Getting Serious: ABS-CBN Goes No More Mr. Nice Guy with The Good Son

It will be a new-look and more serious Primetime Bida starting next week.

Gone were the ‘kilig-seryes’ that permeated the fifth slot of ABS-CBN’s ever-popular evening block. With all due respect to JaDine (‘On the Wings of Love’, ‘Till I Met You’) and TonDeng (Ian Veneracion and Bea Alonzo of ‘A Love to Last’), this formula is starting to wear thin.

Instead, ABS-CBN goes back to a more serious approach that made ‘The Legal Wife’ and ‘Two Wives’ runaway successes. The newest drama, ‘The Good Son’, despite its designation as a family drama, leans more on the mature and dark side.

While rival GMA continues to lean too much on aging and at times overexposed veterans for their primetime dramas, ABS-CBN cashes in on their deep roster of young talent for ‘The Good Son’. The series will be led by Jerome Ponce, Nash Aguas, Joshua Garcia and McCoy de Leon, and joining them are fellow rising stars Loisa Andallo, Elisse Joson and Alexa Ilacad.

In ‘The Good Son’, Jerome (as Enzo), Nash (as Calvin), Joshua (as Joseph) and McCoy (as Obet) are four siblings who live a simple and happy life without their father Victor (Albert Martinez), a man whose identity remains a secret. But Victor’s mysterious death led to a series of events that saw the four siblings accused of murder, and the ensuing battle to prove who is innocent from the crime is on.

‘The Good Son’ will also include Mylene Dizon, Eula Valdez, John Estrada, Ronnie Lazaro, Jeric Raval, Alex Medina, and Kathleen Hermoso. The series will be directed by Manny Palo and Andoy Ranay.

Considering ABS-CBN’s reputation for turning rising stars into superstars, the pressure is now on ‘The Good Son”s up-and-coming actors to continue this budding trend. However, it remains to be seen if the series’ untested group of young talent will thrive in the high-stakes block that is primetime.

It will also be interesting to see how the viewers react to a change of formula from a light drama to a more serious one. That said, ‘The Good Son’ should be a series that may either make or break Primetime Bida’s unpredictable fifth slot.

‘The Good Son’ airs weeknights after ‘La Luna Sangre’ on ABS-CBN’s Primetime Bida.

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JaDine Returns with Till I Met You

JaDine is back on the small screen.

Seven months after the conclusion of the love team’s breakout TV hit ‘On the Wings of Love’, James Reid and Nadine Lustre return for a greater dose of ‘kilig’, but at the same time tackle more serious storylines. Their newest project, ‘Till I Met You’, will showcase a more mature JaDine, while it introduces a new star.

‘Till I Met You’ will focus on the lives of three people, each with a story to tell. Iris (Nadine) and Basti (James) are a couple and are set to marry, but things soon turn when Iris’ best friend Ali, played by JC Santos, is revealed to have a secret relationship with Basti.

Like more recent ABS-CBN dramas featuring their love teams, ‘Till I Met You’ will also highlight a particular tourist attraction. The early portion of the series was shot in Greece, a country that features a mild Mediterranean climate and a vast tradition of civilization and commerce.

Joining JaDine and JC on ‘Till I Met You’ are Carmina Villaroel, Zoren Legaspi, Pokwang, Angel Aquino, Kim Molina, Noel Trinidad and Robert Seña, with Richard Yap and Jay Manalo playing special roles. The series will be directed by Antonette Jadaone and Andoy Ranay, both of whom have been the directors of JaDine’s projects in the past.

The hype for ‘Till I Met You’ has been tremendous leading up to its premiere. News regarding the upcoming series became a constant trending topic on social media, and as such, fans of JaDine cannot stop talking about ‘Till I Met You”s hit potential.

This should cause a concern for GMA, whose continuous failures to concoct their own popular love teams have been well documented. The expected popularity of ‘Till I Met You’ could keep GMA out of it, especially now that they are airing a Koreanovela (in this case ‘Descendants of the Sun’) as a last resort.

It will be interesting to see how the new and improved JaDine will fare the second time around. But as far as viewers are concerned, there will be no surprises, as they are poised to once again generate high ratings for ABS-CBN based on past reputation.

‘Till I Met You’ premieres this Monday, and airs weeknights after ‘Ang Probinsyano’ on ABS-CBN’s Primetime Bida.