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Not perfect -but for sure an epic watch with memorable visuals ~
Was this perfect ? No. Was it at times overtly complex for the sole sake of complexity? Yes.Was I systematically entertained and marvelled at the great sense of esthetics, the acting achievement and high production value ? Yes, definitely !
I really enjoyed the journey on which the series took me, with its layered lore and amazing gallery of characters. Even if towards the end, it got a bit too convoluted and heavy to digest, with maybe some more apparent weaknesses in the writing, I did not mind it at all as I was really deeply immersed and invested into the storytelling of the romances and all the relationships.
This series is also (and maybe before everything) a feast for the eyes. The camera work, the costumes, the way they found interesting ways to sell the story was impressive. The fights scenes were good as well with enough variety and balance to never feel repetitive. I also really enjoyed the music, it was always hyping (or soothing) me at the right moments.
The casting was also amazing : the four main leads did very well as well as all the secondary characters. Tian Jia Rui did once again stand out to me, thanks to his ability to shift and morph himself into various persona, as well as shedding some of the prettiest tears to be shot on screen. Ju Jing Yi, Joseph Zeng, Chen Du Lin and Yan An also had all at some points some incredible moments. I'm finding myself very curious to see more of them all, as well as Wu Han who had an excellent debut role here.
I would recommend this to people looking for an epic journey featuring awesome characters, extensive lore, skillfull camera work and esthetics at all time. Even if the last arc could have been better articulated, the powerful storytelling and the characters build up makes definitely up for it.
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As amazing the album is, the documentary felt a bit underwhelming
The highly expected comeback of BTS post military service came up with a great album "Arirang", a rather impressive live in the middle of Seoul and the following documentary. And let's just said that the documentary feels underwhelming compared to the album release and comeback performances.It felt a bit messy in terms of storytelling, the point of view is mainly their reunion in Los Angeles to work on "Arirang" but it is strangely paced and felt kinda scattered. I would have loved to see more of the creative process, there are tidbits of it but clearly not enough to feel like it is "documentary" level. It just mostly feel like a bunch of vlog videos from that time, and I think there could have done better either at making it entertaining or informative. Don't get me wrong, it is a real pleasure to see the guys again, back tohether. It is not just up to par to the advertisement around it as well as the quality of the album.
I would of course recommend this if you love BTS. Watching it within the context of the comeback and the new album remains a good experience for fans.
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Despite flaws in the writing & editing, worth it for its angsty romance with obsessed male lead
This Wuxia drama is centred around the epic romance between Cai Zhao and Chang Nin with the main focus being if they will manage to build their own path, overcoming the past of their respective previous generations burden or will they be drowned by the weight of those family and clan ties.Overall, I truly had a great time watching this series. The beginning felt a bit butchered because potentially of the edits the production team had to make to fit the proper authorized number of episodes in order to get Chinese governmental approval for release. The middle part and the core of the story was amazing in taking the viewer through a great journey, driven by the passion of Chang Nin for Cai Zhao. They went through a lot and their relationship took various turns, with at his core the fiery (and insane) determination of the male lead of not letting go of the heroine, at all costs, morale and rationale be damned.
The chemistry between Zhou Yi Ran and Bao Shang En, as the main roles, was solid (even if I would have loved to see more skinship to match the intensity of the characters feelings). Zhou Yi Ran demonstrated an amazing range of emotions, a masterclass of acting as the obsessed male lead that you cannot help to fall in love with. There were also a solid gallery of secondary characters with some memorable scenes.
I would recommend this to people looking for a romance between a devilishly cunning male lead and a sassy heroine. Despite a butchered introduction arc and a flawed ending, it is worth a watch for the captivating romance between the leads.
