Rubí (2004-2005) is a telenovela produced and distributed by Televisa in Mexico and distributed in the United States by Univision. It stars Bárbara Mori as the titular protagonist.
The series is the second Live-Action Adaptation of Yolanda Vargas's 1963 serial, eponymous Comic Book which was published in the Mexican magazine Lágrimas, risas y amorTranslation . The first telenovela, based on Vargas's Rubí, aired in 1968 and starred Fanny Cano. A live-action film was made in 1970, starring Irán Eory. Later adaptations were released in 2010 in the Philippines (starring Angelica Panganiban), 2012 in Egypt and Lebanon (starring Cyrine Abdelnour), and in 2020 in Mexico again (starring Camila Sodi). Notably, the 2004 adaptation remains the most popular one, to the point of marketing the 2010, 2012, and 2020 telenovelas as its remakes.
The general premise is that of a working-class, cunning, Academic Alpha Bitch who exploits her beauty and smarts to climb the social ladder, first by marrying a wealthy man and then investing his money for her own profit. This woman is Rubí Pérez.
In the 2004 adaptation, Rubí belongs to a poor household comprised of herself, her single, elderly mother Doña Refugio, and her older sister Cristina who is the breadwinner. They live in a rundown department complex. Thanks to the efforts of Cristina and Rubí's own academic brilliance, Rubí is able to get a partial scholarship at a prestigious private university. While majoring in Business Administration, Rubí befriends and envies Maribel, a crippled, shy, Spoiled Sweet girl.
Maribel meets Héctor, a rich architect, on the internet and the two quickly become a couple. However, Héctor finds himself very physically attracted to Rubí from the get-go. With Héctor comes Alejandro, a middle-class, talented physician who subtly pretends to be more well-off than he actually is in order to seduce Rubí. The two genuinely fall in love but due to Alejandro's trickery and Rubí's ambition, their relationship is ill-fated.
Rubí, overcame by heartbreak and her envy toward Maribel, sets out to seduce Héctor who she has proof is wealthy. She succeeds and they flee to Cancún the day of Héctor and Maribel's wedding. Once married to him, Rubí starts living her dream life, surrounded by luxury and a handsome, wealthy husband eager to please her. Unfortunately, she's no Karma Houdini and her deeds start catching up to her three years later when it's revealed that Alejandro became a Self-Made Man and that he and Maribel are now an item.
This telenovela provides examples of:
- Abduction Is Love: When Hector discovers that Rubí only married him for his money and that she's pregnant with Alejandro's child, he becomes insane and kidnaps her in their home, not only to get back at her for ruining his life but also to force her to love him.
- Adaptation Expansion: The 2010 version gives an entire backstory to Rubí, justifying her bitchy behavior. She was born in prison, as her biological mother was incarcerated for fraud; and was immediately put up for adoption afterwards. She then got tangled into a messy rivalry between her biological mother and her biological father (who married another woman), and she even wandered in the streets. When her biological mother was eventually set free and eventually reunited with her child, she spoiled her like a princess.
- Amnesia Danger: Alejandro's mother Carla. this happens twice while the family is vacationing in Ixtapa after Sonia's death.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: The best way to describe Rubí.
- Bittersweet Ending:
- The bitter: Rubí losing everything she ever held dear; her husband dies, her friends, Alejandro and family ostracize her. Worst of all her face gets disfigured and she is now a cripple. The alternate ending shows her finding solitude elsewhere but is still very much alone.
- The sweet: Alejandro becomes a successful man later in life and marries Maribel.
- The 2010 version ends with Rubi bearing a scar on her face and crippled after Hector, who in this version becomes deranged, tries to kill her. However, she finally understands the destruction she has caused and becomes free of her own greed, even happy that Maribel and Alejandro get married. In the end, she apologizes to her mother's grave and lives with her aunt. She's poor, but says she is free to love without allowing greed to get in the way.
- Black Widow: Subverted with Rubí, while she didn't cause Héctor's fatal accident, she suggested Alejandro to murder him in his surgery, which he refused, and at the funeral Rubí didn't feel any grief for her husband's death, instead, she's glad by that.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Hector, Alejandro, and Maribel, respectively. Interestingly, both Alejandro and Maribel are rather brainy, whereas Hector is both dumb and fiery.
- Phrase Catcher: Loreto tells Rubí that she's "Tan bella como perversa"Translation whenever the latter's evil schemes pan out.
- Color Motifs: Rubí usually dresses in red outfits and wears red makeup which is the color of rubies.
