Giuca

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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If I hear Groundhog Day in the same sentence as a film or a drama, I am certain I am going to watch it. And so when I saw a review for this movie, I had to watch it. Yesterday With You is a good film: it ticked all the necessary boxes for it to be a convincing time travel story!

It was a story about childhood friends who meet as adults reconnect and fall in love. But life keeps throwing them lemons until an accident happens. With the help of magic birthday candles they try to fix what went wrong!

The first 10 min is a whole romcom movie: how they meet and fall in love and fight and make up and just love each other. The montage of significant scenes from a relationship is expertly done and we do not need more in order to know what is important here.

Then the tragedy strikes in the form of a white truck of doom (what else?). I was impressed by the creative use of the said truck: he actually pulled a scaffolding down on the victim. After this accident, the time travel groundhog day style starts using some candles. The cinematography changes a bit and from warm brownish tones we get a lot of greys and cold colours as the main characters rush around trying to change the future. There was an impressive scene with a car driving through a forest of huge grey pillars (must be a highway exchange) but it conveyed well the feelings of being lost and distraught.

The film was full of usual drama tropes: the already mentioned truck, stopping in the middle of the road to think, disapproving and abusive parents, quirky best friends. The actors, completely unknown to me, were really good and had decent chemistry.
This was actually a perfect format for this story avoiding thus all the downsides of a drama like length, filler stories and chinese propaganda (see Reset).

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Messed up cute & fluff

On the surface cute and fluffy but if you look behind it, this is full of lies, cruelty and stupidity. And I never found stupid behaviour cute. It definitely is not here.

Bu Xia is a university basketball star, cheerful and superficial. He suddenly needs to share his dorm room with Jiang Chi a smart taciturn law student. BX is not a happy roommate and does everything in his power to kick JC out. Until one day, because of his sister, he starts hearing ghosts' voices. This freaks him out but when he accidentally touches JC, voices disappear. From that day on, he tries to stay close to him, being nice to him, hugging him, holding his hand and saying he liked him. This makes JC think BX is in love with him and kisses him. BX is revolted but still keeps close to JC.

Secrets, lies and misunderstandings is what should have been the title of this drama. The misunderstanding and the subsequent consequences are dragged out for most of the drama. And for most of the drama, I felt really sorry for JC so in love and hated BX for his lies and the way he used JC without telling him. When JC eventually finds the truth(sister spills the beans which is so wrong: her brother's secret is not hers to tell!!!) he is not angry. He is so happy that BX is also in love with him that he is ready to do anything in order to help him. JC is comfortable with his sexuality and makes passes on BX who most of the time does not understand why JC is behaving in that way. Then he starts wondering about the possibility of same sex relationship as if had been living as a hermin in a cave all his life. At one point he asks: "But we are both men?!?" surprised that his friends suggested he dated JC. When BX eventually admits he might like JC he is not sure whether it is love or if he is just imagining himself in love in order to keep JC close and ghost voices at bay.

In this drama we are given the usual seme/uke trope but put on its head: while BX looks like an uke his behaviour is more of a seme. And JC is the opposite: he looks like seme but reacts like uke. Towards the ending of the series he becomes a real doormat: doing everything in his power to please BX and never questioning him about his lies. The character of JC I really liked in the beginning became a demeaning and sad character: I had no respect left for him in the end. On the other hand, I had trouble believing in BX's sincerity when he declared his love: it looked more interested than real because JC's presence chased the voices away! Eventually he started acting like a real cliché girlfri...ooups! boyfriend complete with fanning himself metaphorically and throwing jealous temper tantrums. The relationship is limit toxic and abusive, not cute since JC accepts anything from BX without really asking anything in return.

There were many fluffy moments here/ the roommates' conflict made me think of TharnType: it was fun to watch. Once they were finally open about their feelings there were a lot of kissing scenes. One, on the roof doing laundry made me think of c drama weddings!

The acting was not really good, they gave it an sincere effort and they had decent chemistry.

The music was really nice and probably the highlight of this drama. The rest is just messed up. It is a nice and easy watch if you do not think about what you are watching!

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Cuteness overload and nothing more!

I was bored, so bored while watching this! These two being cute and adorable, zero toxicity and no conflict (well a tiny one, blink-and-you-miss-it kind) , was OK for a few episodes and then it went flat going round and round in cute and adorable little circles! And I was bored out of my mind!

