#sdl camera work

...and Queen Mom:

Marta appears at the cemetery to deliver a performance fit for a queen (and while the cap chosen above is more elegiac, because the letters of "Reina" were legible there, the scene is much more than that register); Digna kills Darío with glaring daggers across the breakfast table and while maintaining a pleasant conversation.

Outstanding work by both Belmonte and Fernández in this one, framed by a Camera Team and Set Design Team that took no prisoners, either.

One of the contrasting themes of the episode was light and dark, starting off in the dark, with the renewed chamber duel between Darío and Marta across the dining table:

"I curse the day I married Pelayo": Victor Sardou has just entered the group chat:

This was tragedy more than melodrama in the dialogue, but it highlighted another central theme: the conflict of being a genre that is built on packaging high emotions in a very pretty manner versus a performance that strove beyond the pretty.

Marta rebuffing Darío started pretty here, in righteous indignance, but when the dialogue gets to the core point - Marta saying "he made me believe she didn't love me" - Belmonte allows her face to contort beyond the convention, and Directing let her do it.

The episode had several moments of high drama to deliver, but except for the cemetery scene, which was a show within the show (Marta playing the grieving widow), a lot of it was delivered intentionally awkward, vulnerable, and unafraid of being ugly.

That said: of course the camera work is still so sweeping and pretty. So working the gaslight vibe here with the flickering lights and the banister gleam.

Belmonte may be too much of a pro to bask in her character's outbursts, but the camera sure is in love with the work it gets to do on her. Just look at this walk up the stairs:

From dark, the radical switch to light: bright, cool orange, and a talk with the parents.

The camera goes for pretty initially...

...but shifts, moving past the elegiac and the elegance that is usually served and gobbled up:

The Camera Team loved the gaslight vibe so much that we get another neo-goth shot: the backlit window, the gaslight flicker, as the outline of Marta slowly descends the stairs, moving from the somber gaslight into the bright light of realization:

On sound level, the Romance Farewell Motif starts playing at 23:39, in full. Overall, the sound level is fairly typical in this episode, with lots of heavy, extended strings characteristic of melodrama.

At one point in the last eps, threads of this motif were transferred onto Nieves, and: no. Of course the Sound Department has standards tunes for standard melodrama situations, but these two story settings are not comparable.

But, of course, next to budget, that is intention: viewers will be aurally pavloved to affects on characters that have become part of their everyday, due to sheer exposure. And then Sound Design attempts to shift that attachment over onto new hires by using the same motifs (yeah, good luck with that. There are motifs you cannot uncue from Mafin for me, and that's that)

This transition into the light also brings the last appearance of the garishly bright flowers in their sinister gaslight color mode:

in the next frame, the lights are up like in an Almodóvar setup, with the performer ready to go:

Sidenote: There is a bit of that somewhat 90s/early 2000s Almodóvar vibe later at the cemetery, with the sunglasses appearance--

This vibe plays with the trappings of feminized affect and it uses (in the cinematic tropes, see early/mid Almodóvar) that pidgeonholing as a counter-weapon. The vibe is going for it, but pushing it up and over the top until it is camp, until the trappings are queered and shown to be props. (of course it is also a situation where non-dominant, non-heteronormative masculinities are discussed through women as a cipher, but how much are women actually discussed then?)

Marta's breakdown in 547 may include trashing the funeral flowers, but it is different from that vibe in that it doesn't go for camp. Instead, it highlights the vulnerable and the awkward, and that is a part of a performer's work where I always hesitate to post caps (even in the frame bits when it's film and not stage).

What Belmonte delivers here is not magnificient rage. It starts from a small wail ("Pelayo, no") and from a physicality that counts on awkward movements, too. In consequence, it looks as if coming from a place that isn't immediately winning which makes it that much more gripping (although we did get Marta's heel on Pelayo's throat. That was a win.)

Some of the - for the lack of a better word - congruency of this sequence comes, to me, from sizing and pacing it through stagecraft (even though screen work functions fundamentally different when it comes to sizing and pacing). There is no scenery-chewing even in this episode's outbursts; it comes across as too raw for camp.

Perhaps that is part of why it felt satisfying, in a sense of "earned" (for the narrative. I do not discuss viewerhip in terms of "earned"). I find it notable that Marta's breakdown kept eschewing the culinarism of the telenovela genre. It doesn't hinge on the double layer where a performer delights in, or showcases, their prowess.

Another important part of this scene is Fernández as the scene partner who gives an excellent assist (a task as hard as scoring, if on a different level):

So much of it is timing and scaling, to enable someone next to you, and every cue worked (just compare this give and take to the reveal sequence with Marta opposite Darío: experience, in years but also around specific colleagues, makes such a difference).

Please let these two be the core team of Operation "Bring Fina Home"! With how Digna immediately spelled out "Fina!" in that bright daylight couch conversation when Marta alluded to "the thing I treasured most in this world" makes me very hopeful. These two deliver fantastic work off each other.

In the end, when Marta sags and Digna calls her "mi niña" [my girl], we get a variant of the Pietà from five episodes ago, when Pelayo died in Marta's arms. It is so different when it is not female grief staged to highlight a man's body and subjectivity.

The contrast of high and low angles marks the scope this episode spans, on the mechanical level of camera angles. Several shots cowered close to the floor...

...one moved even lower, to six feet under (where Marta leaves Pelayo to rot)...

... and others moved high, all the way to the drone camera rising and rising above the open grave in the final shot:

One thing struck me about the burial scene on a narrative level. Among this oddball community of participants, the show is put on by Marta (and here it is about putting on a conscious show) for Don Agustín only, since everyone else (with exception of Julia) knows that Marta is gay. Everyone around her here knows that Marta's marriage to Pelayo was a lavender one, and that the relationship which has marked Marta is the one to Fina instead:

Darío and Clara know. Tasio, Andrés and Begoña know. Damián and Digna know.

Marta has her family behind her, here. And that is a beautiful thing when there are still too many burials happening where the family by law silences and supercedes the family found, and puts appearances over affect.

Some of the characters present in this scene know that the actual widower is Darío: Clara, Damián, Digna. And Agustín unfortunately seems to be getting a clue (but also how dare you bring Lorca. One, because even the most mannerist, symbolist, heady Lorca is nothing I want associated with Pelayo. And two, because Lorca in 1960 was only available in Spain in the abriged, censored "Obras Completas" version (printed in 1953), unless you saved your 1920s editions. I don't know whether "Alba" - which is the poem Clara tries to read and Marta then stops reading (good. Pelayo does not get Lorca. He does not.) - was part of it, but try to read that one as straight. I keep failing.

And finally, in terms of family, there are three people who know what Pelayo has done to Marta (and to Fina): one the one hand Darío, who is shifting uncomfortably at having to witness both Marta's pain and Marta's grace---

(btw, the funeral flower arrangement at the open grave? Old Perfumerías de la Reina color scheme. Pale pink rubbon, anyone? Set Design has our backs at every point.)

On the other hand, Damián and Digna know, which leads to undercutting the drama of the tomb scene with a bit of hilarity in their exchange of worried looks when Marta appears on the scene:

"How drunk is she still, can you tell?" - "Will she make a scene? Do you knock out the priest if that happens, and I make a run for it with Marta?" - "Can you bring around the escape car"?

Ultimately, though: these are already too many words on this episode. It gives me the sensation of talking over something, and I don't want to do that (and now that Marta knows in the narrative, now that people return to the tag and feel animated and post their reactions more frequently again, perhaps this "1 cap per ep" series that tried to shine a respectful light on the craft at work, day after day, can simply fade out).

Simply: this episode held a stellar performance (caught in great cinematography, too), and stellar not because it was built on coming across as pretty or smooth or nail-buffing, but because it refused to do that. (nevermind there were pretty and smooth and masterful moments too. There was a lot of scope in this one, and at the end of the day, it is still a soap). So perhaps the cap to stick with - in giving thanks for this performance and being allowed to watch it - woud be this:

And now, I need a drink. Because the work done in this episode was gripping and deserves a toast, but also because the work done in this episode really makes me need a drink.

The Costume Department anticipates the breakup by putting Marta and Fina in parallel fighting red in the opening entrance hall scene, with Digna between them left out of the color equation.

Fina’s jacket is the one she arrived in, the one in which she fell into Marta's arms. In this scene, the cut seems boxy, designed here to hide herself, in addition to her turtlenecks. Marta’s matador-inspired red/black epaulet jacket (again, a small check, this is the third black/red small check she has in her wardrobe now) broadcasts fighting spirit, she has already confronted Gabriel in it to protect Claudia: sharp contrast, additional shoulder cording.