- Cool Big Sis: Rubí is this to her niece Fernanda, who is very beautiful and has a hunger to scale the social ladder as well.
- The Corrupter: Rubi ends up teaching Fernanda her evil ways and tells her to go cause chaos between Alejandro and his son, thus causing serious heartbreak for Maribel out of sheer spite.
- Crazy Jealous Guy: Hector becomes this with Rubi when he discovers she married him while being still in love with Alejandro, to the point he mistreats her physically, follows her anywhere, and kidnaps her in their own house and refuses to give her a divorce. It was later revealed that he inherited a mental illness from his late father who behaved the same way with his mother,
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Sonia, as she falls through a glass bridge and dies after an argument with Rubi.
- Hector also applies here as he survives a horrific car crash only to then die in surgery due to a tampered IV which causes him to bleed out.
- Destructive Romance:
- Rubi's relationship with Hector in spades.
- She married Hector for his money and manipulated and lied to him. The irony of this is that she still loved Alejandro. As a result, Hector dies in a car accident.
- The Dragon: In the 2004 version Fernanda ends up becoming this for her aunt.Rubí.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Rubí, after betraying Maribel and marrying Héctor, tries to get her mother's forgiveness by giving her money and medicines, believing she and Cristina would accept them like that. She was wrong as Refugio slaps her on the face with her bills and refuses to accept Rubí's dirty money, even when she and Cristina were almost thrown out from their house for not having money to pay the rent.
- False Friend: Rubí to Maribel, as she only befriended her because of her wealth and because Maribel gave her fancy gifts as jewelry and designer clothes, but Rubí still was envious of Maribel's social status and even insulted her behind her back, and eventually betrayed her by stealing her boyfriend only for his money.
- Fortune Teller: Jorge Flores.
- Framing Device: The 2020 reboot has a journalist named Carla, who convinces Rubí to tell her story.
- Four-Philosophy Ensemble: Rubí (Cynic), Alejandro (Realist), Maribel (Optimist), Hector (Conflicted), Loreto (Apathetic).
- Freudian Excuse: The 2010 remake goes hard in giving Rubí a tragic past and several Freudian excuses for being a bitch, including having her biological father leave her mother and marry into a rich family (and Rubi's wealthy female friend Maribel was retconned into her half-sister) to the backstory that Rubi's single mother briefly lost her daughter in a crowded city, which led to Rubi spending several years a child homeless and wandering the streets, starving; which is why her mother (upon finding her) spoiled her rotten.
- Gilded Cage: Rubí's house becomes this when she's kidnapped by Héctor.
- Gold Digger: The central premise of the series. Rubi wants to escape poverty by all means by marrying a rich man.
- Gossipy Hens: Dona Lola and Mariquita. but especially Dona Lola.
- Happily Ever After: For Maribel and Alejandro, Cristina and Marco, Paco and Lorena, Dona Lola and Oneisimo
- Happily Married: Maribel and Alejandro, Hector's godmother Elisa and Maribel's father Arturo, Alejandro's parents, and Cristina and Cayetano until his death.
- It's implied Rubi's mother and her husband were this as well.
- Hopeless Suitor: Subverted woth Héctor as he was married to Rubí, but she's in love with Alejandro, and Héctor ends up begging her for another chance together which results in his death.
- Paco was this to Rubi early on, but was ignored by Rubi because he was also poor like her. however, he gets involved with her friend Lorena and it's revealed that he's actually the son of the billionaire Victoria Gallegos and is emancipated from his mother, and chooses to live in poverty. Paco even calls Rubi out on this at the end of the novela.
- Maribel is this with Alejandro for a little bit while he's married to Sonia. Maribel even admits this to her directly.
- Maribel herself is pined after by Ernesto and Lucio Montemayor, as well. Ernesto wants to be with her originally to get close to Alejandro so he can help his father take revenge on him but actually falls in love with her, and Lucio even asks her father Arturo if he can marry her because she reminds him of his dead wife!
- Ingrid is this to Saul, and Saul is this with Lorena, and Alejandro's sister Sofia.
- Humiliation Conga: Shortly after Rubi finally gets the power and wealth that she had always wanted, she stole Hector from Maribel to get to the top; and this in turn causes a lot of problems for her as her friends and family turn their backs on her and she is left alone to suffer for her actions.
- I Have No Daughter!: Happens with Refugio, who disowns Rubi as her daughter for betraying Maribel and stealing her boyfriend. Happens as well with Rubí's sister Cristina who disowns her as her sister she caused their mother's death, sent her fiancé Cayetano to jail before their wedding and left Cristina alone and pregnant. Three years later, Cristina even forbids Rubi to get close to her daughter Fernanda.
