Control Z: Sordid secrets revealed in a Mexican high school. Is one about being gay?

Control Z, on Netflix, is advertised as an old-fashioned whodunit: who is revealing the sordid secrets of the students at a high school in Mexico? Ten to one, the secrets include being gay.

Scene 1:  Creepy Girl enters the beautiful glass-and-steel atrium of  her fancy, elite high school, where all of the students are busy on their cell phones. Their texts and websites appear over their heads; mostly sex and romance.

She notices a boy and a girl kissing; the boy is aroused. 

A girl sticking her tongue out for a selfie

A girl who dropped her Motrin (a pain reliever)

She saves the learning-disabled Luis (Luis Curiel) from some bullies by pointing out their secrets.  One gets his mom to cut his hair; another has herpes; a third has dandruff (are those really equivalent sins?)

Scene 2: School Psychiatrist tells Creepy Girl that she's extremely intelligent but getting straight Cs.  She has problems with teachers and classmates.  She was in a mental hospital (wouldn't Creepy Girl know this already?)

Scene 3: Class.  A Straight Couple (Zion Moreno, Andres Baida, top photo) has a tongue-swallowing session, so theatrical and overblown that it looks like a parody.

Left: Andres Baida has an enormous carrot. In Spanish, zanahoria, which sounds sexier.

Finally the teacher arrives, and introduces the New Student (Michael Ronda).  His Dad is a famous soccer star,  so everybody wants to be his friend.  But she assigns Creepy Girl to show him around.

Scene 4: The boys latch on to New Student and ask about his Dad ("Is he really ripped, or only on tv?").   He's upset by the attention and leaves.

Left: New Student walks past a random naked guy in the enormous locker room.

Scene 5: A prim, retro-outfitted Mean Girl is trying to convince a group of adults that National Night, a big annual party, will be ok.  There won't be a lot of sexual assaults, like last year.

More butts after the break

Scene 6:  In the store room, the Straight Couple is having oral sex, followed by more absurdly theatrical tongue-swallowing.  Then she suggests telling people about their romance.  She's tired of lying. But -- everyone knows they are together.  They were tongue-swallowing in biology class.

Scene 7: Creepy Girl is standing on the glass-and-steel roof.  New Student thinks she is planning to commit suicide, and tries to intervene.  But she just likes it up there because she can observe everyone down below.  She gives us a handy list of characters:

Raul  Ernesto, and Dario  (Yankel Stevan, Suraj Beera, Ivan Aragon), who have some sort of illegal business (drugs, no doubt).  

Bully Gerry (Patricio Gallardo) one of their customers

Natalia, who hates everyone

Pablo and Isabella, the tongue-swallowing Straight Couple.

Alex (a girl), who hates everyone

Learning disabled Luis

These will all become important later, when someone reveals All their Secrets.

Scene 8: Gym class in a beautiful, vast, glass-enclosed indoor soccer field.  Who goes to a high school like this?  

Creepy Girl has special permission to read War and Peace (in English) instead of exercising. . New Student takes his shirt off, causing girls to squeal and swoon.  It's gym class -- aren't you used to it?  Coach fawns over him. 

Scene 9: The shy, learning-disabled Luis, who was bullied in Scene 1, is attacked again. This time the bullies pee on his backpack and tear up his important pictures, while he screams in agony.  A very long scene, very unpleasant to watch.  The kid keeps screaming, the bullies keep hurting him.  

Scene 10: Finally the torture porn scene is over!  Time for a school assembly. What new hell is this?

Another long session of Straight Couple Pablo and Isabella tongue-swallowing (if they 've never kissed anyone before, couldn't the director point out that you don't swallow the other person's entire face?).  

Meanwhile Mean Girl Natalie is being snarky, Learning-disabled Luis is being tormented yet again, and Creepy Girl is being all Goth and "I'm too cool to care about anything."

The teacher (Rodrigo Cachero, seen here with his husband and child) finally starts talking.  His lecture is on how cell phones will destroy your soul.

He asks the AV guy to start a video about the horrors of cell phones, but instead it's been hacked by someone named All Your Secrets, who reveals that Isabella, one of the tongue-swallowers, is  transgender!   (the video states, "really a boy").

Why is the video in English?  For that matter, why is every text message we see in English? 

The students all laugh and jeer: "Isabella is a guy!  Show us your penis!"  She runs away.  The auditorium empties as cell phones come out and the news spreads across Mexico. Really?  It's that big a deal?

Scene 11:  In the bathroom, the girls ask Isabela why she was hiding her transgender identity (um...it's none of their business?).  Meanwhile, the guys are razzing the boyfriend.   He dumps Isabella so they won't think he's gay.  

In the library, Creepy Girl meets with Raul (Yankel Stevan).  He reveals that a hacker named All Your Secrets threatened to reveal his secret unless he ratted out a friend, so he chose Isabela (how did he know she was transgender?)  He wants Creepy Girl to help him track down the culprit.

Scene 12: Natalia the Mean Girl is crying in the bathroom.  Creepy Girl and New Student interview her:  she was also approached by All Your Secrets, and named Isabela to avoid having her secret revealed.  

Scene 13: So who uploaded the video and hacked the system so it would play during the assembly? Creepy Girl deduces that it must be the only guy in the auditorium not paying attention while it was playing (since he already knew what was in it):  Bully Gerry (Patricio Gallardo).  He admits that All Your Secrets forced him to upload the video to avoid having his own secret revealed.

Scene 14:  At the end of the school day, Luis's Mom wants to know why he's so upset (um...being tortured repeatedly?).   Meanwhile, Creepy Girl flirts with New Student (she looks much less creepy in this shot from later in the series).

Scene 15: At home, Creepy Girl lies down on her bed and has flashbacks:

She remembers going to a bar and discussing War and Peace with some older guys. 

Then, in a wheelchair in the mental hospital, with a bandage over her wrist (obviously an attempted suicide).

 Creepy Girl's Mom interrupts to note that her new boyfriend is coming over with Chinese food.  Big reveal: It's the Teacher!

Scene 16: Isabella is at home, being sad. All Your Secrets contacts her and promises revenge, if she will reveal one of her friends' secrets. (Geez, don't they have enough already?)

Beefcake:  Some nice shirtless and locker room scenes.

Other Sights: This is by far the most beautiful high school set that I have ever seen.

People in Mexico Speaking English All the Time:  Including extremely complex sentences,  What happened to Spanish?

LGBT Characters:  Isabela.  Looking at the fan wiki, I determined that Gerry's secret is being gay.  He doesn't take being outed well. There's gay-bashing, murder, and a suicide attempt in his future. And a hookup with Pierre Louis.

Will I Continue to Watch:  I heavily disliked the torture porn and the absurd tongue-swallowing, and I hated Creepy Girl.  But I want to know how Gerry's character arc progresses.