Recensie Prime Video-series ‘The horror of Dolores Roach’
A bloody series to lick your fingers.
After sixteen years in prison, Dolores Roach is released and her old friend Luis takes her in. In the basement of her empanada shop, she gives Dolores massages and soon becomes known as Manos Mágicas. However, she has an evil side that causes her to use her magical hands for other purposes as well. After she kills the owner, Luis comes up with a very scandalous way to dispose of the body: he uses it in his empanadas. To his surprise, human flesh is well received by visitors.
The Horror of Dolores Roach it’s definitely a relief. While many movies and series seem to have beauty as the norm these days, this series is all about the ugly that humanity has to offer. Nothing is hidden from view and looking away is not an option. When you’re still reeling from the first chilling kill, the next victim already ends up on the stack. The creators clearly take the viewer seriously and show all the misery associated with these murders.
Through how-to books like Save the Cat! Many novice screenwriters are taught these days that a main character must be liked. Viewers would be moral gentlemen who would immediately disapprove of the dubious choices of the leads. The Horror of Dolores Roach It shows that this is a big mistake. People really like main characters who rub themselves together a bit, as long as we can put ourselves in some shoes. So we don’t hate Dolores when she silences one character after another. Otherwise. Come on Dolores!
Finally it seems possible to delve into the dark recesses of man again. from the movie Raw shocked viewers in 2016, fake blood purveyors are getting busier with their jobs. Blood spurts against the screen the old-fashioned way, just like in the heyday of the slasher genre in the eighties. With a society in which everything is weighed and Hollywood increasingly soft, it takes series like this to show that life is not always rosy.
The story is told using a voiceover creatively introduced in the first episode. Where this medium is often a safe and simplistic option to vocalize someone’s inner self, it adds an extra flavor in this series. This voiceover not only puts us in Dolores’ head, but also gives a humorous background to the story, because although the series contains a lot of misery, the characters and their world also provide a good dose of humor.
The fact that episodes are rarely longer than thirty minutes was probably a big challenge for the creators. Time is needed to adequately justify the bloody deeds of Dolores. It’s time to put in a backstory, so that the viewer can identify with Dolores in such a way that she can possibly forgive her atrocities. The creators have succeeded in this in a clever way, although a longer play time could perhaps provide some additional depth, which is something that is lacking at the moment. So, fingers crossed for a second season, as long as you still have the necessary fingers…
The Horror of Dolores Roach can be seen in first video.