A new screen pairing always arrives with a question: will it work? In the case of Joshua Garcia and Ivana Alawi, the curiosity is even stronger because they come from very different places onscreen.
Joshua has long been trusted for the kind of quiet emotional weight that can make even a small pause feel loaded. Ivana, meanwhile, has the instant presence of someone the camera easily finds, but in “Love is Never Gone,” she is clearly being asked to do more than simply look the part.
The T-Zone caught the preview of the first episode at the Gateway Cinemas, followed by the press conference with the cast and creative team. What was shown was not yet the full episode, as Joshua was quick to point out, but even in that condensed version, the series already had a clear intention: to introduce the two stars not simply as a beautiful pair, but as characters thrown into a story of survival, deception and love that begins on unstable ground.
Joshua plays Teo, a mechanic and breadwinner who goes to Morocco to find a better life for his family. Ivana plays Yana, a woman caught in a criminal world, whose first encounter with him is anything but romantic. She steals from him. He catches her. From there, the story begins building the uneasy attraction, danger and eventual betrayal that will shape the series.
For Joshua, seeing even the fast-cut version seemed to leave him genuinely moved.
“I’m happy for everyone. I don’t know — I’m speechless. It’s beautiful,” he said in Filipino. “But what you watched is just a fast cut. When we watch it on Prime, it will be more complete, and we will feel every scene more.”
Ivana’s reaction was just as immediate, and perhaps even more telling because she seemed surprised by the final effect of what they had made.
“It’s beautiful. Very beautiful,” she said. “While I was watching earlier, I said, ‘Wow, it’s like a movie.’ It’s only the first episode of ‘Love is Never Gone,’ but it really feels like a movie. It’s full of action. There is so much to watch.”
That big-screen feel is clearly deliberate. “Love is Never Gone” is an ABS-CBN Studios and Dreamscape Entertainment series streaming exclusively on Prime Video beginning May 8. It also marks Joshua and Ivana’s first project together and is billed as the first Filipino series shot in Morocco.
But what makes the Morocco setting work, at least from the preview, is that it does not swallow the Filipino story. Director Manny Palo said that while ABS-CBN series had previously been shown in Africa and dubbed in local languages, this project was actually filmed there, specifically in Morocco. Still, he emphasized that the setting came after the story.
“When I direct any project or series, I consider first and foremost the narrative,” Palo said. Only then, he explained, does he look at the location, the elements within it and how these can be used with the actors. He also pointed out that because the series is for streaming, the team used a more filmic approach, with a camera that is “not static.”
His simplest line may also be the best explanation for the ambition behind the project: “We always firmly believe that our audience deserves nothing less.”
Co-director Jojo Saguin also spoke of the different camera angles, the action scenes and “the undeniable chemistry of Ivana and Joshua,” with Morocco and its texture in the background.
Ivana, who is part Moroccan, had an added connection to the setting, but what she said at the press conference was more important than the biographical detail. She described the series as “a combination of something old and new” and stressed that even in another country, the Filipino identity of the story remains.
“You still feel his being Filipino,” she said, referring to Teo. “There are many OFWs, and we resonate with Teo’s character.”
That is where the first episode finds its more interesting pulse. It is not just about a Filipino drama looking more expensive because it was shot abroad. It is about familiar emotional stakes — family, sacrifice, desperation, betrayal — being placed in a world that feels larger, riskier and more unpredictable.
The role also appears to ask more of Ivana than viewers may expect. She shared that her first scene required French, which she studied in the hotel for two to three days because she did not want to be scolded by her director on her first day. She also confirmed having to work with Arabic, Spanish, English and even Japanese for the series.
“You have to deliver,” she said. “It’s very hard because I had to show different characters.”
That may be the best promise of “Love is Never Gone” for now. Beyond the new pairing, the beautiful locations and the streaming polish, it is asking both leads to stretch.
Joshua has to carry the ache of a man whose goodness will be tested. Ivana has to make Yana more than trouble in a striking face. And together, they have to convince viewers that love can still matter even after trust has already been broken.
If the fast cut already made them emotional, then the full episode may just give audiences enough reason to follow where this dangerous love story goes next.
