How envious it makes me Alex de la Iglesia. The big boy of Spanish cinema is now also the big boy of television. Big, spoiled child. The second season of 30 coinsrecently released in HBO Max, is the test. The serie by De la Iglesia has survived the company’s latest catalog moves, which have led to series like By H or by B to other platforms. Move 30 coins would have sent an apocalyptic message: as Patriathis production is exactly what we expect from a brand like HBO (with Max or without Max) in Spain. Unfortunately, 30 coins is also exactly what we expect from a series of Alex de la Iglesia: big, crazy, confused and with terrible script problems.
I never played into their game. Yes in theory, but never in practice. I like the Church talking about its stories more than its stories themselves.. The director and his inseparable screenwriter Jorge Gerrikaetxebarria have hilarious initial occurrences that inevitably derail in their final stretch. This already happens at the end of the first season of 30 coins. The enormous mascletás with which De la Iglesia usually does not close his stories (look, in that way he is similar to Marvel) had their television reflection in that last episode with giant monsters, terrified priests, an anti-Pope and the 30 coins of the title from the series falling slow motion. There De la Iglesia takes up his series, in a big puppet as scattered as the coins that trigger the plot: with them Judas’ betrayal of Jesus Christ was paid for and whoever has them will gain enormous power.
30 coins He is very noble: he shows his cards immediately, so that it is impossible for a spectator to feel deceived. If Álex de la Iglesia does something well, it is presenting his stories. His mix of Spanish customs and genre cinema has always worked and his series for HBO Max is no exception: in the first episode you even believed the unlikely characters of Miguel Ángel Silvestre and Macarena Gómez. Because in a series by the director of The Day of the Beast y The witches of Zugarramurdi the improbable is real. Precisely those two films, his most successful work and his worst closed blockbuster, are very present in the 30 coins. But we miss the humble audacity of the first… and the very expensive lack of control of the second.
30 coins It has enormous moments purely of characters, because another thing that its creator does know how to do very well is give us freaks unforgettable everyday life. The neighbors of Community They are the inhabitants of the cursed town of 30 coins. And portents like Carmen Machi, Nuria González and Najwa Nimri get gold from their characters, even when these are more quirks of the series than anything else. As another whim, a very refined one, we can define the presence of Paul Giamatti in the second season. Álex asked for a star and they gave it to him. What if he doesn’t get angry? De la Iglesia is the child with the best toys in this school. And he breaks them all.