‘Tremembé’ Drives True-Crime Surge in Brazil, Puts Elize Matsunaga Back in Focus

Overview

• Prime Video’s fiction series generated 5.73 million Google searches in six days and 1.36 million social mentions, and it is now the company’s most-watched Brazilian production at home and abroad, according to O Globo’s reporting of Timelens data.
• Netflix’s 2021 docuseries Elize Matsunaga: Era Uma Vez Um Crime re-entered the Top 10 in Brazil following the show’s breakout, underscoring the feedback loop between dramatization and documentary.
• A widely shared clip of Elize thanking supporters and saying she is getting a second chance is circulating again, but the video is from 2022 when she received conditional release, not a new recording.
• Reports revisited Elize’s reintegration since 2022, including her move to Franca in São Paulo state, work as an app driver, and a shift to making pet clothing to reduce public exposure.
• Victims’ relatives and experts urged restraint in treating convicted figures as celebrities, with Isabella Nardoni’s mother asking viewers to distinguish fiction from reality and analysts warning that focus on perpetrators can eclipse victims.