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telenovela: Gran Hotel
Dec. 1st, 2014 07:17 pmGran Hotel is a telenovela from Spain set in a Spanish luxury hotel in 1905. I watched the first season sometime last year and really enjoyed it, but hadn't realized that it had had an official release in the US until ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
prozacpark told me she was watching it on Netflix. You can watch the first season on Hulu or Netflix, and season 2 on Netflix. (But, I mean, why watch on Hulu unless you don't have Netflix? No commercials on Netflix!) Both sites use the English translation of Grand Hotel. There's a third and final season that aired in Spain last year, but nothing on an English subtitled version yet, as far as I know.
The series is about Julio, a young man who goes to the hotel his sister, Christina, worked at to investigate her disappearance. He gets hired on as a waiter and quickly befriends another waiter, Andres, the son on the housekeeper, and Alicia, the daughter of the hotel owner. It's a telenovela and turn-of-the-century and there are major class differences (and Julio's criminal past) so, naturally, Julio and Alicia fall in oh-so-forbidden love while trying to find out what happened to Christina, and learning about the hotel's secrets.
Alicia is generally considered to be the only decent person in her family, and is even referred to as "The best of the Alarcons," even by people who haven't seen her since she was a small child. (People are pretty much right about this, though Alicia isn't always thrilled to be called such as she actually does love her family very much.) Alicia generally falls on the virtuous (but not self-righteous) end of the moral scale, but does reluctantly cross into murkier and outright dark waters on behalf of her family, despite disliking doing so quite a bit. Andres is very sweet and earnest and loyal, but not very bright, and is tied to the hotel's secrets in ways he doesn't know about. Julio is one of those characters who seems mostly nice and good on the surface, but when you think about it, he probably isn't actually that good of a person, we just primarily see him interacting with or acting on behalf of the people he loves (Christina, Alicia and Andres) and when the less-than-savory parts of his personality come out, it's often in the context of trying to protect them. So I like usually like Julio, but I don't think I'd like him at all without the influence of Alicia and Andres.
A lot of the plot is Alicia and Julio running and sneaking around and trying to solve mysteries and generally not being very good at all at lying or sneaking, but usually getting away with it anyway, frequently dragging poor Andres into their schemes. The romance between Julio and Alicia is...well, it hits all the right points for the pairing type and the show sells me on them and that they should be together, but they aren't terribly interesting as a couple in season one, though I think they work better in season two.
Then there's the rest of the cast. Andres's mother, Angela, is the housekeeper of the hotel and very, very tied to it's secrets. Angela is mostly a decent person, but has spent so many years keeping the Alarcons' secrets and covering for them that she's a bit murky there, to say the least. Alicia's mother, Teresa, owns the hotel and is cold and ruthless and devious and very devoted to her children, though it doesn't always manifest in ways they'd like. I really enjoyed Teresa in the first season, but there are some things she does in the second season that made me stop enjoying her as much ,though she does still have her highlights. The hotel manager is Diego, Teresa's scheming (look, almost everyone is scheming, ok?) co-conspirator who wants to marry Alicia. Your instincts will initially make you think Diego is evil and awful and misogynistic. He will sometimes do things to make you think that maybe you slightly misjudged him, but don't be fooled. Your instincts underestimated him. He needs to die horribly, and hopefully will in season three. Despite being in love with and wanting to marry Alicia, Diego regularly has affairs with the hotel maids.
