Kochase

Sure, but all of this also happens because of how the societal structure is laid out. Winner takes all, fight to the death, subterfuge at all costs. The top dog at the end of the day is still the CCP. Everyone else follows suit as a result of such structures.

That you can weaponize policy to bring down business competitors... who do you think allows for that? It's because the government policy works the way it does, no due process, all based on relationship dynamics with the person in power, that it's like this.

Hahaha this is such an American concept 🤣, and I mean that endearingly.

If only. Unfortunately, not at all. The CCP controls all. They can unmake Tencent overnight if they wanted to. They booted Jack Ma, after all. And the only reason he's not dead in a ditch somewhere is that he's too high profile a figure.

The only actual alternative I'd see is... if the copyright holders to the original material (not Tencent) sold rights to Netflix as well for a separate adaptation. It's being done with Three Body Problem, but I've no idea how feasible it is with others. That said, it just wouldn't feel the same without this cast, or any cast we've grown to anticipate. But I do wonder if more source materials are thinking of selling rights simultaneously to domestic and international... I'm still not sure how Three Body Problem ended up with two adaptations simultaneously. I'd always assumed there'd be some non-competitive agreements in place.

You can't blame c-ent for this. It's all controlled by the central government. And lol... kinda. The CCP does not appreciate being upstaged, having content take up too much of the public attention that isn't nationalistic. You have to think of the CCP as the gleeful mean teacher. You are acting out? Ok the whole class gets punished. It's no skin off their back, and now you have peer pressure beating down on you to behave as well.

Remember that this is the civilization that enacted collective punishment by way of the nine familial extermination, after all.

I love that YJY is being a dick here and SHJ knows it. SHJ is honest with his feelings (none of the denial BS we often see in MCs), but he's also not a total downright mess that keeps crying either. He has his pride and acts like a believable, hurt human about it all. And YJY is a believable asshole. You can't have your cake and eat it too, and I'm so curious to see how it all resolves.

THIS is how you portray a more realistic, not just "sunshine and roses" relationship, without sweeping problems away like they don't exist.

Pacing / editing is still weird, and the abbreviated and misleading end scene effect kdramas tend to do is very terribly executed here. Like... very terribly executed. But I'm so so so enjoying all the cliches happening in a rather believable manner.

Acting is not bad. Not amazing, but honestly not bad. SHJ baring his soul and confessing he can't continue like this is subtle, but there. I think people are too used to drama reactions being a bit over the top. The camera angles / lighting didn't help here. But it felt honest / real. Idk, I just always think back to emotional moments in real life, and it really 'looks' so different from person to person. Some people are very expressive, and others really aren't. SHJ is not the most expressive person; he bottles things up a bit. I think he could have been a *little* more expressive, but it wasn't too off. But again, the camera angles also did not afford observations of potential micro-expressions well.

And back to the pacing / editing... sigh. Director, you had a wonderful little character insight there with SHJ and YJY... YJY *is* the kind of person who seems to like to have people fawn over him. And yeah, it stands to reason SHJ feels like he's been lobbed in together with the rest like that. Where was the proper build-up for that climax??? You hinted at it with SHJ commenting on YJY stringing that girl along and... it got interrupted with all the insecurities and pride around money and all...

Gah. I kind of feel bad for the original story. I get the sense it was very well thought out, the conflict and characters deep and complex. But probably due to the short run-time and / or the need to fit something complex into a usual BL drama cadence, the effect comes out a bit poor.

I think a longer run-time with them just going about regular interactions, taking a break between the different conflicts / uncertainties, would have helped. There's not enough light-hearted moments in between to go through multitude of different doubt / conflicts. Or, it being 8 episodes, they probably should have focused on the build-up and resolution of only one major conflict instead.

