Gay shit I watched

mlm. ~720 minutes

This series asserts that watching benevolent sexism play out can actually be enjoyable as long as you turn the girl characters into smaller guys. This is beef I often have with BL, but this series takes it to another level. If you turn your brain off this is watchable. It does have humor.

mlm. ~170 minutes

High school kid likes teacher but doesn't want to pursue him. His bestie proposes they date so he can get over his teacher. Nothing extraordinary.

mlm. ~470 minutes

Tontae is completely oblivious to the fact that his bestie is head over heels for him, and he instead starts dating a Taiwanese tourist. Indie low budget, not competent, but still pretty fun. The way they handled the four languages (Thai, Kam Mueang, English, Mandarin) spoken in this is really realistic, and I enjoy that a lot. If you choose to watch this, which I think you shouldn't, don't watch the last episode. Instead just imagine they had a nice Taiwan trip or something.

cw: not a happy ending, it's real crap. Bunch of burying of gays. Also some amount of nudity within rest of series.

mlm. ~300 minutes

This starts off being an enemies-to-lovers stepbrothers trope, then turns into 'fate determined you can't be in a relationship or you'll die' groundhog day. This is fine-ish. The pacing is off and not much sense is being made, but it's enjoyable enough. I'm glad Chinese producers are finding ways around censorship.

Spoiler: They don't end up together.

mlm. ~140 minutes

Director meets favorite writer who happens to be his ex crush. The connection between the story they're writing and their own is really on the nose. Subtitle translations not good enough. They're refusing to communicate, and for one of them honestly I think the reasons are childish. This whole plot could've fit into a 30 minute short film and would've been better that way. There are many better things to watch, but if you're somehow out of those, this is sure a frustrating watch, but I promise you'll forget everything that happened once you click off the video.

cw: Guy A does stalker shit. Guy B got too close to a sleep kiss.

mlm, wlw. ~200 minutes

Influencer meets dude on beach, also lesbian friends. This is low quality, indie, authentic, and honestly worth a watch.

mlm. ~240 minutes

Homeschooled boy with strict music parent goes to mainstream high school and meets depressed but hot douchebag. Homeschooled boy reminds douchebag of his dead brother, so now he must make his life a living hell. This is like a 'who can communicate the worst' competition. It's very contrived but hey it could be worse. There's nothing wrong with the acting or cinematography. This is watchable.

cw: bully x bullied and it does get violent and homophobic. Off-screen suicide of supporting character due to homophobia.

mlm. ~200 minutes

Estranged childhood besties are made to live together. Sparkly sweet and home-y. Typical BL. Starts off strong, but doesn't manage to keep tension towards the end. There's just no stakes anymore.

mlm. ~310 minutes

80% landscapes, 5% BL. I like slowburn, but this burns too little for me.

mlm. ~120 minutes

Dude has to pair with dude in dating class. Also he helps his crush (girl) with stalker problem. Feels so cliché that I keep thinking 'have I watched this before', but no, I haven't. It's alright. Nothing special. Ending is a lil dumb, but it's sweet.

mlm. ~108 minutes

I watched this probably almost a decade ago.  I don't think I should review it without rewatching, but hey, I didn't forget that I ever watched it and that should say something.

mlm,  wlw, trans. ~830 minutes

A remake of the 2014 Love Sick, the Thai BL that started all Thai BL. there were some changes to the original plot, changes that make it fluffier, which I like, but also less progressive and transgressive, which I don't like. There is barely a female character with their own plotline left. This started strong but the plot loses steam somewhere halfway.

cw: transphobic caricatures. But also one good trans rep character, so they do know how to do it?

mlm. ~350 minutes

Falling in love with a 'ghost' who's actually in a coma, figuring out who attempted his murder. Both siblings are extremely casual about seeing ghosts, but the 'ghost' is scared of other ghosts. 

This show started out decent and charming and funny and silly, and I honestly think this could have been worth at least a 7 if the editing hadn't been so bad. It's not forgettable. Scenes keep changing, as in, flashbacks show a different version of the same scene, and it's not making sense. There's a whole episode dedicated to a grandma who gets a stroke which has nothing to do with the rest of the story, and after that it's just downhill.