Don't misunderstand me, it was really well done, well written and a novel concept, cinematography top notch, and still I was bored! I do not fast forward while watching but I play games on my mobile and I played a lot while this was playing in the background!

What I liked:
- cute and adorable leads
- comic relief provided by band members and not the usual trans/effeminate gay characters
- no toxic mad females
- ballroom dance and ep 5 musical kind of music number
- the first love

What I did not like:
- repetitive plot: teased kisses
- lack of female characters
- most of the music
- the "no relationship while in band" plot device

The first few episodes were the best and though I almost dropped it while watching the first one, I was on board when the final twist came! Gun is a singer in a high school band and the school president, Tinn, has had a crush on him for two years. It is the final year of high school so Tinn decides to do everything in his power to help Gun with his band in order to get to know him and maybe more! The complications arise when Tinn finds out there is a rule of the music club: the members are not allowed to be in a relationship until the singing competition is over. Well this provides plot for about 10 episodes! After 5 episodes they realize they are attracted to each other but because of the rule they restrain themselves for the next five episodes. This is the occasion to place a good number of attempted and avoided kisses! They kisses bottles, notebook, medal but not each other!

While we are on that subject, I wonder if there had been some new guidelines within Thai BL industry because this is the second series in a row I see where the high school kids refrain from kissing until after graduation. Just like in I Will Knock You, they kiss, in spite of numerous attempted and averted kisses, only after graduation!

To make things perfectly clear, you can tell a love story without physical expression of it, but you need to tell it well! I do not look for kissing scenes in the dramas I watch: I look for a tightly woven story that keeps me glued to the screen! Not the case here! I was not glued, if anything, I was really annoyed with the endless repetition of tease kisses!

And of course they ticked off everything that is on the romcom required scenes list: riding a bike together, putting the helmet on a crush, sharing an umbrella, turn your head for an accidental almost kiss, back hugs, piggyback rides, treating a wound etc. etc. It was oh so formulaic but everything was done with those huge, adorable, cute and dreamy smiles! So I guess it is OK?

There was no notable conflict to speak of: bad guys were bad for about 10 seconds, Mom was sick for three minutes and the world was gay unfriendly for about 5 minutes. Parents were proud of their gay kids and worried about their futures for about 1 min. The rest was pure, unadulterated cuteness, adorable fluff, diabetes inducing and boring! So, so boring!

And then of course there were long minutes devoted to the product placement: printer, Nivea, drinks and chicken. HELP! I wanted to scream...

The actors were all really good, cute as hell and adorable like puppies. They have a promising future in acting, adorable and the way they are! And they are all quite good musicians and singers. For young men of that age, they are very, very talented! So I hope to see them in other series and not only BL.

The concept of the series wandered about a bit: is it a BL about and featuring music or a bl musical! Not the same thing! Most of the songs were preformed when plot demanded it: on stage with instruments. Some numbers were illustrated with an imaginary story(club, dance) and one was right out of american musical: people just bursting out in song in weirdest places! I did not like any of the songs: they were so alike I had trouble telling them apart and there were some songs repeating over and over again! But I like the idea of a BL musical so I hope to see one sometimes in the future!

This was a single watch, never to be repeated for me! Cuteness and adorableness are enough for one time watch: I need more conflict and angst, I need more drama in dramas I watch! This one was just cute and boring! Definitely not my cup of tea! Not bad but not for me either!

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Love, escort & revenge

I keep seeing a pattern in these japanese romance dramas: a woman down on her luck, loses job, gets dumped, falls and hurts herself and of course it rains, so she meets someone by accident who changes her life and she finds true love. This is mainly what happens here.

Sumire, the FL, has always been a doormat. One evening, looking like a drowned cat, completely drenched, she meets Yuri, the owner of a lingerie store whose words inspire her to change. The next day, after being rejected at a job interview, she meets Soichi in the rain. Sumire who finally gets a job with Yuri, starts dating Soichi without realizing that he is Yuri's live in escort. All hell breaks loose when a journalist humiliates Yuri during her fashion presentation.

The main characters are all greyish, unpredictable but ultimately they admit to their faults. And all is forgiven.

The drama deals with infidelity which is a topic highly hated on MDL. Even the fansubber hates this drama because of it! Go figure! People are human, we are not perfect or infallible, we make mistakes, we hurt others, we are sometimes unfaithful. I really do not like this puritan mindset: chaste and virtuous but really, are you all such saints? I am digressing! But I agree, adultery is wrong. Still it does not mean we cannot use this plot device in a drama.