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Icky romance but kind of entertaining
This Japanese movie is centred around the romance between a young highschool yakuza family heiress and her adult bodyguard disguising himself to protect her at school. If I did not find it boring, I for sure also found the romance icky from start to finish...I certainly can watch and enjoy a wide variety of romances : from very cute and fluffy to ultra dark and taboo... However, unfortunately it did not work for me here. The romance took the regular shojo road of pretending that problematic stuff are adorable and charming when in fact they were just not. I have nothing against age gap story per se, but here the following combination :
- 10 years gap between the main lead (26 years old) and the female lead (hypothesis of 16 years old as she is in her first year of high school)
- grooming
- overpowering main lead yakuza
was a bit much to sell as "cute". The fact the male lead is also a real jerk sleeping around while pining for the heroine certainly also did not help...Overal that's a lot to take in for the viewer to root for them !!!
Acting was overall average, with male lead being simply a big block of wood! Honestly, if I found him more handsome maybe I would be less severe but well, he is not exactly my style so better acting chops would definitely have helped. Female lead is better but nothing extraordinary...and definitely looking too old for the highschooler role... However, given the plot, I guess it is for the best because otherwise the romance would have felt even more unpalatable.
I would not recommend this to people as I feel there are better high school romance movie out there. In order to work better, the storytelling should either have remove the gap age aspect, either the tone of the movie should have be much darker without the classic shojo style to showcase properly the relationship, the gaslighting, the imbalance in power.
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Unfortunately, never got onboard as much as I wanted with the romance
This age gap love story between a young host and a teacher who became his tutor had everything to seduce me. I enjoyed the first half of it with the focus on learning and the night life topic providing a very griping context for the romance. I found fascinating the Kanji writing and learning issues discussion. I found interesting the way the characters were built : deeply flawed and mostly unlikable because it was understandable given their background. I also liked the OST overall and the production value, even if there were some awkward editing with abrupt fade to black between scenes.However, I never managed to get fully onboard with their romance. I believed in the tutoring relationship and found it even very touching. However I was never convinced by the romantic chemistry. I think it is part linked to poor casting of the two main characters as well as storytelling. Indeed, they never showcased real intimacy between the main leads as their relationship remained very pure, which given the respective age and job of both characters felt strange. In addition to not offering satisfying romance opportunities to the couple, the scenario also derailed quite a bit as it provided to the antagonists too quick change of heart and undeserved redemption.
I am left to ponder if another casting for the main actor and actress would have helped in making the romance more palatable and the relationship feel more passionate despite the flaws in the scenario. Here some of their scenes felt very fake and lacking in the more romantic as well as more angsty moments.
I would not recommend this to people as I feel there are better "older woman/younger man romance" out there. Maybe with another cast and without the scenario derailing in an over the top way, I would be less severe with my criticism of the series.
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Audacious proposal but deeply flawed. Hua Yong is such a memorable character!
How astonishing is it that we got a CHINESE Omegaverse BL ?! It was on the 2025 bingo card of no-one and still here we are...Kudos to the production team and cast for this wild proposal.Having said that, was it fully successful? Unfortunately, no. There were a lot of issues with this series and if I can give flowers for the daring choice to bring to light that relatively obscure universe, I cannot go past through some fundamental issues that hindered my enjoyment of the story overall.
There are some major issues :
- Pacing is atrocious. The series spent a tremendous amount of time on business talks rather than on the relationships progression.
- The secondary relationship is frustrating and has little to no screentime to the point I'm left to ponder if the series would not have been better without it.
- Ending is a real let down (and even more a deception for the ones that were fan of the secondary relationship).
There are also some minor flaws :
- The series does a commendable job explaining the lore as I found it pretty clear while being a complete newbie on the topic (beside just having watched Pit Babe). However, it felt a bit too much like a tutorial than really well interleaved into the story.
- Some of the special effects linked to the genre (the marking, the scent...) as well as the few fighting / action scenes felt really cheap and poorly executed.
- Casting is a mixed bag : Huang Xing (playing Hua Yong) is clearly the MVP of the series. He literally carry the show on his shoulders. It is a shame that I cannot say the same for his three costars that ranged from average to mediocre in terms of acting skills...
