‘I’m alive’ closes its fourth season with no confirmed return

La 1 de TVE broadcasts tonight (10.22) the outcome of this science fiction series starring Javier Gutiérrez, Alejo Sauras and Cristina Plazas

A Daniel Écija (Australia, 1963), creator of ‘I’m alive’ (TVE), loved ‘Mare of Easttown’ (HBO) and not because of their crimes. «I have connected with the concerns of the series and its writers: life; your mother, your daughter, the loss, the neighborhood. And then there is a ‘thriller’ plot that this lady is a cop. But first he is a human being. And what does a human being have? An environment ”, says a passionate Écija in a telephone conversation with ABC. ‘I’m alive’ , whose fourth seasonIt ends tonight (10.10) at La 1, it is carried out by Vallecan policemen, but cut by the same pattern: «In Spain we meet on Sundays, first with friends, then with family. Christmas is coming… That is culture and identity; our life”. Because ‘I’m alive’ talks about life, even though its characters have died over and over again.

These new thirteen episodes, with a sect willing to commodify reincarnation and discover the returnees, have been more benevolent by the coronavirus. They wanted to make a series more fun and dare –even more– with the script twists. For this they had to jump back in time so that their protagonists met Adriana ( Guiomar Puerta ), Márquez’s granddaughter ( Javier Gutiérrez ) and Laura ( Cristina Plazas ) and daughter of Iago ( Alejo Sauras ) and Susana ( Anna Castillo ) , who died during the blackout of La Pasarela, the other thread of this batch.

With this time jump they saved the greatest drama: the death of a daughter . «I try to transfer the sense of loss with the relief that the desired, the impossible happens: to recover your loved ones. Because in the real world you can’t overcome loss, or death, and in ‘I’m alive’yes there is a turning back; it is about the possibility of having a second part, a second chance on people and accidents in life, ”sums up Daniel Écija. He knows what he writes: “I am from a family that does not have extraordinary health, so we have become used to people leaving early.” To this must be added the theme of memories: «I have relatives who are beginning to have some memory sweeps; very old people who are rewriting the past and you do not know if they are inventing what they are telling you or not. It makes you doubt.

‘I’m alive’ , with this fourth season, has rewritten its past ( with a villain and a shadow guardian angel) and has made its characters and viewers doubt.

A therapeutic series: ‘I’m alive’ closes its fourth season with no confirmed return

This fourth season may have ‘dialogued’ with the pandemic, but its writers never aspired to such a mirror game. ‘I’m alive’ – its creator recalls – premiered four years ago talking about the sudden disappearance of someone who goes to work at night and never returns. Écija went through that; hence his philosophy: “The series have to be therapeutic for the citizen with characters who love each other and try to do things well, although sometimes they don’t have the tools.

A neighborhood superhero: ‘I’m alive’ closes its fourth season with no confirmed return

Since its inception, the fiction produced by Good Mood ( ‘Debts’ ) and Globomedia ( ‘Paco’s Men’ ) had something of a comic, but this year they have introduced a superheroine, Adriana, who has to save the world. «She is a neighborhood Wonder Woman and someone who doesn’t want to be. I love the journey that superheroes take with their different abilities. She doesn’t really know what it means to be The Chosen One », explains Écija. This has allowed them to deconstruct the language of a genre led by Marvel and DC, and build a love story, without third parties, with the policeman Mikel ( Almagro San Miguel ), whose stupor at the marcianadas of his girlfriend has become more comedy than drama.

The leading role of Cristina Plazas

But the great protagonist of this fourth season has been the character of Laura ( Cristina Plazas ), willing to discover why her mother ( Magüi Mira ) abandoned her with her brother ( Pablo Vázquez ) in an orphanage. Écija praises the actress, absent the previous year : «Having several seasons allows you to open the biography of some characters who have been at the expense of others. Laura has been very at the service of Márquez, Susana, Iago … Cristina, as she is a great actress, you have to give the character a lot of meat. And when you give it a lot of meat, it returns a jewel ».

A look at the end of the 20th century

Magüi Mira (76) has not been the only veteran to act in this round: María Garralón (68), Malena Gutiérrez , Mila Espiga … And, in the final stretch, Julia Gutiérrez Caba (88), who returns as The Director. “It is an opportunity to talk about the extraordinary actresses that we have in this country and they don’t stop working,” claims Écija.

The producer defends having our elders always present. In ‘I’m alive’ , as in life itself, parents and grandparents are very important. «In our childhood there is much of our security and insecurities, balances and imbalances of adults. It is very important to understand our characters from where they come from and thus, in some way, look at the end of the 20th century, which is relatively close to us, but it seems that society invites you to look only ahead. Fiction, in this case, allows you to look back ”, he reasons.

Fifth season of ‘I’m alive’

Tonight’s episode will leave “an open hook”, like every ending of the season, but Écija does not know if this will be the last of ‘I’m alive’ , as she has not yet spoken with the new RTVE management . Yes, he would like, after more than fifty episodes, to be informed in time and even to be able to close with an extra chapter: “We know that we have fewer and fewer things to tell.”

He trusts the delayed audience after having dropped from one million viewers live and that TVE takes into account the frustrated advance of the night schedule of La 1. When adding the subsequent viewing during the first week, the series is close to 1.3 million of followers with a good pull between adolescents and young people. Also, it is unknown how many people choose to see it on Amazon, where it hangs the next day.

“TVE is not one of the most incisive channels in its ‘marketing’ because it is public,” defends Écija, who trusts the renewal of ‘I’m alive’ for a fifth season to the intangible: “It is absolute entertainment on public television and in open; that talks about people who love each other and tries to convey emotion through science fiction. Flee the scandal and it is made by Spaniards ».