Netflix kept showing me this show. Finally, I decided to watch it. It took me one weekend to finish it and it was fun. It was my first Spanish reality TV show and I’m willing to watch more.

The audio description surprised me a little. I only have two issues. For those unaware, audio description is a separate audio track added to visual media that describes visual aspects. It’s mainly intended for blind and visually impaired audiences, but can benefit and be enjoyed by anyone.

Series Premise

Contestants enter as couples and are separated into two villas, Venus and Mars. The purpose is to find out if their love is false or real and how much they know their partner. Throughout the show, they’re exposed to real and fake videos of each other using deep fake technology and they have to figure out if they’re true or false. The couples with the least amount of errors wins 100,000 euros.

Series Information

Genre: Reality TV
Category: Adult
Explicit violence: No
Explicit sex: Yes
Content warnings I noticed: None

Review

The writing is good. The language targets an adult audience, perfect for this show. Because I have very little exposure to Spanish audio description, I have nothing to compare it to. Sorry about that. Hopefully, that will change as I continue to critique audio descriptions.

The descriptions are, surprisingly, very detailed. I say surprisingly because most of the Spanish audio descriptions I’ve been exposed to are sparse. People are described as well as their clothing. For the most part, they’re easy to follow. There were things I didn’t understand, but it can be attributed to culture differences and my lack of exposure.

I want to talk about subtitles. When it comes to audio description, subtitles are usually hit or miss for me. Most of the time, it’s difficult to tell who is talking because the describer doesn’t clarify who is speaking. So, if there are two people talking, it’s likely I won’t be able to tell who’s talking, but I’ll be able to follow the conversation. That’s not enough, though. Viewers need to be able to tell the difference.

I recently watched a documentary series called How to Get Rich. I love what they did with subtitles. When two people are talking, the audio describer delivers the dialogue for the woman and a male narrator delivers the dialogue for the man. This, I think, was a great idea. I tend to have issues with two different describers dividing the audio description. I talked about it in Argentina 1985, explaining that there was no need for someone else to read the text on screen, dates, and credits. The original audio describer could have done it without a problem. However, with subtitles, it’s a little different since, depending on what you’re watching, it’s between two people and it’s important for viewers to be able to identify who is talking.

I bring all this up because there are subtitles in this series. They’re delivered by a female narrator, but it’s difficult to tell who’s talking. I encourage audio description companies to make it easier to distinguish who’s talking. Since it’s hard to tell who’s talking in this series, there was no reason for the female narrator.

The describer’s performance is engaging. Their voice is neutral with a hint of excitement. It’s a very pleasant voice to listen to. That’s always good.

The audio description is edited well. The describer doesn’t interrupt commentary and dialogue. Viewers are able to appreciate music and silence.

Currently, Netflix offers this series audio described in European Spanish. The series is offered in a few other languages, however. Netflix excludes viewers by not offering the series audio described in all the languages it offers it.

Conclusion

Overall, this was a surprisingly good audio description. I want more of these. We need them. I rate it three stars. Let me know your thoughts in the comments.