User Reviews

This movie was great until actor change don't get me wrong not all the changes were bad and the Celia actress wasn't bad it just wasn't good. Really the movie could have left the Lola character (touching her mouth every five seconds) out. Other than that the movie was great UNTIL.

If they'd have left the same cast throughout the 80-episode mega series, this probably would have been a lot better. Why'd they have to do that? Couldn't they have used make up instead of changing to people who may have looked older? These new cast members were "strangers" to those of us who grew to love especially Celia and Pedro, and even Mario. Up to Episode 55, I'd have given this all the stars I could have except for one (minus one because some episode scenes were mostly a rehash of emotions and behaviors already established). But then, when they changed the cast, my mind never adapted; hence, fewer stars in my final rating -- of course, what do I know? My bad? Maybe yes; maybe no. Surely I could have "forced" my mind to adapt and accept the character changes, but the new cast members that replaced Celia, Pedro, Lola, Mario, and Alfonso, despite their obvious talent, just didn't convince me they were older versions of the persons they replaced. The new Mario, Celia and Pedro looked so totally different, there was no way I could believe they were the same people as their younger versions to whom I believe many viewers had grown attached. After investing 50 hours of viewing time, I'd say a drastic change like that is just plain unfair to viewers. We quit watching after Episode 56.

Celia, a fictional narrative inspired in real life legend Celia Cruz, started high and strong but as the series progressed it just went down hill. The disclaimer at the beginning of each episode stating that is a "fictional account of Celia's life" sounded to me as an excuse to justify the "Telenovela treatment" given by the Director and writers.

Although beautifully filmed and with a VERY strong cast, the poor writing, historical inaccuracies and inconsistency in the characters aging really hurt the story. Filler characters and sub-plots such as Mario (the unrelatable, spineless and overly silly best friend) that was not only annoying but it had no use in the main storyline. The homosexual relationship between Celia's cousin Gamalier and the dance choreographer Rene was a promising sub-plot (portraying a homophobic Cuban Regime) became a sinking ship in slow motion. They make the viewers care for this couple only to give an off-screen death to Gamalier and having Rene committing suicide, even the timeline of the events have inaccuracies. Nuris, Celia's jealous sister, was a hard-to- dislike villain (thanks to Aida Bossa incredible acting) that was reduced to be a one-dimensional character that only became more annoying over time. Nuris ( who is suppose to be Celia's older sister) the aging process had a lot of discrepancies (a problem across the board in the series) particularly when, after transitioning from "young" Celia to "old" Celia actresses Nuris remained being played by "young" Nuris and when they finally aged her the "old" Nuris the other actress failed to seamlessly portray the same character, they're not even physically similar. Another failure character was Oscarito (Celia's surrogate son), that was supposed to make Celia happy and protect her, yet he couldn't protect her from Eliezer's machinations and just became an adornment in the plot.

A highlight, Lola Calvo (character loosely based on real-life singer La Lupe), masterfully played by Carolina Gaitan (young-self) & Marcela Gallego (old-self) was another promising plot line that suffered from the Telenovela treatment reducing the character to a melodrama cartoon along with her Step-father/Lover Eliezer which also was unnecessary to bring back into the plot after he was sent to jail (another one-dimensional character with aging inconsistencies).

The aging process was a big fail across the board with many characters, there was not attention to detail, constant errors that eroded the world the story tried to capture. The accents inaccuracies were another big issue: You had Cuban characters with Colombian accents such as a child Celia, Ollita, at times old Nuris among others. Clearly, the Director failed here, this accents inaccuracies hurt the credibility of the story. As a writer and director myself who's currently developing a fictional biography (that is not based on a real-life person) I have to spend a LOT of time in historical research and attention to details in order to make a fictional world entirely believable... something that failed miserably in this TV series.

WARNING!!! MIGHT CONTAIN SPOILERS!!!

What started off as a promising biopic/series filled with energetic performances and musical numbers, tragically failed to get it right in the long run. The series was given 80 episodes to tell the story of a legend (80 EPISODES) and yet wasted most of the show's run showing us irrelevant character story lines of people that didn't even really exist; they were fictional characters. The director felt the need to fill in some gaps with stories that not only dragged, but had absolutely nothing to with Celia or her accomplishments. Eventually these story lines became the center of attention for most episodes. Mario, Raquel, Myrelys, Renee, Lola Calvo; all characters who pretty much took more screen time away from the principal artist herself.

They wasted so much time on scenarios that weren't needed and characters that had no real meaning to the story line that sadly, the last 15 episodes were rushed. Jumping 10 years within one episode.