I will say that the side character casually being like 'oh by the way my dad's a mafia boss' is hilarious. 

wlw. ~150 minutes

Typical marketing boss/subordinate. But hey it's lesbians and they're def cute so I mean I'm hooked. Within the first ep, she's got 2 higher up ladies and one higher up dude vying for her heart.

cw: offensive comedic relief trans woman.

wlw. ~450 minutes

Rich girl with a homophobic mom re-meets childhood bestie who is now poor, in need of a place to stay, and in the grips of PTSD. There's fluff but also angst. 

Nothing about the portrayal of mental health or the treatment thereof is accurate in this show. Serious ethics violations by those psychiatrists. But well it's a show.

cw: realistic portrayal of sexual assault by uncle on female lead. Hated it. 

mlm. ~540 minutes

This is a mainland Chinese series, which was officially co-produced by a Thai company to get around censorship laws. 

Clumsy and naive rich playboy meets a beautiful 'girl' being attacked in the forest and immediately falls for 'her'. Unfortunately said beautiful girl is actually a male spy who is very ready to use him in order to get closer to his target, the emperor. This is really funny, but the consent politics are absolutely terrible, and it's making it hard to watch. Sex is portrayed to be a shameful taboo thing that is never far from violence, and I hate that.

cw: romanticized rape, bunch of casual murder, torture, parental abuse, general misery. The average of what you'd expect in a Chinese period drama. 

mlm. ~700 minutes

Just a trope-y standard Thai BL. The secondary couple is fun but their story is unfinished and will not be finished.

cw: stalker-y, consent issues

mlm. ~480 minutes

I'm sure I watched this, but I remember absolutely none of it, and that's because it's as standard a Thai BL as they come. Tutor x sports guy, falling out, sports guy follows tutor to uni and becomes secret admirer while pretending to hate him still. The shitness of communication in this is legendary.

wlw. ~600 minutes

Besties who have major crush on one another but can't communicate for shit have shared dreams in which they are able to live out their desires. This spends too much time having the main characters fight, and not enough time having them fall in love. Other than that, it's watchable, but not exceptional.

mlm, gnc. ~150 minutes

Femme vlogger gets hot new neighbor, crushes on him and makes bad life decisions. It's not bad, but it's not good. Has an indie feel. 

mlm. ~530 minutes

And another utterly forgettable standard Thai BL.

cw: femme-phobic

mlm. ~115 minutes

Ok so the lead is a manga artist who draws porn, and yet this series appears to be very sex negative. Then mr absolutely perfect stranger who is in love with him for no reason shows up being all strict and emotionless. But they can't be together because mr perfect believes artist is straight despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. 

In my humble opinion, you can't have dead fish and camera angle kisses when the main character literally draws porn for a living. 

Very forgettable. Pretty standard. Plot makes zero sense and in this case it's just frustrating, not funny.  Attempts at exaggerated camp humor were made. It works sometimes, doesn't work other times.

cw: femme-phobia, sex negativity

mlm. ~430 minutes

Supremely stupid and campy, intentionally so. None of this makes any sense. I enjoyed this for the camp, but then they went and seriously ruined it in episode 7, so I don't recommend watching.

cw: Straight up rape in sleep, but 'it's okay because we're boyfriends'.

mlm. ~540 minutes

Bummed out painter x tightly wound up manager. All of these characters are frustrating. It's not the best, but it's not the worst.

cw: Violently transphobic

mlm. ~1080 minutes

Aaaand we're back to writing about the most popular engineering students, enemies to lovers tropes. It's the standard GMMTV rom-com BL formula. It's the safe kind of content that they know works, and that they have expertise in.

mlm. ~150 minutes

Workaholic runs into childhood 'fiancé' who is deadset on seducing him for real. This has some really funny lines.

cw: nonconsensual handjob in first ep, romanticized.

