Previously on Rebelde Way: Joaquin went on a date with Marizza, and then he went on a date with Mia. That was mostly the gist of it!
So as of this episode, I am officially watching this show without subtitles! My understanding of spoken Spanish hovers around the 85% mark on a good day, which was about the amount of the dialogue I was including in the first place, so I doubt that will make much difference. There will probably be less direct quoting of lines though, and I might have to actually pay close attention to the episodes now. Let’s go forth!
Opening monologue: “I don’t know. I’m sorry.” My God, I thought we were going to at least get past episode 26 before they started punking out on these. Just kidding, jealousy makes us angry people, even though we know it’s irrational.
Dunoff’s office. He yells at Pilar again for not selling herself to the rich kids. This is like the only conversation they ever have anymore. Joaquin comes in and Dunoff suggests that he and Pilar should hang out and she can help him get accustomed to school and stuff. In fact, he’ll leave them alone right now and they can become besties! Pilar is, again, not into the idea. Joaquin suggests that they just pretend to be friends when Dunoff’s around. Like fake dating, but with less fanfiction based on the idea. Pilar agrees.
Lockers. Marizza’s telling Lujan about meeting the Bustamantes in person. She says Mama B is what Mia’s going to look like in about 30 years. Heh. Lujan is all sympathetic that Nacho fucked up the cassette, which is kind of irritating because if it were anyone else, Lujan would be all pissy and accusing them of betraying Marizza already. Am I a bad person for wanting someone to be mean to an orphaned third grader? Of course, when Luna runs by and blows them off because she’s looking for Mia, Lujan takes greatest offense to that. Marizza doesn’t even notice, because she’s too busy squealing over her date with Joaquin. “He’s such a bonbon,” she sighs. Lujan tries to get her to come back to earth so they can go back to plotting violence against their classmates together, but Marizza isn’t listening.
In Mia’s room, she too has been sadly dickmatized by Joaquin. She squeals to Vico about how amazing kissing Joaquin was, which is weird because the last time we saw her, she looked like she was going to vom a little. Were we supposed to interpret that as romantic? I can never tell on this show. Anyway, Vico wants to know if that was Mia’s first kiss, and Mia flashbacks to Manuel putting the mack on her in episode 12. She brushes it off and tells Vico that she’s kissed a guy before, but it totally doesn’t count. It was a totally lame kiss, whereas Joaquin “ate [her] mouth.” Again, is that supposed to be cute?
Luna pops in to tell them that class is starting, and right behind her is Feli. Vico asks how she is, which is nice of her, but Mia just says that they’re going to be late and drags them out of the room. Feli sits on her bed and emos.
Cafeteria. Guido is making fun of Joaquin to the great amusement of the boys, who are all intimidated by his inexplicable ability to bring all the girls to the yard. Tomás is also sitting at Pablo’s lunch table again, for some reason. Joaquin pops up right behind them and starts needling Pablo about his loss at pool. As we all know, pool at Elite Way is serious business, and losing a game is tantamount to cutting off your penis. Or something. All the guys want to fight him, but Joaquin blows them off and wanders away with Pilar on his arm.
In the hallway, Marizza tries to get some PDA out of Joaquin, but he tells her they have to keep their relationship a secret. Mia also tries to get his attention, but he ducks into the classroom to avoid her. Instead of realizing he’s a douchebag, Mia and Marizza glare at each other. Siiiiigh.
Casa Colucci. Peter brings Papa C some coffee while Papa C reads some very important information on his Windows 98. Papa C takes the opportunity to yell at him for bringing Mia the box of her mom’s stuff. He’s like, “You know I wanted to lie to my daughter about her dead mother for as long as possible!” Just kidding. Peter asks how Papa C even found out about the box, but Papa C just snaps that it’s not important, probably because admitting that he needs a 17-year-old to spy for him is hella embarrassing. Anyway, he yells at Peter to never bring up Mama C ever ever again (and also calls her his ex-wife, which brings into question what went down with the Coluccis before she died). And what’s this about a Joaquin? Now Peter is really suspicious: what teenage girl tells her dad about the boys she likes? I think I know where Mia’s girl detective abilities come from.