Of course, not everything is negative and there are quite a bit of positive as well.
- Following the series while it was airing was really entertaining.
- The universe in itself was quite interesting, even if I am still on the fence on some aspects. It was intriguing and felt fresh to me.
- Hua Yong character with his unhinged and obsessive love was amazing !
- Chemistry was quite good with the main couple. Even if I feel they tamed down some of the NSFW scenes, passion and feelings were quite believable.
Given all its flaws, I would not necessarily recommend this to people unless you are a fan of the genre and want to see it live-action. With a better pacing, less useless business stuff, more consistent storyline for the secondary couple and overall better writing, the quality of the series would have drastically increased.
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Not enough screentime for interesting elements + subpar acting: underwhelming overall
This BL series is centred around the encounter of two high school music students as they met and develop conflicting feelings for each other in the midst of their common interest / link with jazz music. Honestly, I'm not the biggest connoisseur of jazz music but I decided to give this drama a shot anyway. Unfortunately, this show missed the marks on many aspects in my opinion.Story-wise, it was super disappointing...I have the feeling that the most interesting part of the drama was not given enough screentime. There was a nugget of information regarding a specific relationship toward the end of the series but it was clearly not enough...I also had some issue with how the main and the secondary relationship evolved. All the heavy lifting were done (for both couples) mainly by one of the character and the evolution felt too abrupt to be believable. There was also on the last episode a "noble idiocy" move that makes no sense at all and just frustrated me a bit more...
Acting-wise, the actors were too bland. The scenario had some quite angsty moments as well as toxic scenes between the characters...Nothing against that, it can be entertaining and it is all fiction, so I'm not looking for always all green flags characters...But in order for it to work for me, it requires for actors to be emoting so much more than what was the case here. They needed to pour much more passion into the acting in order to make the chemistry much more exciting. The best performance on the series was Song Han Gyeom as Seo Do Yoon and I wish his character had been even more central to the story as it was my favorite.
Production-wise, it felt a bit cheap which is not really an issue for a school series. Here the main default is relating to the music scenes and soundtrack. The couple of pop songs that were used as opening and ending songs were okay to me but all the scenes were the actors were playing instruments felt totally unrealistic. The songs / tunes they used as playback for the music sequences were not really matching and it looked quite fake overall. A bit of a shame when the plot is focusing so much on music.
I would not recommend this to people as there are better BL in high school out there. There are a few moments that are cute (mainly relating to the friendship building between two characters rather than the romantic relationships), as well as some elements that could have been super interesting if more developed and better acted. However, the numerous flaws in terms of scenario, acting and production (especially of the music scenes) make it a series that I would not recommend.
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Convincing chemistry saving sluggishly paced story
I quite enjoyed this BL featuring the romance between grumpy music student Qin and sunshine art student Duang. The cat and dog energy was in full force with them, making their dynamics fun and sweet to follow.I really liked the way that TeeTee played Duang...It might have felt like A LOT in the first quarter of the series but as I get used to it, I became quite endeared by the character...which I must admit is probably a mirror of how Qin, the tsundere cold student felt, facing the over the top puppy energy of his suitor. The romance beginning could have felt stalkerish for some but I was charmed by the sweetness of it all, as well as the unexpected layers of the two main characters.
Was it without flaws? Certainly not. The pacing was properly sluggish, with a lot of screen time devoted to competitions and school aspects that did not really matter in the grand scheme of the story. Half the series felt like fillers but still, as I got more and more endeared by their relationship, I followed quite happily the less inspired moments of the story.
Another big flaw of the story is coming from the secondary couple played by Otto and North. I had a good prior feeling about the cast, having watched all the seasons of DMD Friendship, but unfortunately Otto and North definitely needed more time to be able to carry their storyline, which was clumsily written and felt very awkward with the recurring English talking...Maybe sticking to just speaking Thai would have already helped them? Having said that, I quite enjoyed the other relationships with the friend group being really cute to watch when bantering with Duang.
