Written by Adriana Morales
In the opening scenes, a young maid by the name of Flora is murdered by a waiter (or so it seems) during a party that the owners of the home in which she works in are throwing. Throughout these scenes, you also find out, through a letter that Flora penned but was lost in the middle of her struggle with her killer, that she was raped by the husband of the party's hosts. A fact that seems to be ignored as Flora apparently tries to tell her employer's wife that she was not seduced by her husband (or did any seducing) but sexually assaulted instead.
These pieces of information help the viewer understand the road in which the show will travel; murder, mystery, and drama with humor peppered throughout each episode. Key characters are introduced in episode one: Marisol, Rosie, Carmen, Valentina, and Zoila make up the "devious" maids group. Most of the show has enough drama to keep you watching until the end, if you can deal with stereotypical instances and Mexican music throughout the entire show. (As if we didn't realize a long time ago that these women are Hispanic.) It was hard to take some of the serious moments, well, seriously. As Latinas, it stung a little to see that the entire group of maids were also, *drum roll*, Latinas. Yes, it was sort of expected, but couldn't we mix it up a little? Throw different races into the mix? Surely there are other races who cook, clean, and take care of rich kids while their own kids are waiting for them to come home? I highly doubt hispanics are the only people who have to go through these kinds of situations. It would have been a creative breath of fresh air to add at least two maids of differing cultures to the show.
I don't want to include more details on this episode in case you decide to watch it for yourself. However, in my opinion, the show felt like an American version of Hispanic telenovelas. It was sort of like watching TV at Grandma's house. Not entirely terrible, but a little cheesy; I'll be watching Devious Maids again to see if it gets any better before giving up on it entirely. Regardless of it's cons, I'm sure Devious Maids will be entertaining enough to spice up Sunday-night-tomorrow-is-Monday blues at the very least.
You can watch Devious Maids here: Lifetime