In this drama a women had an relationship with a man without realizing he had a family. Why is she getting all the hate and the man (you need two people to tango!) nothing? Was she supposed to hire a detective to investigate the man who says nothing about himself in order to find out if he was married? The FL is also a victim of infidelity: her father abandoned her for another family which caused her a lifelong trauma!
Another character, a childhood friend who's had a crush on the FL for 20 years finally makes a move on her when she's on her lowest. The character was fun and funny but as far as his love life is concerned, I have zero respect for someone who is not brave enough and confess his feelings. For 20 years! I really hoped they would not end up together.
Soichi is the grayest of them all: a charming, handsome pianist, a kept man toying with the women's feelings until he finds the truth out. It is never too late to make amends!

The music is really good and the opening credits with the four main characters lost in a cobweb of relationships is quite eye catching. What is not eye catching is the main actress playing Sumire. She's a good actress and excels in this role of a mouse but because she's a mouse I cannot comprehend the escort's feelings for her. On the other hand, the actress playing Yuri impressed me with her voice: the way she speaks is alluring!

This is not a perfect drama: the episodes are short and the depth and the development of characters are somehow lacking. Nevertheless, I enjoyed it more than I expected and I guess the low ratings are the result of the unpopular MDL topic. But if you are openminded and like dramas who have drama, go for it!

NB This is my 200th review! Pat on my back!!!LOL

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End of innocence

What an amazing short movie! What an incredibly talented couple of actors!

It has been a long time since a movie, short or otherwise, provoked such strong feelings in me. The story is nothing new: two best friends, apparently joined in the hip since forever see their feelings for each other change. Will those feelings bring irreversible changes into their relationship, for better or for worse?

The story is told with no dialogue to speak of. English or any subs for that matter are unnecessary!

Everything is told by looks, gestures, emotions...The actors are extraordinary. The showed us how the feelings change, their reactions, the gap between them closing and then widening, emotions overflowing, things done that cannot be taken back, the courage needed to stand up for your feelings....

If you are looking for butterflies: they are here!

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Healing long vacation

For me, a relative newbie drama watcher, this drama is ancient history relic. And if it had not been for the Drama Discovery Challenge (perfect title!) I would have never had the idea to consider watching this let alone watch it. And I would have missed a real gem of a drama.

The plot is fairly basic: two lonely people get to share an apartment. This forced cohabitation makes them grow and change as individuals and discover real love and affection. Nothing new under the drama sun but this one was excellently written and produced, the cast is perfect and the plot moves forward smoothly without a hitch!

The characters are all too human. Minami, the FL hides behind her cheerfulness the frustration and unhappiness as life seems to pass her by. At the beginning her forcefulness and brazen behaviour are very annoying but in contact with Sena she mellows down a little bit, just enough to become likable and still remain a strong woman and a force of nature. Sena is a pianist, looks like a lost puppy, who wants to become a professional player but has hit the wall which inhibits him from expressing emotion through music that would give him that special something to lift him above the rest. Seta, in contact with a talented but robotic and emotionless student realizes the flaws in his piano playing but still does not know how to remedy it. Minami finds cracks in that wall and breaks it without him ever being aware of it!

The support characters are equally interesting. Minami's brother, a happy-go-lucky Shouji falls for Sena's fellow straight laced pianist. Their relationship is on the lines of extremes opposites attract but can they stay together or will they just bounce off of each other. And then there is this minor character, Sena's piano teacher who has a way with words and uses them to poetically describe piano playing. Beautifully written!

The relationship between Sena and Minami goes through all phases: from acquaintances to reluctant friends to lovers . Since Minami is older, she never really considers Sena a boyfriend material until it is too late and they are deeply in love. They try dating other people only to realize that it is too late for that! They had found the missing part of themselves in each other.
The writers managed to avoid those pesky drama tropes that last for too long: misunderstandings, break ups etc. They are there, otherwise there would be no drama, but they do not take up too much time.

This drama is 27 years old and it shows on a technical plane: the format, the cinematography, the fashion (poor guy and his oversized suits! Awful!), the habits (everyone's smoking everywhere!) and no mobile phones (trying to reach someone on the phone was not easy!). I watched it in poor quality but it was worth it!