Classroom. This scene is actually mildly clever, for this show. It shows the entire classroom, and little arrows and hearts pop up onto the scene to illustrate what’s going on. Mia blows a kiss to Joaquin, trying to get his attention. Marizza notices this and tries to make Joaquin notice her instead, which draws the ire of Pablo. Nico and Manuel start whispering to each other, and Luna looks over and tries to flirt with Nico. The little floating hearts pop confusedly around Nico’s head. Heh. Meanwhile, Feli thinks Luna is trying to move in on Manuel, and glares at her, all while “Sweet Baby” is playing in the background.
Eventually, Hilda has had enough of their teenage hormones and yells at them all that ARGENTINIAN HISTORY IS VERY IMPORTANT! Marizza suggests that they learn something fun instead, and Hilda’s like, ARGENTINIAN HISTORY IS ALSO VERY FUN! She says she’ll show them fun, and you know what the funnest thing ever is? Group projects! Everyone gets all twitterpated and starts crawling over the desks to find a partner, and Hilda’s like, “Dammit, I didn’t want you to actually have fun! Sit back down!” She is master of the mixed message.
The school basement. The Society has found Nico and Manuel (mostly Manuel)’s note, telling them that they are ONTO THEM and CONSEQUENCES WILL NEVER BE THE SAME. The Society decides to beat Nico and Manuel up (again, some more).
Mansilla comes in to start class, and all the kids are still sulking. Hilda snaps at him that the kids are little hellions (not untrue) and storms out. Mansilla decides that they should snap out of their funk with some dance, which is something I remember at least one of my teachers doing, too. Oh God, was my school secretly as crappy as Elite Way? Tomás tells him that dancing is totally lame, but Marizza, never missing a chance to show off, gets up and offers her hand to Joaquin. Never missing a chance to be a tool, he starts dancing with her. Now that two of their classmates are already doing it, the rest of the kids decide that dancing isn’t totally lame after all. Why must this show portray the ridiculousness of teenagers so accurately? Anyway, they’re all dancing and doing no learning at all. What an excellent time for the very important guest from the University of Manchester to arrive! Gloria shows him around the school, and he speaks awkward broken Spanish at her. He’s all shocked and appalled to see dancing in school. The British would never! Their upper lips are too stiff!
Mansilla eventually shuts off the music, and tells them that whoever they were dancing with is now their partner for Hilda’s project. Let’s meet our teams!
I can’t wait for Pilar and Pablo tear each other’s hair out. Also, Vico and Guido look way too happy about being partnered together, given that he’s the reason she got expelled in the first place. Oooh, I sense drama.
Dunoff’s office. I gotta say, the Dunoff scenes are really boring, and now I don’t have subtitles so I can’t listen to something else while reading them. BOO 🙁 Blah blah he smugly tells someone on the phone that the guy from U of Manchester is visiting today, so all the students are behaving perfectly. Gloria naturally picks this moment to run in and tell him that the sophomores are basically having an orgy. Okay, let’s not exaggerate, Gloria. As we’ve seen, they occasionally freak out over holding each other’s hands.
Mansilla leads Hilda back into the classroom and tells her the students have calmed down now. I thought history class was over? Whatever. Everyone does what they want at this school, I should expect that by now. The not-ethics teacher pops in to tell Mansilla that Dunoff has summoned him, and all the kids start leaving the classroom. I guess Hilda came back to give them their assignments and now class is over? Again I say, whatever. Marizza and Manuel look over their topic while Marizza bitters over Mia and Joaquin being partners. Manuel suggests that he can get Mia away from Joaquin. He suggests this by rubbing his chin a lot, for some reason. Marizza beams at him and they scurry off.
Meanwhile, Joaquin stops by Marcos’s desk and exposits that their brothers knew each other: they were in the same class at Elite Way. Gasp! They chit-chat a bit about how Joaquin’s brother is doing, and Joaquin says his dad sent him away to school, and now he’s completely different and going to take over the family business. He tells Marcos, “Your brother would’ve ended up the same way if he hadn’t died.” Is…that supposed to be comforting? Marcos is perturbed.
I’m not even halfway through this episode. Fuck.
Joaquin bounces off to to the cafeteria so he can harass Nico and Manuel, too. Manuel acts obnoxious for no reason I can see, shoving a bag of cocoa puffs in Joaquin’s face and asking if he wants some with this huge shit-eating grin. Mia pops up and tries to remind Joaquin that they totes made out last episode, but he blows her off again. Manuel holds out the cocoa puffs: “Want some?”
