‘Élite’: Season 3’s New Characters, Yeray and Malick, Explained

Continuing the tradition of introducing new characters each season, the third season of Élite introduced two new characters with Yeary (Sergio Momo) and Malick (Leïti Sène). While the characters were not involved with our overall storyline, they played huge roles in stirring things up between two popular couples.

Spoilers for Élite’s third season below:

While Malick seemed to be coming between Nadia and Guzman, in actuality, he was a midseason interloper for Omar and Ander. Meanwhile, Yeray was never really a threat for Carla and Samuel, but that doesn’t really matter because the fan-favorite pairing did not end the season as a couple.

Overall, here’s how Yeray and Malick fit into what seems to be the wrapping up of three seasons worth of storytelling for this arc of the show.

Sergio Momo as Yeray

Momo stars as Yeray, a former student as Las Encinas who has returned and looks totally different. As described by the character, he was overweight and bullied and decided to change his image and become very successful in order for people to like him.

For much of the season, Yeray doesn’t interact with many of the other characters and is only seen mostly in scenes opposite Carla and her father. He is very interested in pursuing Carla, mostly because she defended him on social media when people were cyberbullying him because of his weight.

He approaches Carla about this and she doesn’t recognize him. She remembers an old picture of him but doesn’t realize she was the one who defended him. Because of all this, Yeray has seemed to always carry a torch for Carla for all these years.

At first, Carla isn’t interested in him, but her father is attracted to his business and wealth and blackmails her into pursuing him and getting into a relationship with him. His father has a plan for Yeray to help him save their wineries. Though he’s enjoying things with her, she isn’t, and eventually begins taking drugs in order to get through her day because she’s miserable and still living through everything that she and her family have gone through.

After blacking out due to the drugs, Carla eventually tells Yeray the truth and apologizes to him. But as she noted, he knew all of this but just wanted it to be true and thought that she complimented everything he wanted in life — but wasn’t actually in love with her.

The two of them turn their relationship into a friendship and business partnership. Yeray helps Carla essentially take the wineries away from him when he says the only way he will take on the companies is if Carla can lead them. After being used by her father for so long, Yeray essentially emancipates her.

Leïti Sène as Malick

Sène, who is also a musical artist, joined the third season as Malick. Like his character, Sène is of Senegalese descent. At the beginning of the season, he makes attempts to romantically pursue Nadia and stops by her family’s store. She then sees him at Las Encinas and apologizes to him after she accused him of stealing at the store.

Malick is also Muslim, which makes it easier for Nadia to agree to also try to pursue something with him. Her parents love him and it seems like they could be a great couple. Malick meets Nadia’s brother, Omar, and even brings him together with his parents at a dinner with Nadia that doesn’t go as expected. Omar keeps wondering why Malick is so interested in making sure he is included and Malick chalks it up to him caring about Nadia. Malick and Nadia begin dating.

Malick’s involvement as an Omander interloper

At Lu’s party, when Omar sees Malick and suggests that his outfit may be too much for him and that he doesn’t have to extert his heterosexuality, Malick tells Omar he understands him — and then begins making out with him. Omar is ashamed of kissing Malik and rebuffs him the next time he sees him, reiterating he is in a relationship. But when Omar’s boyfriend Ander, who is battling cancer (unbeknownst to Omar), pushes him away so he can be happy, he begins to accept Malick’s advances and they plunge into a sexual affair.

Ander ends up finding about Malick and secretly meets with him without Omar knowing. Seeking to find out if Malick is in love with or actually cares about Omar, Ander ends up seemingly ceding to him. Nadia ends up finding out about Malick and Omar. She’s angry for a little bit but then gets over it as she understands what Omar is going through, has also been involved in cheating, and wants to use Malick as her way to get her parents to let her study in New York. She ends up telling her parents the truth and they agree to let her move on her own accord.

Malick and Omar’s relationship continues to blossom, although at the end of the day he’s still in love with Ander. Once Omar finds out that Ander lied about sleeping with someone else in order for him to pursue Malick, Omar is angry and leaves off with Malick, preparing to go to NYC with him, Nadia and Lu. However, once Omar sees that his father truly accepts him as gay and knows that he is hurt by what’s going on with Ander, he decides to not to New York and stay with his true love, Ander.

The first three seasons of Élite are streaming on Netflix.