A documentary involving the producers and the cast premiered on Netflix the same day, titled Money Heist: The Phenomenon (Spanish: La casa de papel: El Fenómeno).

Set in Madrid, a mysterious man known as the "Professor" recruits a group of eight people, who choose city names as their aliases for anonymity, to carry out an ambitious plan that involves entering the Royal Mint of Spain, and escaping with €984 million.

[11] Initially entitled Los Desahuciados (The Evicted) in the conception phase,[11] the series was developed to subvert heist conventions and combine elements of the action genre, thrillers and surrealism, while still being credible.

[27] Meanwhile, the casting directors advocated for Álvaro Morte, whom they knew from their collaboration on the long-running Spanish soap opera El secreto de Puente Viejo, even though his prime-time television experience was limited at that point.

[11] Pedro Alonso was cast to play Berlin, whom La Voz de Galicia would later characterize as a "cold, hypnotic, sophisticated and disturbing character, an inveterate macho with serious empathy problems, a white-collar thief who despises his colleagues and considers them inferior.

Cameo scenes of Brazilian football star, and fan of the series, Neymar, as a monk were filmed for part 3, but were excluded from the stream without repercussions to the narrative until judicial charges against him had been dropped in late August 2019.

[47] Preparing a remote and uninhabited island in Panama to represent a robber hide-out proved difficult, as it needed to be cleaned, secured and built on, and involved hours-long travelling with material transportation.

[48] Interior filming took place at the former Locked Up sets in Colmenar Viejo[9] and at the Spanish national daily newspaper ABC in Torrejón de Ardoz for printing press scenes.

[42] The motorhome scenes of the Professor and Lisbon were filmed at the deserted Las Salinas beaches in Almería to make the audience feel that the characters are safe from the police although their exact location is undisclosed at first.

While Denver pursues a love affair with hostage Mónica Gaztambide, inspector Raquel Murillo of the National Police Corps negotiates with the Professor on the outside and begins an intimate relationship with his alter ego "Salva."

One year after the heist, Raquel finds a series of postcards left by the Professor, who wrote the coordinates for a location in Palawan in the Philippines, where she reunites with him and the story comes to a conclusion.

Stockholm feels guilt over shooting Arturo, who is her son's birth father, and takes morphine while nursing Helsinki, which leaves her unable to aid in the gang's defense against the attacking soldiers.

El Español argued that the analogy made it easier for viewers to connect with the show, as modern society tended to be tired of banks and politics already,[64] and the New Statesman said the rich were no longer stolen from but undermined at their roots.

[71] While many plot lines in the heist series still relate to males,[15] the female characters become increasingly aware of gender-related issues, such as Mónica arguing in part 3 that women, just like men, could be robbers and a good parent.

[74] La Vanguardia challenged any female-empowering claims in the series, as Úrsula Corberó (Tokyo) was often shown scantily clad,[75] and Esquire criticized how characters' relationship problems in part 3 were often portrayed to be the women's fault.

[71] The show received good reviews and remained a leader in the commercial target group for the first half of part 1,[83] but the viewership eventually slipped to lower figures than expected by the Antena 3 executives.

[81] Netflix dubbed the series and renamed it from La casa de papel to Money Heist for distribution in the English-speaking world,[71] releasing the first part on 20 December 2017 without any promotion.

[12] As writing was in progress, Pina stated in July 2018 that he appreciated Netflix's decision to make the episodes 45 to 50 minutes of length, as the narrative could be more compressed and international viewers would have more freedom to consume the story in smaller parts.

[108] While considering the pilot's voice-over narration unnecessary and the sound editing and dialogs lacking, Natalia Marcos of El País enjoyed the show's ensemble cast and the ambition, saying "It is daring, brazen and entertaining, at least when it starts.

[109] After the show's move to Netflix for its international release, Adrian Hennigan of the Israeli Haaretz said the series was "more of a twisty thriller than soapy telenovela, driven by its ingenious plot, engaging characters, tense flash points, pulsating score and occasional moments of humor", but taunted the English title "Money Heist" as bland.

[67] In a scathing review, Pauline Bock of the British magazine New Statesman questioned the global hype of the series, saying that it was "full of plot holes, clichéd slow-motions, corny love stories and gratuitous sex scenes", before continuing to add that "the music is pompous, the voice-over irritating, and it's terribly edited".

[6] John Doyle of The Globe and Mail praised parts 1 and 2 for the heist genre subversions; he also said that the series could be "deliciously melodramatic at times" with "outrageous twists and much passion" like a telenovela.

The site's critical consensus reads, "An audacious plan told in a non-linear fashion keeps the third installment moving as Money Heist refocuses on the relations between its beloved characters.

[81] It regularly trended on Twitter world-wide, largely because celebrities commented on it, such as football players Neymar and Marc Bartra, American singer Romeo Santos,[19] and author Stephen King.

[117] Although the show's first two parts were popular, the domestic market in Spain failed to convince Antena 3 to continue the series and it was shelved until international response escalated to the point where the cast and crew were called back for another two seasons.

In numerous incidents, real heist men wore the show's red costumes and Dalì masks in their attacks or copied the fictional robbers' infiltration plans.

[121] Spanish newspaper El Mundo saw the public response as a reflection of the "climate of global disenchantment" where the robbers represent the "perfect antiheroes",[13] and the New Statesman explained the show's resonance with international audiences as coming from the "social and economic tensions it depicts, and because of the utopian escape it offers.

"[6] Viewer response was especially high in Mediterranean Europe and the Latin world, in particular Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, Brazil, Chile and Argentina,[49] so Spanish as a common language did not appear to be a unifying reason for the show's success.

[14][66] Netflix partnered with the video game Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege for an in-game event, where hostages on the Bank map, wore Money Heist outfits.

The 12-part production, titled Money Heist: Korea - Joint Economic Area, would be a collaboration between BH Entertainment and Contents Zium, with Kim Hong-sun set to direct.