Positive immigration-themed comedy has sex references.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 8+?
Any Positive Content?
Sex, Romance & Nudity
some
Heavy kissing among teens. References to adults having sex. Ill-informed comments about a girls' reputation, kissing, and its relationship to getting pregnant. Only some of this will go over kids' heads.
Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.
Occasional argument and threats when a kid doesn't pay back money. Mild insults fly back and forth, but on occasion racist behavior (such as name-calling) is audible among kids.
Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.
McDonald's, Mr. Coffee, Grape-Nuts, and other brands are occasionally featured.
Diverse Representations
a lot
The Castellos are Dominican, and Victor is part Italian. Secondary characters are White, Black, and from various Latino cultures, including Cuban and Colombian.
Uses humor to address many of the challenges Latino immigrants experienced when emigrating to the United States in the 1980s. Family and friendship are main themes. Stereotypes, racism, classism, and assimilation are addressed.
Positive Role Models
some
Cucu is not perfect, but she's strong, smart, confident. Victor Castelli is a hard worker who wants to provide the best for his family, and Adela and children understand this. Some folks are overtly racist, others are more ignorant about what they are doing.
Educational Value
a little
Viewers will learn some details about immigrant experiences, particularly in the 1980s.
Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that Gordita Chronicles is a comedy featuring a 12-year-old girl and her family negotiating the highs and lows of emigrating to Miami, Florida, from the Dominican Republic in the mid-1980s. It's geared toward kids and contains positive messages about family, being true to oneself, communication, curiosity, and perseverance. It also contains a fair amount of sexual innuendo, ranging from adults flirting and talking about having sex (only some of which will go over kids' heads) to quick conversations about losing your reputation and getting pregnant from kissing. One episode features bleeped cursing, and brands like McDonald's and Mr. Coffee are occasionally featured, but this is offered within specific contexts. The series also addresses issues like racial/ethnic and gender stereotypes, classism, cultural assimilation, and the cultural negotiations that sometimes come with being raised in a Latino family in the United States.
Watched it with my daughter (age 10) and loved it! Very tight 30 minute episodes have multiple storylines focusing on mom Elena at home, dad Victor at his advertising job, and daughters Cucu and Emilia at middle school. Most of the episodes focus on aspects of American life that the family was unfamiliar with before coming to America - sleepovers, Halloween, driving laws, etc. Everyone is also dealing with stereotypes - the dad at work and the two girls at middle school. None of it is really mean-spirited, just non-immigrant Americans making ignorant mistakes. A grim-faced social studies teacher enforcing Dade county's "only English in public buildings" law pops up in a single episode. Emilia also gets involved in some Mean Girls drama, and Cucu has a crush that she doesn't know what to do with. LANGUAGE: No swear words. Cucu is presented with a chalkboard of English swears on a chalkboard but they are blurred out. She says bullsh*t later in that episode and gets detention for it. VIOLENCE: Mostly just kids sniping at each other. A third grader threatens to shave off another kid's eyebrows. There is a reference to drug cartels having people murdered. SEX: Kissing. Talk about boobs and male interest in them. There is an episode where the dad is freaking out about a business meeting taking place in a strip club. The mom reminds him that her cousin was a stripper for a while, and gives him tips on how to act. It turns out to be a club with male dancers, who rip off their pants to reveal sparkly boxer briefs. OCCULT: When Emilia wants to get back at a boy, she and the other girls in her squad get out a spellbook and try to curse him. GENDER: A very nice Gloria Estefan drag queen makes an appearance in the first episode. Cucu resists the home ec vs shop class requirement. DIVERSITY: Could have been addressed better. There is one Black American character, Barbara, who works in Victor's office and is called Whoopi by their boss because he can't keep anyone's names straight. But there aren't any Black kids at the girls' school (African Americans or Afro-Latinos) or any Haitian immigrants in the show. Which is weird because a ton of Haitians came to Miami in the late 70s and early 80s. None of the episodes address skin color at all.
What's the Story?
Executive-produced by Eva Longoria and Zoe Saldana, GORDITA CHRONICLES is a situation comedy about a family who moves to Florida from the Dominican Republic in the 1980s. It's 1985, and 12-year-old Carlotta "Cucu" Castelli (Olivia Goncalves) was a happy and popular upper-middle-class Catholic school student living in the Caribbean. But when her father, Victor (Juan Javier Cardenas), accepts a marketing position in Miami, Cucu -- along with her dad, mother Adela (Diana-Maria Riva), and older sister Emilia (Savannah Nicole Ruiz) -- finds herself trying to adapt to a new life in the United States. They soon realize that Miami is expensive and that people can be prejudiced. For Cucu and Emilia, life at school also presents a whole new set of challenges. Luckily, Cucu has friends like Ashley (Cosette Hauer) and Yoshi (Noah Rico) to help her get through it. It's not the American Dream they envisioned, but together they know that they will achieve their goals in the country they now call home.
The humorous series, which is narrated by the now adult journalist Cucu, is a fish-out-of-water story that highlights what life was like for many Latino immigrants who moved to the United States in the 1980s. From understanding the benefits and drawbacks of taxes and double coupons to contending with stereotypes and systematic racism like "English-only" rules, Gordita Chronicles highlights the many different ways Latin American and Caribbean immigrants had to broker their lives in the United States during that time. Granted, the observations are offered during silly and formulaic sitcom moments. But what makes Gordita Chronicles most appealing is its interpretation of Cucu, a young, confident, brown-skinned, bigger-bodied, Spanish-speaking girl who's balancing her need to stay true to herself and her culture with wanting to be accepted by her new community. No doubt those who had similar immigration experiences will identify with (and appreciate) much of what is presented here. Meanwhile, younger generations of Latino viewers will have the benefit of seeing people from their broader community represented in positive ways on TV.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the meaning of "gordita" (or "gordito") in Latin American and Caribbean cultures. Did you know that it's a term of endearment for children? How is it translated and used against Cucu when she moves to the United States?
How do you think Cucu and her family's experiences in the 1980s compare with the experiences that Latin American and Caribbean immigrants have when they come to the United States today? Have things changed? How?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by
Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.
By Melissa Camacho
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
