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Storytelling at its Finest
What a story! This is SO good! It is a short (4 episode) series. It is like watching a movie that was simply broken into 4 parts. This is storytelling at its finest. It involves basically two characters with several supporting roles. To say that they are handsome would not do them justice. There is such chemistry between these two that is instantaneous. There is not a lot of back story and frankly none is needed. You only CARE about them. This is one of the finest acted BL series I have watched so far. It is intense with the last scenes so powerful that I honestly had to stop watching so I could compose myself. The story is imaginative, creative, quirky, sad, beautiful, and fulfilling. My full review is at ppbongi.medium.com.Was this review helpful to you?
A Secret Pleasure!
Formulaic, superficial, and unfocused (well, sort of). But sshh, I liked it - a lot! This BL series is an obvious low-budget, cookie-cutter story with stereotypical characters, and so-so acting. But what was great about this story is that it is NOT in a university, or filled with rich people or fancy cars, and everybody seemed to be cut from the same human cloth. It is in a rural area with a dialect I am not familiar with (or did not sound like your typical series from Thailand). Look, this is not a deep series. The acting is not first rate, but it is not bad. They seem wooden and stilted at times, but they are playing their parts with purpose and comfort. They are all so incredibly good looking, handsome, and beautiful. There is no lack of good looks here. This was quite a relatable story to everyday people who live down here rather than in sheltered environments like universities or surrounded by wealth. Kudos. If you want to review my full review of this rather interesting and likeable BL series, please read it at ppbongi.medium.com and leave me any comment. I would appreciate hearing from you.Was this review helpful to you?
Disappointing and Meandering
This BL series had such good potential and started out well. But then it meandered and veered off into silly and unnecessary directions, which was too bad because the overall story is actually entertaining. This was one of the few series that I almost gave up watching. The production, editing, and translations into English made it very difficult to watch. The story dragged on and on especially for the' main' couple and I found that relationship insufferable. I thought the 'secondary relationships' (if you want to call it that) were way more interesting and had more potential for development. This could have been a good solid story but it did not believe in itself and then got lost. These actors, for the most part, are very young and inexperienced yet they carried what they could on their own without any real direction or solid production. If you want to read my full review of this series, please go to ppbongi.medium.com. Leave a comment if you like.Was this review helpful to you?
Almost a Masterpiece
This series came the closet of any series I have watched (since “Until We Meet Again” to becoming a masterpiece. It is a brilliant and superb work of beautiful art that will be remembered. It is a profoundly moving and deeply spiritual series that is one of the best if not the best acted BL series. The ending just let me down in so many, many ways. So, it never quite reaches the mountain top. They just did not believe that they had an amazing story and instead went to tug at heartstrings and missed it completely. This is a story of love. Actually, two love stories where nothing else really matters. Both are deep, intense, and forever. You know that; you sense that; you feel that. One love is destined for tragedy and the other is destined to transcend time itself in its simple beauty and intensity. No matter how you look at this series, it will be one that no doubt will deeply and profoundly affect you. It is impossible not to feel. The acting in this series is nothing short of superlative. All four have shown great depth to their characters and took us on a journey through their characters’ developments. The major flaw in this series is that it did not bring the audience on the journey even if that journey is painful. If you want to read my full review of this amazing series, go to ppbongi.medium.com. Thanks.Was this review helpful to you?
