Pulang Araw – Episodes 6-10 Thoughts (Week 2)

The second week of GMA Network’s Pulang Araw has wrapped. And it was an interesting week. Interesting in the sense that it really kind of highlighted the limitations of the Filipino teleserye format. But also interesting in how they are still planting the seeds and laying the groundwork for later when the heavier drama begins.

I’ll start with my highlight for the week and again, it really is the wonderful performances from the four young actors who play the young versions of our four lead characters. Franchesco Maafi, Cassy Lavarias, Cheska Maranan and Miguel Diokno are such charming young actors and their endearing performances really go a long way to setting the stage for their adult counterparts. As well as the story of the series as a whole.

Like I mentioned last week, I would have loved to have seen more with the kids. Especially when they have delivered such strong and affecting performances. The sense of nostalgia and innocence is so endearing. And we rarely see anything on TV and film about colonial Philippines under American rule. Well, hopefully we can still flashback to them later on somehow.

But this week was definitely focused on the months leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines. No David Licauco yet, but Alden Richards, Barbie Forteza and Sanya Lopez stepped up to the plate as Eduardo, Adelina and Teresita are now grown up.

To continue with the baseball analogy, especially when baseball holds a lot of meaning for our main characters, the three talented actors delivered solid performances. I think the material so far, which basically is just continuing to build the depth of what the rest of the series will be standing on, doesn’t really require much from them yet.

Lots of lighthearted moments which help to ease us into this sort of transitional period in the series. We learn about how the friends’ relationship and dynamic is now that they are older. And through their friendship, we also see how the Philippines of 1941 is as well compared to the, perhaps, calmer period ten years earlier.

I think the most challenging material from this week is the tense scene between Alden Richards’ Eduardo and Angelu De Leon’s Carmela. It’s a very interesting moment that touches upon Eduardo’s, perhaps, anger issues. Which I will assume play into his eventual response to the Japanese invasion and even American involvement in the coming war.

For Barbie and Sanya, their material this week doesn’t really ask too much from them. They mostly were preoccupied with the sisters auditioning for the new vaudeville theater and the familiar, if not repetitive, scenes of Carmela being the evil stepmom to Adelina even ten years later. I’m sure Barbie and Sanya’s meatier scenes will come much later. But kudos on their on stage performance scenes.

This week’s episodes also started planting the seeds for the Japanese attack and invasion. And they did a good job of being able to connect the emerging threat to our core four (Core4 from now on! hehe) main characters without directly involving them just yet.

Episode 9 is definitely when things start to get going as they leaned into the impending danger more. Adelina’s letter to Hiroshi gave us a nice history lesson as well. And again, all setting the stage for the War.

Coming into Pulang Araw, I’m most interested and looking forward to seeing the scenes during World War II. I haven’t seen many film or television depictions of the Philippines during World War II. I think The Great Raid is the biggest, most substantial production I’ve watched that tells a story involving the Philippines and its people during the War. Actually, I think it might be the only one I’ve watch. Though I do vaguely remember watching John Wayne’s Back to Bataan during a latenight broadcast on AMC, like 20 years ago. Lol

It will be very exciting, but of course heartbreaking, to watch the battle sequences. The small snippets we’ve seen so far have been very good. But I think it is a very important reminder of the country’s history. And with very little in terms of film or television focusing on the Filipino experience during World War II, it makes the series even more important and affecting.

Thinking about the series’ length of 100 episodes (according to Netflix), it got me thinking about how GMA edits their series for international distribution. For their teleseryes, they might combine two or three episodes to make the typical 45-minute to an hour-long runtime for them instead. As that is more feasible for foreign networks to fill in timeslots if they purchase those series.

So with Pulang Araw‘s episodes being about 20 to 25 minutes each, I think they could edit the 100 episodes down to about 30 hour-long episodes. Have three or more teleserye episodes edited into one full-length episode.

So again, in thinking about that potential, the length of the series doesn’t seem too bad. But the teleserye format requires a different type of story execution daily. So it will feel longer and (hopefully not) more like a chore to keep up with the series for over five months.

This week’s episodes were already a bit slow, especially when most of what we saw was typical teleserye banter and situations.

At the same time though, that is part of developing the Core4 and even the supporting characters who will all be affected by the war in their own ways. If we were to edit these episodes into longer lengths, then we’d be somewhere between the end of Episode 2 and beginning of Episode 3. So when you think about it that way, it doesn’t seem that long. But the daily, teleserye format offers up a different viewing experience. Even if binging the episodes of the week in one sitting.

Anyway, the series this week was all about lulling everyone into a false sense of security before everything literally blows up. That’s a very necessary part of any story. But especially for a series like Pulang Araw which is at that step for now. Needing to establish our main characters so we actually care about them and what happens to them when the War begins.

Visuals are still top notch. Acting is fine. Writing can speed it up a little. But overall, Pulang Araw‘s second week continues to proceed quite nicely.