mlm. ~200 minutes

Guy who can sing lives with best friend/fan who likes him. Lots of time skips early on. Should've been flashbacks. They're being adorable, and the singing is excellent, but it doesn't feel like there's much of a plot. Also, him being gently rejected once is treated as like the biggest trauma ever and that annoys me. Where are the stakes? Where is the conflict? They both clearly like each other and already live together, but pine and angst over nothing anyways. Forgettable but watchable.

mlm. ~675 minutes

Remembered as the first Thai BL to reach an international audience. It's your typical Thai BL with engineering students, hazing, toxicity and the phobia of even mild intimacy that all early Thai BL did, but that's because all the other ones copied this one.

mlm. ~585 minutes

They are no longer students, but their relationship has not progressed.

mlm. ~360 minutes

A guy with oodles of internalized homophobia re-meets his high school bestie/crush, who turns out to have liked him back, so they start dating, but self-hatred gets in the way. 

I initially really related to the guy's struggle with internalized homophobia, but that subplot has taken a back seat. I am much less enthused about him being scared of his partner taking touch too far. I don't like the consent politics of this at all. They're so uncommunicative and uncomfortable near each other.

mlm. ~120 minutes

Judo boys secretly crushing on each other slowly find out the gay friend they've been texting is their crush. Meanwhile, a couple of homophobes do their best to ruin their day and their judo careers. It's about what you expect from a BL.

mlm, gnc, background wlw. ~540 minutes

Sweets-eating streamer with no idea how to care for himself does his very best to avoid the pushy guy crushing on him, but pushy guy does turn out to be very kind and helpful and maybe even cute, actually.

Has a mental health/trauma and insecurity theme. It addresses biphobia, which I appreciate. I'm not sure the execution of this is super successful, but I appreciate what they were trying to go for. Parts do feel like a departure from the standard GMMTV formula.

mlm. ~240 minutes

Guy who does incessant odd-jobs gets hired to be a fake boyfriend. How long will it stay fake? It's enjoyable enough, but it doesn't hit me in the feels the way other strongberry shows have. It doesn't feel innovative in any way.

mlm. ~120 minutes

High school, dude gets hit by ball, then falls for guy who hit him.

spoiler: not a happy ending.

mlm. ~390 minutes

Adorkable. It's a little silly and annoying and stupid and I don't recommend it, but it's also not the worst thing in the world. Insecure dude attempts to match-make his crush with another guy, managing to get in the way of both his own ship, and that guy's ship. These are some odd comedic choices. It gets a little better as the episodes go on.

wlw. ~320 minutes

Plot is pretty standard rom-com. The first episode is REALLY rough, but the ones after that are more watchable. The girls are definitely very cutesy, but yeah there are better GL's you could be watching instead.

mlm. ~200 minutes

BL author with writer's block spends his days in restaurant and falls for owner. It's sweet, but not revolutionary. It's about realizing you are worthy of love and about realizing there is a difference between love and admiration.

mlm. ~240 minutes

Feels rushed, low budget, makes you realize why cinematographers exist, because man I just can't even see what's happening with these camera angles. Snippets that don't go anywhere and scenes seems chopped up beyond repair. Subs not accurate. Plot is different from original and I'm mildly confused what's what. Should take more time to introduce its characters. Too many irrelevant 'friend' extras. But it's also campy fun stupidity and I'm always up for that.

mlm, gnc. ~900 minutes

2 episodes per couple. Standard Thai BL. Plot and character motivations don't seem to add up chronologically. It just generally doesn't make a lot of sense. Ep 5&6 quite weak. Didn't like  9&10 at all. Consent issues in some of these.

Sun & Nuea from episode 5 & 6 get a whole series as a sequel, Suntiny, and that is worth watching.

wlw, gnc. ~108 minutes

This story has nothing to do with Yes or No 1 and 2. Two butch roommates re-meet old friends/crushes. Deals with some internalized homophobia. It's fine as a story, but it doesn't really impress me in any way.

mlm. ~300 minutes

The first couple of episodes in which they prank each other are really funny but it's downhill from there. I don't recommend it.