Duang Without Me
My review of this series will certainly not fit into the vast and I do mean vast majority of viewers of this series. For me, I simply did not get its appeal, outside of the obvious. However, how far can gorgeous, and I do mean stunningly handsome, young men take this story? I hate to make the contrast but if this series was composed of not so stunningly Adonizes, would there be such a mad flow to rate this series so high? Or perhaps even if one of them had even been marginally defective in some capacity. I think not, for if you honestly assessed it, the story itself is rather mundane and primarily relied on the God-given obvious assets inherent in the actors’ physical appearances. So, I want to take a step back from the apparent and appraise this series on how it emended me. And to be quite honest, I found this series to be woefully limited. While I know I am probably not in the typical demographics of those watching this particular type of BL, as my perspective of this series is going to be vastly skewed. Plus, I also know the vast majority of viewers are quite positive about this series. I simply cannot agree with that assessment. What I am disturbed about and find most disconcerting is the image that somehow this is representative of gay relationships, which all BLs are. In their world, nearly everyone is gay and everyone seemingly accepts gay unions as ‘normal’. That is NOT the case and Qin and Duang should have been made to, at the very least, have some obstacles to their relationship so that others who think ‘it is a walk in the park’ for us, realize it is not. I would also like to see some sense of maturity also develop in these BL relationships especially Thai ones, so that there is not this emphasis on Pollyanna endings and development of sugar-coated connections so that all one has to do is flitter one’s eyelids, act like a dog, and prostrate yourself before someone and pledge your devotion entirely to your loved one and you will then live in nirvana for the rest of your life. That is just not the case.Unquestionably, this is an entertaining BL; just not for me, however. I could not overcome the story’s flaws but found the portrayal of Marvis and Jamie so much more real and erotic than the connection between Duang and Qin. There are a few surprises but for me not enough to carry me over the finish line into thinking this was a great or even good series.
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I Was Not Enamored
I honestly was not enamored with this series. I have a difficult time with movies and series trying to make gay life ‘perfect’. This even went beyond that. It gave an individual an opportunity for a second chance to relive his life. A do-over. What the series called a reset. But frankly, I was unsure why he deserved a do-over nor did I think he deserved one. It was simply baffling. He reached a pinnacle in this life for which most of us will never accomplish or attain or even dare to dream about. My issue with this series has nothing to do with the acting, per se. Yet it is the supposition itself I have a problem with. One must begin to question what were we watching then? Did it feel real? I had to decide that it obviously was not and therefore this was all a dream, an illusion. It was too perfect; too quixotic. Overall, I simply found this series rather predictable and at times trite. While I certainly get its hypnotic attraction, I just could not get into it with any sense of realism. I for one am getting tired of seeing gay love being portrayed as something that is not attainable in this life.Was this review helpful to you?
A Wonderful Story of Loneliness
What I am astonished is how others see series. As of late, South Korean BLs can be a ‘hit or miss’. Some are profoundly impactful while others are full of trite and mundane storylines. I found this to be simply brilliant while others found its ending cliché. For me, that was the most endearing part of this series. I have lived a long time and as trite as that behavior was portrayed, I have seen and witnessed this behavior in my life more times than I can count to many of my gay friends. It is called ‘jealousy’ and it is indeed a very ugly emotions that makes both males and females do awful, damaging and destructive things to others. And unfortunately, I do not think that emotion will ever diminish. This is a wonderful story, really. It is a story of loneliness but told with such compassion and tenderness.Was this review helpful to you?
Standard Thai BL
Admittedly, this series is perfectly named. It did seem to continue to go on and on endlessly. It was like being adrift in a rudderless boat floating in an ocean of tropes, clichés, banalities, stereotypes, and platitudes. Sooner or later, you would bump into one of them on your way to wherever it was you were supposed to be going. Unfortunately, this series went nowhere because it had nowhere to go to. Honestly, you have seen this story hundreds of times if you are an avid BL watcher. If not, you will no doubt run across its plot again because it is standard. It is another high school love story between two best friends. I know that many will no doubt like this series, but I found this series wantoned for its shallowness, use of endlessly tropey and cliché storylines, supporting characters that were superfluously infantile and not funny, the main characters never got to be a couple until the last episode and by that point it was too late, and a supposed secondary couple that was never fully developed into anything meaningful. I also found it quite sad that these two guys, who are otherwise solid and successful, could not bring themselves to communicate with each other. That for me is simply not a subject matter I can find funny.Was this review helpful to you?
Profoundly Sad Tale
This is a difficult series to review. It is NOT entertaining and at times gets tripped up in its own minutia. There is no real love in this series. It is more pretend or school-boy fantasies of love. The main protagonist is unlikeable. The reason for my anxiety about this series is because of its glorification of abuse for the sake of love. No one is worthy of love who is abusive and to make matters worse, this series paints a picture that the victim is the one who is wrong. I know what it was trying to say but for me, it failed and I wept at all the overt and covert signs of emotional, physical and psychological abuse dispensed like candy in this series. Production is excellent and by no means am I implying the the actors/actress were bad. They were not and in fact there is some very good acting in this series. Its the message and how it was presented that is bothersome.I could not re-watch this series again.