Marta continues in that outfit for their break-up scene (guestroom): a professional jacket that projects distance, just as Fina’s bottle-green turtleneck seems another bit of armor.

This is contrasted in their nighttime conversation where they both wear robes: softer cuts, softer fabrics. They are placed in color contrast at that point, at opposite ends of the spectrum, black versus white.

I would interpret Fina’s white outfit as signaling an innocence in terms of a lack of malice: she doesn’t know who she is at the moment, she doesn’t know what she wants, and the one thing that seems to be an underlying truth – that she wants to stay with Marta – is one she cannot articulate well, as muted as she is at the moment.

Meanwhile Marta is in her black robe that is established as hers. It underlines her somber state and renewed heartbreak, especially as it is the very robe in which she found and read Fina’s farewell letter in #378.

The robes and the nighttime setting also quote the early Season 1 kitchen scene with their first almost-kiss, where Fina made a move and Marta left. Now, Fina doesn’t make a move, still frozen, and again, Marta leaves.

There is one more garment that is called up, which is the orange-yellow Cánovas scarf that Marta gave to Fina after the Gloria Lasso concert (where Lasso wore the same model) and that is linked to their Madrid Escapadas, to Fina calling “Luna de miel” their song, to an era where they were hopeful and happily in love.

Fina “losing” that scarf in Argentina (as she tells Marta; but is it true?) is also a metaphor of Fina losing not just that happiness, but also the tether to its memory.

The new scarf, in muted colors, is no replacement: Fina is not really happy at receiving it. And that she is shown wearing it, together with a for her now untypical skirt, in the 573 preview, may be more signaling pressure than conviction: replacing the metaphorical handcuff with a metaphorical collar, in the worst case? In the best case, Marta breaking up with her has shaken Fina out of her frozen shock. Although I assume that it will be a long way for Fina to gain actual footing again.   

********

Fina continues to be evasive and in reactive mode throughout the episode while Marta has one clear point where she snaps: when she learns that Fina has only broken of things with Bianca this same morning. Fina does not even have the luxury of such a clear sense of who she is and what she wants right now.

Fina lies her way through not wanting to return Bianca’s call (and Belmonte does a great job of an unsuspicious Marta who already feels the monsters creeping up from the deep, and the Sound Department does an evil twist on merging the start of the True Flutes chords with the haunted flutes soundscape at 00:00:40 of the Mafin Drive Cut). Fina also clams up when Digna tells her to finally come clean (the Empty Fifth Chords return for that, at 00:04:13).

The same continues in the guestroom scene (which opens at 00:31:07 with the Haunted Flutes and a close-up of the bracelet): Fina rears up at the knock; she is uncomfortable with Marta kissing her and shifts away from her touch (and Marta notices; she does not even attempt to sit on the bed with her this time, she sits down on the visitor chair right away. Ouch); Fina doesn’t show actual joy at the scarf gift, but is then nervously focused on the bracelet instead. And she tries to deny her relationship wiht Bianca until Marta spells it out for her.

But when Marta finally snaps, “The Fina I know wasn't like this” (aka "I don't know who you are any longer"), Fina immediately shifts into appeasement, not into an argument (and it looks so much like an abuse response pattern that I wince): she kneels on the bed like a kid, she wrings her hands in pleading, she says “por favor”. Ah, Peleona who knew so fiercely who you were and whom you loved, where did you go?

But Marta, before she snaps, is saying two important things: one, she immediately supports Fina wanting to be independent, move out and look for a job (despite enjoying to come home to her). And two, she is accepting of Fina having had another relationship.

 But not of lying about it, or of being lied to in general.

Fina was the one who in #562 said that “one needs to talk about these things” when they discussed Cloe and she chsoe to stay silent; Fina has also just mentioned her desire to move out, and Marta, by nighttime, has put two and two together when she asks whether Fina and Bianca lived together (the final straw for Marta, underlined with the Romance Farewell Motif at 00:47:20): It is something else Fina does not want with Marta, but has chosen to do with someone else. Someone who Fina let take care of her, which she so rarely allowed Marta to do and has refused since her return.

Their breakup frames the episodes, as opener and then with the final nighttime discussion that starts at 00:43:54 (they get over four minutes for it!) with Marta staring out of the window and the True Flutes Motif playing over softy billowing curtains. Only the thunderstorm is missing. Twist the knife much, Sound Department?

Now Fina (who was not comfortable with Marta close, but who also doesn’t want Marta away from her) wants to talk, but she is still on inner lockdown. It is telling that she expects Marta to be “disappointed”, as if Fina were a kid that has made a mistake, and not an adult that has just broken the heart of their partner by making a slew of bad choices (or refusing to make a choice even while given a slew of opportunities).

Marta, for now, can only make sense of it by doubting their love (which has been the worst for her before): you love very differently than I do, she bites out.

Marta wasn’t fully happy with Cloe, and Fina was – or worse: is – happy with someone else. Fina kept sleeping with Marta while being someone else’s girlfriend and keeping quiet about it, and that taints her argument of “I chose you by coming here the moment I read your letter, I chose you by staying here” for Marta, who reads Fina’s inability to actively commit as a lazy back-up plan.

Brunet gives Fina one of few moments where the opacity fades in reaction to that (00:45:31).

Other than that, is a sequence where the Writing Room has them magnificently set up to talk past each other while both are being right and relatable in what they say, and inflict a lot of hurt.

Look how that damn wedding ring to Pelayo is still the third party in the room! AAAAAHHH!

Tellingly, Fina does not break down here when Marta leaves. There is no fight, barely tears. Then she gets cagey and flees the scene: at a distance to her own feelings and Marta's.

In Season 1, Fina got in Marta’s face. Here, she just folds. She doesn’t even know who she is right now, just that something (Marta) called her back to Toledo.

Fina scuttles away from pressure and expectations (Marta’s care registers as expectation), whereas Marta is so very clear on her commitment and so hurt by Fina’s lack of commitment that she reads as betrayal. At this point, they trigger each other’s trauma.

Marta’s heartbroken question of “Weren’t you happy with me?” is another example of this: For Marta, the nightmare is not having been loved back equally and Fina not having been happy with her: having lived a lie (again!). The audience of course knows they were happy, but Fina cannot remember that right now. Instead, she talks down their relationship (we always had so many problems), and Marta, through her own pain, cannot see that Fina cannot remember right now how happy they were. How Fina was once the first to say, “I want you to be my wife.”

Marta stayed true to that in the end. And for now, it looks as if Fina didn’t.

*********

The episode also offered more insight into Bianca, who is again hanging up on someone. Lovely character trait. Very mature. Also her tale of “with me, everything has always been easy, with Marta, everything has always been difficult” that Fina (who told Digna that Bianca was the one who articulated that first) keeps repeating, now extends to “we were always so miserable, we were victims, even before” (in the nighttime scene scene). I guess that comes from the same place and Fina needs it (or needed it) to justify her decision to move on. Combined with the very defensive “I found someone new and we started a relationship”, it sounds like Fina is trying very hard to convince herself there that she could push the memory of Marta away.

Fina’s “I found a better life in Argentina!” tale is getting cracks. “I found someone to take care of me” doesn’t sound like hard-won independence.

I thought the overall arc would be “I found a better life there but still choose you here”, but it seems to be more nuanced as it unrolls: Fina found professional footing (that photo story Marta found in the Mexican newspaper, which made her recognize Fina by her gaze through the lens) and learned to move on her own, yes. But what the audience sees is claims of "independence" opposite “lived with a rich woman on her lands, feels indebted to her, was gravely ill and depended on said woman to recover”.

What the audience also sees is a Fina who says she was “so happy” on constant alert instead: rearing up at a soft knock at the door, hiding behind lies, retreating to pleading, keeping her reactions at bay, making herself small.

What is fact, then, and what is fiction of Fina’s trauma brain?

At the center right now is Fina as an unreliable narrator (I believe it was @cee-f3 who used that terminology at the Liquor Cart) and that is of course also the Writing Room playing with her central character trait of honesty and bravery, which (this is a telenovela) I assume will make a return, but for now, the writing is leaning into destabilizing it first.

