Telenovela

A telenovela is a type of a television serial drama or soap opera produced primarily in Latin America. The word combines tele (for "television") and novela (meaning "novel"). Similar drama genres around the world include teleserye (Philippines), téléroman (Canada, specifically Quebec), and sinetron (Indonesia).

Commonly described using the American colloquialism 'Spanish soap opera', many telenovelas share some stylistic and thematic similarities to the soap opera familiar to the English-speaking world. The significant difference is their series run length; telenovelas tell one self-contained story, typically within a year or less, whereas soap operas tend to have intertwined storylines told during indefinite, continuing runs. This makes them shorter than most other television series, but still much longer than a miniseries. This planned run results in a faster-paced, more concise style of melodrama compared to a typical soap opera. Episodes of telenovelas usually last between 30 and 45 minutes, and rarely more than an hour, except for final episodes. The telenovela combines drama with the 19th-century feuilleton, and naturally evolved from the Latin American radionovela, according to Blanca de Lizaur.

The medium has been used frequently by authorities in various countries to transmit sociocultural messages by incorporating them into storylines. By the 1950s, Brazil became one of the first countries to produce novelas with high budgets and aimed both to the national and international markets. Mexico soon followed, and by the 1970s and 1980s the country started to engage more profusely in using telenovelas to shape behavior. This was particularly successful in introducing the idea of family planning. The 1990s played a key role in the international export of telenovelas, thus the so-called 'Telenovela Craze' that spread in many regions in the world.

By 2018, some signs of fading popularity had emerged.

History

Brazil is considered the pioneer of the telenovela genre. In 1951 Brazil produced Sua vida me pertence ("Your Life Belongs to Me"), the first telenovela in the world. In 1952 Cuba released Senderos de amor ("Paths of Love") and Mexico released Ángeles de la calle ("Angels of the Street"), shown once a week. Between 1957 and 1958 Mexico produced its first drama serial in the modern telenovela format of Monday to Friday slots, Senda prohibida ("Forbidden Path"), written by Fernanda Villeli. The first global telenovela was Los ricos también lloran ("The Rich Also Cry", Mexico, 1979), which was exported to Russia, China, the United States, and other countries.

Genres Telenovelas tend to fall within these seven categories:

Working-class melodrama, which is the most popular to date, easy to understand and contains less explicit content. This is heavily reliant of the common rags-to-riches plot, typically featuring a poor woman who falls in love with a rich man whose family spurns her, such as the Las Tres Marias ("Maria Trilogy", 1992, 1994 and 1995).
Historical romance is set in the past, such as the colonial period (Martín Garatuza, 1986), the restoration of the Republic (El carruaje "The Carriage", 1972), the late 19th Century (El vuelo del águila "The Flight of The Eagle", 1994) the Mexican Revolution (Bodas de odio "Weddings of Hate", 1982), and the 20th-century military dictatorships (such as Anos Rebeldes "Rebellious Years", 1992)
Teen drama, which portrays the lives of high school teenagers and their issues with sex, drugs and other coming-of-age topics. This genre started with Quinceañera in 1987.
Mystery/thriller is a category of telenovela that is more cold-hearted than the other subgenres. It may portray a mysterious death or disappearance, which may tear couples, even families apart, such as Cuna de Lobos ("Wolves Crib"), La Casa al Final de la Calle ("The House at the Street End"), La Mujer de Judas ("The Woman of Judas"), ¿Dónde está Elisa? ("Where's Elisa?"), El Rostro de la Venganza ("The Face of Revenge") or La Casa de al Lado ("The House Next Door"). Chile has produced this genre.
Horror is a subgenre of telenovelas that is rarer than the rest, it can deal with anything of the horror genre, but the majority of these telenovelas deal with the themes of the supernatural like demons, witchcraft, ghosts, and the occult. It is one of the few subgenres that use special effects. It always portrays the main protagonist trying to find out the truth while at the same time confronting frightening events and the main antagonist which is always a witch or a warlock, demon, evil or vengeful ghost, or the devil itself such as El maleficio, El Extraño Retorno de Diana Salazar, and La Chacala.
Romantic comedy, which portrays love stories with some or much comedy such as Las tontas no van al cielo "Fools Don't Go to Heaven" or Yo soy Betty, la fea (the most successful telenovela in history).[10]
Pop band story portrays the lives of aspiring popstars such as in Alcanzar una estrella ("Reaching a Star", 1990) and its sequel Alcanzar una estrella II (1991), as well as Rebelde (2004), which spawned a multi-platinum pop group, RBD. Some, though not all, of these type of telenovelas are geared towards a teenage and/or pre-teen audience.
Narcotraffic Recently narcotrafficer telenovelas have become frequently produced.
Besides these, another category of series that has become popular in recent years is the youth telenovela, which borrows some elements of the teen drama format but is usually more family-oriented in structure, contains comedic elements and sometimes maintains a high concept or supernatural plotline (such as 11:11: En mi cuadra, nada cuadra and Chica vampiro).

Telenovelas have geographically diverged into two major groups – the Latinovelas, and the Asianovelas, portmanteaus of Latin and Asian with novelas. Telenovelas, in particular, are the most popular non-English-speaking scripted forms of entertainment in the world to date.

Novelas made in Spain and the Spanish-speaking Americas are widely popular in spanish-speaking countries and communities.

Novelas made in Portugal and Brazil are highly popular in Lusophone (Portuguese-speaking) countries, with Angolan novelas also making their way recently.

Some novelas also have a huge following in Europe's Mediterranean and eastern countries, as well as in Asia and Oceania. Latinovelas are primarily responsible for the telenovela trend in regions outside of Latin America, which is known as the biggest producer of telenovelas up until the early 2000s.

The Asianovelas are dominating television programming through most of Africa and Eurasia, and have recently made inroads in the Latinovelas-dominated television in the Americas. In the Arab world, telenovelas are very popular with families taking breaks during the day from midday onward to watch these shows, whose content often reflects many of the moral and social issues faced in cultures like Morocco, Algeria and Egypt. The medium has been used repeatedly to transmit sociocultural messages by incorporating them into storylines.

Millennial telenovela

In the 2010s, the terms "millennial telenovela" and "modern telenovela" have been coined to describe an emerging genre related to the telenovela. Based in the same culture, the target audience is much younger (the millennials); the typical storylines and melodrama were recreated to better appeal to this demographic. Commenters have written that a millennial telenovela will contain many of the following themes: it fits into contemporary politics and culture; has positive representations of LGBT+ people when present; features themes of female empowerment and the sexualization of the male body; involves use of social media; presents characters of moral ambiguity rather than in black and white, and with more complexity; contains intentionally comedic moments; and is centered on an unconventional family.

Though the term "millennial telenovela" was first used in 2016 when BuzzFeed and Telemundo co-produced a short series to cater for the emerging Latin American millennial market, it became more widely used in 2018 after the success of the Netflix black comedy The House of Flowers.

The development of the genre may be a response to a controversial market practice of importing telenovelas to US channels, with a Univision and Televisa deal having to be renegotiated when traditional telenovelas fell in popularity around 2016; at this point, the majority of Hispanic people in the US were millennials, and "drawn to edgier and more fast-paced programs than traditional telenovelas." Though Univision did not start making its own hybrid shows, they began investing in online and multimedia programming, and bought into Netflix's original Mexican programming.