He has filled that void now. But has he found a new one worth exploring?
En el cruce entre el arte y la industria, Netflix estrena un retrato de DUKI —el artista de trap más influyente de Argentina— que recorre su camino desde los freestyle callejeros hasta el estadio River. El documental captura los hitos de una trayectoria extraordinaria, pero al hacerlo desde adentro, desde la voz de quienes lo quieren y lo protegen, revela tanto sobre los mecanismos del estrellato moderno como sobre el propio artista. La pregunta que flota sin respuesta es antigua y universal: ¿qué se gana y qué se pierde cuando alguien que alguna vez cantó desde el vacío aprende, finalmente, a llenarlo?
- DUKI construyó su carrera sobre una honestidad brutal —canciones que nombraban el abuso de Alprazolam, la incertidumbre, el hambre de reconocimiento— y ahora un documental de Netflix convierte esa materia viva en un relato de superación prolijo y sin fisuras.
- El film excluye toda voz crítica: solo hablan familia, equipo y músicos aliados como Bizarrap y Nicki Nicole, lo que convierte el documental en una operación de imagen más que en una exploración artística.
- Las cifras de streaming contradicen en silencio la narrativa del documental: los mayores éxitos de DUKI pertenecen al período anterior a 2020, cuando todavía cargaba las heridas que luego transformó en canciones.
- El documental insinúa pero nunca persigue la tensión central: si la ansiedad por la validación fue el motor de su arte, ¿qué ocurre con ese arte ahora que la validación llegó?
- Lo que Netflix y DUKI producen juntos es un formato ya conocido —el origen pulido del ídolo contemporáneo— que documenta la llegada al mainstream sin preguntarse qué quedó en el camino.
Netflix estrenó el 2 de octubre Rockstar: DUKI desde el fin del mundo, un documental sobre Mauro Ezequiel Lombardo, el artista de trap más prominente de Argentina. El film recorre su infancia, su paso por El Quinto Escalón —la competencia de freestyle que también lanzó a Wos, Paulo Londra y Trueno— y su transformación durante la pandemia en artista profesional, hasta culminar en su debut en el estadio River. DUKI aparece desde el inicio reflexionando sobre sus primeras canciones, donde narraba su vida cotidiana con una franqueza descarnada. Esa compulsión por contar su propia historia sigue siendo, nueve años después, su mayor fortaleza y su límite más evidente.
El documental avanza sobre dos rieles paralelos: la biografía del artista y los preparativos emocionales y logísticos para el show en River. Logra señalar con claridad los momentos bisagra de su trayectoria, pero esos momentos ya habían sido narrados por el propio DUKI en entrevistas y, sobre todo, en canciones como 'Xanax' y 'Pastillas', donde habló con honestidad sobre su consumo problemático de Alprazolam entre 2017 y 2020. El documental menciona ese período, pero lo trata como un capítulo cerrado. No interroga sus causas ni sus consecuencias. El tiempo, sugiere el film, resolvió el problema.
Lo que el documental no hace es igualmente revelador. Todos los testimonios provienen del círculo íntimo de DUKI: familia, equipo, músicos cercanos. Ninguna voz externa, ninguna perspectiva crítica. El resultado es un retrato sellado que dice más sobre la gestión de una imagen que sobre la vida de un artista. Federico Lauría, CEO de Dale Play, afirma en el film que 'su mejor versión artística llegó cuando Mauro estaba bien', una afirmación que los propios números de streaming desmienten: los diez temas más escuchados de DUKI pertenecen casi en su totalidad al período anterior a 2020.
Ahí reside la pregunta que el documental esquiva con elegancia: si la urgencia, la incertidumbre y el dolor fueron el combustible de sus canciones más esenciales, ¿qué alimenta su arte ahora que la estabilidad llegó? El film documenta la llegada al mainstream, la pule y la llama triunfo. Pero no se pregunta si algo vital se perdió en el trayecto, ni si el artista que alguna vez cantó desde el vacío ha encontrado un nuevo vacío que valga la pena explorar.
Netflix released a documentary about DUKI, Argentina's most prominent trap artist, on October 2nd. The film is called Rockstar: DUKI desde el fin del mundo, and it tells the story of a man born Mauro Ezequiel Lombardo—from his childhood through his rise in freestyle competitions to his sold-out show at River stadium. It is, by design, a controlled portrait. DUKI himself appears in the opening half reflecting on his earliest song, "No vendo trap," where he laid bare his daily life, his romantic struggles, his defeats. Nine years later, he remains obsessed with narrating his own story, a compulsion that has become both his greatest asset and his deepest constraint.