Fina speaking is a blend if things of the moment:

she lies – badly (which is a callback to her actually not being a person who lies, as @bloomsberries mentioned at the Liquor Cart) and compulsively – to keep a situation at bay and to not enter into conflicts that would force her to acknowledge that her own tale is untenable (“I found the bracelet somewhere in Buenos Aires”).

Then there are stories that seem to be not her own, but tales she has internalized and is parroting (“Bianca told me it’s because things were always hard with Marta, and always so easy with her”, “I owe Bianca my life”, “I am so happy and uncloseted with Bianca”) while the audience has seen evidence to the contrary, such as “uncloseted” meaning “isolated in the countryside among only Bianca’s circle of friends”, all while the audience knows Fina as her happiest among family and friends and has seen her be reluctant about the Mafinca setting.

And then there are moments where Fina actually speak a truth that aligns with her history and her reality, but they are still hard to pinpoint at the moment (even as the Sound Department, Costuming, Editing and Directing do their delightful meta work and it is so compelling to hunt for those crumbs): was it in “I read that letter and nearly passed out”; was it in “I love you” upon seeing Marta; was it in “I thought I would return to Buenos Aires”? When can the audience rely on Fina’s facial expressions? And I assume this is another reason to keep Fina so clearly muted around Marta, to signal that Fina at present, doesn’t know what’s true any longer.

What’s more, these layers shift and contain open contradictions: to Digna on the couch, Fina says within the same minute, about Bianca’s insistent calls, “I knew she wouldn’t take it well!” and then “that’s not like her, she’s a lady”. Fina doesn’t know a clear truth or a clear path at the moment. She’s in defense mode only, trying to ward off one situation at a time and failing.

Meanwhile, the audience is a step ahead of her in sorting this out. E.g. it has already witnessed Bianca hanging up twice on people in an immature manner; it has witnessed Fina being blissfully happy with Marta in past seasons and remembers that even as Fina, right now, cannot.

There’s “Bianca told me to come to Spain to break up with Marta” and “Bianca told me I was still in love with Marta” opposite “I read your letter, and here I am”. There is “I am so happy living out in the countryside with Bianca and I love her very much, everything is perfect with her” opposite “I am still in love with Marta and want to stay with her.”

And the audience has witnessed Bianca’s staff not knowing about Fina’s relationship with her and not passing on her message despite knowing her, so the audience has a clue as to where Fina deceives herself and where she – with her back against the wall and in constant survival mode, trying to avoid more stress at all costs – cannot access truths that are buried within her.

Fina needs to be able to trust herself again before she can trust anyone else again.

(and I continue to be amazed how the Writing Room makes that kind of intricacy possibly on a daily show!)

********

A few things I circle back to on a meta level:

The Writing Room is doing an excellent job. It is delivering a compelling plot curve that keeps people engaged. It takes no more than a look at the amount of reflection posts since yesterday to prove that.

What’s more: the Writing Room manages this while – to my eyes – still carefully preserving the Mafin narrative of “They keep choosing each other above everything”, even if at the moment in a difficult-to-pull-off twist where the writers know it, where the audience that looks closely enough can know it, but where neither of the two characters know.

And there’s the fact that this show and this Writing Room will casually put, with the inevitable arrival of Messy Chacracore Barbie, a fourth queer woman on screen. On an afternoon daily soap.

Pelayo is dead. Which invites questions: why take this obvious route that was broadcast miles-wide in advance? Why no rugpull here?

And instead of a beating: death, without a confession. So what does that mean for the narrative domino chain?

With Pelayo dead, Marta and Fina (and the viewers) have no chance of a carthartic confrontation (though some of that was transferred to subtext in the murder, I will get to this in a minute) - perhaps also to keep them clean of the murder/manslaugther that would likely occur upon Marta learning the truth?

In narrative framing, Pelayo seemed to move towards a planned confession on his last day (the show likes to give even their darkest characters some struggles with ethics), in an episde highlighting regrets: foremost, Digna telling Julia that regret shows a person has feelings and ethics; Pablo regretting his affair, but also having told Nieves about it; Tasio regretting he missed his luncheon, but not really because he is too hapless to think of consequences. Pelayo's struggle with guilt, made explicit several times in talks with Darío, pointed towards a confession which in the end doesn't happen. Pelayo only gets to teaser the reveal that we know will come next week (the AF spoiler), in addition, he was consistently shown as unempathic towards Marta since his return - perhaps making a conscious point of his guilt being about how it makes him feel, and not about considering how Marta feels.

What is the narrative path now, since "Marta finds out slowly on her own" is out of the window, just as much as (with that phone message to Mexico) "Marta moves heaven and earth in a slow search for Fina"? From where will they now draw up the tension for their reunion arc? What is the plan? Did Pelayo die so soon because they couldn't book Albacirrín for more days? - There must be a plan. I have no idea what it is. Well done, novelita.

But: even if Marta and Fina were denied a direct confrontation, they got their Pelayo comeuppance in the murder, on a level of image parallels, text parallels, and sound parallels.

Image parallels:

the stabbing of Pelayo is shot similarly to the stabbing of Fina in episode 56 (blocking of the characters and camera angle, knife trajectory - also mentioned at the Friday Liquor Cart by @veganpepsibaby)

the dying of Pelayo and the way Marta holds him in her lap, pressing a cloth to his wound, cradling his head, is shot similarly to Marta holding Fina in the same situation in episodes 56/57. But Fina survived that sitation. Pelayo does not. Their narrative twists and tilts on him.

on a meta level (applying only to the viewers) there is the re-use of the prop knife: Pelayo gets stabbed with the same white switchblade that killed Santiago, i.e. with the very proof that Pelayo kept and used to blackmail Fina (even as they are supposed to be two entirely different knives in the story).

Dialogue parallels:

Pelayo offering Álvaro money and Álvaro scoffing at him, going off about "the rich ones who never care" is the same dialogue as Marta offering money to Santiago in episode 375 while he threatens her with a knife and also scoffs at rich people who should pay (this might be lazy writing, but if not, it also drives home a point of difference: because Marta survived that situation because Fina was there and saved her. Pelayo does not survive. There is no one there (except Marta whose cries for help are in vain), while Pelayo's partner is all the way in Mexico. Meanwhile, we get reminders (one as image, one in dialogue) of Mafin saving each other in parallel situations.

another interesting parallel is the Mafin catchphrase "Mírame" which has been present at several points where Marta and Fina sorted out differences and which ultimately affirmed their love and their choice to continue to grow together (Marta says it twice to Fina before she tells her, for the first time, that she is the love of her life). Álvaro in 542 says it to Pelayo twice as he watches him die (more on that below), thwarting a phrase that for Mafin is coded as a phrase of connection and love, into one of derision, with any love absent.

Sound parallels:

again, this could simply be a shortcut of "oh, that's our standard tension music", but the slow, dramatic rise of trembling strings employed as of 00:46:17 (Mafin Drive Cut), as Pelayo hints at "I have have done something horrible" is the same string tremble carpet used in 540, over Marta's slow realization that she is looking at photos taken by Fina and finally has a clue of her whereabouts. - The close succession of the motif's use, just two episodes apart and at length (it stretches over half a minute in both instances), seems to point towards a purposeful parallel.

Bottom line: while Marta and Fina had no part in Pelayo's murder, elements of their narrative were used to accompany the death of Pelayo, who has separated them. Subtextual justice, perhaps?

..................

At this point, you can simply stop reading this post. Following: lots of photos from the murder for analyis and for discussing subtexts evoked by visual conventions.

There was a fascinating discussion at the Liquor Cart on Friday about how Pelayo's murder is ripe - intentionally or not - with Western visual conventions of 1940s/1950s/pulp movies of punishing gayness, and about what reactions those can create for (queer) women who have been socialized with Western tales of gender-specific sexualized violence.

Since Pelayo isn't murdered for being gay, why are these conventions so promiment in his murder, creating subtextual parallels? The parallels land because even while Álvaro doesn't know that Pelayo is gay, the viewers know. And many of the queer viewers may be aware of the early tropes of gay representation in film, as e.g. discussed in "Celluloid Closet" (book & documentary).

For me personally, the parallels were too much. Watching a gay character die this way felt gratuitous and disturbing, even if the character was a villain who narratively deserved to die. (again: the only ones in the know of Pelayo being gay are the viewers, and the people making the show, so this is directed at us, and I felt made complicit of a violence I abhor, and made to pity a character I did not want to pity - a point made similarly by @madronash). Personally, I would have enjoyed Marta realizing the truth while Pelayo had to face her, and I would have wanted him to suffer the consequences for longer. I didn't want a confession (not even the intention of one!). I wanted him to pay. But here we are, and I am curious to see where the novelita will go next (@anandabrat, elsewhere, remarked that this sets up Álvaro as the new central sinister villain, a danger to everyone - good point).