The problem that I have with j-dramas in general is the music: too loud, too much of it, sudden changes of tune, wrong music which does not correspond the mood of the scene. I found all of it here. There were some nice original piano pieces as background music. And then there was this tune (which turned out to be a song in the last episode) which played repeatedly in the background with different arrangements (harp, piano, violin, flute). The thing with that tune is that it sounds like a mash up of Tears In Heaven by Eric Clapton and Blowing In The Wind by Bob Dylan. The resemblance to these songs made it very distracting and I found myself listening to the music instead of following the story.

Anyway, this has been a great watch and a beautiful story of facing challenges, deciding what you really want to do with your life and going for it!

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Pomp & Circumstance

I guess they do not have any background composers in Korea capable of writing the uplifting, triumphant score for this drama so they had to use universally known Elgar's piece? Unfortunately, every time this music came on, I forgot to follow the story. It means all the time! But it says a lot about the plot as well since it did not manage to keep me really interested.

Still I finished it. It is a story about a righteous prosecutor who is offered a second chance on life in order to get the big bad man. Killed in his thirties, the lawyer is sent back to his university days where he quickly meets a string of persons. Using his knowledge from the future, he solves a few cases and then there is a SEVEN year time skip. Why? Why seven? He's a prosecutor again but, having learned his lesson from the first time, he does not go after the bad guy alone but uses his network of friends. And eventually gets sort of rid of him but simply by cutting him off from his two closest aides. It took him only ten years to do so! But soon enough, we are led to believe all he did was for nothing because another villain appeared using the previous one's networks! THE END

What I liked:
- songs
- fighting scenes
- female characters
- delusional villain
- time travel

What I did not like:
- background music
- unused great female characters
- brown envelopes
- illogical plot
- comic book second villain
- abandoned fantasy element
- macho tone

The plot is extremely repetitive. The prosecutor decides on a target, then blackmails the target's surroundings with brow envelopes and then arrests him and moves on. The supply of brown envelopes is endless. The prosecutor is mysteriously smiling, smirk on his face and strutting all importantly around.

The main villain, a completely delusional politician convinced he was god sent in order to make the country great again, always calm, emotionless. He has two aides equally emotionless who do all his dirty work while he sits all importantly, cutting his bonsai and spewing metaphorical nonsense about dogs and leashes. Truth be told, he is not the only one doing it: every character does it one time or another while trying to illustrate an event, they all use animal metaphors (dogs, fishes, horses, birds...) which by the end become a complete gibberish.

The lawyer was surrounded with five strong female characters who eventually had not use outside incidental help. Otherwise they were far in the background and would come out only when needed by the MC.The writers even decided to include a useless love story literally in the last 15min of the drama.

I used to be a fan of Lee Joon Gi but I do not like his acting anymore. It looked like he was just on autopilot and it reminded me of Lawless Lawyer but much worse. I know he looks young, but I could not help thinking he was forty as I was watching him play a 19yr old. This is the drama that ends my fan period as far as he is concerned. Every other actor nailed their roles: the bad guys were so obviously bad and creepy, the good guys really good even when pretending to be bad.

The drama is based on a comic so everything is very basic and character development is really hard to notice! The plot is so often seen corruption and unhealthy relationships between the politicians and chaebols and the great companies. Nothing new or original....

Find something better to watch! I am going to!

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Fan guy and his soulmate: a bromance!

DISCLAIMER: I have never seen a wuxia(I think it's what it is called) before so this is a review by someone who has ZERO knowledge of the genre and its rules! Since this is going to be drowned in the sea of reviews, I shall be painfully frank!

I did not hate it! I did not like it either. I was mostly bored. But I finished it nevertheless. And without fast forwarding!

The story is messy: there are a few sects and a prince trying to get their hands on a mythical weapon called Glazed Armor. There are a lot of underhand alliances, betrayals, deals, lying, duels and endless talking!

This is based on a widely popular danmei novel which had to be toned down because of chinese censorship. Well this is where the first surprise came from: the bromance was more romance than I expected: there was so much double entendres in their conversation that I was really surprised with things the producers managed to get away with.

The fighting scenes were rather spectacular. At first I did not like the constant changing of action scenes filming speed: FFW/slo mo/FFW. I ended up getting used to it because the choreography was spectacular!

What else was good? Let me think....costumes and certain sets (palaces, plum trees, mountains etc.). And the cute young couple, too cute to survive this ordeal, unfortunately! And that is about it!