The documentary operates on two parallel tracks. One follows DUKI's biography: childhood home videos, his emergence from El Quinto Escalón (a freestyle competition that also launched Wos, Paulo Londra, and Trueno), his transformation during the pandemic into a professional recording artist. The other tracks the weeks leading up to his River debut, centered on the practical work of assembling a setlist and the emotional weight of the moment. The film does accomplish something real here—it marks the turning points clearly, the moments when his life shifted. But those moments are ones DUKI has already narrated in previous interviews and in his own songs, particularly during the darker years of 2017 to 2020, when he spoke with raw honesty about his struggle with Alprazolam abuse in tracks like "Xanax" and "Pastillas."
What the documentary does not do is interrogate why those struggles happened, or what they meant, or what they might still mean. The passage of time has apparently resolved the problem—DUKI seems well now, and the film treats his past suffering as a chapter closed. There is no critical examination of the gap between the urgency he once felt and the professional stability he has now achieved. The testimonies come exclusively from his inner circle: his family, his team, musicians like Bizarrap and Nicki Nicole who are close to him. No one who doubts him appears. No one who might push back. The narrative is sealed.
This is where the film reveals its true subject: not DUKI's life, but DUKI's image. Netflix and DUKI share an obsession with controlling the official story, with managing how he is seen. The result is a documentary that feels familiar—the polished celebrity origin story that streaming platforms have perfected in recent years. There are new visual registers, archival footage that hasn't been seen before, but these additions do not illuminate anything new about the artist or his work. They simply arrange what is already known into a more orderly form.
The film hints at something deeper but never pursues it. DUKI appears caught between two versions of himself: the one his inner circle loves and supports, and the one his critics reject. He seems anxious about validation, about whether people will truly accept him, whether they are waiting for him to fail. This anxiety has shaped his entire trajectory, yet no one in the documentary asks him about it directly. No one wonders whether that hunger for legitimacy might be the engine of his art, or whether losing it—as he seems to have done—might actually be a loss. His most-streamed songs, his artistic peaks, come from before 2020, from the period when he was still fighting, still uncertain, still putting words to the void inside him. "Estoy caliente y estoy frío, no se llena en este vacío," he sang in "She Don't Give a FO." He has filled that void now, the documentary suggests. But has he found a new one worth exploring?
Federico Lauría, the CEO of Dale Play (the production company where DUKI is the flagship artist), says in the film that "his best artistic version arrived when Mauro was doing well." This is debatable on artistic grounds and contradicted by the streaming numbers themselves. DUKI's top ten is dominated by songs released before 2020. The documentary presents wellness as an unambiguous good, as the natural endpoint of a recovery narrative. But it does not ask whether the rawness that made him essential to his generation might have required a kind of suffering he no longer carries.
If DUKI has spent his career telling his story through song with brutal honesty, the documentary offers little that his own work has not already provided. It is a videoclip stretched to feature length, a confirmation of what fans already know and what critics already suspect: that the artist has moved from the margins into the mainstream, and that something vital may have been lost in the transition. The film does not explore this possibility. It simply documents the arrival, polishes it, and calls it a triumph.
Notable Quotes
I counted my life, what I did every day. My romantic relationships, my difficulties, my adversities.— DUKI, reflecting on his first song 'No vendo trap'
His best artistic version arrived when Mauro was doing well.— Federico Lauría, CEO of Dale Play production company
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why does a Netflix documentary about a living artist matter? What's at stake?
Control. DUKI has spent nine years telling his own story through his songs—raw, unfiltered, sometimes brutal. Now Netflix and his team are telling it for him, and they're choosing what to include and what to leave out. The question is whether that official version adds anything, or whether it just domesticates what made him dangerous in the first place.
You mentioned his past struggles with drugs. Why does the documentary treat that as resolved?
Because resolved is safer. The film shows him well now, supported by people who love him, successful beyond measure. But it doesn't ask why he needed those drugs, or what he was running from, or whether the hunger that drove him then still exists. It just closes the chapter.
His most popular songs are from before 2020. Doesn't that contradict the film's narrative?
Completely. The CEO says his best artistic version came when he was doing well. But the numbers say his best work came when he was struggling. The documentary ignores that contradiction entirely. It's easier to celebrate recovery than to admit that the pain might have been the point.
So you're saying the documentary fails because it's too positive?
I'm saying it fails because it's not curious. A real documentary would ask: What did you lose when you got well? Do you miss it? Is there another darkness worth exploring? Instead, it just shows us a man who has won, and assumes that's the end of the story.
Who should have been interviewed that wasn't?
His critics. The people who doubt him. The ones he's anxious about. That anxiety is the most interesting thing about him—it's probably what made him an artist in the first place. But the film treats it as something to overcome, not something to understand.
Will this documentary change how people see DUKI?
Only if they haven't listened to his songs. For everyone else, it's just confirmation of what they already know. It's a very expensive way of saying nothing new.