturing firm Paranoid. His background is moviemaking, having directed movies together with Drained, which performed at Sundance, Adrift, which was within the Un Sure Regard part at Cannes, and Amanda Seyfried-starrer Gone.
In addition to Prison Code, he’s ending up one other Netflix mission, Os Donos do Jogo (which roughly interprets as The Homeowners of the Recreation, nevertheless it doesn’t but have an official English-language title). That can comply with the Rio de Janeiro playing mafia. He says it has comparable core ideas as Prison Code.
Brazil has a storied filmmaking historical past. In TV, in the meantime, it’s identified internationally for long-running melodramas. With motion sequence corresponding to Prison Code and shortly Os Donos do Jogo hitting worldwide screens, viewers around the globe are seeing a unique taste of Brazilian TV drama.
Dhalia says: “I hope this marks a brand new chapter for Brazilian productions to shine on the world stage. As one of many characters on this new present says: ‘Solely those that play win.’”

