Caray, Caray!

Yet another great recap, Jean. Thanks so much!

So at last Lucas and Daniel meet. I liked the scene, though I too was struck by the fact that Daniel was clearly shorter than Lucas. Since the only shots of the two of them together were at a distance, I'm surprised they couldn't find someone exactly Lucas' height (since we wouldn't see them up close together). I was also surprised that Lucas wasn't more sympathetic to Daniel. After all the time Lucas has spent wishing he were 20 years younger and could do things differently, he comes upon "himself" 20 years younger. I thought he'd cheer him on, encourage him to do what he wants, not what other people want, to follow his heart, etc. etc. Instead he's very disparaging and discouraging. Hmmmm....

This episodio was full of surprises for me. In addition to the ones I mentioned above, I was a bit surprised when Alej and Pablo go to the apartment and find it has been cleared out. Not only am I surprised that the druggies could manage to get the refrigerator down the stairs without killing themselves, I'm even more surprised at how spotless they left the place! They could hire themselves out as Spotless Movers, Inc. and charge extra for the cleaning service.

Another surprise: Albieri is not TODIM (The Only Doctor in Miami). I was sure that when Lucas said he was going to call a doctor who was a friend of his father's, it would be the clonemeister.

Keeping with all the things that surprised me, I was surprised that I missed the fact that the woman in Marisa's flashback at the clinic was calling Marisa's name. I guess my Spanish is even worse than I thought. Muchas gracias for clueing me in. I'm not quite sure what to make of this new piece of information about Marisa.

Was that really Paula with Fernando. I at first assumed it was, but I thought she looked more attractive than Paula, though she certainly acted just as obnoxious.
Poor Clara--is she really going to be able to deal successfully with Fernando's problems in just the few (ojalá) remaining capítulos culminantes?

Finally, I should mention that twice in the recap you said "she" when you meant "he." First when you said that Alej comes to Nati's house and Rosa tells HER that Nati is in a clinic, and then at the end when you say that Lucas comes to Dora's house and SHE finds out that Daniel has gone to Morocco. I mention it only because it may be confusing to people who haven't seen the episode. If I knew how, I'd have pointed this out in a PM, but....

Anyway, as always, I'm most grateful for the recaps and in awe of your ability to do them so well.
 

Thanks for pointing out the he/she's. There were a lot more typos in there that I cleaned up as well. I got a late start on the recap last night and then overslept this morning so it was done in a bit of a rush.

I guess that Lucas was in a really bad mood when he met Daniel and he took out his frustrations on his clone. As I've said before, I think I would be the last person to recognize someone who looked like me 20 years ago. I didn't spend a lot of time looking at myself. Lucas has a twin so I guess that would be different.

I don't think Fernando is going to make it to the end of the novela. No spoiler, I'm just guessing that he is will OD or something. He isn't that important a character and if Nati goes to rehab then Fer will be the example of what happens when a druggie doesn't get help. Poor Clara seems to be completely clueless.

I noticed how clean the druggies left the apartment, too. That was funny. I'm sort of surprised that neither Paula or Nati have been reduced to selling themselves, i.e., prostitution, to get money for drugs.

I loved the scene with Julio and the Chump. Julio was so expressive without saying anything nasty and the Chump was so oblivious.
 

Jean, great recap and Spanish lesson as usual. I am so grateful for all of the time and talent and NovelaMaven put into volunteer job.

A lot happened last night. If Fernando is not going to make it to the end of this TN, I am glad that Clara has Roberto. She certainly hasn't had any support from the Chump. Maybe this will be what does dear ole Malicia in. (Wishful thinking).

Boy, that Paula is a real PIG. Something nasty needs to happen to her.

The thing with "little" Marisa was a real surprise. I wonder what that was all about?

Thank goodness Leo has more than one Dr. friend. Hopefully, someone can help Nati.

I cannot believe that Alej went over to Nati's parents to get money for what was stolen. I could understand him wanting her parents to know what happened and work together to help Nati, but to get money, I didn't like that one bit. He should have taken away her key long ago.

Rosemary
 

This was one of the best episodes so far and your recap did it more than justice, Jean. Thank you!

Among my favorite lines here:
"Lucas is looking at old production shots, I mean family photos."
"Escobar is in Magic Malicia land where all reason has gone out the window."
"[Now in a normal novela, this is where Luisa would run Silvia over with her car.] hahaha -- so true!!

And Juanita, you are in pretty good form yourself this morning with your druggies who "could hire themselves out as Spotless Movers and charge extra for the service" and Albieri, "the Clonemeister", not being TODIM.

