Go Team! Ending Explained: Why Does Laura Replace Pepa as CEO?

Netflix’s Spanish dark comedy movie Go Team! follows the employees of Tío Mochales, a struggling cheese company whose staff retreat takes them to the village where the business began. The trip is supposed to bring everyone together. But there are rumors of impending layoffs, and that gives them a much more pressing concern: making sure they aren’t the ones shown the door. Nothing, after all, encourages teamwork quite like making employees compete against each other like The Hunger Games.

When their livelihoods are threatened, the retreat degenerates into treachery, sucking up, and secrets that just won’t stay buried. This is a great formula for corporate disaster: ask the workers to work together as a team but at the same time give them every reason to only look out for themselves. At the end, though, the tables are turned, and Pepa (Maribel Verdú, known for DC’s The Flash movie and the acclaimed fantasy movie Pan’s Labyrinth) has to step down. Now, how does this corporate retreat play out, and what will be its consequences for the workers? Here we take a look at the surprisingly happy conclusion of this Netflix movie.

How Does Pepa’s Defeat Change Tío Mochales?

Maribel Verdú as Pepa in Go Team! | Credits: Netflix

As mentioned above, at the end of Go Team! Pepa fails at her plans of making the company employees fight over each other. There is a threat of replacement, but it comes for her. The whole time, the employees were worried about whether they would still have their jobs by the time the retreat is over. In the end, their boss is the one who loses her grip on the company. She encourages her underlings to be utterly ruthless with each other. Her student, Laura (Blanca Martínez), the HR representative, learns that lesson a little too well and uses Pepa’s skills against her.

Judging by the depressing tone of Go Team!, I did not expect it to have a positive ending. The reversal is particularly satisfying given the retreat’s supposed purpose. The employees were brought together to build better relations among themselves, but the looming threat of layoffs makes them wary and distrustful of each other. It becomes quite meaningless to ask them to work together when they are certain that someone else’s success will be at their own cost.

Furthermore, this film adds a personal element to the insecurity by means of Olga (Alexandra Jiménez), a high-performing employee who has recently returned from maternity leave. While the employees were forced to question their value to the company in financial difficulties, the same question will now face the management team as well. Just because Pepa has the greatest job title does not mean that she is indispensable.

Why Does Laura Become the New CEO?

The French company acquiring Tío Mochales appoints Laura as the new CEO at the end of this dark comedy. We can assume that since she handles HR, she was also in conversation with the French buyers. Pepa also, however unwittingly, taught her how to be like her. She watched how Pepa operated. By the end, the mild-mannered woman gets the power to put those lessons into practice. Laura’s rise was celebrated by the rest of the employees, and it is clear that for now, there will be no layoffs. 

The supporting characters give the workplace tensions a more personal edge. Two male employees, one senior and one junior, are involved romantically, bringing the company hierarchy into their private lives. The older employee’s hostility toward anything “woke” provides another source of friction. He comes across as a dinosaur furious that the rest of the office has failed to remain prehistoric with him. I read that belligerence as partly a fear of becoming irrelevant. He resents a changing workplace, while the threatened layoffs make the possibility of being discarded much more immediate.

That is why the ending feels like such a relief. These people don’t have to become perfect colleagues to deserve a secure livelihood. They can be petty, prejudiced, or hopelessly tangled in office politics without that making Pepa’s treatment of them acceptable.

Do you think Laura will be a better boss than Pepa, or repeat her mistakes? Share your thoughts regarding Go Team! in the comments!

Go Team! is now streaming on Netflix. It was released on September 11.