Maria La Del Barrio/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Complete Monster: Soraya Montenegro initially seemed like an ordinary Rich Bitch, but turns into something far worse upon Maria's arrival. Obsessed with Luis Fernando, she tried to seduce him with her Nana Calixta's black magic, taking advantage of him while drunk, and forcing him to marry her. She tried to poison Maria and shot her lover Osvaldo to prevent him from revealing her plans. After surviving her fall, she murders her husband and caretaker Óscar for his money, and starts abusing her stepdaughter Alicia and her godmother Esperanza in horrifying ways. She uses Maria's son Nandito to get revenge, but upon discovering Nandito has fallen for Alicia, she tries to kill them both. She ends up murdering her mother Nana Calixta, framing Nandito for her crime and getting Maria imprisoned. Finally, after Maria survives the prison fire, she kidnaps her and tries to burn her to death. Ruthless, uncaring, and completely unwilling to take responsibility, Soraya proved to be the most irredeemably evil character of the series.
  • Crosses the Line Twice: Thanks to Narm Charm, a lot of Soraya's antics look like this, which are the reason why they're so memorable.
  • Designated Hero: We're supposed to root for Luis Fernando even though he treats Maria horribly, even cheating on her. At least Soraya and Penélope were meant to be villains. Granted, this trope was because of Values Dissonance kicking in in the New Tens, but still...
  • Fountain of Memes: Soraya, Soraya, a thousand times Soraya.
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Naturally, in the US, since Spanish telenovelas are quite popular, but Thalia was also popular in the Philippines. She even recorded songs in Tagalog.
  • Iron Woobie: Maria.
  • Jerkass Woobie: Believe it or not, Soraya can come off as this (though she isn't subjected to Draco in Leather Pants nearly as much as you'd expect). Yes, she's a horrible person who doesn't regret her monstrous deeds in the slightest, but her all too frequent breakdowns makes some people feel pity towards her, if only because of how pathetic she ultimately is.
    • Penélope turns into one after Maria's Heroic Sacrifice. She may have acted like a royal bitch to Maria up until that point, but seeing her crying while talking to God about how much of a good person Maria was, praying for Maria to be in peace is just heartbreaking to watch. It helps that, even at her worst, she wasn't nearly as awful as Soraya, and this moment marks Penélope's official Heel Face Turn.
  • Love to Hate: Soraya may be rotten to the core, but damn isn't she entertaining! (both for the right and wrong reasons)
  • Magnificent Bitch: Soraya. Penelope as well, to a much lesser extent.
  • Mean Character, Nice Actress: Itatí Cantoral, who plays the completely evil (and memetic) Soraya, is very friendly and gracious to her fans, completely embracing her breakout role (even reprising it for the Orange Is the New Black trailers)
  • Memetic Mutation: Soraya's infamous "MALDITA LISIADA!" shitfit is so hammy that people love it.
  • Narm Charm: Everything about this series. It's ridiculous and melodramatic as all hell, but this all makes it all the more memorable. As for characters, Soraya is the pure embodiment of this trope.
  • Replacement Scrappy: Penélope was supposed to be this after Soraya's "death" mid-series, but Soraya became such a Breakout Villain that she was relegated into a secondary antagonist and later turns out to be Soraya's Good Counterpart.
  • Seinfeld Is Unfunny: The novela was wildly popular in its heyday and catapulted Thalia to international stardom, but nowadays it's seen as heavily clichéd, even by novela standards. Then again, some people love it for those very same reasons.
  • The Woobie: Poor, poor Alicia.
Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Maria_La_Del_Barrio/YMMV?oldid=1564766"