Over at Marizza’s table, Lujan is throwing drafts away, fuming that the history project is going to take all day. Well, sure, but it’s not like it’s due tomorrow. Or is it? I wouldn’t be surprised, at this school. Belen reminds them that they still have dance practice, and Lujan’s like, “Crap, I nearly forgot that that happened.” Same, tbh. Lujan also weirdly bitter that she has work with “that moron” Marcos. Marizza reminds her that Marcos is a walking nerd stereotype and is like, “Just do what I did and make him do the project alone.” Oh, Marizza.
Pablo rolls up and makes Marizza agree to do his project for him. She grouses at him but eventually has to doormat. “One day, she’s going to break his face,” Pilar notes from a table nearby, where she’s sitting with Guido and Vico. In what universe would either of them ever want to sit with Pilar? Whatever. Guido muses that Pablo must have blackmail material on her, and Pilar’s like, “Oooh, tell me more!” Wait, does Guido know about Nacho? When did that happen? And then, Vico calls Guido “mi amor” and they vaguely flirtily agree to get together to work on the project. What is going on in this scene? It’s sowing so many doubts in what I thought I knew about this plot.
Vico finds Mia emoing in the classroom, and Mia wails to her that Joaquin blew her off in front of everyone, including (and especially) Manuel. Oh, the shame! Vico rightfully tells her that Joaquin is a dick. Not that that’s going to stop Mia from throwing her self-respect away on him, probably. Literally the second Vico leaves, a cafeteria worker brings Mia some candy that a boy bought for her. Mia flips out: did he have dark hair and a Mexican accent? Nope, it’s from Joaquin, with a note asking her to meet him later. Mia is all twitterpated. What did I just say?
Mia’s room. Vico busts Feli looking through Mama C’s stuff. Uh-oh.
Dunoff is on the phone with ~someone~, talking about Lujan. Oh, right, Lujan has that mysterious tutor who comes up about every ten episodes and then is promptly forgotten about. He tells the tutor that Lujan is doing well in school, but whoever it is starts reaming him out about how irresponsible the school is. I mean, not untrue. Sadly, I don’t think the tutor is referring to the teachers’ habits of barging into the students’ bedrooms, the entire library only having one bookcase, or the complete lack of bell schedule.
Mia meets Joaquin in the map room. No, Mia! Not the map room! They make out, but she pushes him away to pout about how mean he was to her. Joaquin tells her to look at it from his point of view (don’t do it, Mia!): he’s the new kid moving in on the most popular girl in school, surely she understands that he doesn’t want to be a target. That’s also why they should totally keep their relationship secret. Mia says she’ll do anything for him. I think this is the most tragic thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life.
Mansilla gets sick of waiting for Dunoff to meet with him and is about to storm out. Gloria starts shrieking at him, and Mansilla tells her that she looks hella stressed and needs to chill out. Bizarre pornographic saxophone music starts playing in the background as he tells her to breathe. This scene is just weird.
Marizza complains to Manuel that she has to work on two projects at once, which leads Manuel to the obvious question of why the hell she’s doormatting for Pablo. Marizza hems and haws before telling Manuel that she lost a bet. She bitters that both Mia and Joaquin are missing, and they’re probably off macking it while Marizza is doing homework. I mean, she’s not wrong.
Manuel splits Mia and Joaquin up by telling Mia that they need to get some maps for class. Not the map room again! Mia, you should know better. Manuel locks the door behind them (creepy!), and then pretends like they’ve gotten accidentally locked in. Uh, why did Manuel volunteer to lock himself in a room with Mia? He can’t like Marizza that much. Nobody can, except maybe Lujan.
With Mia gone, Marizza chews Joaquin out for hanging around with Mia. He tells her that they have to keep their (Joaquin and Marizza’s) relationship on the DL, because Dunoff wants to believe Pilar has a chance with Joaquin. As for Mia, they seriously were just doing work. If by “work” he means “solitaire”, then sure:
“Solitaire” is also usually what I mean when I say “work”, admittedly.
Joaquin tells Marizza he doesn’t want to hide their relationship, but they must! Marizza accepts it, because she don’t love herself.
In the not-library, Nico and Luna are working on their project. Luna suggests that they work really well together, and slides him a little drawing on a Post-It note. Aw! Luna’s really growing on me, you guys. She’s cute. Nico is hella awkward about it, but Luna chalks it up to him being nervous on account of his crush. She tells him that she likes him back, and he runs away.