Upon rewatching the murder scene, I have to admit that it is very well done in terms of craft, and that the lights, blocking, costuming, camera angles, and story tropes such as "persecuted by a bulky, menacing man in a park at night" that we discussed at the Liquor Cart (thanks again for that exchange!), are only half the tale here. I was so focused on Pelayo's character during the airing that I didn't pay attention to how Álvaro is directed to deliver this scene. Together with the camera work, his performance gives the murder - this "slow, intimate death" (@roadie60), cruel in how it is drawn out - the undercurrent of a twisted sexual encounter.

This starts when Pelayo is thrown down the stairs, ending in the position shown in the next cap, before the camera then cuts to Álvaro staring down at him in focused excitement. - For the hunt, for the soon-to-deliver kill, for murdering someone rich? Several choices on story level. But there is excitement. Álvaro then delights in the physical attack at close distance, making his victim look at him: that creates intimacy. Both these affects are touchpoints as Pelayo dies.

This is how Pelayo ends at the bottom of the stairs, prone and face-down, with the light-colored, narrow trousers he wears drawing focus.

Pelayo has always been coded by slighly flamboyant dress: narrow suit cuts, more daring colors such as the plum overcoat, the teal paisley shawl at his recent reception. This underlines his gay-coding here even if it is not metioned in this scene.

From the sinister silhouette of Álvaro at the top of the stairs, the camera cuts to his POV next. We are staring down at the soon-to-be-victim through Álvaro's eyes while the light outlines Pelayo's ass:

When Pelayo realizes that he is not getting away, Álvaro keeps a grip on his throat (not his hair, not his lapels) - and not from the front, as would be logical to cut his breath, but from behind, around his neck.

Pelayo, struggling for breath, offers money; Álvaro scoffs and vents in a tirade against "the rich", taunting Pelayo with what he will do to him. The countershot rests on the gradually rising fear in Pelayo's eyes who does not look up fully while Álvaro is unhinged and emotional. This is not a quick stab-and-run, not a random mugging gone wrong. The camera makes Pelayo pay and invites the viewer to dwell on it (which may well have been the plan: "this character deserves to suffer, so we will show it.")

Álvaro snaps out the knife - a theatrical moment to stage the phallic object, hinting at the penetration to come.

The most poignant move may be the next, as Álvaro passionately spouts his hatred at Pelayo: the camera angle is wide enough to frame Álvaro's grip on Pelayo's neck, and at 00:43:25, just for this cut, it shows how his hand moves further around Pelayo's neck, into an even more intimate position (my first association is that moment two minutes into a tango when you reach the level of connection with your dance partner where you allow this degree of intimacy):

Then there is the slow stab: a penetration, while we see Pelayo gasp for breath. And while this murder embrace continues, Álvaro demands, two times, "Mírame" (look at me) - which fits with making it a horror take on the Mafin catchphrase, as discussed above, but it is also an intimate request, at close distance, from one man to another whom he is watching as he dies and loses control.

When Álvaro steps back and drops Pelayo, the camera first cuts to Álvaro's face, showing him panting heavily (00:43:41).

And then when the camera cuts to the fallen, panting Pelayo, notice how the camera cuts the angle right underneath his outlined crotch.

The next cut is once more the knife in Álvaro's hand - the phallic object that has done its deed - before the camera cuts once more to Pelayo on the ground, arching his back, helpless and still panting.

With the way Álvaro is directed in this scene, the images and their sexualization seem intentional. It would be so interesting to know what a crew that so clearly knows their Douglas Sirk and their Maltese Falcon, set out to do here. And if Pelayo's final suffering is this, then the visual conventions used, whether intentionally or not, do not highlight class, or the manipulation that characterized him, or his cowardice (he could have run, Álvaro could have stabbed him in the back, quickly, stealing his wallet with a taunt as he died?) but they highlight his slight, elegantly dressed body as that of a man dying in an encounter with another man.

This is made even more apparent by the more at-a-distance camera work that characterizes the ensuing scene with Marta, who appears up on the hill crest in the sidelight that catches on her red coat, red like the blood that awaits her down the stairs:

The images of Marta hugging Pelayo to her point toward the Pietà conventions: centering the grief of a mother (in this case, likewise platonical, a lavender wife). There are no sexual undertones to it and their absence makes the intimate tension of the previous scene all the more evident.

The positioning of this Pietà (cloth to the wound, cradling head) centers Marta's shock and grief while the blocking is close to the one of Fina's stabbing in ep 56. Yet the intimacy is a bit more distanced here than in ep 56 since here, Marta is shown wearing gloves (excellent move if intentional!):

The camera then delivers two shots of Marta crading the prostrate body of Pelayo in a Pietà, once cropped close (no crotch included), and one at full body, as shown in the final two shots below.

At 00:46:17, we get the the same tremble string rise as under Marta's realization that she found a trace of Fina in the Mexican newspaper. Here, it underlines the linked information of Pelayo alluding to his crime. I found it notable that he, in his dying breaths, does not say, "please forgive me", but "you have to forgive me". And he didn't get that. Yes, he got to die in her ams. But who was also struggling for her life in Marta's arms like this was Fina, and FIna got to live. With Marta.

Sidenote: the moment Belmonte enters this scene, and then unpacks that guttural voice work, pushes everything up another notch.

And here is that final position, with Marta and Pelayo not filmed like lovers, but alluding instead to an image convention that is religious and not sexual. Additionally the camera here relents and pans out for the final shot, removing the viewer from the scene and suggesting a less intimate involvement now:

For this episode, the crews really pulled all the stops to orchestrate a reunion that delivered on all counts and then some. We didn't get one reunion scene, we got four, in different modes: overwhelmed, solemn, intimate, and domestic with family. The riches of this! (I know, "but just one episode!" - but, have you see this one episode? So much bliss to commit to memory, like a Restore Point in case the sharkfins start appearing!)

After tag-reblogging every gifset that @clairedsfield has made for the occasion, much of this will be a repeat, but here are some (more) thoughts in terms of blocking, editing, writing and performance. And this is shorter than planned already; I had nearly twice as many caps, but Tumblr apparently has a "30 images per post" policy. Who would have thought, usually I only max out on tags (for which I blame @clairedsfield's gif sets).

The episode starts off with a perfect overlay of Marta's head with the the head of the Perfumerias de la Reina Spirit Animal woman's head on the hallway poster: same height, same hairdo as Marta walks out towards Fina's voice. Camera Team on point!

Next, the Sound Department brings back The Mafin Main Theme ("Pasión Oculta", which I would still rename "Mi Mujer") - not as they see each other down the hallway, but it is timed between intro and main motif to the exact moment they fall into each other's arms at 00:02:00 (all time stamps, again, thanks to the Mafin Drive Cut and the wonderful work of @caskettmyheart and her team: @mafin-libertad, @thexfridax, @galacticdesperado, @lifeisbettergay, @newsfromthegutter - I hope I didn't forget anyone!) and AAAAAAHHHH.

Marta is even lifting Fina up for a second, and Cloe in the background may finally be getting a clue (though probably not, with how press is trying to hammer home "triangle" on the meta level. But look at this: There is no third wheel!) as the Mafin Theme plays quietly underneath their entire first dialog, timed right through (it's usually not overlayed with dialog).

Sound Department says, "They're home." (Sound Department, please have some champagne with us)

Also that moment of "coming home to the scent of you", in the hallway of a perfume factory... yeah:

Look at how they are the absolute center of the following shot, with a history (or future) behind them, and in perfect balance. All verticals align, their heads just above the marble paneling:

And since I am only getting around to typing this a week later (sorry, there were many, many caps to take): even taking into account the five episodes that follow this one, the heartfelt "mi amor" that Fina offers first of all? That's it. That's the actual endgame.

You can pry The Forehead Fusion of Forever from my cold dead hands. Also that smile (and Camera still manages to balance them against the poster on the wall).

After following Marta from despair to desolation to being duped to finally determined to find Fina, here is the full circle moment of perfect bliss for Marta: that one exhale, a half-smile through kissed-off lipstick, and the crease in her brow easing out at last. Marta is at peace for the first time since Fina left, and that was beautifully performed and caught at close angle to reveberate with the audience.

