Brothers is not THAT series

The setting failures (which there are) of the first episode of 'Brothers' are the least of it. The important thing is that the series, although little, does offer something new in the less and less parched landscape of Spanish television fiction. Little, but something. Six episodes and an ambitious plot arc are reason enough to give the series that Telecinco premiered yesterday a chance (to try to finish off 'Vivo Cantando', much more "white", on Antena 3, everything is said).

However, in the first few minutes of this first episode (the only one I've been allowed to see) we come face to face again with one of the worst cancers on current Spanish television: young and handsome but very mediocre actors imposed over great mature performers who They are almost decorative. As was the case in 'Gran Hotel' and in 'Velvet', the protagonists of 'Hermanos' are very limited actors, so the mix of 'Cuéntame', 'Los Soñadores' (sorry for the heresy) and 'La Mejor Youth' (sorry for heresy 2) is lame from the start. Meanwhile, Elvira Mínguez returns to repeat the role of a sour and resigned lady and Carlos Hipólito seems to be parodying himself. It is assumed that Álvaro Cervantes, Antonio Velázquez and María Valverde are, from their villa, the least bad, but that assumption is also a common place promoted by their agents and clients. To begin with, I think we still think that Miss Valverde is still that morbid girl from 'La Flaqueza del Bolchevique' and no: more than ten years have passed (and more than ten bad movies and series) since then. The other two, the boys, have less, which, given what we have seen, is almost better.

In return, that the series is going to hit important time jumps forward, covering a couple of decades of real history, it is attractive to me. Or that in the following chapters such magnetic actors as Roberto Álamo or Aura Garrido prevent me from having to watch too long the painful performances of the leading trio (La La La).

Nor has it made me too funny that in the first episode the plots flee (I would almost say "shamefully") from the costumbrismo of the real Spain of the 80s to become frankly bizarre. A girl from the scene, a troubled boxer and a seedy version of Pip from 'Great Expectations'? Wouldn't it have been easier to do as 'Cuéntame' did in its beginnings and tone it down a bit, creating more recognizable characters and stories?

It is true that there is nothing less photogenic than real life. The daily life of oilcloth and scouring pad is not on television. But completely rejecting close references is, and more so for a Spanish series, risky. And the Spanish series are still not sophisticated enough to take those risks. Because, let's be serious, an attempt at a trio (sessuarl) in a swimming pool while 'La Revolución Sexual' by La Casa Azul is playing is as new as Bertín Osborne performing in a casino in an olive-growing region. And "I've stayed to see some performances" is a script line that we only admit to Fabio McNamara or Mar Segura.

Do I ask too much of 'Brothers'? Should I say that "it is what it is" and settle it with "to be Spanish it's pretty good"? Possibly. But I refuse. I want to believe that Spanish television is prepared to take more serious steps forward. As the Spanish spectator is also prepared to interact with series that do not explain things to him as if he were twelve years old. If 'Hermanos' wasn't Spanish, I wouldn't have wasted a minute of my time with her. If I have done it, it is because I had hopes that it would contribute a little more. Although it may not seem like it, deep down I am an optimist: I always believe that the next Spanish series to be released will be the one that finally moves this forward a little. Is 'Brothers' that series? It gives me no.