{"id":7242,"date":"2016-01-29T01:12:38","date_gmt":"2016-01-29T05:12:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/arts.umich.edu\/ink\/?p=7242"},"modified":"2016-01-29T01:12:38","modified_gmt":"2016-01-29T05:12:38","slug":"why-i-absolutely-adore-jane-the-virgin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/2016\/01\/29\/why-i-absolutely-adore-jane-the-virgin\/","title":{"rendered":"Why I Absolutely Adore Jane the Virgin"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week, something extremely important happened in my life. What was it, you may ask?<\/span><\/p>\n

Jane the Virgin<\/span><\/i> returned after its mid-season break this Monday night. <\/span><\/p>\n

*screams very loudly*<\/span><\/p>\n

I love Jane the Virgin<\/span><\/i>. I don\u2019t know how many times I can say it in a week – I said it on Monday when the show came on, I said it on Tuesday night to my friends, I said it Wednesday to a girl I had just met. I love this show. <\/span><\/p>\n

So here\u2019s the story. Last semester, I was scrolling through Netflix to see what they had added recently, and I saw <\/span>Jane the Virgin <\/span><\/i>on there. I was instantly excited. I had heard really good things about the show, even if I didn\u2019t know anything about it. However, this meant absolutely nothing. There are about 100 things on my Netflix queue that I was \u201creally excited about\u201d 3, 4, 5 months ago. <\/span><\/p>\n

So when I was having a particularly bad day, and I didn\u2019t feel like doing any homework (although, to be honest, when do I feel like doing my homework), I laid on the couch in my apartment with the lights off and looked on Netflix for something to make me feel better. Surprisingly, I clicked on <\/span>Jane<\/span><\/i> and started episode 1.<\/span><\/p>\n

Eventually, one of my roommates migrated into the living room around episode 2 or 3, and we ended up watching either 7 or 8 episodes together. And after that I was hooked. The show was funny, dramatic, serious, clever, intuitive – everything I never knew I could have in a TV show but now needed.<\/p>\n

I began telling everyone I knew about this show. I ended up convincing my other roommate to start it, and with one roommate already done, and three currently watching it, <\/span>Jane the Virgin<\/span><\/i> kind of became the apartment show. <\/span><\/p>\n

However, all good things must come to an end, and by the time winter break rolled around, we were all done with season one and had to catch up on season two, so that this week we could all watch it together. And of course, we did, and it was fantastic.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now that we\u2019re all caught up to the present, I should maybe talk about the actual show. There are so many good things I could say about the show, I don\u2019t even know where to begin. As someone who truly cares about diversity (#OscarsSoWhite y\u2019all), I tend to get excited about things that feature a diverse cast. Last semester, I was all about <\/span>Quantico<\/span><\/i>. Though they could do a bit better, especially in the male cast, I am in love with Priyanka Chopra and Aunjanue Ellis is queen. Last year, I was all about <\/span>Fresh Off The Boat<\/span><\/i>, featuring the first Asian-American cast on primetime television in 10 years, even if its been surrounded in some much-needed controversy about representation of minorities on television. <\/span><\/p>\n

So when I started watching <\/span>Jane the Virgin<\/span><\/i>, I was already pleased at how well the cast was organized. Jane has very strong latina roots, and they come across loud and clear on the show, and yet because of her sunny disposition and ability to befriend anyone, the cast opens up so that it isn\u2019t just a latin@ show, and it doesn\u2019t claim to be one. It doesn\u2019t stigmatize or stereotype the lives of the women on the show, and yet they clearly aren\u2019t there for diversity\u2019s sake. They have complex, emotional lives, and are highly relatable characters.<\/span><\/p>\n

And not only is the show centered on the lives of latin@s, it also focuses on female relationships and even, at times, prioritizes them over male relationships. For Jane, family is everything, and all of her decisions, her thoughts, feelings, dreams – they are all closely tied to her family. And for a very, very long time, her family has been three women. Three strong, independent, resilient, vulnerable, caring women. Even when portraying Jane as the \u201cgood girl\u201d who took care of her teenage mom at times, Xiomara herself isn\u2019t portrayed as helpless. I mean she raised Jane for crying out loud, so that\u2019s saying something. And while Alba may be the grandmother, and therefore the oldest out of the three, she isn\u2019t portrayed as \u201coutdated\u201d or \u201cold-fashioned\u201d in any way. She\u2019s portrayed as strong and caring as well, clearly showing how her traits have been passed down all the way to Jane.<\/span><\/p>\n

I could keep going, but I think my point is clear. Both comedic and dramatic, both sad and hilarious, both fresh and funny, <\/span>Jane the Virgin<\/span><\/i> is dazzling. It\u2019s complex, it\u2019s diverse, it resists and even challenges stereotypes, and seriously, when\u2019s the last time you saw the main character of a TV show pregnant for the majority of it? And as evidenced by my apartment, it brings people together.<\/span><\/p>\n

So your homework this weekend, then, is to sit down and marathon <\/span>Jane the Virgin<\/span><\/i>. You won\u2019t regret it. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week, something extremely important happened in my life. What was it, you may ask? Jane the Virgin returned after its mid-season break this Monday night. *screams very loudly* I love Jane the Virgin. I don\u2019t know how many times I can say it in a week – I said it on Monday when the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[141,142,939,647,606],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7242"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7242"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7242\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7243,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7242\/revisions\/7243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}