Absolute Zero

absolutely needed better writing (watch suggestions)

Overall: I enjoy a series with a different premise, but unfortunately the writing/world building/pacing did not work for me. 12 episodes about 50 minutes each. Aired on iQIYI. Re-aired on Studio Wabi Sabi YouTube channel.

Content Warnings: past death/grief, dub/non con touching, 10 year age gap with a highschooler*, manipulation

Watch suggestions: unless you enjoy very slow pacing, characters doing nonsense things, a bunch of crying and untold flashbacks here is my suggestion
1. Watch episode 1, at the end tell yourself that Ongsa died
2. pretend that Suansoon goes back in time and tries different things like having Ongsa avoid that location/day/time but none of them work, so then he tells Ongsa to not meet him at the movie theater
3. Ongsa ignores him, watch episode 7 (basically a retelling of episode 1 from Ongsa's perspective)
4. watch episode 8 where Ongsa learns the only thing to do is for them never to meet when in high school
5. Ongsa time jumps to the present, start watching episode 11 at 19 minutes (although there is a cute high school moment at the very beginning of episode 11)
6. Watch episode 12

What I Liked
- mysterious vibe/present
- how what happened in the first episode related to later episodes
- sweet moments
- Karn (Dear Doctor I'm Coming For Soul) in ep 12

Room For Improvement
- character actions didn't make sense, if Ongsa had actually died and then Suansoon went back and told Ongsa not to drive that day and he didn't but still died and we see Ongsa repeatedly going back trying to change things that would be interesting (like The Butterfly Effect) however Ongsa wasn't even dead and instead of being by his partner's side Suansoon started a romantic relationship with high school Ongsa in the past...
- *age gaps generally don't bother me but the adult Suansoon actor is 36 and he looked like it, past Ongsa is in high school (actor is 25 but looks much younger), it was very uncomfortable to see the adult Suansoon in a romantic relationship with a teenaged Ongsa (who didn't even know that they end up together for quite some time), and Suansoon touching Ongsa when he was sleeping was not romantic but came across as creepy, in general they should have shortened this time and focused more on young Ongsa/Suansoon and older Ongsa/Suansoon
- nonsense stuff, how did no one say anything about a highschooler romancing an almost 30 year old??? why wouldn't in the present Suansoon call Onga's parents/go to their house/look on social media/talk to mutual friends/do an internet search/hire a private investigator/hang up fliers/go to their old hangouts....he just cried
- slow pacing, there was a lot of hanging out in a coffee shop and crying
- a bunch of flashbacks
- really poor world building and a ton of "because the writer said so"

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Almost absolute zero!

Well, I finished watching it! Incredulous and hoping against hope that the producers would realize the mess they had created. And what is the most infuriating and disappointing is that the drama had a great premise and an even better start and then nosedived and barely resurfaced in last two episodes. I really, really wanted to like this! And what I liked the most were CGI butterflies!

DISCLAIMER: I am not shocked by age gaps or age gap romances, student/teacher love stories as long as they are both consensual, adult, legal and informed.

There are two parts in this drama: the first half is told from the point of view of Soon and the second from Ongsa. They were given the choice; either they get together as teens and one of them dies ten years later or they get together only as adults!

The story of star crossed lovers on a time travel mission to save each other was a great idea. And it starts great: Soon and Ongsa have been blissfully living together for the past ten years when Ongsa gets into an accident and dies. Soon, devastated, makes a wish upon a star and finds himself in the past. And that's when everything starts going wrong.

The following is really the biggest problem I have with this drama. Soon, a 29 yr old adult goes back in past and meets the 18yr old version of his boyfriend before he himself met him aged 18. The kid hits on him, and Soon falls head line and sinker for the teen! Never really telling him who he is. This whole relationship was odd, unhealthy and wrong.Yes they are both adults but the 10 year gap is something important at that age and the fact that Soon does not question his own behaviour towards the teen is huge red flag. Their relationship is neither cute nor acceptable. Another factor influencing the perception of that relationship is the actor playing adult Soon: an extremely wrong choice since the actor is 37 and it shows: he cannot pass for a 29 year old so his behaviour with the teen looks even more creepy! On the other hand, Soon's level of maturity is of a 7yr old while teen Ongsa behaves and acts like an adult. The whole dynamics between them is wrong! This plotline goes on for 5 episodes until Soon goes back to his own time! The method of time travelling: making a wish in a taxi going through a tunnel!

In the second part we follow Ongsa who, armed with the knowledge about the future from Soon (who ended up spilling the beans eventually!), gets in the relationship with teen Soon. Ten happy years ensue until that fateful day of the accident when a future Ongsa shows up in front of the present one and tells him he needs not change the future but the past and sends him back to his teen self. In order to save both their lives, Ongsa decides not to meet Soon as teen but to wait. They meet as adults, with all their memories from past timelines intact. Happy ending!

How does Ongsa time travel? That is never explained! In one instance he dies in an accident, his wristwatch starts going backwards and he is suddenly a teen! I guess there are many different means of time travel!

This series deals with grief (they cry a lot!): and the solution is time travel! Time travellers like manipulating their boyfriends by not telling them the whole truth. While in the first half, Soon was sleeping with the teen Ongsa, in the second part teen Ongsa stalked bigtime teen Soon! Ongsa had an accident because he knew he was going to be in an accident that day and was lost in thought thinking about the accident: could this be a self fulfilling prophecy?

Time travel stories are notoriously difficult to write and this one is at the base quite good. It is that everything that had been piled on the skeleton is wrong! The pacing and the structure of the story was correct for a slow burn drama. The side characters were really nice: the coffee shop owner, the loving parents, the friends. There was also a mysterious old man watching them from the sidelines and giving them cryptic answers with an old clock ticking and blue butterflies flying around (butterfly effect?). We never find out who he actually is: a god, a demon, an angel or an ordinary man?

Beside the wrong casting choice for adult Soon, the actors are ok though the chemistry between them is rather flimsy and literally sickening when the adult Soon is cuddling with teen Ongsa.
Music was annoying: the same song played over and over again with a lot of high pitch singing: my poor ears!

Every episode starts with an inspirational quote, very positive! The last episode ends with a 5min flashback of the entire series: so you may as well just watch that!

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