With how kind, gentle, obedient, loving, and gumptious he is, it was initially quite easy for Santino Dimaguiba, the character impressively portrayed by up-and-coming actor Ronwaldo Martin in “FPJ’s Batang Quiapo,” to capture the hearts of the viewers. Besides, he was also among the several people then who believed in the innate kindness of our mighty primetime hero, Tanggol (Coco Martin).
Sadly, as time went by, he has changed for the worse due to the hard-hitting circumstances that he and his family had gone through, which also affected his relationship with his Kuya Tanggol. From idolizing and having high regard for his eldest brother, Santino went on to detest and resent him, as he also believed that Tanggol was the root cause of all the unfortunate events that had been beleaguering their family. And his hatred against him had already gone too far, as he reached the point of attempting to kill him more than once.
As we look forward to seeing if it’s still possible for the brothers to make amends after what Santino had done during the miting de avance of Tanggol’s team, let us revisit the five instances when the former showed animosity towards the latter in this episode of Friday 5.
We really saw how upset and bitter Santino was to Tanggol when the latter showed up at the wake of Noy (Lou Veloso) after a very long time of being absent in their lives. As Tanggol tried to hand him money for the expenses, Santino refused it and told him that he would just use his own savings instead.
Santino then went on to confront Tanggol, saying, “Kuya, ganito ka na ba talaga ngayon? Tingin mo sagot ang pera sa lahat ng problema? Hindi naman mababalik ng pera mo ‘yong buhay ni Lolo Noy eh.”
As Tanggol argued that he would not allow it to happen to Noy if he was just there, Santino retorted, “Alam mo kung nasa bahay ka lang, hindi naman mangyayari ‘to e dahil may pro-protekta sa kanila. Alam mo, ang sama-sama ng loob ko sa’yo dahil pinabayaan mo kami. Ang dami-dami mo nang pera o, pero bakit di mo naisip na ilayo kami ni Nanay kay Tatay, ha? Kahit na pinagdaanan mo mismo ‘yung pagmamaltrato ni Tatay sa atin!”
Tanggol told him that he didn’t want what had happened, as well as reminded him how much he loves them, but he couldn’t save or at least visit them because of Rigor. Santino returned the money to him and told Tanggol, “Ikaw ang kailangan namin, hindi ‘yong pera mo.”
Santino’s animosity towards Tanggol further grew upon finding out that he’s actually not a son of Rigor (John Estrada) and Marites (Cherry Pie Picache) had him after being sexually abused by infamous fugitive Ramon Montenegro (Christopher de Leon). Despite his mother’s plea for him not to change the way he sees or treats Tanggol, Santino conveyed that he regretted idolizing him and that he would never forgive him for what he had done to his father.
He became more eager to hit back at him, which was further fueled by his comrades in the Red Phoenix group, especially their leader, Angkong Lucio (Ronnie Lazaro), who was hellbent on defeating the Montenegros in order to establish domination in Manila when it comes to drug trafficking.
The first attempt of Santino to finish off Tanggol was during the wake of their brother David (McCoy de Leon), wherein Rigor and Tanggol figured in an intense and bloody fisticuff. He tried to stop Tanggol from further beating up Rigor, but he was too strong and too furious to be tamed, so he had no choice but to wait to see what was going to happen next.
But when he saw that Tanggol aimed his gun at the unconscious Rigor, Santino swiftly grabbed the gun from Mando’s (Allan Paule) holster and pulled the trigger. He was supposed to shoot Tanggol, but it was Marites who caught the bullet on her shoulder after she shielded her firstborn.
And lastly, despite having last-minute hesitations as he suddenly felt guilty about killing his brother, Santino was pressured by Lucio into pressing the bomb detonator that caused the huge and deadly explosion during the miting de avance of Tanggol’s team. He even engaged in a gunfight with the friends of Tanggol after the incident, through which they discovered that Santino was the one behind it.
Is there still a chance for Santino and Tanggol to go back to how they used to be? Let’s see by not missing an episode of “FPJ’s Batang Quiapo,” weeknights at 8 PM, on Kapamilya Channel, Kapamilya Online Live, A2Z, TV5 and iWant.