I hate to say this, but... maybe the whole money issue thing would have had to go. Either the show is long enough to have two arcs - one, in which the conflict is over their wealth / circumstance gap, and two, being the romance part - the unfair possessiveness, the agony on SHJ's part of trying not to read too much into it, observing how YJY likes to be fawned over and finding the parallels to himself... Or, just cut out the money conflict altogether. Show it as - YJY is concerned, and SHJ is bottling things up, but don't make his pride a point of contention. Then, the only conflict there is more a simple - 'I'm worried but you're not saying anything', which couples more nicely with SHJ's not wanting to read too much into YJY's actions.

If there was more time to show the money conflict more properly...I would have gone with... cut out those early scenes with the girl who was interested in JYJ. Forget trying to portray JYJ as the kind of person who likes to be fawned over, and just portray him as a bit aloof towards people's feelings. Spend more time showing how their lifestyle gaps grow apart, Spend more time showing JYJ's family conflict, and SHJ's family struggle. Spend more time building up the tension around how they view their respective futures. Show more of JYJ worrying over SHJ's situation, and show when he finds out about the chocolates, realizing how expensive it is. Show him finding out about SHJ's living situation. Show his thought process of connecting these two and how it hurts to see his friend like this.

Maybe I'll write this up more as a review. Sigh... I do really really like this drama in the refreshing realism it contains. But man, the editing has made me facepalm hard!

I like that both of them are actual real flawed humans here, and not just 'my flaw is that I am annoyingly persistent, chasing after my love interest', 'my flaw is that I'm oblivious to being liked or too humble', or 'my flaw is that I don't know how to express my romantic feelings'. BL 'flaws' are usually contextualized to the romantic dynamic, with the only consequences being of the romantic nature.

I've seen some comments on how this is another miscommunication trope. To the contrary, I feel like they communicate rather a lot for BL couples. But what's complex is their feelings of insecurities and love, and the two are actually distinct. Their insecurities don't stem from their romantic dynamic, but their friendship, which is so real.

I'm starting to think this drama is (while not the most A+ storytelling) just too nuanced or not what many people are looking for (or used to seeing) in a BL. The usual BLs are all rather simple / predictable and follow a certain cadence. We're used to the two mains being (practically) flawless characters (again, those pseudo-flaws don't count). We're used to there being a clear conflict - their positional differences, their getting off on the wrong foot, etc. We're used to a clear progression of - they inch closer together, there's maybe one setback, and then they end up happily together. People are trying to flatten a complex portrayal into common BL plot lines, and yeah the result isn't very pretty. The mains are not as likeable, and the conflict seem 'poorly done' and seemingly over nothing. Because, yeah... by the normal BL standard, none of this fits very cleanly. A shame, really. Maybe it's the drama format that messes with the pacing... movie might have been a better fit.

I also think YJY's reaction was spot on. How else was he supposed to react? Was he supposed to suddenly be okay and be like 'yeah I secretly love you too?' Like... the dude is going to have to do some introspection as he has no idea how to properly react right now. The possibility clearly hadn't crossed his mind. And he was still wound up from his anger like you said. And suddenly where's he supposed to direct that after that confession? So he left before he could say something he'd regret.

I really didn't want to blame them, because it felt like victim blaming. And it's such an Eastern culture thing to hammer down the nail that sticks out, when in reality, the system is the problem.

That said... this *is* the reality we live in. Youku should have known better. And I will say I was a little less forgiving towards WoH too because the quality was so badly rushed towards the end, and I felt some aspects of it were done rather poorly. As a result, it felt like they relied on more skinship and being risque to bring in the viewership rather than producing something good with the budget they had from start to finish. So yeah... I don't want to blame them, but I kinda can't help but do so a bit.

I wish they'd take a break and just let Tencent or Iqiyi test the waters instead. I applaud Youku for being groundbreakers, but at this point I just need them to take a backseat lol. Clearly their political management skills are down in the dumps.

That said, I'm curious why it's Youku... again, that's (supposedly inadvertently) causing the brakes to be pumped. First time, it was Word of Honor.