The production value was very good. DoMunDi production is proving once again that they can really develop a vibe specific to a show while maintaining great filming quality. It just feel done with care and budget. The soundtrack was not outstanding though, except the credits song, nothing really memorable to me, which is a bit of a shame given the central place of music in the story.
I would recommend this to people that are looking for a sweet student BL with a sunshine x grumpy romance. The story could definitely be better paced and not every arcs is worth that much screen time...But the romance evolution, the unexpected deeper moments really save the series and make it worth a try.
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Half-baked resolution
I really enjoyed the idea behind this BL but the execution and the ending felt half-baked. I enjoyed the subdue esthetic and the soundtrack. What I liked the most about the series reside in watching two contrasting personnalities be drawn to each other. One being very solar and the other being more introverted, but both finding confort into each other. There were also some trauma on both sides as well as darkness and murkiness that got me very looking forward about how it would be explored.However, that's where the main disappointment did come from. The way the murky elements of the plot were brushed off and not properly addressed, and how trauma were resolved was just poor writing. The acting also had some misses. If I liked the contrasting characters, the way the actors played them felt sometimes awkward, with one lead always growling and the other always speaking very softly. It might have been a directing and acting choice, but it was a bit odd at points.
I would recommend this to people that are looking for a BL high school romances features some bitter / traumatic elements. It is unfortunately failing at addressing those properly but still the angst it provides was gripping at first...Even if the later stage of the series were a letdown.
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A countdown to friends to lovers
I overall enjoyed this friends-to-lovers BL. It was not very memorable but it was good. Mainly thanks to the photography focus and the way it was bounded to the storytelling. The blurry aspect of some pictures took by the characters in the series was mirrored by the filmmaking. I found this parallel very well-thought in terms of production choice.In terms of pacing, it feels both slow and fast-paced : the progress felt slow on screen between the episodes, but thinking about it, the real countdown was pretty quick to friends-to-lovers. Given the characters background, it made sense that it should not be easy. So it all depends of the lens you look at it.
The cast did an alright job but I must admit that if the intimacy and friendship felt very believable, the chemistry and shift to love and passion could have been better...It is not really bothering because the romance remains at a pretty platonic level with very light romantic interaction, which is in line with the peaceful vibe of the series. However, i cannot help to think that having a more sizzling chemistry and more pining would have brought the story to another level.
I would recommend this to people looking for a friends-to-lovers romance with a more subdue vibe. It does not revolution the genre but for those liking this trope, it is a nice watch.
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This was a mess
Full disclosure, I have not read the source material on which this movie is based. So far it seems the movie adapted part of the webtoon but I cannot judge how well they did. However, not knowing the lore, I found the story all over the place, the characterization very poor and the CGI pretty weak.Even though there are some interesting aspect to the story itself and I was entertained to some degree, it feels quite typical of some isekai / leveling up action story already out there. But it also feels super messy with the hero having like a cheat code, making the tension void. There also too many characters to build properly the relationships in the span of one movie. Even if I like the cast, I was not impressed by any of their performances...It might have been more the fault of the script than their acting but it felt flat for the most part.
I would not recommend this as it feels very messy and quite generic overall. I watched for the cast, but even them could not save the movie.
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Super entertaining and fun with some touching moments: a healing must-watch
This series features the passionate romance of Thee, mafia heir, and Peach, talented photographer. As the tone of the series is definitely to poke fun at a lot of lakorn (Thai Soap series), Pond delivers an incredible performance playing an over-the-top mafia boss Thee (ready to do everything to make Peach fall in love with him). The deadpan way to which Peach (played by Phuwin) reacts to Thee antics are making it even funnier.Among all the laughs, there are also a fair share of emotional moments, heartwarming and making this series feels very sincere. The two actors are selling very well the dynamics of their characters and the tenderness between them, despite their differences.