On with the rest!
The pacing was a major problem with this series.( I was told it was because of filming during COVID! I don't know!). Stop-and-go! It was never constant: mostly slow. So slow! Lots of time was wasted on endless static conversations. So endless that I usually started playing games because I lost attention and the conversations were not interesting. They would drone on for ages like that, change settings and have an extremely important conversation all of a sudden ; I had to rewind a few times because I missed some important facts. The passage of time was not clear: slow than jump forward than a bit of reminiscing etc... The plot was complex but they never resolved the main problem (the prince!) instead of which they introduced a bunch of new useless characters and killed a cute young couple! That did tug on my heartstrings and I did not like though I should have expected it! The useless characters were the most ridiculous in a scene towards the ending when the serious guy goes for a quest and they just stand there solemnly and seriously watching him disappear into distance! I was bent over laughing at that scene!The villain was obvious from the get go: the creepy, slimy fake kindness was a dead giveaway! And the "best" was a heart transplant! In the past, a wife wanted to save her husband like that?!?!? Wuxia magic!

Next big problem was the main couple. Basically, they meet and fall in love within 3 seconds and start immediately addressing each other as soulmates?!?!? That was quick! But they seemed to live in different time zones: there was something terribly off about their relationship. One problem was the characters! The first one sports expressionless face practically throughout the whole series. He manages to crack a smile three times and that changes the character completely, giving him warmth and humanity. In any case he is very superficial. The fan guy, on the other hand, talks and behaves as a clown, forever smiling quixotically, evidently hiding something behind his laconic answers and jokes! We find out about it eventually so he gains a certain depth more than his soulmate, in any case! Their relationship lacked chemistry! At least for me: I could not believe them to be soulmates. And even though the fan guy was very expressive, doe eyed and all touchy feely, the other guy was nowhere near so open or welcoming of a prospect of staying together forever. Eventually he accepted. Towards the end, there was a subplot in which the fan guy enlisted help of everyone except for his soulmate who then barges in the middle of the plot execution and almost ruins it. Afterwards he is visibly hurt by being left out but the fan guy never apologizes or explains and the other guy just moves on without questioning anything! I felt enraged for the poor neglected soulmate!

The acting was average, at the best! Because of dubbing; the voices were hushed mostly: this breathless speaking is really annoying. The writing is boring and lacks humour: the banters are not funny and those long conversations are not interesting. When the actors speak, they often have long monologues which sound as if they are being read out in a monotonous voice. Sleep inducing! Actually, I managed to fall asleep regularly during 7 first episodes. It is then that the fan guy became interesting!
Music was boring. And editing is a chinese drama's way: episode is 42min long so we cut it at that mark! So what if it is mid sentence! They have no knowledge how to make a cliffhanger!

Anyhow, this was an experience I do not wish to repeat! Moreover, the last episode (37!) is a joke! It is 11min long compilation of scenes from the series with one single new scene: them living happily ever after on top of the mountain, forever and ever. How romantic! Bah, humbug!

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Guilty pleasure

And another short c drama under my belt. They are something else, these short c dramas! As someone who resolutely refused to watch c dramas (length, language, dubbing, censorship) I am feeling my resolve weakening. These short dramas are to blame. I think they found a perfect format for today's drama viewing audience fed up with endless drama filled with unnecessary side characters and with a lot of time to fill so they end up losing the plot. With these short dramas, they are forced to give us a solid, logical plot without fillers and straight forward.

Circle of Love had all of this and every single revenge melodrama trope was in evidence. Soulmate lovers torn apart by a revenge meet again but then there are a lot of mind games and amnesias (3 I think: every time she hits her head she gets amnesia and the plot restarts! Brilliant!) involved, crazy ex and her even crazier brother pulling the strings from behind until the final showdown where the main triangle kill each other. And then they meet each other two years later: I guess they had been reincarnated, or their souls like ghosts possessing other people looking like their twins. Completely illogical and incomprehensible but we do kind of get a happy ending or a promise of one!

It is messy, hot, convoluted, ridiculous, a lot of fun to watch and full of toxicity. But that is what makes it a great watch when you do not want to be aware or correct or care but are just looking for some mindless fun.

The drama is a well made product: writing, cinematography, music, acting- everything is top notch. It is not realistic or woke but it is a drama full of drama made for our viewing pleasure. And on that account it delivers as promised.

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BL & Makjang

As I was skipping through the last episode, (actually FFW a drama for the very first time EVER!) while trying to avoid the ultimate cringe that episode is, I was just trying to comfort myself justifying watching this by its relative shortness. There were some good things about this drama and then there was the plot.

Good things: actors, cinematography.

