Hospital Central

It has been said so many times that this Spanish TV series is a cheep copy of "ER" (known as "Urgencias" in Spanish TV) that many people go on saying that this is not a serious TV production.

People is right when they say "ER" was released long before this one, and, OK, "Hospital Central" is far less expensive than the American TV series, but that doesn't mean this is a bad Spanish clon of "ER". I would say that "Hospital Central" is much more entertaining and easy understanding than the American series, and I wouldn't even say this is a "version" of "ER", because I think this TV series is quite original and no character on it remains any of the American series. And there's no need to say that stories told in "Hospital Central" are very different from "ER"'s ones, in this series you don't get lost while trying to understand what happened to the people in the hospital, and you're not always hearing strange vocabulary from the doctors and nurses. This series has another good point, it is not as over dramatized as "ER" and stories don't usually get so melodramatic as in the American series.

The cast in "Hospital Central" is quite good: María Casal (Elisa) and Jordi Rebellón (Vilches) give good performances, and not so well-known actors Ángel Pardo (Rusti) and Antonio Zabálburu (Javier) are also good. The series has improved since Alicia Borrachero (Cruz) and Leticia Dolera (Miriam) are part of the cast. Maybe Amaia Lizarralde (Cristina) and Rosa Mariscal (Andrea) give less relaxed performances, but they are not as bad as it is said. The cast in this TV series deserve better reviews from newspapers.

Some people must stop and think, if this series has over 5 million viewers every week it can't be as bad as they say. I would give it 8/10.

I watch this show since season 3 and i can't miss a single episode.

Some people say that it is very similar with the American show "ER", but i can't disagree more, i'm also a big fan of "ER" and there is a big difference between the two shows, "ER" focuses more on the inside of the ER, and we see the patients only when they enter the hospital, and only a few times we follow on their future, but in Hospital Central, we see the lives of those patients and even watch their accidents and circumstances that took them to the hospital, there are a lot more exterior shots and good accident scenes, "ER" lives mostly from studio shot scenes.

Also in "ER" there is much more technical talk and it's most of the time filmed in a frenetic environment, Hospital Central is much more accessible in technical terms and it's rhythm is much slower.

I confess I have not been an avid "Hospital Central" watcher until pretty recently. Until then I had been more attracted to the offerings of rival channels, but I eventually decided to give it a try.

Now, as episodes go by, I only regret having missed almost three years and six seasons of this great series. Besides, it keeps getting better and better with time, a thing one can say about very few TV series today. The similarities between this and "ER" are undeniable, but only on the surface. It might have followed the footsteps of its American counterpart at the beginning, but soon it gained its own place and its own personality.

Actors have come and gone, but they have been well replaced by great actors. It's impossible to name all the great actors that have impressed me all over the seasons, but I'd say Jordi Rebellón, Rosa Mariscal, Amaia Lizarralde and Alicia Borrachero have been my all-time favourites. The supporting and guest cast is also outstanding, and it's a joy to watch our veteran and forgotten actors appear in episodes even if it's only for a few minutes.

Overall rating: 8/10

More successful than "ER" in Spanish television, "Hospital Central" has become one of the series with more audience in Spanish prime time in recent years. It´s quite similar to the american series in many ways but it knows how follow an own style. Between the long cast María Casal, Rosa Mariscal, Ángel Pardo and Jordi Rebellón may be mentioned, they are some of the reasons to explain how this TV series is able to attract so many people. Good acting and arguments episode by episode. Not to be missed.