Where does one cut from that overwhelmingly perfect, and perfectly overwhelming, reunion?

To Damián in shirtsleeves and a loosened tie (reader: he can pull it off), sharing a glass of something with Digna over romantic jazz (Camera and Prop Department love their fancy cream-colored record player and so do I!) and both respecting Marta's decision to travel to Buenos Aires to search for Fina:

But there's more to it - Editing does get in a meta commentary here - because the scene then shifts back to Marta and FIna, seated in The Office, and this is intercutting the established long-term couples (marriages!) on the show:

Of course it has to be this office space, calling up the many talks they have had in here before, especially at the table in the front, with its visual weight of the crystal ashtray.

Here, they have gone from quietly intimate to flirtatious to defiantly choosing each other, and that is, hopefully, also a comment on their connection and their commitment going forward. Because in this scene, the Writing Room drops the first small drop of ink into our celebratory champagne, small enough to to pass unnoticed, but by the next ep, the color will have unfurled and dispersed within the bottle.

It's Fina saying she doesn't know how long she will stay, and Marta taking it like a blow to the stomach: "Do you mean to go back, to Argentina?"

And Fina's reply of "I thought so" twists the knife a little further (look at Marta'a face!):

Fina's (successful! rewarding!) new life abroad is a dramaturgical move that now allows the Writing Room to smoothly write out Fina at any point, back to her artists' collective in Argentina.

Yet, with a freer life now at her disposal, it also makes Fina's reason for returning and staying apparent - after having thought that she would never see Marta again, having given her up and set her free; after then receiving her letter which has apparently been enough to make her take the first plane available; after then falling into Marta's arms without a single moment of hesitation: it's Marta.

Still, this is a point where Brunet gives Fina a first bit of hesitation, torn between two lives now: she doesn't even know where she will sleep, she says, and Marta is so sure now, so uncompromising in her commitment: you will sleep where I sleep (every day of life I have left, if you want to).

And here, Fina is muted in her reaction: moved, but looking as if she were not at liberty to commit with the same conviction and joy.

But still Fina goes on to proclaim that Marta is her love and her home, and that does not come across as dishonest. If Fina has realized out in the hallway, after a year of believing she would never see Marta again, upon seeing her, that she cannot walk away? That is also a proclamation.

Whatever struggles lay ahead, home is where the heart is, and the Writing Room, after Fina was always the more open-hearted one, the one with her heart on her sleeve, the hothead, next to a more reluctant Marta caught in her family's and her job's expectations, now passes that particular torch to Marta and it's great.

This change of positions allows them to put Marta in the situation of the fearlessly committed Romantic Lesbian Heroine (tm), and the way she proclaims here, without a blink, that she will discard their shared home if Fina wants to be elsewhere? If the Marta of the earlier 300s could see herself here! if the Marta who canceled on Callas could see herself here! Swoon.

On a sidenote, the only hands that are allowed on Marta's Jaw are back where they belong. Nature is healing:

The scene's concluding kiss is shot in a way that centers Fina's bracelet, which is new.

And someone else on this show has a newish bracelet, from a woman who has kept her company, but doesn't love her, and that's Cloe. What if Fina has a bracelet from someone who could never be Marta? (as @veganpepsibaby has asked):

Moving from solemn to intimate and gently flirtatious: the third sequence is set in the Mafinca. The Bedroom, the Bed, and it is a close follow up to their last shared scene before Fina's departure (episode 377), in this same bed. And under the same blanket!

The Mafin Blanket, which I will now always look at as the sea of waves crocheted to carry Fina home, across many months (all thanks to Penelope/@anandabrat), makes a return.

And there is the second tiny drop of ink into our champagne: Fina's brooding look.

On the one hand, I could argue that back home in bed with her wife against all odds, there should obviously nothing but bliss for Fina, but on the other hand, they need to work through so many things (Santiago, Pelayo, their time apart and the battles each one of them has fought on their own, Fina's growing wings abroad, towards freedom and a new career, Marta's newly fierce commitment to their relationship that will have to adjust to these changes).

Of course course these two could not just fall back into each other (there are things to work through!), but instead of going the slow route, Writing and Directing gave us the "they fall back into each other at first sight of course!" anyway. But, also of course, it cannot be more than this one moment, yet Marta and Fina (and the audience) got this one moment.

They also got a pajama upgrade. Look at the sleeve width on Fina's shirt: those are men's pajamas. Fina's new gay wardrobe is a joy. (honorable mention for Marta in the roses and pale pink. I still choose to believe they belong to a set with trousers).

Look at Fina touching Marta's shirt, and then reaching out to touch her face, and how her expression changes to wondrous...

...and then shifts into a smile when a sleepy Marta curls into her.

The trust and intimacy is echoed on the sound level: as of 00:09:28, the Love Awakening Motif plays, breaking through the fog (also that of Fina's mind apparently).

Those chords were there when Marta first dreamed of Fina in the store in episode 19, and they are there when Fina looks at her here and Marta wakes up stating she had feared that Fina's return had been but a dream. (It was also there in episode 548, when Marta dreams of recovering Fina in front of the bouquet of white roses, after Darío tells her about Buenos Aires.)

The Love Awakening Motif continues to play, with its second half of the little fifth drop-and-rise motif that has turned into Marta's Search Motif, but it continues to play as Love Motif underlining their conversation here, including Fina admitting that she thought she would never see Marta again (also a hook, to explain further ahead, how she has built a life abroad on that assumption?):

Something else that is returning here: hands! In this case, how Marta reaches out and maintains contact.

This entire bed sequence highlights the intimacy, familiarity, and vulnerability these two share (and, thinking dramaturgically: upsetting that and making them have to rebuild it makes for a fall from heights unparalleled), yet it is different in that Marta is so fearless and open here, the one leading and not following, in this new dynamic.

At 00:10:26, a variant on the Love Motif sounds and then continues to meander, notably switching to major at 00:10:40 when Fina tells Marta that she realized there were beautiful things out there in Argentina for her, too, which made her hold on.

To Fina, it may seem that Marta is the same since she is still in the same place, but when Marta mentions the blackmail over her diary, there is a brief moment of surprise: it hasn't been a sad but cushy cage of roses for Marta, either. She may not have passed hunger, but various betrayals (Gabriel, Pelayo, presumambly Fina abandoning her):

There is an interesting line on that difference in how they have lived their rupture: Marta framed it, under Pelayo's gaslighting, as Fina abonding her and their love, whereas for Fina, it was being forced to rescind their love, but, true to her letter, also as setting Marta (and herself) free to fly and live. And that is a very different mindset to live with after a separation. One that might come up again?

The shot opening out to the bedroom has Fina's short red coat as the spot that pulls the color focus, but it is very amusing that the coat is placed on top of the trousers, as if she would have taken off the trousers first. Balancing this on the front right is Marta's pinstripe jacket (has Fina unbuttoned it again?), and the glimpse at her broader belt (gay points!):

On the sound level, there are Pelayo's Sinister Gaslighting Woodwinds at 00:11:50, when Fina says she is convinced he was already planning to get rid of her the moment he helped them with Santiago's body, which leads to Marta's confession of "he made me think you left me" and Fina being aghast at the thought, saying she would have never.

The woodwinds sound up again at 00:12:20 - for Fina, their separation narrative seems to be "I told you I loved you and always would, but that I had to leave and you should go on living."

Oh, Fina Valero. Do you understand how much Marta de la Reina, Romantic Heroine and Intense Lesbian, loves you? Not yet, I gather.

Marta repeats her words of episode 377 (when they were last in this bed, under this blanket. Excuse me, I need a minute and a tissue. Full circle! The fullest of circles is what we have come!): "I want to spend my life with you."

Over more hands (I have missed how these two performers have their characters put their hands on each other!), at 00:13:03 the Love Theme returns as a warm, low meander, when Marta declares she wants to be happy and enjoy Fina ("disfrutarte"). And Fina here may be muted because she is conflicted, but she is not cunning.

That smile there? If that is a conscious lie, I never writ nor no man ever loved.