- Irony:
- After betraying Maribel, Rubí mocks her by telling that no man would ever love her, and she latter gets a photographer named Ernesto, a count named Lucio Montemayor and more importantly Alejandro interested on her, while Rubí only has Héctor who is insanely jealous of Alejandro and mistreats Rubi for that.
- Also Cristina told Rubi that her daughter Fernanda would never be like her aunt, eighteen years later Fernanda becomes an exact copy of Rubi both in looks and greedy ways, even taking her name for herself, with the only difference being her hair color.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Cayetano to Marco, shortly before his impending death, giving him his blessings to marry Cristina and raise his daughter, Fernanda.
- Karma: To Rubí and Héctor.
- To Rubí because she betrayed Maribel stealing her boyfriend and mocking her for her disability in her leg, and Rubí ends up with losing Alejandro to Maribel and with an amputated leg. Also because she sent her sister's fiancé Cayetano to jail only to keep him apart from Cristina, and Rubí ends up kidnapped by Héctor.
- To Héctor because he betrayed Maribel, who genuinely loved him to marry Rubi, a gold-digger, and Rubí ends up betraying him, who really was in love with her for Alejandro.
- Missing Mom: Maribel's mother Silvana, who died in the accident that crippled Maribel.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Rubí adores and dotes on her niece, Fernanda, despite not getting along with anyone else in their family.
- Old Flame: Arturo and Lilia who were previously lovers.
-
One-Hit Wonder: As of December 2023, this is the only Televisa telenovela that Barbara Mori has starred in that has received wide acclaim. The rest of her works are with TV Azteca, a much lesser-known Mexican TV channel. - Oops! I Forgot I Was Married: Genaro to Elisa after the reveal of his other family with Lilia.
- Please, Don't Leave Me: Rubí's reaction to Alejandro breaking up with her in the ending of the series. This also happens to Alejandro himself as Rubi dumped him earlier after finding out he was from a middle-class background.
- Parent-Preferred Suitor: Alejandro's mother really likes Rubi, due in part to her having Alzheimer's and not remembering that Alejandro and Rubi broke up.
- Raised by Grandparents: Maribel with Nanny Pancha. also Hector, with his godparents, Genaro and Elisa.
- Rags to Riches: Rubí's entire modus operandi.
- Paco, after his mother comes back into the picture and convinces him to accept her money.
- Riches to Rags: Lorena, when her parents don't approve of her relationship with Paco.
- Ingrid after her father loses his businesses and she has to beg Rubi for a job at her hotel. Rubi unsurprisingly says no.
- Redemption Equals Death: With Ernesto, who is Bermudez's son, when he discovers that his father was responsible for Héctor's death and that he went to jail for his corrupt dealings, he turns against his father and prevents him from shooting Elena (and unknown to them he also saves Héctor's son), but he ends up accidentally shot by his father, much to the latter's horror.
- Rich Bitch: Rubí was already a bitch, and then she married Héctor.
- Ingrid is this in the beginning, making fun of Maribel for her disability and Rubi for her poverty.
- Runaway Fiancée: Hector runs away from the altar during his marriage to Maribel and runs off with Rubi
- Scholarship Student: Rubí at least at the very beginning until she abandons her studies when she escapes with Héctor.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Fernanda to her aunt Rubí in her adult years, with the only difference being Fernanda's blonde hair, which is one of the main reasons Rubí loves her niece.
- Secret Other Family: Genaro with Lilia, Luis and Naty.
- Surprise Incest: Maribel and Luis, who are revealed to be half siblings while they're dating each other.
- Surprise Pregnancy: Cristina, Rubi, and Sonia are all revealed to be pregnant unexpectedly. Sonia is revealed to have been 3 months pregnant at her funeral, Cristina finds out she's pregnant by Cayetano and Rubi gets pregnant from Alejandro after they reconcile in Ixtapa.
- Taking the Bullet: Rubí protects her niece Fernanda from getting hit by a car and loses her baby as a result.
- Tragic Keepsake: Rubi's coin necklace, which is said to have been given to her by her deceased father. Rubi then gives it to Alejandro.
- Villain Protagonist:
- Rubí's greed gets in the way of whatever love she feels for anyone deep down... which should not come as a surprise given what happens to her years later.
- In the Philippines, where the 2004 and 2010 versions aired, Rubí was even billed "Ang Bidang-Kontrabida" (The Villainous Protagonist).
- Will They or Won't They?: Maribel and Alejandro,
- Cristina and Marco are this for a little while.