The plot: BAD! Nonsensical and cringy. The story follows some mobsters who are ALL gay of course: from the Boss in a a happy 30 years old relationship with his secretary down to the minor players. What kind of mob is that? The criminals themselves were extremely unconvincing, unnatural! They just looked like a bunch of PC schoolkids putting on a show in which they imagine what real criminals might look like,behave and dress! Ridiculous!
The characters are not really explained: we do get to hear a kind of a back story but it does not explain their situation at the beginning of the series! Why does he have to work three jobs in order to put himself through high school? Why is the other guy a member of the mob? They all talk about killing people but look like they'd apologize and start crying if they accidentally crush an ant? Apart from the four main characters, everyone else either cannot act or they got unclear direction?
The second half plunges deep into a makjang with rich families, paying off the unsuitable lover, amnesia...classic!

It is still watchable under one serious condition: turn your brain off. Then you can enjoy the two love stories with decent skinship and a lot of cringe. Especially in the last episode. A lot!!!!!
All in all, this was bad. Barely watchable short drama: its saving grace being the short duration. LOL To watch only when there's nothing else!

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Exciting turns to boring but beautiful

Well this was an interesting experience. This short drama was beautifully crafted, acted and produced. It was a pleasurable watch.

The story revolves around two antagonists: Nie Zhe the son of the most powerful man in the county and Xiaodie, a maid. When her mistress dies after being assaulted, Xiaodie decides to avenge her death. She takes her place and introduces herself into Nie Zhe's house. Immediately the sparks fly and they clash until they do not anymore. That is the moment that Die's mistress chooses to reappear after being brainwashed by the neighbouring county's spy.

The drama has an amazing first third: enemies to lovers trope is my favourite. Watching the main couple spar, bicker and fall in love, chemistry lighting up the scene like fireworks, was perfect. Smart female lead and tsundere male lead were just a joy to watch. And there were some hot scenes, let me tell you! Barechested Nie Zhe is worth the watch. I am shallow, sue me! LOL

Until they became a boring couple in love. Love in dramas really means death to brain cells. So they are in love and keep wanting to die for each other when facing the bad guys! But, fortunately, heavens protect people in love from their own stupidity, it seems here!

The rest of the drama is quite boring frankly! Being held hostage, poisoned, threatened, held at gunpoint, faked death etc. etc. you think of it, they did it! Spies, crazy doctors and revenge of revenge of revenge or whatever was boring and annoying.

The actors did a wonderful job, they were perfect for these roles. The cinematography was stunning and the sequences filming details (flying pen, sloshing drink, breaking glass, falling petals...) were a feast for eyes! And songs were amazing: they gave the drama this century ago feeling,

It could have been a perfect drama had not the second part got lost in the ridiculous spy story. Bi=ut it is still worth the watch: if only for the main leads. They were extraordinary!

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Beauty is in the eye of the beholder!

It has been a long time since I binged a good thai BL. And I loved this one. The main couple was on fire, their chemistry was so good. So much so, I might even go back and finish To Sir, With Love which I dropped....

But I have an issue with costume designer. More about that later!

The story is rather superficial: a cynical lawyer wants to get revenge for being fired from a case so he takes the former opponents as clients and in the course of investigation they fall for each other. Not a new or revolutionary plot: a classical enemies to lovers story. And I love those so this turned out to be such a binge fest!

The actors were great: Film is an amazing actor. He showed us all the ambiguity of Charn's character and motivations. I might check out his other series! Jam is Tin, the usual macho man, straightforward and honest to a fault.

Did anyone watch this for the plot? I do not think so! We all watched for the romance and the plot was secondary: it was important as a driving force behind the characters, bringing them together. But those characters were what mattered and they were a varied and intriguing lot. There was the second couple: the big baddie's son, yearning for his crazy abusive father's love and his bodyguard. Ambiguous at the start of the series, they proved to be a couple of unlucky boys trying to survive the bully of the father/boss/criminal mastermind(korean makjang evil chaebol like)! And an assorted lot of his henchmen with baseball bats beating everyone up. On the good side, there was the grandmother: kind, smart, strong and open minded; and of course the club owner and her girlfriend, the singer: wise and loving and helpful! And last but not least, Charn's the mad as a hatter ex boyfriend and local thug rich boy, Naween. A delight to watch., for real!

So that was a really fun watch until the last half an hour when they delved into the weak gay rights in Thailand, and hopes for the better world, and diversity, and inclusion and all that jazz. Now days, they seem to end every bl like that including a wedding! Fine! Just fluff mixed with gay rights movement! Well, why not?