The most recent maid is Belen, a scheming maid who Andres is in love with. I tend to get very judgey about the show when it comes to Belen. Despite her scheming, the show is fairly sympathetic towards her, and least in season 2, and wants us to feel bad for her when bad things happen to her, but it keeps punishing her for doing things not nearly as bad as some other characters do with little or no repercussions. Alicia's brother, Javier is...ok, there's no nice way to put it. The guy can be very, very loyal to his sisters and come through for them when they absolutely need it, but that's...about the only redeeming quality he has. He pretty much exists for his family to bail him out of trouble, which they do very, very frequently. Some of his exploits are amusing, but any time he notices a woman who isn't related to him, get ready for a LOT of annoyance. On the other hand, there's Alicia's sister, Sofia, and her husband, Alfredo, who is a nobleman. Sofia is clever and scheming and devious and ruthless when she thinks it's needed. Alfredo is...not incredibly bright, but very noble and honorable and honest. Sofia and Alfredo have very very different worldviews and moral standards and know it and are pretty much completely incompatible save for the fact that they're very, very much in love and usually committed to making their marriage work. (I say "usually," because Alfredo can only take so much scheming.) Their relationship and attempts to make it work are, IMO, more interesting than other romantic plotlines in the show. Teresa can't stand Alfredo, but is (usually) committed to helping Sofia keep their marriage intact because sofia loves Alfredo. Alfredo's mother thinks he's slumming and hates the Alarcons, and only appears to try to find a way to break Sofia and Alfredo up. The mother's really don't get along. There's also Ayala, an investigator sent to investigate a local serial killer, who also gets caught up in the goings-on of the hotel. Ayala very frequently gives Alicia and Julio looks that say "I know you are lying and trying to get away with something but I'll let it slide for now because I kind of like you kids. Usually." Unless it's "HOW DARE YOU MEDDLING KIDS INTERFERE WITH MY INVESTIGATION RAWR" when they're REALLY misbehaving. Ayala is very, very long suffering and likes to play cat-and-mouse games with Teresa in which they both think they're the cat and are doing their very best to rip the mouse into shreds. But politely. He also has a bumbling sidekick whose name I forget. At one point, a teenaged Agatha Christie shows up and decides to base Poirot and Hastings on them.
Most of the rest of the cast are the servants of the hotel, mostly in bit roles, but a few have larger roles. Sadly, with one exception, the most endearing of the rest of the servants take off after having their hearts broken. Kinda.
Season 1 primarily revolves around solving the mystery of what happened to Christina, and whether she's dead or alive. Season 2 revolves around the secrets Christina was keeping coming out, and the mystery of whether or not Alicia's father was murdered, and what extra secrets he may have been keeping, as well as solving a murder attempt that took place in the final minutes of Season 1. Season 1 ended on a cliffhanger, but one which left me content to wait (but hopefully not too long) for Season 2. Season 2 ends on a cliffhanger that makes me go "OMG NO WHY WHERE IS SEASON 3?"
As a heads up, the original episodes were 70-90 minutes each. Hulu and Netflix have them reformatted to be about 43-47 minutes each. As a result, an episode sometimes seems to end in the middle of a scene (because it does) or an obvious cliffhanger/climax happens in the middle of an episode. Gran Hotel tends to often end the original episodes by quickly switching between all the plotlines of an episode, which is hectic, but works very well in the original format (which is how I watched the first season) but is a bit odd when it suddenly happens mid-episode, only to calm down again.
prozacpark told me she was watching it on Netflix. You can watch the first season on Hulu or Netflix, and season 2 on Netflix. (But, I mean, why watch on Hulu unless you don't have Netflix? No commercials on Netflix!) Both sites use the English translation of Grand Hotel. There's a third and final season that aired in Spain last year, but nothing on an English subtitled version yet, as far as I know.The series is about Julio, a young man who goes to the hotel his sister, Christina, worked at to investigate her disappearance. He gets hired on as a waiter and quickly befriends another waiter, Andres, the son on the housekeeper, and Alicia, the daughter of the hotel owner. It's a telenovela and turn-of-the-century and there are major class differences (and Julio's criminal past) so, naturally, Julio and Alicia fall in oh-so-forbidden love while trying to find out what happened to Christina, and learning about the hotel's secrets.
Alicia is generally considered to be the only decent person in her family, and is even referred to as "The best of the Alarcons," even by people who haven't seen her since she was a small child. (People are pretty much right about this, though Alicia isn't always thrilled to be called such as she actually does love her family very much.) Alicia generally falls on the virtuous (but not self-righteous) end of the moral scale, but does reluctantly cross into murkier and outright dark waters on behalf of her family, despite disliking doing so quite a bit. Andres is very sweet and earnest and loyal, but not very bright, and is tied to the hotel's secrets in ways he doesn't know about. Julio is one of those characters who seems mostly nice and good on the surface, but when you think about it, he probably isn't actually that good of a person, we just primarily see him interacting with or acting on behalf of the people he loves (Christina, Alicia and Andres) and when the less-than-savory parts of his personality come out, it's often in the context of trying to protect them. So I like usually like Julio, but I don't think I'd like him at all without the influence of Alicia and Andres.
A lot of the plot is Alicia and Julio running and sneaking around and trying to solve mysteries and generally not being very good at all at lying or sneaking, but usually getting away with it anyway, frequently dragging poor Andres into their schemes. The romance between Julio and Alicia is...well, it hits all the right points for the pairing type and the show sells me on them and that they should be together, but they aren't terribly interesting as a couple in season one, though I think they work better in season two.