This is the extremely popular BL web series that got gay online media made literally illegal in China. That's not speculation, and it's not exaggeration. People were jailed for writing gay fanfic. This series was not allowed to finish airing.

cw: very rapey and abusive.

mlm. ~460 minutes

Based on the same Chinese novel as the 2016 'Addicted' and 2023 'Stay With Me'.

First of all the age gap between the leading actors (16/27) is not okay, and it's especially worrying given how much shipping and fan service usually goes on after a series airs in Thailand. I sincerely hope they don't do that.

But I'm a Sinology major with an interest in queer media and I wrote whole academic essays on what the censorship of Addicted meant for Chinese queer media (severely hampered) and general Chinese attitudes towards queer people (not great), and I can't not know how that saga continues. Thai BL's are massively popular among Chinese audiences, and that's why Chinese advertisers fund them and that's why they exist. Call it morbid curiosity, but I need to know how they've chosen to edit and represent this story in 2024 with a Thai production crew unbothered by CCP censorship.

The conclusion is that they've mellowed down all the toxicity of the original material and changed the plot to give it a happy ending. They've also chosen to not have any real kisses, only camera angles. I think that's probably a good choice, but I still wish they'd just chosen older actors across the board, or at least not an 11 year age gap. I am of the opinion that this adaptation shouldn't have been made. If you're going to adapt a fucked up story, hire older actors. I'm not sure what the point of this was.

cw: guns, kidnapping, romanticized abuse between partners, minor actors in situations they shouldn't be in, severe abuse from parent

mlm. ~230 minutes

Cook guy likes uptight customer. It's awkward and they do the Japanese emotional constipation -> explosion thing. Plot is a bit of a mess and I've never seen two actors with less chemistry than these two. The characters have absolutely no reason to be together.

wlw, gnc, mlm. ~600 minutes

She takes her girlfriend with amnesia to a resort and re-meets her old friend. Old friend used to have a crush on her, and now also develops a crush on girlfriend. 

Idk this is mostly an advertisement for the resort it was filmed in. It's really slow. If it was cut down to less than a third of its current runtime maybe it could've been good.

wlw, gnc. ~75 minutes

Season 2. To watch this, you should first watch season one of The Two of Us, but you don't need to have watched Deep Night. These appear to be 5 short stories with not much plot. Production quality is quite bad. But they're still sweet together. These two actresses did well with what they were given.

mlm. ~440 minutes

The dynamic between the leads is strange and unequal. It's watchable but barely. Plot isn't great, acting definitely isn't great, and the blood thing is weird and definitely not how that works IRL. There's two support girls who really should've ended up together, but lesbians didn't exist in Thai media back then.

mlm. ~500 minutes

Nerd x jock. Watchable. Some likeable characters. Good acting. Good production quality. I still wouldn't recommend it.

Spoiler: Not a good ending. Minor x adult sexual relationship, kinda graphic.

Not technically mlm, trans. ~540 minutes

I don't recommend this one. Fujoshi bodyswaps with a guy she ships with his friend.  It's cringey, and not really in a fun way. I feel like this show kinda hates its audience. The nonbinary angel of death is fun though. She is kind of a standard comedic relief trans woman, but idk I like her.

spoiler: not a happy ending, consent politics not great.

mlm. 200 minutes

Goody two shoes is constantly overshadowed by his chaotic neutral colleague at his paparazzi job. Subpar mysteries. Something missing in the chemistry, and I think it has to do with subpar editing and camera work, but it might also be the blonde guy's acting, because he doesn't make any facial expressions, like at all. Or it's the lack of buildup in the relationship. They suddenly love each other and want to live together even though they are practically still strangers who can't communicate with each other about the most basic things.

