An update of an earlier Mexican telenovela with the same name, Netflix’s Rebelde is a teen drama that has unfortunately skewed a little too close to its roots. Now, I haven’t seen the original, but this version tries a little too hard to stay relevant to the Instagram/TikTok generation. So much so that its characters feel a little like caricatures.
Unlike Control Z, Elite, or AlRawabi School for Girls, this Mexican teen soap opera doesn’t quite raise itself to the heights of what the genre can do in this day and age. The series falls back on old tropes. Popular boys and girls gang up to haze the new kids in school, driving characters either together or apart. Even the fact that they’re all in a special music school barely adds to the anything to the drama.
Rebelde feels like a telenovela version of the high school in Glee. Except with less singing and more drama. The characters feel familiar in the worst way. There’s the new girl who is also a famous Instagram musician, but feels alone because while everyone knows her, no one really KNOWS her. (Yawn!) There’s the cute boy from a poor family. (Double yawn!) The exchange student. The bad boy. The bad kid who has a problematic relationship with his rich father. (Gossip Girl called. They want all their characters back!)
Unfortunately adding a pinch of music to this retread doesn’t make Rebelde different enough to watch.
Give this a pass. Watch Control Z, Elite, or AlRawabi instead.
Welcome to the EWS, the prestigious boarding school where the bumpy road to stardom isn’t for the faint of heart. Rebelde is the reboot of the beloved teen soap opera that spawned separate telenovelas in Argentina and Mexico in the early 2000s. Under the direction of Santiago Limón and Yibran Asaud, Rebelde develops within the hallways of Elite Way School, with a new generation of students, storylines and characters, (plus a few familiar ones that longtime fans will recognize). Over the course of eight episodes, Rebelde follows a group of students who are doing their best to win EWS’ Battle of the Bands, the key musical contest for them to succeed at the beginning of their musical careers. Along the way, love and friendship bloom between them while a mysterious secret society casts a shadow over their dreams of becoming the next big music star.
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