State of National Television Assessment (SONTA)

(Second of three parts)

My State of National Television Assessment or SONTA is getting to be longer than the TSONA (True State of the Nation Address) of Senator Panfilo Lacson, former President Joseph Estrada’s SONIA or State of the Nation Inspite of Arroyo (reminder again to Erap: in spite are two words) and even President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s State of the Nation Address (SONA).

President Arroyo’s SONA was short at 23 minutes because there were a lot of pertinent issues she didn’t tackle – like Hello, Garci and Goodbye, Mike, among others. But I will try to be more thorough with my SONTA – and so here’s the continuation of my assessment of national television today (the commercial networks only and not cable).

• There’s an excess of Korean telenovelas on TV (the Mexican telenovelas has been relegated to daytime). Of course, I do understand why local networks continue to invest on these canned foreign programs. Buying finished products from abroad is still less of a headache (even with today’s exchange rate) compared to waiting for the availability of local young stars (who are into so many things) and gambling on unpredictable Philippine weather (goodbye outdoor shoots!).

And then, there is also the fact that Korean stories can be very interesting – with twists and plots that often penetrate into the viewer’s heart. There was a time when I would take Korean Airlines only because I enjoyed the inflight movies and watching those film features up in the sky more than made up for the lousy service – starting with the arrogant and nasty ground stewardesses at the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX).

Now I don’t know until when we will have this Korean telenovela invasion. But Korean nationals still continue to come over to the Philippines to do business and learn English. Meanwhile, Filipinos are leaving the country to settle in the US, Canada, the Middle East – anywhere but here.

Maybe the time will come when there will be no more Filipinos left in the Philippines. Only Koreans. Oh, well, when that happens, at least they don’t have to dub the Korean telenovelas to Tagalog anymore.

• There’s so much reality shows on TV. From the beginning, I never really liked this concept – robbing people of their private moments. Whatever happened to the word privacy? In this age of reality shows, you can’t even pick your nose privately anymore.

I’m a bit curious and at the same time worried about ABS-CBN’s new reality show, Pinoy Big Brother (which should start airing soon) because it reminds me so much of George Orwell’s 1984 novel. (The show’s title was obviously taken from the Big Brother character in the book: "Big Brother is Watching You!")

In the 1984 novel, people live in dreary rooms equipped with a two-way television screen (telescreen) – and so there is no privacy. I think this is what will happen in Pinoy Big Brother. Every person’s move will be closely monitored by hidden cameras. This is the exact scenario in 1984 – the story of how the world has totally succumbed to communism.

• One or two showbiz-oriented talk shows may have to go (and it better not be Startalk). At the moment, there are five movie talk shows on television: Startalk, ETK, The Buzz, S-Files and the daily afternoon entertainment program, Showbiz Number One – aside from the Chika Minute segment of 24 Oras and Star Patrol of TV Patrol. No, I don’t think Ricky Lo and Melanie Marquez’s Showbiz Stripped (airing tonight on GMA 7 after Idol Ko si Kap) should be under the movie talk show category because it is more of a showbiz documentary. It’s really like the I-Witness of show business.

The number of showbiz talk shows today is definitely less compared to about 10 years ago – when we had Showbiz Lingo, Startalk, Movie Magazine (which became S – with Dolly Ann Carvajal, Jun Nardo and Eugene Asis), Cristy Perminute, Troika (with Alfie Lorenzo, Billy Balbastro and the late Oskie Salazar), Eye-to-Eye and other short-lived movie talk shows that sprouted on Channels 9 and 13. But then, the movie industry was still alive 10 years ago – when there were a lot of things happening in mainstream show business. Sure, we have a lot of digital films now. But would the public be interested in Irma Adlawan’s dirty linen (that is, if she has any)?

And so now we have the Baywalk Bodies and The Bodies having catfights in these showbiz-oriented programs – people who are not even doing films.

Of course, there’s Mahal’s nude video and Madame Auring’s affairs of the heart that still draw a lot of interest among the viewers (Believe me, they bring in the ratings, baby.)

Obviously, we are already scraping the bottom of the barrel because there’s really nothing much happening in show business today. And so we’ll have more of Mahal and Madame Auring and, if there’s really nothing else, even Mystica.

• We have very good public affairs shows in I-Witness, The Correspondents, Reporter’s Notebook and Pipol. These late-evening programs are not cowed by people in the government and present stories and issues as they are. Very commendable work from the public affairs divisions of the two leading networks.

• There’s less sensationalism in news programs. With the incredible things happening in our government today, I swear there’s no need to sensationalize the news any further.

(To be concluded)