The minus of the series definitely resides in its secondary romances. Two secondary couples are sharing screen but I would have preferred the scenario to focus only on one additional couple rather than to come up with those half-baked storylines, especially that one was clearly more interesting than the other and would have benefited from more screentime and better storytelling.
I would recommend this to people that are looking for an uplifting BL with a strong comedic and parodic tone. It will definitely bring you a smile.
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Super entertaining with an amazing soundtrack
The story in itself was entertaining and well-paced. It is kinda reusing very known beats of storylines about knowing and trusting oneself, friendship and overcoming fears. But it does it with a touch of Korean culture, demon hunting magic and with a lot of energic girl power. Truly enjoyable even if I wish some of the relationships would have been explored further, it was enough to convey the overall message of the movie.The OST is the strongest point of this movie with Golden by Huntrix and Soda Pop by Saja Boys being my faves songs from the movie, but honestly all of them are a vibes and are also kind of echoing very famous KPOP groups. The voice actors and actresses all did a solid job, I particularly appreciated Ahn Hyo Seop voicing Jinu in a super smooth way.
The animations style is not necessarily my favorite but I appreciate how different the characters design of the three members of Huntrix are. I wish the demons and the demon king design were more refined, as well as the fights scenes more varied. At some points the fights seems to all merge into a big battle again the same kind of puppets demons. I loved how colorful everything was and the care brought to the stage costume design for the heroines and the Saja Boys. Very reminiscent of what would actual KPOP stars wear.
I would recommend this to people looking for a very entertaining action anime movie. If you are fan of KPOP or are/have been part of a fandom, it will be for sure an enjoyable watch as there are myriad of references, moments, atmosphere that will resonate in the heart of fans.
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Impossible for me to not compare - It does not live up to the South Korean drama adaptation.
Even if I try to look at this movie in itself, separating myself from the South Korean drama adaptation (which was far from perfect, as well as what I have read from the source material, also pretty flawed), this film was quite a let down.It is very colorful and pretty but the romance never worked for me, with the chemistry being very poor. That's the biggest flaw, with the lack of charism of the main cast. The role of Su Ho (called Kanda Shun in the japanese adaptation) is a pretty robotic one, but it felt even more bland in this version with the actor Watanabe Keisuke playing it in a very awkward way. The role of Seo Joon (here Igarashi Yu) gave me one of the strongest Second Male Lead syndrome but in this new adaptation, I felt nothing. To be fair, Tsuna Keito acting was not the worst but clearly he is suffering the comparison with Hwang In Youp from the South Korean drama.
While the movie took some shortcuts on the original story, the core of the story remained the same (even if I was frustrated at some scenaristic choices) but the feelings felt lacking as everything was accelerated. However, I feel it made perfect sense to split the story in a two part movie and to make the split at the point they chose to do it.
I would not recommend this movie to people as I feel the South Korean drama, despite its flaws, does a better job at bringing the webtoon to live. There are a lot of storylines that felt rushed off and the overall impression on this first part of the story is quite a superficial one as it does not dig enough into the suffering of the heroine and some of the most dramatic elements from the original story.
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Cute and sweet : very shojo in its core.
This series was a breath of sweetness, each episode felt like a nice treat in a shiny packaging. The premise was definitely refreshing at first with the main lead way of dressing. However, the story felt less novel in its last arc with the script hitting all the usual beats of the standard shojo romance.Characters were very likeable which is foremost thanks to the solid acting of both main actor (Matsumoto Leo) and main actress (Osaki Ichika). Matsumoto Leo is incredible playing this multi faceted role. He really stands out and I will be looking forward for more with him. Osaki Ichika managed to make her role super endearing despite the character being quite hair-headed : she never felt annoying. The weakest point might have been the more intimate scenes, it felt so cute but at the same time I was expecting some range and evolution as the story progressed. However, the passion never really came.
I would recommend this to people looking for a very relaxing and feel good show. Even if the story is kind of classical for a shojo once you look past the interesting premise of the main lead, it never bothered me and always brought me joy to watch.
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