Some people like this, so idk maybe you will too, but I can't say I understand it.

mlm. ~190 minutes

Stuck up domineering star x young temp manager. I think they attempted to use BL to promote this one singer. But he can't act for shit and we don't see him sing, so this is baffling. The other lead acts just fine, but the plot is not good.

cw: consent issues, power dynamic issues.

mlm. ~160 minutes

Guy who doesn't believe in love gets aggressively courted by guy deadset on proving him wrong. It's pretty stupid and cliché. Sense is not being made. Bunch of childish nonsense.

cw: stalker-y harassment. Romanticized.

mlm. ~460 minutes

Oh no the girl I fell for as a child is actually a guy.

cw: forced feminization, felt kinda transphobic, getting outed, consent issues.

mlm, trans, gnc. ~225 minutes

Actors have to live together to improve chemistry. Watched this a long time ago, don't remember much. There's a nonbinary person who is shown respect in the script, and a trans lady who very much isn't. Honestly those characters are the ones I remembered, not the main leads lol.

cw: offensive comedic relief trans woman 

mlm. ~360 minutes

Dude falls in love with a guy who is secretly a merman and who angsts about that.

Is this good? No. I watched this when I was ill and my brain didn't work, and it's perfect for that occasion, just the right amount of simple, slow and mildly entertaining. 

Somewhere deep below there is a real message in here about difference, identity, acceptance, the risk of rejection, fear of people who are different which leads to hatred, but it's not executed very well at the end of the day. 

And every conversation is SO slow, and Phu keeps looking at Nawa's mouth instead of his eyes to presumably portray desire, which is a cute gimmick once or twice, but he does it in every conversation and that's just awkward.

mlm. ~120 minutes

Bury your gays shit with lack of relationship development.

Spoiler: not a happy ending.

mlm. ~200 minutes

Very much a domineering non-communicative abusive seme/ clueless dependent stuttering uke thing. People told me it only seemed abusive but it was told by an unreliable narrator and would get better in the end, so I continued watching, but it very much does not get better. 

The seme guy looks severely anorexic and everyone in the show treats him like he's the most beautiful man they've ever laid eyes on and I don't think it's healthy to promote a beauty standard that gets people killed. 

There's lack of communication, there's 10 points above that, and then way past the end of the scale, there's whatever this is.

cw: serious consent problems, power dynamic, stalking, getting tied up, extreme possessive jealousy.

mlm. ~120 minutes

Rich stepbrothers like each other since forever, but miscommunication and fucked up drama abound. It's a typical Chinese BL microseries, except with Thai actors. The English subtitles are really shit, but the Chinese subs are okay.

cw: sexual assault between end-game partners

wlw, trans. ~390 minutes

Well it isn't good, but it is GL. They're beautiful, I'll give them that. 

This is possibly the shallowest series in existence. Vaguely based around beauty contest, but the contest doesn't seem to actually matter. There are no stakes. They just kinda wanna win. 

It's pretty stupid. Lots of reality TV style bitchiness. Not much character development. No one grows or learns anything, nobody takes responsibility for any shit they did. I'm really glad I don't have to meet any of these people IRL. 

Lots of on the nose exposition. Would be so awkward without the overwhelming music all the time. Too many antagonist characters, can't keep track. Some plot hooks are set up in the beginning, and then just abandoned, replaced. 

At episode 7, scenes are no longer even edited together in a cohesive manner. It does not chronologically add up at all. Feels like they were just going like 'well we shot this scene, so we have to put it somewhere, I guess it'll go here.' I'm not even sure if ep 7 and 8 got switched. 

mlm. ~360 minutes

Just classic tropes, uni life, except somehow worse. Why are there SO many characters that all fill the 'supportive friend' role?

mlm. ~135 minutes

Besties like each other and don't communicate. They keep being angry at each other for dumb reasons. Like bruh it is actually possible to express emotions and communicate without anger and violence. 

Plot, timeline is confusing, as in, I don't know what's happening when or why. Chopped up. Frustrating inconsistencies between the same scene shown twice. E.g. there are two completely different versions of one crucial scene, or for another example, one minute he's black out drunk, and within one second stone cold sober. 