I know that I am going to be slapped on the fingers by the community, but am I allowed to have a slight disagreement with you about the fashion?

The non business clothes they put on Film: frilly blouses and wide floppy trousers and a tuxedo looking more like a wedding dress than a suit - why? Why did not they put the same kind of clothing on Jam? So people here say that Film's character wears that because he is in accord with his sexuality and being gay he shows his softer side like that. Could not the same thing be said about Jam's character? Tin is open about his sexuality and does not hide it. But unlike Charm he does not feel the need to advertise it???? I had the same problem with Bed Friend where James wore the same kind of clothing. And his macho boyfriend was always dresses in black. Yes, the BLs have evolved from classical seme/uke stereotypes but still it is very much obvious by the way the characters speak, move and dress who is who in these relationships. Both James and Film are beautiful in their respective series. Beautiful not handsome.

But, that's only my opinion...

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Japanese BL version of Something In The Rain

The fluffiest part of this drama were opening credits. The rest is a slow burn, angst filled, heavy with secrets and untold truths and I loved it. Moreover it reminded me of my favourite K-drama, SITR with the stress put upon family ties, friends to lovers theme and workplace sexual harassment. Since it is a japanese drama, it is shorter, more succinct and the family is just touched upon but it is just as bad.

Tokyo in April Is... tells the story of Kazuma and Ren, best friends when they were in school but separated due to an incident. They meet again accidentally ten years later and the spark that connected them years earlies is still there. But something is holding Ren back, he does not want to confide in Kazuma so they become sex friends. And then slowly more.

The main theme of the drama is acceptance: how to accept and define yourself, how does the family see you and whether they accept you regardless.

The main leads were excellent, they had good chemistry, were very much at ease with each other and were deceptively obvious. At the start of the drama, Kazuma looked like a shy, sweet and innocent boy while Ren seemed like a much stronger characters, he was outspoken and nonchalant. But very soon it turned out that Kazume, behind his sweet exterieur, hides a core of steel while Ren hides his wounds and his fragility. I liked this non conformity. They met when they were teens and struck a firm friendship which developed into love neither was really conscious of, especially Kazuma. Ren quickly figured out he was gay himself but Kazuma always refused to put the term to the feelings he had for Ren. And he stuck to this notion to the very ending, refusing to define himself as gay but saying he "only loves Ren". This gay-for-you-only trope is really getting old and unnecessary. It was very much obvious from the beginning that both boys have strong feelings for each other.
At this point, I would like to congratulate casting director on casting two young actors who played Ren ans Kazuma at 15(in flashbacks): they were perfect, there was a definite resemblance with the main actors and they portrayed those young man with talent and sensitivity.
The romance between them is an adult one, they are not afraid of physical contact. What scares them both is communication: so they sleep together regularly, practically live together but do not talk about important things. That leads to a lot of misunderstanding and missed chances. And almost to another unwilling separation because of "it's for your own good" classical plot point. The main events, the ones that shaped them and caused them a lot of suffering happen in the rain under transparent umbrellas. (Is there any special meaning to it? Not an umbrella expert, here!lol)

The boys' families are something special. After the first incident, Ren's family disowns him to the point of having him change his surname. Ultimate cruelty of unloving parents. Kazume is a child of divorced parents and his mother seems to be just as bad if not worse than Ren's parents. But her reactions are explained by her being worried about them (since she quickly understood that those two have extremely strong connection!) which was not really clear to begin with.

Personally, I really liked this drama, it is my kind of drama!I wanted to rate it higher but then they went and ruined it with two of my most hated tropes. Still, if you make abstraction of those, the drama is an excellent short watch. Great story, lovely cinematography, excellent acting, natural, subtle skinship; and cuteness overload in credits where they show off their domestic bliss!

When I think I almost did not watch this believing all those posts saying that the second half was bad etc. True, it was not as good but it was far from ruining a great drama (which went, for me from 9.5/10 to 8.5/10 so still an excellent drama!)

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BL version of a Korean romcom drama

The year 2023 is the season of office bls. Last year we had an abundance of sports and mafia series and the year before, 2021, cooking was most prominent theme while 2020 was the school centered bl year. Step By Step is one of the better office romcoms if not the best.

