Dreams, Desire, Ambitions, what boundaries are we ready to cross to fulfill them? If you have a burning desire that doesn’t let you sleep, you’d be willing to do anything, to make sure it sees the daylight. In “Snabba Cash,” the protagonist, Leya also holds a similar dream, and against all odds, she does make it come true. But at what cost?
‘Snabba Cash’ Season 1: Plot Summary
Set in Stockholm Sweden, the narrative follows an aspiring tech entrepreneur Leya (Evin Ahmad) who is ardently chasing investment for her software, “TargetCoach.” Leya lives alone with her young son and works in a restaurant to support herself. Her late husband was a drug trafficker, the business that is now run by his brother, Ravy (Dada Fungula Bozela). Leya puts her best efforts to keep her son, Sami away from Ravy or any other peddler. However, she develops a liking for a man named Salim (Alexander Abdallah) who sings at weddings organized at the restaurant Leya works at. Unaware of the fact that Sami is a drug addict and a henchman to Ravy, Leya falls in love with him.
Ravy is facing issues with a rival gang run by Dani (Mehdi Merali). Dani and his men were selling drugs on Ravy’s territory that pissed him off. The supplier, or the head of the organized crime, Marko arranges peace between them, but the fire has already set in. Ravy tries to finish off Dani and his men with the help of his most trusted shooter, Salim but Salim fails him. Salim is suffering from distress and denial and wants to leave the business as soon as possible. He is done with all those killings, but Ravy won’t let him go. Upset by Ravy’s step, Marko cuts off Ravy’s supplies and leaves him stranded.
Here Leya gets an investor for her company. Tomas Storm wants Leya to cut off the previous investor by paying him off some million crowns, but Leya doesn’t hold that amount. She isn’t ready to let her dreams fade away, not when she is so close to reaching them. Leya decides to borrow money from her brother-in-law, Ravy. But every favor comes at a price. Once stepped in the gutter, it’s impossible to come out clean. Ravy uses Leya to organize a meeting with Marko who is indebted to Leya. Her late husband used to work for Marko and when he died Marko promised Leya to make it up for it at the right time.
Though Marko sorts out things between the rival gangs, Leya gets to know the real truth about Salim, that he is in fact, a drug trafficker, an aura she has been avoiding. To gain Leya’s trust, Salim informs Leya that the money Ravy lent him wasn’t a loan but an investment in her new company and Ravy is going to reap the benefits when the right time will come. Angered by Ravy’s intention, Leya snitches on him and leaks the drug shipment information to Ravy’s rival Dani. In a shootout between the two gangs, everything ends up in chaos, and Leya finds herself in the midst of it.
Major Spoilers Ahead
‘Snabba Cash’ Season 1: Ending Explained
Ravy finds out that someone leaked the shipment information to Dani. he mercilessly hunts Dani but before he can reach out, Salim shoots Dani to save Leya because she was the one who leaked the information. Though the spiral of errors doesn’t end here. Due to the loss of shipment drugs, Ravy is now in heavy debt with Marko. He won’t supply any more items until Ravy pays it off. Ravy’s business has come to a standstill. Ravy asks Leya to return the money he lent her. When Leya tries to take out the money from her account, she finds out that her investor Tomas lied to her. The money he invested in her company wasn’t the actual money, and he was just window dressing. He is rotating the same money in different companies to gain from IPO, that is to lure the public to invest by showing fake numbers in different accounts.
Leya feels helpless but here conflicts are burdened when Salim informs her that Ravy is cruelly looking for the snitch who informed Dani. Salim plots a plan to finish off Ravy with the help of Leya, but she fails to comply. She doesn’t want another son of the same mother to disappear. Through a child peddler, Tim (who worked in Ravy’s gang), Ravy finds out about Leya. He threatens to kill her when Salim takes the blame. Ravy heartlessly shoots him off. He gets an escape from the business but not the way he was willing. Ravy terrorizes Tim to take the blame for Salim’s murder and surrender himself to the police. Tim, naive and threatened, complies. Another childhood is wasted by the criminal world. Salim left, but another Tim is in the making. Leya approaches Marko and pays off Ravy’s debt with the help of IPO money she took from Tomas. In return for the debt, Leya now owns Ravy until he settles on her debt of 5 million crowns. In a way, she bought off a protection shield for herself and her son. But in all this, she lost someone she really loved. In the end, she is seen shedding a tear for Salim.
Final Words
“Snabba Cash” is a short but complicated narrative that portrays the darkness and brutality of the criminal world. Once associated, it is clearly impossible to leave it, until you take the bullet or the bars. Salim, played by Alexander Abdallah had been a promising character throughout, and how he tried to protect Tim, the teenage peddler showed a ray of hope. However, in the end, Both Tim and Salim failed to escape from the dirt. The writing style is a bit complex and that is why the viewers might have to push attention to grasp it. The Swedish language also adds complexity but the emotions on the screen are raw and moving. It is a buffet of some really intriguing characters, and they are able to hold the grip. The creators tried their best to create an outlaw land like the “City of God,” but the message in the end and the outcome of the tale aren’t impactful enough. Salim could have become their medium to create influence on the viewers, but creators went for the realistic zone.
The literal meaning of “Snabba Cash” is Easy Money. The story justifies its title with the approach that anything that comes “easy” doesn’t last long. In the end, it became the tale of a woman who went through hell to fulfill her dreams but came out clean. Though in the journey, she lost a few hands who embraced her efforts.
“Snabba Cash” is a Swedish Language mini television series directed by Jesper Ganslandt. It is based on the novel written by Jens Lapidus, who wrote the series as well. All the 6 episodes are streaming on Netflix.
