Perhaps it is unnecessary to summarize the plot of a series based on a trilogy of novels that has sold more than three million copies worldwide. But any adaptation must have a life of its own and be able to attract not only the audience that already has won and knows the story, but also those who know nothing about its origins. Red Queen, the recent premiere of Amazon Prime Video, has it easy at that point because its story is easy to enter, whether or not you know Juan Gómez-Jurado’s novels. The first chapter presents its protagonists: on the one hand, Antonia Scott, the most intelligent person in the world, tormented, suicidal and with difficulties in social relationships; on the other, Jon Gutiérrez, a sly, temperamental Basque policeman, back from everything. The person in charge of a secret government program turns to Scott and Gutiérrez, so opposite in physique and characters, to investigate a case that is out of the ordinary: the brutal murder of the son of a powerful businesswoman and the kidnapping of the man’s daughter. richest in Spain, two crimes that turn out to be connected.
From there, Red Queen He wants to be many things and cannot define himself. She has two of the fashionable actors, Vicky Luengo and Hovik Keuchkerian, with physiques that fit very well with what can be expected from the characters. But she wastes them with fake dialogues that may work in a novel, but not in flesh and blood characters. Few things expel the viewer from a series or a movie more than when they are aware that no one in real life talks like that, and that happens in Red Queen constantly. Nobody speaks only through jokes and jokes like Jon Gutiérrez. “We are not characters from a novel,” says Antonia Scott at one point in the last episode of this first season (it does not seem unreasonable to assume that there will be more seasons, given the issues and characters that have been planted in these episodes). If they are not characters from a novel, as Scott claims, they look very much like one.
The villain, Ezequiel, played by Nacho Fresneda, also seems like a character from a novel, who establishes a peculiar game of cat and mouse with the investigators that sometimes causes him to approach them to later let them escape and thus continue playing. The villain, of course, also has his own twist to him.
Red Queen It is a series in search of tone. At times she appears playful, with the intention of going off the rails, looking for shocking images and surreal moments getting into Antonia’s privileged head. It is inevitable to remember references such as the series Hannibal o Sherlock in those cases. She tries hard not to take herself seriously, but she can’t help but do so from time to time. In the end, it works better the closer it stays to what it really is, a sum of clichés from the genre of thriller. It tries not to be what it is, a light and formulaic entertainment whose plot easily engages and invites you to follow until the end. It is appreciated that it is not longer than seven episodes, more than enough to have already fallen into some repetitions that would be difficult to digest if it were longer. In a way, it manages to get ahead in its own trap and take the viewer to the end, despite its script and tone problems.
Definitely, Red Queen It is destined to be a commercial success and offers the entertainment expected of it. But in a market so saturated with television products, it fails to find the distinctive piece that makes it stay in our memory.
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