As they cuddle up, pondering whether they should start to believe in destiny again (it's not destiny! It's you two continuing to choose each other! That's the magic! You didn't wait for kismet, you both bought plane tickets!), the Love Motif continues to meander warmly (00:13:12), and if we had any doubt what the next kisses will lead to, the Camera moves from the bed (and the soft fall of The Mafin Blanket) to the writing desk where a desperately crying Fina wrote her farewell letter (seen in flashback in episode 378) and centers a pair of open scissors on its surface. *snort*

Never mind where the international letters suddenly come from (cutting out stamps for collection and saving would have been normal at the time), this is the Prop Department and Directing/Editing winking at us (straight audiences mostly won't get the joke), and possibly rolling their eyes with us at the double standard of showing queer love-making.

Same, dear backstage queers. Same.

Finally, domestic bliss. The daughters get to tell mama that they are home and reunited!

Ana Fernández proves again to be a phenomenal scene partner, with Digna's nerves highlighting Marta's deep happiness.

One small detail I noticed at 00:42:42: when Marta tells Digna that everything is all right - "todo está bien" - it is the same cadence and the same facial expression as when Marta once told Fina on a park bench in Madrid, during their happy escapadas era in the early 100s, "todo está bien". And for this moment, it is:

And the joy these three manage to convey here at the reunion. The sheer joy between Fina's exuberance, Digna's tearful surprise, and Marta's glowing happiness! (I've said elswhere that I would bottle this if I could, and I stand by it.)

And then there is the small detail of Marta being the one to make the coffee and performing the wife, and the domestic lilt of it (no one brought out The MdlR Apron for this, which we know is at the Casa Grande, but we still need some ammunition for further down the road!), and being so pleased to be able to do so. Oh, and how Fina automatically turns to look at her and smiles then.

And note how at 46:07, Marta sits down as closely as possible to Fina (Fina and her fabulous navy pants, and Marta twists her own legs so that she sits in parallel to Fina rather than forward. Any closer? Impossible in front of mama, she'd have to climb into her lap.)

And there's one moment - the Restore Point to save before the rollercoaster will start its downward track again since this is a telenovela and I know I said 'this will not last but at least there is this moment' - at 00:46:49, of that instinctive communication and connection that Brunet and Belmonte have always managed to build so convincingly for their characters. One moment of domestic bliss and immediate understanding (and matching turtlenecks. Just look how happy they both look here), come what may:

Was it just an episode? Yes. But it was this episode, and it was perfect. They (and we) got it all. We really got it all. We got so many variants of this cake, after the tragic epic 377 fall and the 182-episodes--long slow build towards this reunion.

We got So. Much. Cake. (or, as @roadien60 phrased it, so many muffins, as it were)

Mindblowing really, even more so given the constraints and speed demands of the genre, that so many people on all crews care enough about this narrative to pull this off. My profound thanks to everyone involved in making this come true.

*************

Author's note:

Fina ha vuelto, and that's the point the "1 cap for ep" series has been building towards since I started it at the beginning of Season 3, with the aim to highlight the level of craft going into the story.

I will continue to write entries for this series (I will need to process. I will need to process so much!) but perhaps not for every ep or not as in-depth, since the time commitment on this is huge, and time is scarce. And I am not as willing to put in the time when instead of moving towards Mafin, it's about pulling the very foundations of Mafin into doubt. (I still believe they are endgame, as far as contract run times will allow, but the latest curveball towards internal conflict as of episode 562 - independent of how well it is written - is giving me anxieties.)

The point was to add to the tag in a constructive manner in uncertain times, when we didn't even know whether Fina (and Mafin) would make a return. Now that Fina is back, there is more and different activity in the tag, so this little series, which has been a tribute to upholding the narrative on all levels of craft, can shift to the backburner.

After saying "Endgame!" in #568, Editing is saying "but for now: major crisis!" in #570 by intercutting, as an episode opener, Beatriz killing her relationship with Álvaro (and Álvaro himself) with Fina killing her relationship with Marta over lies and yet more lies.

How are they going to account for all of Fina's lying? Especially since she's a terrible liar and even lovestruck Marta calls her on some of it. They may be formally together, but a wasteland in terms of an actual relationship and communication (and it hurts to watch. It hurts!) because Fina keeps a lid on things, which means that she neither trusts their relationship right now nor is she giving it a chance to prove itself.

Outwardly, they're having flan in the dining room (and I take it back: no smiling at Marta hurt less than strained fake smiling at Marta).

Inwardly, we get Fina's new Haunted Flutes Motif (00:02:07 in the Mafin Drive Cut) and Fina turning away from Marta when Miguel calls in with her test results. Belmonte gets in a blink-and-you-miss-it, excellent reaction look by Marta: hurt and bewildered.

That call is followed by more lying and Marta pointedly asking, "The doctor is calling you? About a headache?"

And Fina is lying so badly about "I think it's necessary to have uhm some bloodwork done... for precaution" that it makes me wince, and on the sound layer, the lone final a' fermata of Fina's Haunted Flutes Motif gets an octave-down echo companion piece in two pale, single cello notes: Hauntosphere is here to stay, it seems (00:04:07).

Editing is going in for the kill today: Fina lies about "some neighbors" taking care of her during her brucellosis recovery to Marta's trusting face, right after Beatriz shoots Álvaro dead. One relationship blown up and a second on the way, and we get haunted, empty fifth jumps on piano over a held g' flat, teasing first g flat minor (although: probably f sharp minor, with the D Major third parallel popping up next) and then D Major when Marta says "We are here now, for the one to take care of the other" (just as she promised to Fina after her release from prison, "until the end of my days" -- are you not running out of knives to throw at me yet, novelita?) and Fina is, again, locking herself away under trauma, now more than ever:

And the uncomfortable truth is that keeping silent about Bianca showcases how Fina is living (or not living) two lives right now that she considers irreconcilable, and she has not yet made a decision (not holding my breath for a break-up with Bianca on the phone in #571 as teased in the preview; but crossing my fingers that the Writing Room will spare us te quieros there. Please. This week has already been enough torture on the Mafin heart).

Marta could so easily tell Fina about her relationship with Cloe because Marta knew very clearly that Cloe is over, that they never were in actual te quiero territory, and that she wants Fina. While Fina needs to shift from "Bottled Up Trauma Covered With a Comforting Rebound" to "Working Through The Trauma and Trusting My Loved Ones Again". (Brunet will get to play a big breakdown down the road, I expect. Belmonte will get to play another, and the audience will slowly get to reconnect with Fina who seems to have lost all sense of safety and trust. Hence the lies? That would be an explanation. The Writing Room also underlines again that Fina nearly died, so allowing Bianca close was initially not a choice, but survival instinct, which serves as a nice metaphor for the Chacracore Copy Rebound Scenario overall).

But there is a small step in the direction of processing trauma for Fina - and Editing intercuts Tasio talking with his father to Fina talking to Digna as her mother figure for this - because at last Fina tells Digna about the death of Santiago and Pelayo's ensuing blackmail, and Digna is the perfect audience who knows a thing or two about being implicated in the death of bad men.

The Writing Room and also Directing are giving more space to Fina's trauma; she gets another flashback (starting again with Marta: her voice telling her to run) and a PTSD reaction.

In this dialog - where Fina finally speaks a truth, with her voice breaking - Digna calls Marta "el amor de tu vida" when she speaks of Fina having had to abandon her, and Fina assents, and right off Fina's confession - "he forced me to leave!" - Fina adds "That's why I thought I would never see Marta again, and that's why I was capable of falling in love with another woman."

The Writing Room is careful to explicitly frame the causality chain in a way that does not unseat the long-term Mafin narrative (just like they did with Marta and Cloe: in both cases the assumption is that the actual loved one is lost before embarking on another relationship), whereas Fina's decision at this point, which is to stay with Marta and break up with Bianca, comes across as unconvincing (Bianca will show up in front of an unsuspecting Marta, won't she) - and that's logical: Fina may have feelings for two women to sort through, but most of all, she has a lot of feelings locked away, and at the moment, she is not in a relationship with anyone: regarding Bianca, there is is the distance of both geography and an overarching frame of love that is Marta. Regarding Marta, Fina keeps her at a distance with her lies.

This episode delivers an argument scene framed by two scenes of Marta talking with both her parents (shh, Digna counts) in a openness she does not get from Fina at the moment.

Quick detour to 581 for the parent frame: Marta cannot sell the Mafinca, because there's a rapist buried in the garden, but she doesn't deal well with her father telling her she's a sentimental fool for clinging to an abandoned property where Fina doesn't want to live.

The Mafinca - abandoned, closed up, "you won't return there" - offers a perfect metaphor for the Mafin relationship at the moment, and Marta doesn't deal well with that recognition, either:

Oh dear.

