Morangos com Açúcar

OK, I just wanted to say that I have never seen a soap opera as bad as this one, I've seen the first episode and I got sick, all I wanted to do was to turn off the TV and throw up! Here's the story of the first season, just for you to know how bad are these screenwriters... A girl that finds her boyfriend making out with another girl. She goes to the beach and, although she doesn't know how to swim (I'm taking a guess, because how the hell does anybody drowns when the level of the water is almost by its knee?) she goes into the water and starts to drown (all of this because of her boyfriend... Sweet love...). She is rescued by a surfer who is nude and, by chance, is in the same school as her and, by chance, is in the same class as her!! What are the odds?!BAD BAD BAD!!! And attention, that was just the first episode! After that, obviously, they fall in love, star to date, get mad at each other, the boy apologises to the girl, they date again, and the circle repeats itself like 20 to 30 times, just enough to keep the Portuguese youth glued to their TV sets(I only know all of this because my friends kept telling me the story every single day. After the first episode, I just refused to see any more of that). Meanwhile, something happens and the girl goes to Brazil, and the boy goes after her, and at that point the soap opera just turns a complete chaos, almost apocalyptic. They break up 30.000 times in two episodes (or so it seems), and then they're about to get married, but afterwards it's not quite like that I don't know why. If you want to know the end of this wonderful story, ask someone who is over 5 years-old and lives in Portugal, because I missed the "grand finale" and, honestly, I don't wanna know! End this, please, and I'll rest my case.

I used to watch this show back when I was quite younger, I was eleven years old when it started and when it finished I was already twenty years old, but in any case, the only season I remember watching pretty much from its entirety until its end was the third season, the one with Tiago and Matilde, the Popstars and all that, and, realistically speaking, it's the only one that it's really worth watching from the beginning to the end. Sure it may be highly formulaic, some of the acting from some of its actors might not be the best and some of the stories there, the best one for me was the Tordocai virus which was so influential that it actually caused a mass hysteria moment in some schools in Portugal, might be highly bizarre but you can't help but enjoy that specific season of the show. Other than that one the show in general is highly formulaic, the main stories in general are quite basic and, for the most part, this show hasn't managed to age that much well.

In general, I give this show a 3/10 because the third season was good enough to raise the show's quality but other than that specific season the show never really showed much signs of evolution and it has been quite a stale show since then, I mean, seasons one, two and seven also had their moments but still quite far from the peak of this show which was and will always be season three.

As for the new show, I've seen some of the trailers for it and I definitely have zero interest in watching it, I think it might work when it comes to the first episode but after that it's going to be a massive flop because it's trying too hard to appeal to both "new" and "old" viewers and it's going to be a complete mess, in my very honest opinion.

"Morangos Com Açucar" only functions with cliché lines and cliché situations. Season after season, the storyline remains the same only with new actors, replacing the previous ones with identical characters.

The basic plot suits the basic actors and the even more basic audience.

Every ten minutes, some political/social message is said without having a direct relation to the situation. Two characters may be having a discussion and out of thin air, the subject of recycling is brought up. Once there was a dialog between a main character and an extra, solely for the purpose of indicating to the young audience that smoking is harmful to our health.

The editing is beyond any doubts, the worst I've seen. Part of the problem is the fact that certain scenes were written and shot without the writer and director applying something called "logic". I've seen a boat chase in which they've actually shot the scene alternating between a static and a moving boat.

Another poor thing which is a result of a poor script and editing, is the fact that characters speak in a specific order, without overlaying the others:

A - "Did you know that he stole the money?"

B - "Really?"

C - "Is that so?"

D - "This is bad..."

E - "Are you serious?"

F - "That can't be..."

And every time a character speaks, there's a close up paired with an annoying post production sound. How annoying...

In four seasons, there is only one good thing I've seen in this show: at some point we could relate to the female antagonists and protagonists.

There is little talent nowadays on the Portuguese TV industry, I believe, and this show is another proof of it, from the news shows that last 2 hours to soap operas and soap operas in a row to this kind of teenager soap operas you can't really watch public television in Portugal and hope to not drop some IQ points in the process. Once now and then there are some movies and documentaries and that's about it as far as quality goes around here. This show in an attempt to imitate Brazilian teen soap operas that were popular a little before the show started, the acting is terrible, the plot is terrible, or random, it would be watchable if the actors, conscious of how bad the show is, turned it a little more satiric and fun, but alas, no - they genuinely try to make it as terrible as it is. I watched the first season, sporadically, it was launched on Summer vacation and by that time I was stuck with nothing to do but read and watch TV, needless to say I finished some giant books before being forced to poison myself with those strawberries. After I don't know how many seasons it hasn't changed much, they try to approach a new general topic such as abortion or homosexuality or racism now and then but overall the show puts up a very poor attempt. I do believe there is some talent in this industry, it's not employed by SIC or TVI though, that's for sure

I've seen Morangos com Açucar. It depicts the life of Portuguese teenagers in a really twisted wonderful way, where everything is sunny and happy all the time. Of course it has its downs, but it's always some ridiculous cliché situation like "He stole my girlfriend", or... no actually that's it. there are these "cool" delinquents who skate and make graffiti; again, so cliché (I actually know one of th actors...I still can't figure how I manage not to laugh when I see him). All the young actors are there just cuz they're young and good-looking, but they suck. Amongst the adults, there are some good references in Portuguese acting, but u wouldn't know by watching this show, because the argument (or script, or whatever) won't allow any actor to show his talent, even Anthony Hopkins would look like an amateur saying those lines. It's just plain ridiculous, it's all the adolescence clichés and mere stupidity and merchandising all compiled into... that. Even so, it wins in 2 fronts, and by a landslide: hot chicks and comedic value. As I said, th actors (specially th ones who play youth) are there to look good. I'm a man, so I find th women attractive. What I call comedic value is the fact that u can sit there, and laugh at the show during it's entirety (and that's a long time, coz they give you 2 episodes at a time, 1 from th day b4, and th new one... of course u stop laughing when u realize th commercial break's been going for 15min...) Anyway I watch the show regularly now, so I can laugh at it, and then cry at the misery that Portuguese TV has become, and u should do so too. It's a great show