The one guy's motivations are impossible, unreasonable, stupid. He gets confessed to and likes him back but just says nothing,  for no reason.

cw: violence between partners. Possessive jealousy

mlm, wlw. ~620 minutes

Intern discovers the guy he's chatting with online turns out to be his new boss. Also, some hinting about magic dreams and mythical creatures, but sadly not much of that plot materializes.

The relationship dynamics very much end up feeling like big manly man / demure damsel who offers token resistance, and I don't like it. The plot isn't plotting. So much cringe.

It has pretty pictures though, as its redeeming quality.

censored mlm. ~575 minutes

I watched this ages ago, but I remember it being silly and low quality. Not really worth watching, but not super terrible.

mlm, wlw. ~630 minutes

I don't recommend this one. It's just not worth it. Swimming club.

cw: serious consent issues and all sorts of other issues.

censored mlm. ~120 minutes

I speak Mandarin. The subtitle quality is so shit I would not have understood what happened if I didn't. 

Two stars who refuse to be nice to each other but like each other deep down. An evil and controlling parent. Manipulating media to tear people's reputations down.

mlm. ~660 minutes

I know there are people who like this, and that's because it's horny, no other reason.

cw: serious consent issues, romanticized and played for laughs.

mlm. ~540 minutes

Don't watch this. It's a university hot guy contest, and it's homophobic.

mlm. ~120 minutes

I can't for the life of me understand why people like this. It has pretty boys I guess?

Based on a cliché gimmick, barely has a plot, no character or relationship development.

mlm

Just don't.

mlm. ~270 minutes

This one isn't good, but part 2 is worse. Just classic tropes. Too many characters. There are tomboy lesbians I think, but they're on screen for so little time that I'm not actually sure, they might be gay boys. Gay panic is funny. Plot is a mess.

mlm, background wlw and gnc. ~210 minutes

1940's period piece. Two besties secretly have major crushes on each other, but society, misunderstandings and village politics makes that hard. This is low budget and indie. Not really competent. The pacing is weird. I like that it's different though, and some of the acting is really good, but most of it is just really bad. Wouldn't recommend.

cw: gang rape (not graphic), threats of sex trafficking, murder, homophobia. Not at all a happy ending.

wlw. ~145 minutes

I forced myself to finish this but I don't think I've ever hated watching anything more than I hated watching this. Unless you somehow ran out of lesbian pornhub videos geared at straight men and want more of that, you should go watch the 2005 series 'Fingersmith' instead. It is based on the same novel, and executed better in every single way. I thoroughly enjoyed Fingersmith.

cw: Everything. Just all of it. This is gruesome and graphic.

mlm. ~580 minutes

Hands down the worst BL I've ever finished. Bafflingly badly written, a disjointed mess. And it's not like they didn't have a budget. 

So why did I finish it? Because watching this feels like opening up a machine and seeing all the parts individually, seeing which parts work and which don't, and why. Normally a show is a streamlined whole, and you're immersed and not thinking about what went into making it, but not with this one. The creators have made better BL's before, so theoretically they know what they're doing and are applying the same techniques here, and that's just fascinating to me.

cw: age gap, butts, sex scenes

dropped after ep 1

Not really a GL. ~480

Stylistically, the first episode was great. Loved the pacing. However. 

I dropped this because it has been straightwashed. The souce material is gay. This show has gay kissing in a dream, but nothing undeniably gay happens outside of dreams. Why is it so hard to make your lesbian characters actually lesbian, instead of 'who knows, maybe they're galpals, maybe there's something more' vaguery. No you know what, I know why, it's because this is palatable to conservatives. There's a bit of fantasy girl on girl action, but no actual lesbian characters. Honestly I think this show is lesbian erasure.

We're supposed to be content with ambiguously gay glances, and not ask for an actual love confession, because 'ew wow do you need them to have sex on screen before you believe they're gay or something?' And I think that take is fucked up. Like for real we're going to say that a simple gay love confession is as transgressive and 'inappropriate' as two characters having sex on screen? Is that where we're at? 

