Variety’s John Hopewell brings word of a new Spanish action series now forthcoming in Talitha Kum. Marialy Rivas (Young & Wild) is directing the action drama from a script by Chilean playwright Manuela Infante (Invisible Heroes), and writers Enrique Videla (The Pack, Dignity, HBO’s Profugos).
Talitha Kum culminates around a global covert organization of ass-kicking kung fu nuns who train in the confines of Convent of Sisters of Charity, before applying their deadly skills against Mexico’s most feared gangs to help free young girls from sex trafficking.
Our story is set in Tenanchingo, Tlaxcala, South-East Mexico, where Magdalena, a young cloistered nun with fierce martial arts prowess, receives the call to infiltrate the criminal underworld of sex slavery just as war breaks out between rival gangs. As the rest of Hopewell’s report elucidates on Magdalena, though she’s “One hell of a bad ass when it comes to martial arts, Magdalena also proves in other ways to be special.”
London-based Freemantle is teaming up with Pablo Larrain (Jackie) and producer Juan de Dios Larraín (Gloria Bell) at Fábula to co-produce, with the latter handing international sales.
The report also notes that as casting awaits, the story arc and script are all ready for season one while both companies will be at Natpe: Miami next week to pitch the series, as noted by Angela Poblete, Fábula’s director of TV.
“We’re ever more moved, as women, to enjoy the opportunity of creating fiction with issues that affect and interest us,” Poblete said. “The question is how. How can we get across our issues so that they’re attractive for large audiences? In this case, an action series, bordering on the supernatural, is the perfect and highly sexual wrapping as a way into the material. The scripts are mind-blowing, characters complex and diverse, the ninja nun team has the legs for multiple seasons.”
The show itself is described as one that targets all markets, with Rivas reportedly drawing her inspriation from a news byte she caught once upon a time about a group of nuns rescuing young girls. She herself points out that the series is constructed for all markets, and will be told with “a contemporary, feminist viewpoint,” and have “pop, comic-book, attractive visuals,”.
Talitha Kum sounds like a move in the right direction after more than a year of sobering cancellations for hit shows like Netflix’s Marvel ventures on Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist, Luke Cage and The Defenders. Martial arts-dominant Into The Badlands wrapped its series progression last May on AMC, and now it appears Cinemax’s epic kung fu crime drama, Warrior, is getting the shaft long before its second season premiere this Fall.
Talitha Kum isn’t the first property to arise with a warrior nun theme to its narrative, though this particular series looks to touch on something very real and relative in its push, given the prevalent and problematic existence that is sex trafficking. Rivas’ heart is in the right place, and I certainly hope this show finds one all the same.
Read more at Variety.