So there are two versions released: the uncut version has episodes 20 to 50 min longer than the 45 min/ep TV version. Usually when we talk about uncut version of a BL, viewers think that the steamy scenes had been cut. Considering that there are the grand total of two hot scenes in all of the uncut version of the series, I do not think it is the case. Probably just plenty of regular scenes though I do not understand what they managed to cut since there is not one single unnecessary scene . The flow of the story is steady without idle time and in spite of it being a slow burn romance and full of usual tropes, I was not bored for a minute.

Story is a rather simple office romance about Pat and Jeng. Pat is the youngest member of the marketing team and is regularly asked to do chores for his coworkers. One day while carrying coffee cups, he bumps into Jeng and the connection is immediate. They accidentally meet like that a few more times and it seems like they really like each other. Until it turns out that Jeng is Pat's new boss and the developing feelings need to be put on a back burner because Jeng as a boss is a completely different person, so much so that Pat is scared of him and gets to be very insecure and emotional. Jeng on the other hand proves to be rigid, controlling, micromanaging and inflexible.

The love story develops slowly over 10 episodes, step by step while they are learning about each other and changing and mostly because of the boss/employee relationship which makes any other kind of relationship a very risky business. When they eventually get together, the whole hell breaks loose and they split only to get back together two years later (trope).

There are a few side stories involving Pat's ex, who wants to try again, of course (trope), Jeng's father doing everything to discredit Pat (trope), a straight couple getting pregnant (trope), a long term gay couple (fem gay trope), and Jaab, Jeng's rebellious younger brother having a crush on a taken coworker (trope).

Main couple is comprised of a tsundere Jeng and doormat Pat. And while Jeng is perfection, I never managed to understand what could have possibly attracted him in Pat. He is short, too emotional, ugly, weak of character (can't say NO to anyone), too sensitive, not particularly smart and very unlikable (this last is due to the poor choice of actor: he is so wrong for this role!). I watched this Man, who played Jeng wonderfully well. I believed him to be in love even though the chemistry with Ben (who played Pat) was minimal almost non existent. Man literally carried the whole drama all by himself, he's the one who made the drama worth watching to the end! Ben cannot act nor is he cute, casting director made a huge mistake there!

The writing was on the spot because they managed to show us over time (the first 11 episodes take place over about a year) the slow , step by step progression of their relationship, how they get to know each other better and go beyond boss/employee relationship fully understanding the problems that that may cause (which of course happened!). I was also surprised by an almost total absence of misunderstandings: they regularly talked when problems arose and when they didn't, it caused major rifts between them. So the writers learned the lesson of communication being important and managed to find other issues to create drama about.

Another actor who actually stole the show is Saint who plays Jaab, Jeng's younger brother who decided to stay away from his rich family and their big corporation. Jeng is a heir to the company but when he needed to choose, he chose happiness. Jaab is the same: pursuing happiness. Though his relationship with Jane is not resolved, they keep dancing around each other for a long time with Jaab trying not to cross the line since Jane was dating someone already. Their relationship also grows slowly, step by step through misunderstandings and lack of courage.

A special shout out to the costume designer. The clothes were nicely color coded for characters and all were in light dull colours: Pat was always wearing oversized shirts in stripy and beige while Jeng was in slim mustard coloured suits at work or jeans at home! The rest of the characters were similarly dresses: Put, Pat's ex was always in black etc.

Few miscellaneous notes:
- supportive friends you can call any time: they were fun to watch!
- why are drunk people considered cute? Because they tend to talk without a filter so you get to find out their secrets?
- at a usual mid-series beach escape(trope), a room was missing in a hotel so Jeng asks Pat to share his room not his own brother? Smooth!
- this is the second series (after La Pluie) where an adult has a meltdown because the parents divorced though here it was solved in an evening by talking about it.
- the most horrible scene that i have ever seen in an asian drama: a woman was giving birth on a bus and the other passengers were filming her while the Police was standing on the side and only the threat of a lawsuit had them lower their phones. These smartphones have created monsters out of all of us!
- we never really got the answer to Jeng's mysterious departure from the company two years before the beginning of the series
- and of course a totally unnecessary two years later time jump: they could have sorted everything out two months later or even better two days later when everyone has cooled off.

This is not so much a BL as it is a regular romcom. It is on the same level as the ordinary korean rom coms: cute couple, hot ML, great group of friends, awful ex who tries to butt in,a horrible rich parent, understanding middle class parents, supportive fem gay friend (no screaming trans characters, yey!!!!), final fight and a time jump until the honeymoon happy ending.

I want to see Man in something else. Stat!

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