Onto 582: Digna corners Marta on The Couch of Confessions, aka the Chaise where Digna grills her daughters. Marta doesn't stand a chance of not confessing the full story of Santiago:

Also Marta is horrible at pokerface when it comes to Digna (who rightfull says, "You two are utterly transparent to me"):

And Marta has to assimilate another breach: it's not just that Fina, on the one hand, keeps to herself and lies by omission, causing betrayal. One the other hand, she has now betrayed Marta and her trust by telling Digna a sworn secret.

The most telling moment - in returns in various iterations across this episode and also others - is Digna telling a guilt-caged Marta that she is a survivor (very modern-day terminology, but I like the point they make with it), while Marta insist that that "we (!) killed a man" even as he audience has seen Santiago fall onto his own knife while he tried to strangle Fina in repeated flashbacks.

The audience is told one thing, by characters who believe it, but has seen another thing be the factual truth. It feels like a domino placed. To what end, we will see.

*********

The Mafin scene in Fina's guestoom is cut by Editing in between Gabriel and Beatriz (another dysfunctional marriage? - ouch) and then followed by a starving, homeless Paula breaking into the kitchen: another echo of what Fina might not tell of her early days in Buenos Aires.

The Sound Department doesn't do much motivic work in the scene (although it does proved a thunderstorm. Uh-oh); they only unpack the Empty Fifth Chords that underline them being lost and adrift around each other. The Camera Crew delivers a starker take with catching Marta in the mirror while she talks to Fina: these two are not in the same room, emotionally.

The emotional distance is all the more glaring (and hurtful) set against the domesticity of the scene: they are in a bedroom with the door closed (and they are not undressed between tousled sheets despite the opportunity - early #100s Fina and Marta would gape at this moment in outrage and disbelief!). Fina sorts things into the closet, takes off her shoes and then gets her slippers. Her slippers!

They are also dressed like proper lesbians, Fina once more in fighting red, with the armor-turtleneck and a checkered button-down (and those trosuers and that belt!) while Marta is in The Gray Pinstripes That Once Missed A Button After a "Lunchbreak" With Fina, and now they are not (more gaping in outrage). - The colors also match the curtains: the roses with their red and cool green stems. But no rosegarden to be had beyond that here.

Now, they don't make out, they have it out. And, sadly, the familiarity and intimate knowledge of each other they have now shines through in fighting, where they are not as guarded or muted (God, all of this hurts).

Marta says that she wanted to split rent, and anyway, she wouldnn't mind paying Fina's place since she earns more (look at the lesbians having the most heteronormative of arguments!) and Fina fights the infringement on her inpendence plans -

"Do I need to explain that to you again?!"

Oh. Hello, Peleona Fina. How we have missed you! (although this is not quite how we dreamed to reencounter you)

Marta gets in her sulky little jaw clench in reply: "You're independent, you haven't stopped demonstrating your independence since you've returned from Argentina".

And that is not actually "you want to be independent". It is "I am afraid that you don't need me any longer", and that is so very close to "I am afraid that you don't want me any longer." And it comes across, even though that's not what Marta says, and that is some fine writing and performance.

Marta's next point on Fina's plan to rent something small downtown is hitting the same spot: "You don't think of us". Because Marta couldn't visit and spend the nights.

And Fina doesn't say, "Of course I want you to spend the nights, you'll just have to take the bus like the general workforce to be discreet."

Or, "Not the nights, but let's save on electricity and have long lunch breaks at my place. Bring that jacket."

Or, "Well, I'll still visit you in the the guestroom at the very end of the hallway at the Casa Grande, if we make it there, but if I don't have some workspace apart from you, I won't take a single picture."

What Fina says instead: "What do you want me to say?"

(uhm, Fina? Any of the the above would do, really. Because what you are saying right now with your evasive counter question is "I don't want you around overnight.")

And then it's conterattack: "Well it's not like you have moved out , which would make things easier!"

Which is a) not true because Marta's family is a team of Mafin cheerleaders at this point, except perhaps for Tasio, but Manuela would keep him in check with a shotgun if need be, and b) way out there since large bourgeois family units were the norm in into the 1960s. You were unmarried? You lived at the family home, period. (in my family, there were e.g. 12 people in a semi-detatched house in the 1950s, including one daughter with husband and child, two unmarried children from the first marriage, the second wife with the new kids, etc.)

So, Fina: you're wrong on more than one count, but at least you are recognizable, Peleona!

Now Marta unpacks the eyeroll and scoffs, "Oh, sorry I am not independent enough for you!"

And, in fact, Fina - who has scraped by in a metropolis entire on her own, whereas Marta has always had her family to rely on, even if they kept her wings clipped - might agree.

But instead of saying "Yes!" and talking about it openly, she goes for the most passive-aggressive move in this entire talk: "I won't force it onto you!" (echoing with "not like you are trying to force me!")

Once upon a time, Marta would have kissed Fina at this point of an argument. Alas, not any longer.

Fina says, "My life and my decisions shouldn’t depend on your approval." (ouch)

And Marta, with a broad lining of irony, replies - and notice how she is the one to move in and reach out, while Fina remans standing with her hands clasped in front of her torso - that, sorry, some things in a relationship to depend on shared approval. "But of course, you want to live your life. And I want to live a life with you." (double ouch, but also what a line!)

And now the Empty Fifth Chords are back (ouch again!)

Both surface arguments are solid: of course Fina should get to make her own decisions. Of course a relationship requires compromise and shared decisions.

But the actual question is: why does Fina feel caged and patronized when Marta thinks of them as a couple? And why does Fina wanting her own place feels like being discarded to Marta?

"Are you doubting my feelings for you?" Fina wants to know (we all are, Fina, we all are, at this point) and of course Marta does not take the gutsy option of saying "Yes!"

She does the bad style replacement argument of "No, but... you told Digna about Santiago!"

And now for the actual skeleton in this conversation's closet: Fina's guarded "oops" face (Brunet is so good in this reaction here!), only to say "I thought you would never find out."

Wrong answer, Fina. Try again!

So... Fina would have been comfortable with having that lie sit between them indefinitely? While Marta is more upset about Fina not telling her than Fina talking to Digna.

Fina. Girl. Guess what, Marta trashed a flower altar a few weeks ago in a fit of rage because someone who kept sleeping in her bed kept betraying her by protracted lying. Do the parallel math. It does not look good for you.

Yet Fina is awake and present again when it is about selling the house: caged panic.

And here, Marta is a model partner: she tells Fina what has happenend, she lines out the options, she wants to reach a shared decision. She makes sure to have Fina's consent for telling Damián. And she assures Fina that she will not sell the house: she will keep her safe. (something Marta couldn't do when Pelayo sent Fina to Buenaos Aires, but something that she can do now!)

Again: who is the one to reach out in this rosegarden?

Marta looks so resigned. Fina looks frightened and lost:

Finally, the second bookend of the parent talks: the thunderstorm continues when Marta - who still seems worried to not pass as the model daughter (don't worry, Marta, a daughter who would murder for the family is a model daughter to Damián!) - at last tells Damián the truth about Santiago and the Mafinca, and Belmonte/Novo proves again one of the best onscreen chemistries this show has to offer. The flow!

Notably, the talk starts with a longer hook of Marta once more framing the Mafinca as a "refugio" where she and Fina were happy.

Then, Marta does the utterly bourgeois countenance thing of a little smile and eyebrow quirk while relating how she and Fina nearly ended up murdered by an entitled rapist.

And Damián immediately assumes that Marta killed Santiago to protect Fina and herself, and what's more: he is immediately understanding of it.

Damián's reaction is more: it also validates Fina as Marta's wife. ("That's my daughter's life partner for whom she would kill. All right. I respect that.") Because that's how much Fina means to Marta, and he understands it.

The flashback of Santiago trying to strangle Fina makes another return (to even out Mart's guilt to the viewer, perhaps?), and Novo is so good in portaying the empathy and concern of Damián who will not reach out and hug, but he will curl one hand into a first and cover his face with the other in shock. Great detail work.

But it's not just Marta answering the phone, it's how she is answering the phone: rushing and calling "I'll get it":

This phone call is a hinge in this episode. The tail end has Marta talk to Damián (once more, Belmonte opposite Novo is a treat). The talk first returns to the posthumous decoration for Pelayo that Marta skipped, and Marta gets to spell out again just how much she despises him.

