The Reception (2021)

The things one comes across when just going by the poster and the title!

I had no idea how this ended up on my "Watch Later!" list on iQIYI, and was not aware at all what this would be about. So, it took the first two episodes to figure things out -- is it horror? Mystery? Thriller? Elements of these were present in the first episode -- and the second turned out to be more on the silly side?

Finally, I understood that this is a collection of short stories -- they are just all happening in a remote run-down hotel.

Now, short stories are a genre that not everybody can get along with. They tend to have no real introduction, only outlines of characters, and often an abrupt or open ending. Nowadays, when we are used to media that spells things out more often than not (and, when in doubt, more than once), we are occasionally thrown by this form of story telling.

Keeping this in mind, these twelve short stories (each of them just about ten minutes) were well done. In each episode, we get a guest (or a group of guest) who come to the hotel -- and most of the episode is spent trying to find out what on earth is happening, who they are and why they have come there. All of the stories are more or less absurd, some silly, some surreal. Some with a layer of meaning below the obvious.

It's very clear that this was made on a shoestring budget, but that it was used well! The location fit well with the stories, and the actors were mostly doing a good job -- with the shortness of the stories it was occasionally hard to tell. I wish the writer had given the recurring cast -- the hotel's employees -- a bit more character: Not necessarily multi-faceted, broad strokes are more than enough, but just slightly more -- especially the two female characters stayed too bland.
I did like how they integrated elements of horror and mystery as well as rom-coms, mixed with comedy, into their little absurdist stories -- you'd never quite knew how things would turn out.

Overall, it was a nice change of pace, and I enjoyed some episodes a lot, other were ... forgettable, which is the norm for me with anthologies. I liked the dramatics of the hotel manager and the absurdity of the short stories.

If the English subs on iQiYi had been better better (they were machine translated, and I occasionally had to guess what was being said), this would get a rec from me.

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