Fantaserye, bilang na ang mga araw?

Author: Billy Balbastro
Column: Take Billy

I saw the Filipino passion for the komiks in the �70s and early �80s when the komiks were the Bible then of Pinoys from school kids, college students to even housewives and professionals.

Those were the days when komiks magazines were displayed in the streets and sidewalks, for rent, with people of all ages filling up long benches. Komiks-reading was in vogue then.

TonyVelasquez� story about Kenkoy and Rosing. Uncle Mars Ravelo with his small town drama as well as legends of Darna, Captain Barbell, Lastikman and love stories like Maruja, Haydee and Rowena.

Even Brocka and Ishmael Bernal had their own films from komiks serials like Wanted: Perfect Mother and Vibora.

There were Francisco Coching and Carlo Caparas who were a class by themselves then. So was Jim Fernandez.

But the public romance with komiks came to pass. Suddenly they disappeared from the scene and our current culture. By the 90s they were pass�.

I remember the komiks with last season�s fascination of television with fantasies. Instead of giving us slices of real life as soap does, they transformed traditional soap to fantasies and adventures, which used to be the domain of the komiks.

ABS-CBN started it with Marina in 2002. Again Krystala with GMA coming up with Darna, Encantadia and now Sugo and Etheria. With great expense, ABS came up with Kampanerang Kuba and now Panday which are originally komiks materials.

But observers of Pinoy television must notice that slowly, the interest is waning. Darna and Encantadia and Marina before then, used to have ratings in the 40s. If they scored less than 40 percent rating, that was their bad day.

Not anymore. Sugo and Etheria have current ratings now lower than 33 percent. Sometimes even in high 20s. Of course, we can explain that!

Of course, ABS-CBN�s Gulong ng Palad, a traditional Filipino soap -- a small town drama of simple folk -- is giving a good fight as it inches to improve on the competition each day. Real life drama vs. fantasy.

And there�s Mga Anghel Na Walang Langit -- with an interesting story for a tearjerker, with no big stars, only kids and seasoned performers and topnotch director Maryo J. delos Reyes -- holding its own now with Sugo, its competitor in its evening slot. Again, real soap vs. action fantasy.

To think that MAWL was originally conceived as a two-season soap and unlike Kampanerang Kuba and Ikaw Ang Lahat Sa Akin which cost a lot of money to produce with big stars, it is performing even better now in the ratings. Imagine besting Sugo in some days! Like Sugo, 24.9% vs. MAWL, 29.7% last last 9.

So I feel that the sign for these action-fantasies and costumed adventure series is on the wall. Their days of public interest and patronage are numbered. I applaud even if I am just the only one applauding. I shout for joy even if mine is just a voice in the dark, now. I am for more realism on TV.

Soon our TV people will get tired of fiction and fantasy and go back and look at us, normal people for inspiration. Human beings have more stories to tell than flying maidens and talking birds and princesses of imagined kingdoms. Real stories much better than fiction.

Even if Andrea del Rosario looks and behaves not as a high school student and Cherie Gil has transformed herself to a priestess of overacting (how come when she used to be excellent), I still would take Gulong ng Palad and all the stories about life in a typical barrio, town or city in my TV fare.

Granted that we need to escape from the harsh realities of life and enjoy some escapism in our TV fare, tila sobrang escapism na yata kung we have gubat boy in the class on Sunday, a local version of Thumbelina on early afternoon and two more hours of fantastic flying beings on evenings!

My God, what would happen to us with too much fantasy in our TV diet? We won�t even know how our neigHBOrs or people like us live. Children may believe that even the birds and the bees can talk, that with black magic they can be pretty.

Enough is enough.

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sNEW ACTOR: A new actor is born in the current gigantic hit of the season, Don�t Give Up On Us, the Judy Ann Santos-Piolo Pascual starrer.

Introducing in the Joyce Bernal-picture is former TV host JC Cuardrado. The tall looker who is 20 used to be a co-host of Ogie Diaz in ABC-CBN�s talk show, Showbiz No. 1.

JC used to be also with Studio 23�s Wazzup Wazzup.

After this movie stint, he finds it fun and an unforgettable. A nice sideline, he says. I heard that before. From Paolo Bediones who has made two films (Kapalit, Exodus) in his decade-long TV career.

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HOT KATRINA: Showbiz insiders not that Katrina Halili is a hot item in showbiz. A daring pose in a calendar. An inclusion in the sexiest ladies in FHM current list.

A proof of this is the replay tonight of her story Minsan May Isang Anak, The Katrina Halili Story in Mel Tiangco�s Magpakailanman.

A product of a broken home, Katrina has luck and fighting spirit to go through life with her own degree of success. A teener on her own.

She appears in this episode as herself with Rio Locsin and Lloyd Samartino as her parents and Juan Rodrigo as her stepfather. Andrew Schimmer and Symon Soler are in the cast.

Her colleagues at StarStruck, Cristine Reyes and Sheena Halili appear also as themselves.

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ONE-LINER: Be happy when God answers your prayer but be more thankful when God makes you the answer to someone else�s prayer.

Source: Abante