Then there's the rest of the cast. Andres's mother, Angela, is the housekeeper of the hotel and very, very tied to it's secrets. Angela is mostly a decent person, but has spent so many years keeping the Alarcons' secrets and covering for them that she's a bit murky there, to say the least. Alicia's mother, Teresa, owns the hotel and is cold and ruthless and devious and very devoted to her children, though it doesn't always manifest in ways they'd like. I really enjoyed Teresa in the first season, but there are some things she does in the second season that made me stop enjoying her as much ,though she does still have her highlights. The hotel manager is Diego, Teresa's scheming (look, almost everyone is scheming, ok?) co-conspirator who wants to marry Alicia. Your instincts will initially make you think Diego is evil and awful and misogynistic. He will sometimes do things to make you think that maybe you slightly misjudged him, but don't be fooled. Your instincts underestimated him. He needs to die horribly, and hopefully will in season three. Despite being in love with and wanting to marry Alicia, Diego regularly has affairs with the hotel maids.
The most recent maid is Belen, a scheming maid who Andres is in love with. I tend to get very judgey about the show when it comes to Belen. Despite her scheming, the show is fairly sympathetic towards her, and least in season 2, and wants us to feel bad for her when bad things happen to her, but it keeps punishing her for doing things not nearly as bad as some other characters do with little or no repercussions. Alicia's brother, Javier is...ok, there's no nice way to put it. The guy can be very, very loyal to his sisters and come through for them when they absolutely need it, but that's...about the only redeeming quality he has. He pretty much exists for his family to bail him out of trouble, which they do very, very frequently. Some of his exploits are amusing, but any time he notices a woman who isn't related to him, get ready for a LOT of annoyance. On the other hand, there's Alicia's sister, Sofia, and her husband, Alfredo, who is a nobleman. Sofia is clever and scheming and devious and ruthless when she thinks it's needed. Alfredo is...not incredibly bright, but very noble and honorable and honest. Sofia and Alfredo have very very different worldviews and moral standards and know it and are pretty much completely incompatible save for the fact that they're very, very much in love and usually committed to making their marriage work. (I say "usually," because Alfredo can only take so much scheming.) Their relationship and attempts to make it work are, IMO, more interesting than other romantic plotlines in the show. Teresa can't stand Alfredo, but is (usually) committed to helping Sofia keep their marriage intact because sofia loves Alfredo. Alfredo's mother thinks he's slumming and hates the Alarcons, and only appears to try to find a way to break Sofia and Alfredo up. The mother's really don't get along. There's also Ayala, an investigator sent to investigate a local serial killer, who also gets caught up in the goings-on of the hotel. Ayala very frequently gives Alicia and Julio looks that say "I know you are lying and trying to get away with something but I'll let it slide for now because I kind of like you kids. Usually." Unless it's "HOW DARE YOU MEDDLING KIDS INTERFERE WITH MY INVESTIGATION RAWR" when they're REALLY misbehaving. Ayala is very, very long suffering and likes to play cat-and-mouse games with Teresa in which they both think they're the cat and are doing their very best to rip the mouse into shreds. But politely. He also has a bumbling sidekick whose name I forget. At one point, a teenaged Agatha Christie shows up and decides to base Poirot and Hastings on them.
Most of the rest of the cast are the servants of the hotel, mostly in bit roles, but a few have larger roles. Sadly, with one exception, the most endearing of the rest of the servants take off after having their hearts broken. Kinda.
Season 1 primarily revolves around solving the mystery of what happened to Christina, and whether she's dead or alive. Season 2 revolves around the secrets Christina was keeping coming out, and the mystery of whether or not Alicia's father was murdered, and what extra secrets he may have been keeping, as well as solving a murder attempt that took place in the final minutes of Season 1. Season 1 ended on a cliffhanger, but one which left me content to wait (but hopefully not too long) for Season 2. Season 2 ends on a cliffhanger that makes me go "OMG NO WHY WHERE IS SEASON 3?"
As a heads up, the original episodes were 70-90 minutes each. Hulu and Netflix have them reformatted to be about 43-47 minutes each. As a result, an episode sometimes seems to end in the middle of a scene (because it does) or an obvious cliffhanger/climax happens in the middle of an episode. Gran Hotel tends to often end the original episodes by quickly switching between all the plotlines of an episode, which is hectic, but works very well in the original format (which is how I watched the first season) but is a bit odd when it suddenly happens mid-episode, only to calm down again.