She doesn't spell out "I hate him for having taken Fina away", but here is bright anger at being manipulated by someone she trusted, a minute after the audience sees Cloe withholding information about Fina from Marta, and that looks like an intentional echo.

These two, though:

PFlag Damián calls Fina "family" and then encourages Marta to continue searching for her and count with his help because "she's the love of your life" (the Writing Room is about as chill about Mafin as we are):

And Marta is touched by the support, of course - while on a the level of dramaturgy, the outside conflicts Mafin could face are dwindling down with this: everyone in the Casa grande is openly rooting for Marta and Fina at this point, from Digna and Damián and Andrés to Carmen and Tasio, a visiting Begoña is also in favor and Manuela probably knows more that she lets on. So no sneaking-around plot there.

But back to the hinge, and its front end. Here is Cloe, taking the call from the photographers' association in Rosario and getting the Fina intel she then impulsively decides to keep to herself when Marta answers the phone (in the cap at the top).

But even if Cloe's decision is impulsive (at hearing Marta's hopeful voice on the phone), its foundation is built across the episode.

First, there's Cloe talking to Valentina, and the Wrong Flutes Romance Motif is back (00:19:00 in the Mafin Drive Cut) just when Cloe spells out that she is helping Marta finding Fina.

When Valentina asks why, Cloe's reaction again centers her own emotions first: "It hurts me to see her so desperate" (instead of, e.g., "She is so desperate, I can't help but feel with her". Whoever is lead writing Cloe's dialog lines is really good in getting this layer of nuance in there, and consistently so). This offers a segue into Cloe's next line, "Now I am not so sure if I want to help her" - and "now" referring to "after yesterday" (which Cloe has just related to Valentina as "we almost kissed", which is a an interesting take on what the audience saw as "Cloe tried to kiss Marta, who turned her head away") - which translates as: after Marta avoided the kiss. So "helping Marta" depends on "Marta being open to Cloe's overtures"? Or expecting a reward, in some way?

The Wrong Flutes Motif continues to play when Cloe states that she doesn't want Marta to find Fina. Marta not finding Fina would be her "only chance to get Marta back" - which is another interesting take, since "getting back" implies that Marta has been in love with Cloe before, whereas the issue, as the audience has witnessed it, and the reason for the end of the Marta/Cloe affair/relationship was that Marta was and is in love with Fina and not with Cloe. Not much to "get back" there.

And "taking out the desired option will mean Marta will take the option at hand" is also a steep take that ignores that Marta might not want anyone, in that case, or eventually someone else entirely. Of course, Cloe is immediately conflicted about her hope that Marta never ever find Fina, but it still doesn't stop her from acting towards that end later.

Good-coded Valentina being understanding here and saying "You can tell me anything!" seems less narratively than dramaturgically motivated: the audience needs Cloe in a dialog situation where she says "I hope she will never find her! This is my only chance to get her back!" to build up towards her later behavior.

Cloe, moping over a woman who has not and will not love her back:

And, mirroring that hand posture, Marta in her scene with Cloe a little later in the ep, just when she looks away while saying "I've seen crazy jealousy before" (alluding to Santiago thinking he could own Fina, I think?):

Cloe opens the dialog by saying, "Rodrigo was a very possessive man. He couldn't stand that Valentina was seeing another man that wasn't him" and the "not accepting that the one you want wants someone else" is an eerie echo here that also applies to Cloe, who then uses non-romantic bonding over work schedules and sibling love to lob another innuendo at Marta.

This time, the sound design doesn't use the Wrong Flutes but Cloe's personal Horror Accordeon Motif (00:22:12) to frame Cloe envying Marta's bond with Andrés. Cloe says, "I hope to find someone with whom I can live this," and Marta, kindly, says "I'm sure you will," only to have Cloe give her a meaningful, longer glance that translates to me as "YOU. I want you to be the person with whom I have that sibling-like bond."

It is a look that isn't scary per se, but it comes across as a little scary where it is placed, right after discussing Rodrigo's possessiveness and unwillingness to accept that Valentina has moved on.

if the Writing Room is building up Cloe as increasingly unhinged in claiming Marta, they keep the hints small, always followed by a guilty conscience and easing up, but there is a constant drip and it is consistent even going back to Season 2 (did they know after all where they wanted to go with this character?), between the pushiness and making situations about herself. An impressive bit of long-term build-up if true, and in that light, it is also consistent for Cloe to keep the Fina intel for herself.

When she hangs up on Marta at that point, she looks tortured at doing what she is doing (but she is stll doing it), and the Wrong Flutes are back once more (00:31:24).

There is no space for Marta's feelings (news from Fina!) at this point, as Cloe wallows in her own:

This slightly-above camera angle that is overhead but also fairly close the the body, to signal characters that are overwhelmed, under pressure, or on the verge of losing control, shows up repeatedly in recent episodes, for example when Marta is despairing over the newspapers in episode 551.

And on the far end of that scale - with the camera very close to the head from above, the face cropped, and the above-angle signaling the loss of reason and control - is the ending of the previous episode with Rodrigo, caged in his obsession, getting this shot right before he goes after Andrés:

But first things first: Marta (possibly the only woman on earth who can pull off beige this way) stand a little off center to make a dynamic diagonale, but she is perfectly centered in the window behind her. Her position more to the right is balanced by the woman on the framed de la Reina heritage poster to the left, whose hairstyle and white top Marta matches.

Second, Marta is wearing a skirt that is beige like the company marble walls around her, but with a dark brown horizontal stripe on the top (it is mirrored also towards the bottom), and, in as a result, she is turned into a a personification of the company here: white, beige, dark brown in its hallways. Also, she is perfectly aligned horizontally: with the beige of the skirt to the beige of the marble, the white of the belt to the white light reflex line on the windowsill, the dark brown top line of the skirt matching the dark brown window frame, and then the white of the shirt matching the lit window behind her.

Guuuuuh this is so perfect I want to scream. Who in Costuming and Set Design and Directing thinks this up; don't you people ever sleep? (this is so staggeringly good, please never stop).

But, back to the start:

Past Cloe and the office, there is the Perfumerias de la Reina poster on display (I think it was there in recent eps? Didn't Pablo walk past it?). The woman on the poster has a hairstyle similar to Season 3 Marta. In contrast, we see Cloe in the office, in a bright green skirt that does not blend into the company colors, with a returing blouse with a bow, but note how the bow is here tied very small (to the sides), making it different from the times where it was used to create a parallel to the old dependienta blouse bows and Fina.

In walks Marta, who perfectly overlays the woman in the poster (also allowing a look at the skirt design with its two dark brown stripes - the top one aligning with the bottom poster frame in the hallway):

Up to here, Marta is still inside the poster frame, now she breaks it as if stepping out of it, like the true directora she is destined to become again, taking the company spirit and moving it forward (also the stripe on her skirt is still alighing with the poster frame on the wall aaaaaaaaahh):

Even when Marta and Cloe exit the office in an argument, Marta's mark is placed so that her head covers the head of the woman, and even the hair color is similar with how it is lit now:

Who is the company here, and who is the interloper?

As the discussion continues, Marta trying to convince Cloe to help her for the good for the company and Cloe being snappy, Marta is mirrored by the poster, both turned towards Cloe in their midst (here already on great diplay: the alignment of Marta's outfit with the marble/sill/window frame behind her):

And now we get to the staging of Heroic Marta fighing for the company, opposite a flippant Cloe:

Last Perfume Samurai to the rescue!

The amount of lines Marta gets, in relation to the company (also in the earlier breakfast scene with Digna), that deal in "brave", "valiant", "fair" and "just" are just stacked on and on.

Here we have Cloe asking, "you never give in, do you?", and Marta gets to proclaim "never!", but not in the simple form of "nunca", but in the more poetic and old-fashioned "¡jamás!" - if it is, again, "for a just cause" (that is, in this case, also profitable):

This leads us to an interesting Hitchcock supense frame, where we see the just heroine (for whom we are supposed to root), but we also see an information that Heroic Marta does not get (while we do), which is Cloe's calcluating face - and Cloe is still perfectly centered between the two heads (Marta and the poster), and here it really shows how small they tied her bow here (I'd wager because this scene is not about a parallel to Fina):

And once Cloe walks off, there she is, valiant and brave and just and NEVER giving up: the Last Samurai of the Perfumeria!

And - borrowing an image from the earlier breakfast scene with Digna, where Marta has also just said something about bravery and justice - this isprobably all of us at witnessing the insane detail work in this scene: