VALDEZ. Propensity for “hyper” drama and emotional excess.
We caught the final telecast of “Mula sa Puso” last Aug. 12, and were properly impressed to see that, after many months of messy and melodramatic conflicts and emotional upheavals, the series finally ended—with a double wedding. —Well, of course. Given the teleserye’s propensity for “hyper” drama and emotional excess, a simple, standard wedding would have felt like an anticlimax!
To rev up the action for the finale, the series’ resident villain, played by Eula Valdez, came up with nothing less than a big-bang explosion in a bus! No ordinary car bomb for this super-virago, she and the show’s ending needed the biggest, loudest explosion possible, and the production’s explosives experts obliged with one of the most visually and aurally “satisfying” coups de grace seen on the local boob tube.
Atonement
For an even more slam-bang finale, Eula was made to run into the flaming bus in ululating atonement for what she had done. The flames generated for the scene were so overwhelming that no one could possibly survive them for even a second, but—
—What do you know, one of the final episode’s concluding scenes revealed that Eula had indeed survived—but, not after being burned to a toast and scarred throughout her upper torso.
Improbable? Impossible? Hey, we’re in teleserye la-la-land, remember? In this
alternate universe, all you need to make anything happen is the suspension, not just of disbelief, but of logic itself. —The more illogical and improbable, the yummier!
It turned out that Eula’s “miraculous” survival was a set-up for the series’ “final-final” ending, to make it a big puzzlement up to the very last fade. If the story had ended with the double wedding, it would have been too low-key for the serial melodrama. There had to be at least the hint of a final danger, a last “crazy” act of vengeance and evil, to keep viewers on tenterhooks.
Well, after reappearing as an utterly bald and scarred virago to end all viragos, Eula was run over (there is a God!) by a huge vehicle—just as Dawn Zulueta and the other lead players’ van was passing by. Talk about “coincidence,” that was really one for the books.
Shattered form
To make the “moment” more “delicious,” Dawn was even made to step down from the van and peruse Eula’s shattered form. Despite her grave injuries, Eula was (barely) alive, so anything was possible. Would she beg for forgiveness from Dawn before she finally, finally expired? —Oh, please, that would be much too cheesy even for a 12-handkerchief teleserye.
Thank goodness, we were spared all that. Dawn simply looked at the unknown vehicular accident victim pityingly, Eula gave up the ghost, and the show’s leads, who had been put through the wringer for months by Eula and her vicious minions, could finally fly off to their long-delayed but well-deserved (Slap) Happy Ending!