One of the biggest disappointments was the portrayal of Celia's career with Fania Records in the 1970's. The 70's was when Celia Cruz was at her prime. I anticipated seeing her in that prime; perform at large venues (similarly to her Madison Square Garden concert scene in the first episode) I was hoping to hear all the great songs she recorded and performed with Fania. I wanted to see more of her friendship with Johnny Pacheco and others like Willie Colon, Hector Lavoe and Pete El Conde. We didn't get any of that in this show, instead we got 3 of her hits, 1 of which was only heard as background music. We had two archive concert footage of the real Celia performing in Yankee Stadium and Africa. No scenes recreated, no effort what so ever and her 1970's prime was only shown within 5 episodes, most of which consisted of Mario, Raquel and Myrelys love triangle story line that was not needed or wanted. I was hoping to see and hear more. It was way too little bit of music and performances for a show with so many time on its hands.

I wanted to see more of Celia and her life. I get that supporting roles are needed and I would've wanted that as well, but with characters who meant something to Celia or her career. People who contributed professionally and personally like Johnny Pacheco. Why not show us more of the artists who were apart of her life and music? Those artist who were her friends? They did succeed in the beginning with the supporting roles of Myrta Silva and Rogelio Martinez; that's what we needed more of, those characters.

Now Lola Calvo. This character was adored as a fictional secondary character. She was a friend who happened to be an aspiring artist as well. Then we find out she based on Latina legend soul singer, La Lupe. Then we see her character get treated with the utmost disrespect and become annoying, hateful and just pathetic. It was a slap in the face to La Lupe and her legacy. For starters, La Lupe wasn't raped as a teen or young adult; she didn't have a step father her real father loved her very much and was very supportive. She came from a happy family who adored her; her mother was always apart of her life. Her music career was the greatest of any Latino entertainer of that time in that genre of music. She was never friends with Celia. She never spoke bad of or even mentioned Celia ever. Their only negative encounter was in 1978 when La Lupe had jokingly remarked that Pedro Knight was a santero, which angered Celia. That was it.

I had high hopes for this, they had so much potential. Most biopics get 2 hours or less to tell the story of a legend and many fail to tell the full story because of it. Celia had 80 EPISODES and ended up rushing through the years in the end. There was no need for that. It failed in many ways and I'm truly disappointed.

My family and I really enjoyed watching this series on Peacock and we were really thrilled to learn more about this legendary singer. We would watch an episode at a time so that we could cherish each and every chapter. It had become one of our favorites to watch and what was awesome about it was that it brought out some burried memories of our childhood and of our land. We just couldn't wait to see what would happen next. That was until we got to episode 55.

After Celia marries Pedro Knight, the beloved cast we had watched for the first 55 episodes was no longer with us. Well.... some of them where (Because I guess the others don't age?). We had learned to love these characters from the very beginning and then all of a sudden most of the lead actors were replaced. Celia, Pedro, Mario among others looked nothing like their younger counterparts. I wish they would have kept the originals and just progressively age them. It truly felt like the rug was just pulled out from the viewer's feet.

I know it's way to late for this review to change anything, but I was not surprised when I saw others react in a similar manner. I am missing the original actors already. No disrespect to the ones who portrayed the leads in their "older" years. It's just going to be hard to keep watching and trying to keep track of who is who in the final chapters of this series.

I was completely obsessed with this telenovela, I got so into it I was watching it all the time as it was my favorite telenovela. What really killed it for me was, WHO THOUGHT IT WOULD BE A GREAT IDEA TO SWITCH OUT THE MAIN CHARACTERS MORE THAN HALFWAY INTO IT?? Like who let that happen? Like I'm sorry but that just left a bad taste in my mouth. And not only that, but everyone else seemed to stay the exact same younger person that they had always been the entire show (like Mireleys but not Mario or Lola's husband but not Lola) like wtf??? After already falling in love with all the characters the way they were and being used to their personalities They get swapped from one show to the next and the story plot continued as if nothing happened. I was really confused for a second and I thought that maybe 20 years had passed in the storyline and that everyone was older but only some characters changed and others stayed the same which was really weird and hard to get used to. Nothing against the new characters I'm sure they are amazing actors but who does that. They should have just made the main characters look older gradually not completely change a swapped a character. Other than that the story plot is amazing and i was obsessed with the show, but this surprise is going to take some getting used to.

As an island girl always being in love with Latin music--Celia being one of my favorites, I was so happy to discover this on Netflix 2 weeks ago. Halfway thru, I decided to Google reviews and was caught off guard when people mentioned the cast change and story lines either just fading away or changing without warning. My first thought was hmm? Sure enough, after Rene's funeral the cast changed and so much didn't make sense. The new Celia and Pedro lack the strength of the younger two. There is absolutely ZERO energy in their performance. And how can Celia be so much older but her sister stayed the same for a while. How can Mario and his stepdaughters be older but Mirelys didn't change.... and on and on. The only reason I'm hanging on is because I want to see it thru to the end. With 80 episodes, this could have flowed so much better.