I don’t usually write about what I’m up to, because I’m boring and it’s usually the same thing over and over, but I just wanted to announce that I received my VOTE-BY-MAIL BALLOT a few days ago! I’m all aflutter at getting to do my civic duty. If Donald Trump wins, my only hope is that global warming will come swallow up the peninsula I live on in the next few years.
(Also-also, some party called the Peace and Freedom Party was on the ballot? Even following the kerfuffle with third parties, I still had no idea they were running. Apparently Roseanne Barr ran for them in 2012, if that tells you anything.)
Opening monologue: Sometimes old loves come back into our lives, and we realize time didn’t pass ~in our hearts. That’s beautiful.
We pick up where we left off, with Feli accidentally spilling the beans to Dunoff. “You’re an imbecile,” Lujan says. Aw! I mean, she’s not wrong, but everyone is really aggressively mean to Feli in this episode 🙁 Lucky for Feli, Deus Ex Mama B swans in and she’s like, “What’s up, Pablo and his friends snuck out to film a campaign promotion for my husband, and I’m just late with the permission slip! What a wacky mix-up!” Dunoff’s like, “But…but…yelling at the students :(” Nevertheless, he accepts Mama B’s explanation and ushers her and Blas off to his office. The second he’s gone, Lujan turns to Feli and is like, “If Mama B hadn’t shown up, I would’ve strung you up!” Jesus, Lujan. I think even Marizza would balk at you committing homicide in her name. (Then again, maybe not.)
Nacho, meanwhile, is having some fake suspense where he almost gets caught breaking into a house by a dog, but then he escapes it. The only good thing to come out of this is that he says his criminal brother’s name without mumbling, and I can now hear that Criminal Older Brother is apparently named “Lito.” They run from the house and Lito starts doubling over and having problems breathing. Nacho’s like, “Could he possibly have some kind of mysterious telenovela illness that he’s hiding?” Lito’s like, “Pfft, that’s impossible, I’m totally fine!”
Sonia and Papa C carpool to Elite Way to investigate their missing children. Papa C’s freaking out at her driving skills, and she’s like, “Omg, you only think I’m a bad driver because you’re sexist!” “I think that entirely independent of your sex,” Papa C deadpans. HEE! I like the implication that Papa C can’t drive though, since he needs Peter and now Sonia to shuttle him everywhere. Also, they’re in the middle of traffic, and they STILL find a way to get up in each other’s faces.
JUST GET MARRIED ALREADY.
Mama B asks Dunoff to “cover” her and Dunoff’s like, “Whoaaaa, was not expecting to be gettin’ some today.” She clarifies that she wants him to keep this a secret from Papa B, and Dunoff’s like, “Oh, sure, that’s cool too.”
In the hallway, all the girls are being mean to Feli. I bet she regrets being a dick to Marcos now.
She sniffles to them that she really thought Dunoff was telling the truth about Marizza, and Lujan snaps that Marizza would never call the school, as she’s not a HORRIBLE SNITCH like Feli! Marizza has never done anything wrong in her life ever! Dammit, Lujan, I love you, why you gotta be like this? Vico snarks at Lujan not to waste her time on Feli, which is also horrible, although I’m amused to see that they’re still friends. Feli hesitantly asks if they’re still working on getting Hilda back together with her ex-boyfriend, and Lujan throws her up against the wall and is like, “Never darken my doorway again! Your betrayal of Marizza is unforgivable!”
All the girls ditch her, and Feli runs right into Augusto’s arms. DAMMIT, LUJAN! Feli cries to Augusto that he was right, she has no friends here and she has to leave. Augusto’s like, “Woo, my control over you is complete!” Do they like…not have to ask her parents about this?
The rest of the girls call Hilario, and pretend he’s going to receive some kind of award from the school to trick him into showing up. Pilar rolls up, and Lujan’s like, “Your little friend [Luna] isn’t here, so you can just keep on walking.” Man, Lujan is cranky today. Hilario is, frankly, weirdly overexcited, but none of the girls comment on this, they’re just thrilled he’s going to show up.
Oh thank God, Erreway comes back to school. If I had to go through another episode with just the secondary characters, I was going to die.
“Don’t be suspicious, don’t be suspicious…”
They immediately get busted by Papa C and Sonia, but Mama B swoops in saves their butts, too. Mia sniffles to Papa C that she’s sorry and he’s her favorite dad, and Marizza makes a snide remark about them being almost related. Mia’s like, “What?” and Marizza’s like, “Well, you know, with my mom dating your u –” and then Sonia claps a hand over her mouth to shut her up. Hee! Would that people do that to Marizza more often!
Papa C tries to get Sonia to leave now, since she’s his ride and all, but Sonia’s like, “I must visit with my daughter!” Too bad for her, though, since Lujan comes in and is like, “Omg, Marizza, I was lost without you!” She immediately hustles Marizza off, leaving Sonia in the dust.
