Gina Rodriguez in Jane the Virgin.
Repost: Jane The Virgin: "Pilot" Review
Make sure to catch us on Episode 4 of Jane the Virgin. While you wait check out this review!Article: http://www.ign.com/articles/2014/10/13/jane-the-virgin-pilot-review
VIRGIN TERRITORY.
→ OCTOBER 13, 2014 Advance Review: As The CW shifts more and more away from its past Gilmore Girls/Gossip Girl candy center, filling its primetime ranks with superheroes and myriad forms of sc-ifi and fantasy, a show like Jane the Virgin actually feels like a bit of an outlier on 2014, when just a few years ago it would have fit right in.Now I won’t say that I’m glad, or that I really have any opinion one way or another about The CW retaining part of its trademark schmaltz, but Jane the Virgin is charming, well-presented, and uniquely funny. In an utterly disposable way, sure, but still ready and able to provide lighter, fluffier TV fare for those pining for breezier programming.
Based on the telenovela Juana la Virgen, Jane the Virgin actually embraces its soapy roots by turning almost everything into sort of meta-camp - wherein the studious, responsible “good girl” Jane (a winning Gina Rodriguez) “miraculously” becomes pregnant after a series of silly mishaps causes her to get accidentally inseminated during a routine doctor visit. And if it sounds insane and feels contrived, it’s supposed to. Because the show doesn’t hold back when it comes to the fact that she’s basically become the center of a real-life ridiculous Latin TV soap. The narrator even says at one point, “Jane’s life was now the stuff of telenovelas.”In fact, Jane, during her less lucid moments following the discovery that she’s now pregnant after never having had sex, even imagines herself talking to a telenovela star. A dashing, romantic man who’s there to comfort her with his suave voice and sea-blown hair.Complicating matters even further (because finding out that you’re pregnant out of nowhere wasn’t going to be the cut-off point for crazy here) is the fact that Jane’s already in a long-term “on-the-cusp of marriage” relationship with a nice-guy cop (Brett Dier) - and that the father of Jane’s baby (the unintentional donor) is a rich, earnest man, Rafael (Justin Baldoni), who Jane once shared a romantic afternoon with years ago.So the tone of this show is both comedic and that of a TV existence that doesn’t allow for full-blown realistic freak outs regarding any of the insane news that Jane is hit with. Jane protests here and there, but hope and romance is more or less the name of the game. Jane’s man-chasing mother, Xiomara (Andrea Navedo), had Jane at a young age so a lot of what Jane’s done in her life was done sort of in protest to her mom’s irresponsible ways. And yet now she’s ended up pregnant all the same. It’s a fun notion to play around with, but it’s also not something a show of this nature is going to explore with any depth. This is basically a fool’s parade.