That's just othering, hyper-sexualizing and erasing queer identities. And I'm not here for it.

dropped 45 minutes in

mlm. ~125 minutes

His boyfriend dies and he discovers that their durian farm and home are all in his boyfriend's name, not his, so now boyfriend's family wants to take it all away. 

I think it's excellent, but I can't bear the amount of tragedy in it.

dropped during ep 2

mlm. ~500 minutes.

Beautiful rich dipshit gets sent to tropical Island where a hot guy has to make him feel less lonely. Rich dipshit tries his very best to annoy the guy, but the other guy is better at annoying him back. 

Too horny for me but don't let that stop you.

dropped within first ep

mlm. ~900 minutes

I don't this is going to be bad, but it is not for me. From the roughly 10  minutes I did watch, it appears to be about sex positivity, and openness surrounding the topic.

dropped after ep 2 because the finale never aired.

mlm. ~480 minutes

Dude has a boyfriend and a kiddo to take care of, but he also has schizophrenia and a guilty conscience. It is hard to tell what is really happening in this series, and what is just the main character's hallucinations. But that's the point.

cw: please take the 'horror' tag this has seriously. Graphic burn wounds, death, delusions and hallucinations, kidnapping, cheating.

dropped within ep 1.

mlm. ~300 minutes

An established couple solves divorce lawyer cases. This seems like fun but I have some triggers that mean I can't actually watch this.

dropped after ep 3

mlm. ~210 minutes

Enemies to lovers except the one guy is taking things really far and the other is entirely reasonable. The connection between them seems to be only based on appearance, because these legitimately hate each other, not in a playful way. I kinda really hate the plot, it feels cheap and shallow but it wants to be taken seriously.

cw: that's abusive.

dropped pretty far in, but don't remember how far

Censored mlm. ~750 minutes

Bodyguard x cute guy. This was fine I guess, but I realized it wasn't going to actually be gay.

dropped after ep 7

mlm. ~540 minutes

Intern fanboy x tv star. There is campy fun and then there is just secondhand embarrassment and unfortunately this one is the latter.

cw: Too parasocial. Transphobic. Evil trans woman does casual sex trafficking. Guy too drunk to consent to 2 night stand, said no when sober, they're meant to be together anyways.

dropped after ep 1, fastforwarded and skipped through rest

mlm. ~144 minutes

It technically has everything a standard BL should have, but really no more than that. Nothingburger. 

Dropped after ep 3

mlm. ~560 minutes

Typical engineering students Thai BL, enemies to lovers, one overbearing guy chasing a weaker feminized guy. It's watchable for sure, and it would've worked in 2020, but it can't compete with the 2025 BL landscape. 

cw: noncon kiss.

dropped after ep 1

mlm. ~200 minutes.

Severely traumatized homeless gay boy meets cute guy at gay club, almost gets beaten to death by him, and decides to pursue him sexually anyways.

This isn't for me. I'm sure it's brilliant, but it's not for me.

dropped

mlm. ~220 minutes

Cutesy romance between art teacher and his high school student. Nobody thinks this is weird.

cw: age gap.

Dropped after ep 4.

mlm. ~260 minutes

Remake of the Thai 'Love in the Air' (2022). Fairly faithful to the original series. I still don't like their dom/sub 'daddy' dynamic. But it's interesting to see Japan interpret a Thai story.

dropped after ep 5

mlm. ~360 minutes

Awkward guy meets mysterious guy in online game. Mysterious guy turns out to be mafia. This isn't bad per sé, it's just a recombination of all the standard BL tropes. It's mid.

dropped because people told me not to watch last 2 episodes, so I didn't.

mlm. ~560 minutes

Childhood best friends to lovers. Shy kid x jock. Set in early 2000's. Watchable but barely. Gets better over time. 

cw: Weird age gap thing in secondary couple.

dropped after ep 2

mlm. ~640 minutes

Omegaverse except there are no omegas? Horny racer star needs fwb to focus, guy with dream to also be racer comes along and fulfills the role. It is flashy and dramatic, well-acted, good cinematography, competent.

