Too many loose ends to tie up

PADILLA. Should have known when to quit while he was ahead.

When a TV series is about to end, its producers often have a problem: To keep viewers interested and excited for months, its plot and subplots have become so complex-compound that, by the final telecast, it becomes difficult to make sense of all those intricate twists and turns, so that the show can end on a clear and satisfyingly logical climactic note.

—That’s what happened last week to “Kailangan Ko’y Ikaw”: On its final telecast, the show had so many loose ends to tie up that, when the smoke finally cleared, there were four principal characters in the ICU, all fighting for their lives—dad Robin Padilla, his teen daughter, dad-lolo Tirso Cruz III, and Kris Aquino’s brother and Anne Curtis’ “surprise” dad, Ian Veneracion!

Poor Kris and Anne, they had so many loved ones to pray for, they didn’t know where to begin.

Conclusion

The biggest loser in this confusion of concluding conflicts and melodramatic “highlights” was Robin, because he couldn’t resist going all mega-melodramatic and lushly over-the-top on us, as he characteristically gritted his teeth and intoned moodily self-conscious lines of “quotable” dialogue, when he and Ian launched into their final mano-a-mano confrontation.

In a few past starrers, Robin has shown that he’s capable of focused and controlled acting, but for this finale, he went back to lush and over-the-top mode. Aside from the unintended silliness of seeing all those wounded principal characters in the ICU, the other members of the cast were thankfully able to avoid the thespic pitfalls that Robin subjected himself to.

Still, it was tedious to have to listen to each character as he or she had to have his or her “poetic” or “quotable” moment before the show ended.

To recover from that overlong and eventually redundant series of scenes in the ICU, the show was belatedly given a “final-final” happy ending that showed everybody forgiving everybody else, becoming a family in the true sense of the word!

Thematically, the show’s conclusion was a triumph for Robin’s character, because he was able to clear his late cop-father’s tarnished name, send Tirso to prison, alternately romance his nemesis’ two daughters, belatedly gain the respect of his high-and-mighty in-laws, etc. —What’s not to like and celebrate?

It’s just too bad that the actor had to go all lushly melodramatic and indicative on us. He should have known when to quit while he was ahead!