Fiction, especially when it is well done, from sincerity and without fear of creating from the gut, can have the ability to unlock memories and sensations. It can be an almost cathartic experience for viewers who feel challenged: it forces them to look at the past, unearth experiences and confront those emotions that at a certain moment invaded our way of being. That burst of rage, insecurity, frustration, the first-time butterflies, that moment that seemed static in which you lost your breath, breathing desperately due to the impossibility of managing paralyzing sensations.
Red Flags, which Atresplayer premieres this Sunday, has this unlocking capacity for adult viewers who, like yours truly, are already graying. Fridays tells of four young people who contact each other through social networks through a group that has a single purpose: to share content, photographs, anecdotes and intimate reflections without judging each other and above all without the hate that invades the social networks. For those who are still young, the proposal of the prolific writer Nando López is possibly a mirror from which to dissect current conflicts.
The trigger for the plot is a publication by Érika (Mar Isern) on her Instagram. She has a non-normative physique and, instead of hiding it, she shares it with a video to show what a real body is like. She is not prepared, however, for what the post provokes: hundreds of messages messing with her weight and the removal of the images by the social network for being indecent content. She also receives messages of support from three strangers in delicate moments, whom she includes in a hate-free chat that she calls Red Flags.
They are Toni (Diego Rey), homosexual and humble, who spends the day at the gym looking for something exciting when he is not directly on Grindr planning express sex dates with strangers; Walter (Ibrahima Kone), a black boy from a wealthy family, who has problems being accepted into his basketball team, populated by cayetans; and Luna (Iria del Valle), who lives her daily life in a somewhat dissociated way: she has a toxic best friend and a boyfriend with whom she knows she doesn't connect.
Nando López, who here offers us his first series as a television creator, gives the audience a symbiotic work with the help of Estel Díaz, screenwriter and director, who opens one melon after another. The dehumanization of sex is addressed, especially in a sector of the homosexual community, and the possibility of perpetuating those behaviors that traumatized us at the time.
They talk about the daily violence that people with non-normative bodies receive. From bullying. Of racism. Of consent. Of the need for validation based on absolutely artificial (and despicable) social standards. And, in addition to individual conflicts, there is an omnipresent theme: the way in which our digital social dynamics make us even more vulnerable and, at the same time, how networks can also be tools for finding refuge.
This digital dimension is transmitted organically with on-screen overlays that are never perceived as blobs, redundant or boomers. The music enhances the emotions of the characters at every moment, whom the script allows to experience drama, comedy, fun and contradictions from youthful radicalism (and making mistakes). The cast has four young people who work the characters from the inside out: an amazing example is that of Iria del Valle, who builds Luna based on looks.
And, in structuring the season, the writers are skillful: Red Flags works both when it has the characters distanced and not knowing each other, due to the authenticity of each portrait, and when dynamics are established. What sensitivity, whether in addressing traumatic scenes, sexual scenes, or scenes that address anxiety so effectively that the episodes would almost have to be broadcast with a trigger warning. And, episode by episode, they offer the opportunity to empathize, to raise necessary conversations and, as I said, to unlock experiences and try to relocate them.
It's a teen treasure.