Nacho attempts to beg for food, and some grocer guy makes fun of him for being poor. Man, this guy deserves to get robbed. Nacho steals like, a single apple, and runs. Bizarrely, the grocer guy chases him down, and has a total about-face where’s like, “How sad that a nine-year-old is resorting to theft! Truly you deserve my sympathy!” He gives Nacho some money, but tells him to stop stealing before he’s stuck in a life of crime.
In Manuel’s room, Marcos catches him up on everything that happened in episode 81. And man, was it a trip! He tells Manuel that he thinks Lujan wrote the newspaper, for some reason. Are you new, Marcos? Like Lujan gives enough of a shit to write about her classmates. She usually just beats them up and leaves them. Marizza comes in to talk to Marcos alone, and she tells him she wants to explain everything, and apologize to him. Whoa, what? Marizza apologizing? Marcos should know what a rare event he’s seeing. Like one of those moons or comets that only shows up every 150 years. Anyway, they make up, and tells him not to fight with Lujan, as she didn’t have anything to do with the letters. Except…she did? Oh, this will end well. Marizza pins the whole thing on Sonia instead.
Meanwhile, in Mia’s room, Mia’s waxing on about the meeting with the record company. They were paying so much attention to her! “It was the first time that it wasn’t so hard to be me,” she sighs. HEE! Then Sonia comes in, and she confesses to Mia that she’s dating Mia’s uncle. Mia’s all excited and she’s like, “I ship you guys so hard!”
Luna is all sad over her family potentially moving to San Luis (Argentina. Not the San Luis in the US, or Brazil, or Uruguay, or Columbia, or Venezuela…), and Sandra tells her to think about herself: Flor has her parents, and she’ll still be Luna’s sister even if they live apart. Besides, once Luna finishes school, then she can think about moving closer to her. Luna’s like, “But that’s in three years, and I am a teenager with no impulse control.”
Pepa calls Sonia, flipping out about Nacho. Sonia’s like, “Whatever, I’m sure he’s fine.” Then she remembers that she wrote Nacho that check, and she’s like, “Then again, maybe not.” Pepa finally is like, “Oh, right, I heard his criminal older brother escaped from jail. Do you think that’s important?” Frickin’ Pepa.
In the main office, Mansilla’s on the phone with his pick for the math teacher job. He apologizes to her for Elite Way fucking up and snarks that the dumbass administration probably picked someone who doesn’t know what two times three is. “Six,” deadpans a voice from behind him.
She’s pretty and she hates Mansilla. They’re definitely going to hook up.
So this is the new math teacher, Renata! Mansilla introduces himself as the ethics teacher, and Renata immediately snarks that it’s not very ethical to be badmouthing someone you haven’t even met. They’re not getting off to a very good start, are they? That means they’re going to end up married. (Full disclosure: I already know they end up together. But even if I didn’t, I think I could probably guess.) Etchamendi then pops up for the first time in about forty episodes, and he asks them all to welcome Renata. He’s kind of handsy with her; I didn’t hear anyone mention what kind of relationship they have. Nepotism? Maybe we’ll find out later. Mansilla takes his leave from the awkwardness, and Renata, checking the class schedules, notes that the third years have ethics class during the only time she’s free. Ergo, ethics class will have to be changed. Gloria, picking up on Etchamendi’s thing with Renata, immediately moves to appease her. Oh, Mansilla is not gonna like this.
Luna is being said (again, some more) in Marizza’s room when Lujan comes in and starts accusing her of writing the newspaper. Lujan has gone completely crazy in this episode, guys. And then! AND THEN! SHE JUMPS ON LUNA AND STARTS BEATING HER UP!
THIS SHIT IS BANANAS.
“MY EXTENSIONS!” Luna wails. Oh, wow, I can’t believe they remembered those. Marizza comes in and even she’s like, “Dude, Lujan, you need to chill.” Luna goes to Sandra to fix her hair and is like, “You know, maybe I should leave this school.” Sandra admits that she already told Luna’s parents to go without her, because Luna needs more time to decide. Luna is pissed — somewhat rightfully so, especially given that she shares a room with Lujan “Punch First, Ask Questions Later” Linares, although Sandra also has a point that Luna is just doing this to martyr herself, as usual. Luna storms out of the cafeteria and into Nico’s arms. I guess they’ve made up now. (Although first she has to drive off Guido, who’s trying to convince Nico to make him the band’s manager. “I am a creator of stars!” he insists. Oh, Guido.)
Mia writes some more sad music about Manuel, and Feli admits to selling them out to Dunoff. Mia, God bless her, realizes she didn’t do it on purpose and forgives her. The next day, after an extended scene of product placement —
They seriously have never explained what those things actually ARE. Candy? Chips?
