Confessions of a TV series buff

For a few hours that I am at home, my time is spent mostly on watching television in the comfort of my bed or sofa. That is why I set aside in my household budget expenditure for subscription for home cable. The advent of cable enabled movie buffs like me to watch at home even box-office films, albeit on delayed basis.

Still, it’s better than having to go out and watch it in a movie house, especially if it is a suspense, scary or horror film. Some directors of this genre of movies — though fiction only — are so good that they can really scare you out of your wits. Yes, I sometimes shriek in fright. It’s a good thing I was just watching the horror or suspense movies at home.

Just last Sunday, while I was catching up the replayed episodes of the “The Walking Dead” TV series, everyone was startled at home when I suddenly screamed. The series in the US cable TV, as the title connotes, is about the apocalypse of zombies. It is based on the series of comic books of the same title by Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, and Charlie Adlard and was adapted for television.

Little known actor in Hollywood, Andrew Lincoln, plays the role of Sheriff Rick Grimes whose wife Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies) and their son Carl found themselves, along with several other survivors, having to contend with a disease that can turn people into zombies. The “walkers,” as the zombies are called in this TV series, prey upon people who survived the unknown source of the disease. But when bitten, if not eaten alive by a “walker,” the uninfected humans can turn into zombies, too.

As in the comics, Season 3 of the series is set in both an abandoned prison complex and an active rural town of survivors. After several months on the road, the group of Grimes tried to make the prison complex into a safe fortress for their group to stay in. To do that, they first have to clear the place of “walkers” (mostly prisoners and prison guards turned into zombies) roaming aimlessly looking for flesh to feed on.

But how do you kill zombies or people who are already dead? The TV series graphically depicts the zombies’ heads being shot or axed off to finally keep them dead and end their menace.

According to its American TV producer, they renewed “The Walking Dead” for a third season after the season two premiere broke cable ratings records in the 18‑49 demographic in the US. Here in the Philippines, this TV series is obviously also rating well.

This we gathered from the briefing STAR editors had the other day with top executives of local TV cable provider SkyCable — Rodrigo Montinola, chief operating officer of SkyCable Corp. and Arlene Reyes-Torres, head of trade and marketing services. In their sales pitch to us, SkyCable installed the latest technology on cable TV called high definition (HD) that could make such scary and gory movies more graphic on screen.

“SkyCable HD brings the action straight to your living room with breathtaking images and panoramic widescreen viewing with motion picture quality sound,” as stated in their promotion feelers.

Locally, Reyes-Torres told us Cinema One is their top-rating cable channel that features latest Filipino movies followed by the DzMM Tele-Radyo and ANC News Channel.

The SkyCable Corp. is a subsidiary of ABS-CBN Corp., the flagship network run by Gabby Lopez. Montinola disclosed the SkyCable has further upgraded their digi-box subscription with HD feature to make home viewing more customized, or the channels are packaged according to the desires of the customers.

To promote HD subscription, SkyCable earlier announced P1 billion in capital expenditure (capex) that the Lopez-owned company will allot in 2013 to be spent on digitization efforts. Now regarded as the country’s largest cable TV operator, SkyCable sees the digitization efforts to boost its subscribers, currently close to 700,000. For this year, SkyCable has also earmarked P1 billion for its capex, bulk of which was spent on digitization.

The TV cable company reportedly forecasts a “double-digit” growth in revenues this year from P5 billion in 2011.

Pay TV service is SkyCable’s main revenue source followed by broadband service and TV advertisements.

SkyCable’s planned capex also includes spending for its newly acquired firms, namely cable TV operators Destiny Cable and Uni-Cable TV Inc., and broadband service provider Solid Broadband Corp.

But what I did not know before was that SkyCable came into being from the brainchild company of former Sen. Ramon Magsaysay Jr. The namesake son of late Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay pioneered the cable TV industry in the country in the early 1970s when community/master antennas for cable television were unheard of.

In his visit at the STAR editorial office last Monday, Magsaysay related to us how he started the cable TV business which has turned into a multi-billion peso a year industry. There are now roughly 900 cable operators nationwide. And in recognition of setting the blueprint for this sector, Magsaysay is credited as “The Father of Cable Television.”

Magsaysay has started making the media rounds to reintroduce himself as one of the 12-man senatorial ticket of the Liberal Party (LP)-led coalition of President Benigno “Noy” Aquino III.

Magsaysay impressed us with his very low-key presentation of himself despite his good record of performance for two consecutive terms at the Senate from 1995 to 2007. I had the opportunity to cover him during his first two years at the Senate where he crafted many landmark laws, including the Electronic Commerce Act or Republic Act 8792.

RA 8792 was the first law that penalizes hacking or cracking of electronic data messages and documents.

Confessions of a TV series buff: I had to leave early our roundtable meeting with the comebacking senator to catch up this week’s episode of “Last Resort” on cable AXN channel at 10 p.m.

*      *      *

My good friend, Jess Paredes sent this timely text message as we observe All Souls’ Day today: This coming “Undas,” do not forget to visit Congress where the anti-dynasty provision of the Constitution lies dead and buried.