Record-setting ‘teleserye’ ends on a (happy) high

Last Wednesday, two days before it ended its record-setting, two-year run, we caught the hit late-morning teleserye, “Be Careful With My Heart”—and we found it an unusual viewing experience.

Here’s why: Most teleseryes about to wrap up their storytelling make it a point to pile one stressful penultimate conflict and extreme danger on top of another, in order to end on a hysterically melodramatic high.

STA. MARIA AND YAP. Benefitted from popular series’ runaway success

—On the other hand, the concluding “Be Careful” appeared to avoid all possible problems, and instead focused on a series of happy events in its resident family’s existence!

For instance, Ser Chief not just succeeded in overcoming his financial and business crises, but hundreds of his former employees even signed a petition to urge him to lead their airline company again!

For her part, Maya got a promotion, and the kids in the show were doing very well in school, and in their romantic relationships. —And the little girl who couldn’t even talk due to her psychological problems at the start of the series was now cheerfully yakking away—and Top One in her class!

The huge contrast between this daytime series’ conclusion and the turgidly convoluted finales of other drama shows provides a telling clue to explain why it’s been the most popular series on the tube for so long:

From the get-go, while the show did introduce some problematic situations for its characters to resolve, its main thrust was generally removed from harsh reality, and focused more on fantasy, and the fulfillment of its target viewers’ escapist desires!

To start with, its female protagonist started out as a yaya, but slowly and steadily improved her lot. She even ended up marrying her “perfect” employer, Ser Chief—who naturally turned out to be a pluperfect husband, for good measure!

Lip and sass

As for his older kids from his previous marriage, they did give Maya some lip and sass, but they eventually learned to love her—and how!

While the series’ development was generally too good to be true (and thus too untrue to be good), its stars’ careers definitely benefitted from its runaway success. In particular, Jodi Sta. Maria and Richard Yap rose in the entertainment industry’s stellar ranks, in addition to becoming in-demand product endorsers.

Still, the series’ fantasy and wish-fulfillment orientation prevented them from dealing with intense dramatic conflicts, so they didn’t progress as much as actors.

That’s why we were especially grateful for the presence in the show of Aiza Seguerra as Maya’s “butch” sibling. Aiza tells it like it is even in real life, so her TV portrayal was acutely believable and empathetic, unlike her coactors’ often idealized existence.

That’s why we complained when her character’s importance and exposure in the show were reduced—and cheered when she was eventually given more significant things to do again.

Aiza may have been in the distinct minority in “Be Careful” but, pretty much all by her lonesome, she gave it the realism and truth that it sorely needed. So, as we bid a fond farewell to the series, we thank her—with special fervor!