…Mia comes in and announces that they’re reforming the dance group, this time under the tutelage of Sonia Rey. All the girls are excited, and Mia tells them that Feli will be in charge of the group, so they have to be nice to her if they want in. Mia is a good friend and I love her. Fernanda in particular is all pissy, I guess because she thinks she’s a main character now.
Dunoff is all excited because a Mr. Gonzalez is going to come to the school and have a conference with him and I guess it’s some kind of big deal. (Spoiler: it’s not a big deal.) Golly, I wonder if there will be some kind of wacky misunderstanding with Hilario and Mr. Gonzalez?
I guess Sonia and Pepa have reported Nacho missing, because Sonia gets a call from the police that they’ve found the body of a young boy, and can she come down to the station and identify him? Pepa asks what’s up, and Sonia BSes that they haven’t found anything, and she’s just gonna pop down there real quick. She asks Luca to come with her instead. Anyway, obviously the body isn’t Nacho’s, but Sonia’s still freaked out about seeing a corpse, as she should be. Luca is pretty supportive and mature about the whole thing. Wow, he shaped up fast.
Guido and Tomás walk into the classroom and see Pilar plotting with the other girls. “Pilar’s such a bitch, she’s the one writing the newspaper,” Guido says. What? WHAT? Now Guido knows again? Why won’t he do anything about it? Anyway, Renata rocks in for class, as does Mansilla. She’s like, “This is my class now!” Then she notices Luna’s crying and she’s like, “Get outta here until you get over your emotional problems.” Heh. Renata is mean and I love her.
Some older guy shows up to the school, and for some reason Fernanda’s just wandering the halls instead of being in class. She assumes he’s Hilario (spoiler: he’s not) and leads him off to the cafeteria. She texts all the girls (except Mia and Feli) that he’s here, and they get all twitterpated. Renata notices that nobody’s paying attention, and she snaps that they can just do the work themselves if they don’t want to listen to her lecture. Then the bell rings and the kids are like, “Too bad, time for recess!” and she’s like, “Okay, then turn the assignment in next class.” They’re all like, “I can’t believe our teacher is giving us homework! WHAT A CONCEPT.”
The face I make when I watch a lot of these episodes.
Marizza forces Lujan and Luna to make up. I think Lujan mainly does it because she’ll follow Marizza anywhere, but whatever. Lujan is terrible in this episode, and it pains me.
Another old guy shows up to the main office, and he says his name is Hilario. Shock! It’s not the guy Fernanda met! I bet you didn’t see that coming.
He’s all polite and gentlemanly and nice to children, and even Gloria and her bitterness are charmed by him. She clearly doesn’t know what he’s talking about, re: the award, but she says she’ll check with Dunoff anyway. Hilario compliments her smile, and Gloria’s all twitterpated. Aw. I mean, she brings it on herself by being all petty and passive-aggressive, but I bet that’s the nicest thing anyone’s said to Gloria in a while, nevertheless.
Meanwhile, Marizza and Lujan usher Mr. Gonzalez into the map room and lock him in. Man, when he finally gets to have that conference with Dunoff, it is not going to be pretty.
Hilaro wanders around the school, presumably being nostalgic for his years there. I wonder if Elite Way was always so tackily painted. He asks some random kids about Hilda, and gets all twitterpated when they tell him she still works there. He sadly voiceovers about how they’ve been apart for so long, and then he gets so sad that he collapses against the wall. Feli and the other girls walk by, and it sounds like they’re joking? I guess their desire to be in Mia’s good graces overrides their hatred of Feli. Anyway, they run into Hilario and he asks them to get him some water. Feli’s like, “Somebody get water!” and none of them move. COME ON, GUYS.
Hilda’s in the teachers’ lounge, correcting papers. Gloria comes in and tells her some guy is looking for her: “An older man, with very clear eyes.” Hilda’s like, “…yeah, that’s not a helpful description.” Then Marizza and Lujan bounce in and tell Hilda they have a surprise for her. It’s gonna be so much fun! They should go, right now! “Point one: today is my day for correcting,” Hilda says. (So at least one teacher grades papers here!) “Point two: I DON’T LIKE SURPRISES.” Ha! I love how mean the teachers are today. These kids could use some discipline, to be honest. She shoos Marizza and Lujan out, and they’re like, “Our plan has been foiled! WHAT TO DO.” Why don’t they just bring “Hilario” to the teachers’ lounge? Anyway, Marizza says she has a plan.
Bizarrely, we then suddenly switch to spending half a minute on the band’s plot (that was the whole point of last episode). Their contact with the record company calls Mia, and tells her he has bad news. “NO PUEDE SER!” she shrieks. Oh Mia, are you new here?
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