Now this obviously cuts across networks, so that is its limitation as well: I can’t quite watch two soap operas at the same time, though I will try all the time. There is no list that isn’t biased, and this one for Pinoy TV and showbiz in 2010 is also a measure of my own personal taste for that which is different, and new, and sometimes a bit inane.
John Lloyd Cruz in a genre all his own. Because he can apparently sell everything from biogesic to fruit juice to crackers, tuna to pancit canton, and just might have singlehandedly brought back Greenwich Pizza in our lives. Of course he has a whole barkada in those commercials, but really now, that’s every other barkada we have. What works in the end is that John Lloyd is so willing and able to make a fool of himself, and to create this image of being the every guy in a co-ed barkada. And even when we hear him admit to girlfriends, and we hear rumors of vaginal locks in his life, in the end all that remains really is John Lloyd as the every boy, like a Juan dela Cruz without the indio or the konyo, and just a whole lot of middle class charm.
An Aljur seems to be in order. Aljur Abrenica opened the Cosmopolitan Bachelor Bash for 2010, with the confidence that we still rarely see in our men after Richard Gomez decided he could just row his way in an ad and wear briefs in a fashion show. Sam Milby just lost so much luster compared to Aljur, also because the former just seemed so darn uncomfortable the whole time he was on stage; it also didn’t help Sam that the new and improved Christian Bautista came before him, who undoubtedly new to strut his new, uh, assets. Aljur meanwhile, had us asking for more, and we wanted to see him on that stage again. After seeing what seemed like hundreds of topless men, that can only be a measure of Aljur’s presence. He’s playing Machete in a GMA soap for 2011; you know what channel I’ll be on for that timeslot.
The Currency of the Kantoboys. If you don’t know who they are, then you are missing something. Composed of Luis Manzano, Vhong Navarro, Billy Crawford (without the Joe), and John Lloyd, and an ASAP XV original, the Kanto Boys go against the grain of on the one hand the now defunct Hunks, and on the other just the standard metrosexual. There are no perfect pretty boys here, instead there is imperfection, one that’s borne of silliness, and these four boys’ willingness to make fools of themselves, with poker faces throughout any performance. It’s an anti-macho creation that just works. That they remain cute — if not become cuter — is well, just their luck. (more…)