This week will be the last hurrah for ‘My Love from the Star’.
On Friday, August 11, GMA will give viewers one final glimpse into the love story of Steffi and Matteo. Since its premiere on May 29, the unlikely pairing of Jennylyn Mercado and Gil Cuerva breathed new life into the characters originally portrayed by Korean stars Jun Ji-hyun and Kim Soo-hyun, and people who watched the original series looked in awe at the performance of the duo.
Notwithstanding the story and the actors involved, it is very surprising to see ‘My Love from the Star’ run for only a short period of time. Clocking at only 55 episodes, this series joined a dubious list of Filipino teleseryes that did not last at least 80 episodes (this included its predecessor ‘Destined to Be Yours’ which ran for only 63 episodes).
But unlike AlDub’s ill-fated debut series, the brief run of ‘My Love from the Star’ has nothing to do with the ratings (the series regularly fell victim to ‘My Dear Heart’ and ‘La Luna Sangre’ throughout its tenure). In fact, GMA planned it to run for only a short period of time in order to remain faithful to the original Korean series.
It was a shame that ‘My Love from the Star’ had to air for only a few months. The brief tenure of the show did not allow enough time for veteran Jennylyn Mercado and newcomer Gil Cuerva to develop their much-needed chemistry.
Still, as far as GMA is concerned, the pairing between Jennylyn and Gil is only temporary. Unless GMA plans to give the duo another series to work with in the future, all signs point for this on-screen duo to move on and focus on other opportunities.
In short, Jennylyn Mercado and Gil Cuerva together is like a one-off project. But if GMA is satisfied with their performance, perhaps another, longer series could be in the offing for the two.
The final five episodes of ‘My Love from the Star’ should be a great one. This will be the final opportunity to see how Steffi (Jennylyn) and Matteo (Gil) forge their love for each other.
P.S.: The final week of ‘My Love from the Star’ will be dedicated to former cast member Spanky Manikan, who unexpectedly left the show due to health reasons (it was later revealed that the actor is suffering from Stage 4 lung cancer).
From the Tube 
The reason: Di yata sumikat ang local version nito kesa sa Original version nito… At sigurado sa Lunes na ang pagbabalik ni Alyas Robin Hood…
Since the start, inannounce that they are no extension plans whatsoever kung sumikat man or hinde.
Obviously they want to make the series as faithful as possible to the Korean series, hence the short run. You don’t normally see that kind of decision in Philippines teleseryes in which they want to make it as short as possible regardless of success or failure.
Sinugalan ng GMA yang male lead? lol kaya naman DOA
Don’t blame him. It’s just that the producers only made MLFTS a short-term series so that it remains faithful to the Korean original. You don’t see very often that an adaptation of a Korean drama had a few deviations from the original. Most of the time, they were highly altered to fit the Filipino style.
Although it was said that the show was not planned to have any extensions regardless if the show was a hit or not, the fact that it was losing in the ratings badly must have still hurt and probably only strengthened that decision. The ratings were so bad that people were calling it “My Flop from the Star” or “My Flop from the Start”, or even “My Flop from the Start to Finish”.
As for Gil, I remember reading that he was a fashion or commercial model prior to being cast as the lead role. That, and that the promotions calling him “King of the Gil” didn’t really click, and fans of Enrique Gil weren’t pleased. Finally, as far as I can tell, the only role he’s had since then was as a guest role in I think DKNLK, so it looks like GMAAC still has work to do in giving roles to their artists. At least Jennylyn’s doing fine so far.
It was a bad pairing from the start. GMA could’ve given the lead female role to a younger actress but given their propensity to cast veterans they handed it over to Jennylyn. And predictably, it flopped.
It also didn’t help that Gil was raw in terms of acting skills. He’s like a Maine Mendoza that came out of nowhere but whose acting talent still needs further polishing.