Centring on Fernando León de Aranoa’s Política, manual de instrucciones, this essay examines what Antonio Gramsci has called the ‘crisis of authority’ in the context of (post-) crisis Spain. I claim that León de Aranoa’s documentary feature not only registers the emergence of Podemos as a nascent political party, it also attempts to legitimize Podemos as the only viable parliamentary alternative to the hegemony of the Partido Popular (PP) and the Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE).