janus-rackelldant

Disclaimer: I am a Roman Catholic, and a faithful one. But that doesn't stop me from hating this "show".

I am (in)fortunate enough to watch this series many times thanks to the fact it's at lunchtime where I live at. And oh good lord, where do we start? Well, acting: Dull, overacted, really stiff and annoying at best. Acting here comes in two flavours: Either overreacted to the point it feels overly feigned (and annoying also), or really stiff, almost woodlike. The acting would make any cheap amateurish Elementary School drama play look like the Lord of the Rings. Nominating these kind of acting to the Razzies (since I don't know which is the award to the worst of the worst TV series) would be a disgrace to the Razzies awards itself.

Thematic: All of the episodes are too repetitive and formulaic: Problem A happens, it goes rock bottom, a white rose appears sent by the Virgin of Guadalupe, and the problem is solved by magic, everybody lives happily ever after. Wait, does that ever happens in real life? As far as I know, the Virgin (and the saints in the Catholic traditions) plead to God for the miracles to happen. But leaving the religious themes aside, the whole "Virgin ex Machina" theme is just annoying, since it gives people the false hope of leaving it all to the Virgin to solve their problems. A really lazy, and downright stupid, solution. There's an old saying, stating "Help yourself so I can help you", which is the real way on how do miracles work. Seconds, the series is promoted as "stories of love and redemption." Lies, there's neither love nor redemption on those stories; while the stories try to entangle with the emotions of the viewer, the horrible acting, weak scripting and downright dumbed down characters don't help at all. Third, the writers didn't do any research regarding some of the thematics, which is grating and offensive, considering several episodes took on fashion trends (like the emo subculture, for example) and made them look downright offensive; Another one I can think is one of a teen aged girl who got pregnant and then she got dumped by her boyfriend, and suddenly wants to try abortion before her parents realize she is pregnant, but sorry, at a certain phase of pregnancy you just can't do that if you don't want to end jailed. And there are more examples, but the whole wrongs done by this program make me too lazy to list them all.

Music: Corny and melodramatic, usual in any soap opera. But here's the only salvageable point: the ending, a beautiful version of "La Guadalupana" pointing you out that you just lost a valuable hour of your life trying to figure out what did you just saw. At least that ending actually points out something good about the series.

And oh joy... let's go for the dialogues! Completely unreal and stupidly idealistic.

Overall, this TV show sucks. Avoid it like a plague.

I remember watching this movie with a group of friends which were hardcore Christians (although I'm a devout Catholic, I do not fall in such extremes). To say the least, this movie has more propaganda than a Nazi Germany 1930's flick! Poor acting, scripting, bad Audio/Video synch, using Football as a tool (and perhaps as reference to "Remember the giants") to explain miracles... I can forgive such failures in "low--budget films", but there had to be a distorted biblical message to make things worse and then turn all the Shiloh football team into a massive plot device instead of being the real protagonists.

Yes, this has a message: "Become a Christian and enjoy the fruits of being so." I think not. Miracles aren't made by faith alone, but with blood, sweat, toil and a bit of faith.