Meanwhile, Vico gives Guido a massage. Seriously, when did this start happening?
Pablo’s room. He opens his closet to see Pilar standing there. What the hell! Pilar’s getting weirder and weirder, you guys. She gets up in Pablo’s face and tells him that she has a present for him, since they’re best project buddies now and all. She turns around to get it, and Pablo checks out her ass. When did this start happening? Like, I don’t understand why they were even dancing with each other to begin with. Doesn’t Pablo hate Pilar? Don’t they all hate Pilar? Anyway, she’s brought Pablo some alcohol, and enacts her master plan: getting Pablo hella drunk so he’ll spill what he’s got on Marizza. This seems like a lot of effort to me. Like, the next time we see them, Pilar’s had to sit there while Pablo downs three bottles. Anyway, eventually Pablo tells her that if Marizza doesn’t do what he says, he’ll tell Dunoff about “the boy.” Scare chord!
Map room. Manuel suggests Mia just get her boyfriend to get them out. Oh, yes, he knows Mia and Joaquin are 2gether 4ever: he and Joaquin are bosom pool friends, they tell each other everything! Mia’s all appalled, but then Vico shows up to let them out.
In her room, Marizza grouses about how much she hates Pablo, and trips out into another dream sequence where she does a dance routine that ends with her shooting a cardboard cutout of him. It’s weird, as are all of Marizza’s daydreams. Anyway, Nacho wakes her up and tells her that he fucked up and gave Lujan the wrong cassette. He’s holding the one with Marizza’s blackmail material, and it works perfectly. Marizza is all twitterpated.
Teachers’ lounge. Alicia frets to Mansilla that she doesn’t know if she should let Pilar in the group or not — clearly she wants to be included, but she didn’t win the dance competition. Mansilla sensibly says that she should just let Pilar audition and accept her if she’s good. In fact, why didn’t Alicia just dissolve Mia’s cheertatorship to begin with, and make all the girls audition? Why is Alicia such a shitty teacher? I’m just asking. Alicia sighs: she doesn’t want anyone to think she’s just letting Pilar in because she’s Dunoff’s daughter. Gosh, if only there was a way for Pilar to demonstrate her skill and earn a place on the team. If only people did some kind of short performance to see who gets to be on a dance team and who doesn’t. Mansilla brings up that all the girls could reasonably have a place on the team. True! Not to project my high school experience onto it, because my high school was tiny, Catholic, and all-girls, so basically not like any high school on TV ever, but pretty much everyone who auditioned got a spot on the dance squad, cheer squad, in the school play, etc. The less talented girls usually got smaller parts or put on a “B” team, but they were still allowed to participate. ANYWAY, Alicia says they could in fact do that, but Dunoff storms in and cuts her off as she’s explaining why. Whatever, it’s because this school is incredibly corrupt. We already know that.
Alicia slips out as Dunoff starts yelling at Mansilla for ditching his meeting. Mansilla rightfully points out that he had classes to teach, which Dunoff does not like at all. Dunoff yells at him that this is an elite school, blah blah blah, and the students shouldn’t have things like fun or, idk, opinions of their own. Mansilla says teenagers should be able to express themselves, and Dunoff’s like, “Don’t come to me with that progressive talk!” Heh. Then the British dude comes in and says that he’s been looking for Mansilla. Cliffhanger!
As usual, about fifty more scenes are crammed into the last five minutes of the episode. Let’s see:
The Society meets up and decides to pick someone from the sophomore class to carry out their plans for Nico and Manuel. They wave a knife into the fire and stab it into someone’s photo, although of course we don’t see who it is. How do they even have time for all this? Don’t these kids have class?
Peter comes to see Mia, and she swears to him that she didn’t tell him about the box of her mom’s stuff — or about Joaquin, for that matter. Peter muses that someone must be informing on Mia to Papa C. I wish Peter and Mia solved crimes together.
Lujan and Marcos are doing their history project in the chem room. I bet they wouldn’t have to keep ducking into unused classrooms if this school had an actual library. But whatever. Lujan verbally berates Marcos for like…not hating class as much as she does? It’s unclear. She yells at him so much that she gives him an asthma attack. Oh, Lujan. Marcos grabs at her and mimes using an inhaler, and tells her that it’s in his bedroom. Lujan: “WHAT’S in your bedroom? I don’t get it.” He falls over unconscious. Oh, LUJAN.
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