Just before a new batch of glossy magazines fills the stands, we look back at this month’s covers and features and pick the ones that caught our fancy.
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MEGA
Best cover
Just when you thought you’ve had enough of Anne Curtis on magazine covers, Mega brings us Ms Annebisyosa herself in pure form. Just a refreshing face, seemingly unmadeup, wearing only a festive headgear. Fashion mag know-it-alls raised eyebrows: Why shoot a million miles away from the Philippines if you’re just going to show the face? Elegance, they seem to have forgotten, is in the refusal. The last time Mega stunned us with a cover was exactly four years ago.
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HOLA!
Best spread of wealth: Gina Roxas’s home story
Other magazines obsess with gowns and major jewelry and shooting in fashion capitals in order to evoke supreme luxury. These Roxases only need to stand, sit, look at the camera as Francisco Guerrero takes a shot.
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ROGUE
Best cover to showcase a stylist’s pull
Longtime rivals Angel Locsin and Marian Rivera break the laws of physics by being at the same place at the same time. Oh, hey, there’s Judy Anne, too, and Anne Curtis, and a curious participation of Ms Charlene Gonzales Muhlach. No other magazine has put this much star wattage on its cover in a long time, and Rogue has much to thank its go-to stylist Pam Quiñones for, for bringing all these top brass names together, all of them her clients, in one sitting. Would’ve been awesome if Sarah Geronimo, another #teampamq girl, joined in the fun.
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FHM
Best way to shoot underboob for a cover
The biggest men’s title in the country is having an “underboob” moment. Remember Jinri Park an issue ago? But we see what they did there. Possibly aware of the fact that kids pass by these things on the news stands and in the supermarkets, they made the bubbly and very funny Rufa Mae Quinto do it, therefore taking the risque quotient a notch down. Now Rufa’s boobs just look like two kids surprising mom and dad from under a blanket. How fun!
COSMO
Best reason to buy Cosmo this month: The CosmoMen pullout
And since we’re in the subject of cute-ifying risqué, the accompanying print version of the annual Cosmo Bash fleshtravaganza makes us want to think of weekday sleepovers with the campus crush. The theme for this year’s spread of 69 mostly half-naked bachelors: Naughty Schoolboys.
ESQUIRE
Best token serious feature: The Unfinished Revolution of Jose Almonte by Mia Gonzales
The men’s title attempts to give us a whiff of the human, kinder, spiritual side of the elusive Mr. Almonte, previously known as the “sinister” and “scary” National Security Adviser, in a piece written by a former Palace reporter.
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ROGUE
Best nostalgia feature: Neal Oshima and Cristina Valdes profiles
With the magazine’s obsession with nostalgia, you’d think nothing worthy exists in the present, save for the women they put on their covers. But to be fair, no one else does nostalgia pieces like Rogue, capturing the rarefied air and decadent lifestyles past. September delivered a one-two punch: the legendary socialite Valdes gives an account of the mishap that changed her, well, perspective; and Neal Oshima revisits his early days shooting commercials and magazine editorials. Handsome pages, as always. Now if we can just have time to read.