But. So many characters fulfill the 'toxic masculinity x 1000, I was basically born the coolest guy alive' role. It's too hierarchical and stoic and yell-y for me. Also I'm not familiar with how omegaverse works and not really interested in learning.

dropped after ep 2

wlw. ~530 minutes.

Star aggressively pursues reluctant recently heartbroken goody two shoes who considers herself straight.

This is not for me, I think. The pacing is too slow for me and I'm finding myself bored a lot of the time. The characters, their motivations, their individuality, aren't convincing me and the acting isn't helping. I haven't seen anything innovative in the plot so far. The main love interest is kinda stalkery and I'm not into it. I think people probably like this for the chemistry and not much else?

dropped within first episode

mlm. ~240 minutes

Teacher x student. Age gap + power dynamic is not cool. Other than that it did not seem special/original enough to look past it.

dropped ep 3.

mlm. ~360 minutes

Silly unserious story about a rural Thai boy who gets a sudden Korean houseguest. The language gap is really well done in this. There are a number of characters that make this unwatchable for me.

dropped during ep 7

mlm. ~230 minutes.

Insecure country bumpkin goes to college in the big city to pursue some bloke who helped him get over his dead bird. Just the standard 'painfully awkward guy x super popular guy who is good at everything except expressing his feelings' formula. Very slow and unoriginal, but not unwatchable if you're into the standard formula.

dropped after ep 1

mlm. ~150 minutes

I haven't watched any of the seasons that apparently came before, and yet I still feel confident I would've dropped this regardless. The 'I'm scared of my boyfriend touching me' thing makes me really uncomfortable. Why is romance and touch continuously represented as a threat in Japanese media?

dropped during ep 5

mlm, background wlw. ~380 minutes

Rich but orphaned modern era firebender on the run wants to find secret ancient city to learn more about himself, but an airbender forest guardian doesn't agree.

There's so much plot in this. It has no chill, at any point. I wish it had a little more time to let things breathe. 

spoiler: It started out doing pretty okay, but then I read that the main character dies a pointless death during a nonsensical ending and I wasn't invested enough to sit through that.

dropped after episode 2 

wlw. ~600 minutes

Reality dating show, lesbian equivalent of His Man. 

A lot of drama surrounds this show. A cast member, Riwon, was found to have been a cam girl in the past, the rest of the cast had a problem with that, and one accused her of taking her to an explicit club or something? So Riwon got edited out of every episode after episode 2.

Then people are also saying that the fact that some cast members are bisexual means this is a fake lesbian dating show somehow.

To be honest, I'm not interested in being involved with this much toxicity. The decision by the show to edit out a girl for having done sex work is really rough. The dynamic between the cast members is really rough. The comment section on MDL is really rough, really biphobic, transphobic, conservative, anti-sex worker, and no it's not a loud minority. All of it leaves a very bad taste in my mouth and tells me I'm not welcome there anyways, so I'm out. I'll wait for sparks camp to bring in some lesbians instead.

Dropped after 3 episodes

wlw. ~460 minutes

Abused broke goody two shoes meets bossy and badass young CEO woman. 

It feels like a standard GL formula that pushes all its tropes to its extremes in very illogical ways. I can look past a couple of red flags and still enjoy a series, but I feel like there's nothing to this series outside of the red flags.

dropped after ep 3

wlw. ~450 minutes

The characters have a significant age gap, but the actresses do not.

Rich dad forces daughter to get engaged to a girl who really likes her a lot. She's grumpy about it, but that'll change. Feels like a pretty standard Thai GL so far. They're cute, it's fun, that's it. Idk why I'm not enjoying this and other people are. The acting and plot feel sub-par to me, but I guess I'm in the minority opinion.

dropped after ep 10

wlw, gnc. ~360 minutes

Indie lesbian reality dating show.  I really liked the start, but it seems to be devolving into some performative and passively mean-spirited stuff, probably because they're all getting more tired as the show goes on. There's a lot of peer pressuring going on and they don't seem to be enjoying themselves anymore.