About the growth disparity -- it might be deliberate. Men don't achieve full growth until age 25.
--
I was also surprised by the bitterness (on Lucas's part) and the disappointment (on Daniel's part), but I felt it made perfect psychological sense. And once again, I was blown away by the writing and the acting in these 'encuentro de rostros' scenes. When Daniel says to Lucas: 'tú no eres nada mío' and Lucas answers 'Soy todo...todo!', I felt that was a moment of truth-telling. In a sense, Lucas IS Daniel's everything -- mother and father, brother and self.

Could it be that with Marisa's flashback to her childhood and (presumably) her mother being wheeled away on a stretcher, we (and she) will have some insight into the trauma that scarred her character and she will begin to change?

And poor Clara, she'll have to call in Padre Andres to perform an exorcism before she'll be able to sleep in that bed again!

Rosemary, Alej would never have conceived of asking Nati's parents for money if he hadn't been egged on by Pablo. In any event, Alej didn't have the heart to go through with it when he heard what was going on.

[What he should have done, I think, is report the theft so the judicial system would become involved. The only way someone can be obligated to undergo rehab is by court order. Rehab facilities are filled with people who have been given a choice: Rehab or jail.]
 

Jean thank you so much for another great recap.

NovelaMaven ita yes Lucas was clearly taking all of his bitterness out on Daniel. Like everyone said i felt there is a sense of doom hanging over Daniel especially when he said his goodbyes to his love ones. I just want to know doesn't he know that once you say you are leaving that you just don't keep hanging around for no reason but to further along the plot storylines.

I was LOL at how clean the apartment was looking when Pablo and Alej went there to get the rest of his stuff.Really all of those i told you so from Pablo i can't wait for his friends to do the same to him about Malicia.

The Chump gives new meaning to the expression you've been played for a Chump, doesn't he.

I really hope Fernando doesn't die, but Clara needs to get her act together pronto. Go long onto the internet and google what she needs to do to help her son.
 

This was so great :-)

Fer in bed with Paula could be a PSA in its own right! Eww. (...And this is your brain on drugs.)

I wonder if Mauricio Ochmann's past addiction and recovery provided some of the emotion he showed while Nati was taken away. He seemed very genuine and touched. (I guess Marisa did too.)

Too bad about Zein and la novia :-( Que lastima.

Now, let's get to Morocco already, cast.
 

(And, c'mon, Karla--have that baby, ya! Estamos muriendo por ese zapato a caer...)
 

Thanks everyone for the nice words!

A couple of tidbits: A new novela, Ojo por Ojo (An Eye for an Eye), is announced as 'muy pronto' so presumably that will replace Clon. It looks like another narco novela.

And from TW, the actors who play Rania and Mohamed got married.
 

Excellent recap, Jean. I think there was some movement in the plot. I hadn't thought about Nati being of age and that they couldn't intern her against her will. You can have a family member of any age interned in the case of mental illness; it's usually a 72-hour period, and the relatives then need to prove the person is harmful to themselves or others. A good friend has a schizophrenic sister that has had many 72-hour internments.

I was very disappointed in Lucas' behavior toward Daniel. None of what's happened is Daniel's fault; he didn't choose to be cloned. And there's absolutely no evidence that his life has to turn out the same way as Lucas' life. We don't think Daniel will survive the end of the TN, but Lucas doesn't know this. I expected him to feel wonderment, which he did, and compassion for his younger self. But no.

I think the Marisa as a child plot point was an interesting development. Having a perhaps crazy mother could explain some of her character faults. She may have been so damaged by this that she began shutting herself off from really loving someone. (I know, cheap psychology!)
 

Jean i have seen the advertisement for the new novela for quite a while, i was under the impression that is was going to replace El Cartel 2 but oh well. It stars two of the stars from Mas Sabes el Diablo, Gaby Espin and Micheal Varoni.

What is up with a lot of these Telemundo novelas and their drug references in their storyline?
 

Blusamurai, You're so right about Pablo -- He's got some "I told you so's" coming. Of course, he won't care too much. He's a pretty shallow kind of guy and he's not in love with Malicia. She did ruin his thing with Cristina, but that wasn't going to last anyway.

Novelera, If we can't indulge in cheap psychology here, I'm going to write to that address on the matchbook and demand my money back!!

As for life after El Clon, I have high hopes for "India" on Telefutura (although I hope I can figure out when it starts and what time it will be on.) I'm not a great fan of the NarcoNovela myself.
 

