It is easy to sum up what is happening on television nowadays. Forget about who you should side with in the departure of icons Tito Sotto, Vic Sotto and Joey de Leon from “Eat Bulaga.” The main point here is that one family — the Jalosjos family — has launched a power grab and nobody could do anything to stop it. After all, on TV, the Tagalogs have a word for it: “pera-pera lang.” In a capitalist setup, the moneyed always prevail.
Tito, Vic and Joey or TVJ have been eased out by the Jalosjos family, who controls the show’s producer, Tape Inc. Now that family will have to sink or swim with that decision. It will start from zero, sort of, because everybody, from the hosts down, have departed.
Will the help provided by GMA’s Felipe Gozon to the Jalosjos family work as far as ratings are concerned? ABS-CBN actually did a power grab of its own decades ago by taking over its noontime slot and forcing “Eat Bulaga” to transfer to GMA 7. It ended up losing the ratings war, after “Eat Bulaga” reigned supreme at noon for years.
Gozon seems to be salivating at the thought of having more freedom to plot the trajectory of the noontime slot. He has already promised to lend the Jalosjos family the GMA talents who are under the station’s “Sparkle” unit. But for how long can he work with the Jalosjos family? History, after all, has a way of seemingly repeating itself. Today, TVJ. Tomorrow, Gozon?
TVJ has relocated to TV 5 owned by billionaire Manny Pangilinan, whose station will serve as the show’s producer. I would say TVJ is Pangilinan’s biggest catch because having the group in his fold is a game-changer as far as image is concerned. Pangilinan has been trying to build up TV 5, and with both Showtime and TVJ, how can he fail? GMA ratings will surely suffer a blow with the fake “Eat Bulaga” taking its noontime slot.
I actually am a TVJ follower. That means I no longer watch GMA at noon. It’s my choice. Because in the end, Gozon does not dictate my morals. Gozon, after all, is nothing but ratings.
He sees things in the context of revenues. And high ratings mean big revenues. In this case, I feel like TVJ got the short end of the stick. I am for the underdog. It’s just like in the National Basketball Association or NBA.
I have a confession to make. I wrote this article only after Game 2 of the NBA finals has ended, with the Miami Heat winning over the Denver Nuggets. The Heat are the underdogs in the series. So I am obviously rooting for the Heat, more so because their coach is the Fil-Am Erik Spoelstra. So them winning Game 2 mattered, at least for me.
Back to “Eat Bulaga.” The Jalosjos family are obviously losing in the propaganda game in many ways. But it would be wrong for TVJ to talk about the older Jalosjos’ previous conviction for rape.
The older Jalosjos has served time for that, meaning that justice was already served. And some “Eat Bulaga” hosts could not boast of being immaculate themselves. So let us leave the past behind and tackle the current issue instead.