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The Brilliance Of This Series Is Its Omnitude
This is a rare gem that tells such an aggregate story in an uninhibited way. Not from a BL slant but from a gay man’s perspective. It is refreshingly honest, touching, and one of the most contemplatively deep series I have ever seen. The title is a bit of a misnomer to me, however. So much more than romantic love is explored in this series. It goes beyond classical definitions and allows us to see affection, devotion, attachments, friendships, and yes passion and intimacy as well with gradations within those feelings as well, all within its location of a big city only as an afterthought. It is one of the most powerful dramas of this year.Was this review helpful to you?
Dare You To Boredom!
The protagonists and many, many of the supporting cast are so handsome that the iceberg that sank the Titanic would have melted into a mere ice cube if these guys were in one location on the top deck of that ship. Their radiant good-looks melted everything bad about this series away which included an absurdly dumb murder mystery and, sorry to say, rather mediocre acting. If one honestly assessed this series with any sense of objectivity and detachment, one would see how wrought this series was. Everything about this series felt lazy to me. The writing and directing was frustratingly inept. The story drones on ad nauseum. One would suffer from neck whiplash the way this series ping-ponged from murder mystery to love story with no understandable transition. From my perspective, it just was not all that good no matter how you looked at it and is essentially forgettable.Was this review helpful to you?
On My Must See List!
This is an astonishingly funny yet poignant series completed a number of years ago that is just awesome. Funny, cute, and filled with real human characters that are relatable, charming, and individuals i would want as friends. It is a story of friendship and of life and how in life there are always challenges to relationships that must be resolved by ending them. The timing of the humor is shear perfection and the whole series just has a certain 'lived in' feeling about it that is so relatable. I loved this series a lotIf you want to see my full review, read it at BLBliss.com.
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Fell Apart At The End
Undoubtedly no one is going to like my review. I LOVED 95% of this series. It was charming, witty, and magical. But then they ended it on such a ridiculous note to simply please the audience. As a gay man, I found the ending insulting, degrading, and yet again forces gay relationships to fit into the mold of straight relationships. All I can say, since I do NOT want to reveal any of the story lines, is I quite literally cried. Here was what could have been a BL fantasy masterpiece that simply became a logical farce. It forced the story into societal norms rather than personal norms. If you want to see why this series so upset me, you can read my entire review of this what-could-have-been masterpiece at ppbongi.medium.com. I am sure that there will not be a lot of people who will necessarily agree with me and perhaps I analyzed it to its extreme, but this series just missed it for me. I was deeply saddened.Was this review helpful to you?
There are 3, 698 Reasons to Love This Series!
I found myself thoroughly absorbed in this love story that is told unreservedly and unconditionally only from the perspective of the two individuals involved. It is displayed in soft, gentle tones, almost like a whisper. With cloudy overtones to the hues of the cinematography even though, ironically, it is a story where the central focus is photography. It is a serendipitous happenstance that turns out to be a long journey to destiny for two young men. This is a saga from a slice of life of two young men who are so deeply in love with one another with one so haunted by the thought of losing the other again that he is willing to not love again. Remember they are restricted by a society that does not value the commitment of two men living together. It felt more like an environment of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” So, there is no obligation, no social contract, no foundation, no pledge for staying together other than their own embrace to each other. Which for one party felt overwhelmingly fragile and very scary. I got it. Finally, I understood. The series concludes in one of the most creative and original ways I have ever seen, and I thought it was so authentic and astonishingly moving. What slightly distracted from this series but only a bit is its lack of passion especially in the kissing. Although it is certainly better than the vast majority of Japanese BLs of late, it still lacked a depth of believability to it. Make us truly believe you are in love with each other with at least one good, passionate, erotic, exotic kiss. Is that really so hard to do?Was this review helpful to you?