I don't know what Ojo por Ojo is going to replace. I'm just guessing that since El Cartel 2 doesn't seem to be in 'ultimas' anything and we have to see a 'muy pronto' for what will replace Clon fairly soon, that Ojo was it. The Spanish Wikipedia page still says that La Reina del Sur will replace Clon but we haven't seen any promos for that one. I don't get Telefutura so I can't watch India.
 

Blusamurai, I hadn't thought about the predominance of drug-related TNs on Telemundo. Interesting point! I'm not a great fan of such stuff, but I hope to make an exception for "La Reina del Sur," a TN in the works, based on the novel by Arturo Pérez-Reverte. I read the novel in English years ago and liked it a lot, so I'll definitely give the TN a try when it starts, even though it too deals with el narcotráfico. I'm not sure when it will start.

I have a feeling I may be telenovelaless for a while. I'll be travelling for three weeks in October, and I doubt that I'll want to start a TN that has been running for three weeks, especially since CarayCaray is unlikely to arrange for recapping. Sigh.
 

Jean, I didn't get Telefutura until very recently when I decided to try out my cable company's Spanish 'tier'. Actually, it's only in the past year or so that I've been able to get Telemundo. Now I can watch news, nature, history, etc in Spanish. My favorite is a Mexican station, oncetv, that has lots of cooking shows. :)

Juanita, La Reina del Sur IS an intriguing novel, although plenty violent and bloody. The story of the protagonist, La Mexicana, is fascinating and it might to fun to see how they capture it in a TN. I actually don't mind coming late to a novela. Especially in the case of Televisa shows, they are often so over-the-top in the first few weeks that they are unwatchable. But then they settle down a bit and allow the characters to be something other than parodies. I felt, for example, that 'La Fea' was unwatchable for months, but was tolerable (just barely)when they abandoned some of the tics and shtick the characters were burdened with in the beginning.
 

NovelaMaven, your TV lineup sounds like mine. I don't have cable, but DirecTV. I switched to the "Latino" package about a year ago. Because a dish gives you both East Coast and West Coast airings of some shows, I can set my DVR to record El Clon at 5:00 California time and Soy tu Dueña at 6:00. This gives me more sleeping time!

I had to give up (sob) BBC America, but I really enjoy all the extra stations in Spanish. ONCE is very good. Have you ever seen something called La Dichosa Palabra? It's a real test of your comprehension. No subtitles, of course, and rapid fire Spanish by four or five REALLY intellectual people about all kinds of things: art, philosophy, literature, politics. It's on whatever is the Mexican equivalent of PBS.
 

I looked at my cable channels and I should be able to get Telefutura. When I go to that channel, it says that it should be available shortly. I'll check with my cable company about why I don't get it.
 

Novelera, I have seen La Dichosa Palabra and enjoyed it. I'm still trying to figure out the lineup of channels. There's very little info on scheduling except for what appears on the tv screen, so I'm just going to have to take notes. I did find TVE, a station from Spain, and I find it's good for getting your ear accustomed to European Spanish.

Good luck with your cable company, Jean! I've found tv providers among the worst when it comes to customer service, kind of like the bad old days of Ma Bell phone monopolies. Locally, stations, captions, languages come and go and nobody can tell you why. They're not unpleasant, they just seem clueless.
 

NovelaMaven, you make a good point about the advantage of coming in late to a TN. The trouble for me is that my Spanish is pretty weak, and so I need all the help I can get. If I don't really have a context, it's all the harder for me to make sense of what I'm hearing. It would perhaps be different if CarayCaray offered recaps--I remember coming in late to En Nombre del Amor, but I was able to get caught up thanks to CarayCaray.

And yes, I agree that La Reina del Sur is quite violent, but I enjoyed the novel enough to want to see the TN anyway.
 

Very nicely done once again, Jean, with some interesting Spanish (and English).

Lots of interesting comments too, covering most of what I was thinking.

I'll add one thing about Marisa's flashback. I'm guessing her mother was being hospitalized, maybe even for a drug problem. If so, I think that's the first we've heard of her mother. I think I remember her mentioning her father, early in the series. (Was she going to move in with him when she broke up with Lucas and before she knew she was pregnant? I forget.) I'm guessing we'll find out more about why her mother has never been mentioned.

I too am wondering what's next after this show. I'm OK with narco shows, if they are really good. There sure are a lot of them, probably because being in the drug trade is one of the most interesting lives one can have in much of Hispanoamerica (or anywhere, though there are more options in some places).
 

I’m coming here late but want to thank you so much, Jean, for the helpful summary with laugh-out-loud snark. There was so much going on last night that it was impossible for us to catch everything. For instance, how intriguing about Marisa’s flashback. I loved all your comments, too, and will miss y’all when El Clon ends.

Elizabeth on West Coast time…