Ultimate entity to blame is the gov, for sure. But I wonder if Youku hasn't been too irresponsible, taking risks, and kind of ruining it for everyone. It was the last platform to have a proper BL aired, and it's the first that re-attempted. That's kind of bold (or stupid) IMO. Not to mention how bold they'd gone with WoH in the first place... it's only particularly admirable if you finish clean, and I feel like they didn't. It was a rather hasty bold. So I wouldn't be surprised if part of this was on them, not planning things out properly knowing the risks.

But we'll never know what the inner ongoings are... Either ways, who is to blame matters little... the result is we don't get more BLs 😭 (But my biased heart would rest a little more easily if the next spear-header is not a Youku production... )

The pacing or editing could definitely have been a lot better to have a better build up, but I can understand it. Money is a real sensitive issue for a lot of people, but especially so in Asian culture (not sure what your background is). It represents your capabilities. I mean, Chinese people will openly talk and compare salaries, and I don't mean in a positive, transparency and equity kind of way. Not sure how it is for Koreans, but the East Asian cultures tend to be pretty similar. Also, there's a tighter identity between a family. Your parents' (lack of) money reflects on you much more strongly in these cultures than Western ones.

So. That's the weight of money explained. And then so for these two best friends who are really close to suddenly experience a (new) gap in wealth where there wasn't one so obvious before... SHJ is understandably rather self-conscious - seeing YJY, the boy he likes, start buying these expensive clothes and wondering how he can keep up, having doubts as to whether or not his friend might start looking at him differently / with pity... He becomes overly sensitive to what YJY does or says (or doesn't say). And YJY is understandably pissed that SHJ hasn't been honest in return, and overly sensitive to the notion that perhaps SHJ thinks he's become that kind of materialistic person.

And the back and forth with 'let me cover you' or 'oh no let me get it' at the cafe is kinda real too... They were all kinda joking about it, but I could feel some of the tension there. Asian people have a lot of pride and 'face' when it comes to these matters. And I've personally felt really awkward at times deciding how.... aggressive I should be about paying for things. To put it bluntly - I make way more than my relatives, both due to currency differences and just job status. Some circumstances, it's easy for me to, based on social norms, claim the 'right' to pay for their meal. Other times... it's less clear. I would love to pay for them, but I'm also super anxious about offending / hurting their pride. This is way less of a problem with my American friends lol.

One little interaction carries... a lot of implications. So I actually can totally see how their trust began to break down and they both reacted in compounding fashion on the implications of each other's actions / words.

Of course, I do think the pacing / editing could still have gone a lot better. Some scenes felt a little abrupt, or the resolution too fast. But the elements are real. I do empathize with this more though, coming from a slightly similar background.

Sorry, didn't mean to end up writing a dissertation lol. But this was kinda fun to analyze.

Ahhh.. another couple of well done episodes. It's not complex, but I'm absolutely LOVING how realistic this all feels. The drama / tension around their difference in wealth is very believable, and a little too real. And sure, some people might not find this particularly 'exciting', being another typical school setting, but honestly, this being an element of the conflict puts the storyline at above a lot of other BLs for me. For once, we have a conflict not entirely rooted in just misunderstandings and tug-of-war of emotions.

Also.... the boys are realistic teenage boys here and friends. Neither one is overly girly or cute, and the way they care / dote on each other or get upset at each other is very natural and not played up like romantic stills. They argue, but then they talk it out, and resolve it... until next time of course.

I wouldn't watch this if you like the actual tropey interactions and scenes BLs tend to have. Or if you're looking for something more complex. It's definitely too mellow for that. It's just a really realistic school setting drama. I think the most realistic one I've seen so far.... Curious to see if they continue to handle it well through the end though, because now the drama *is* stepping up as of episode 4.

I think it certainly helps that (at least so far) the drama is written believably. I sometimes feel bad for actors because they're asked to act out such melodramatic scenes... no wonder they can't evoke genuine feelings. Like, none of the cringey voice-overs / internal monologue is written in. They did leverage a flashback, but as long as they don't overly rely on it, it can be powerful.

For a moment, I forgot I was watching a BL haha. Usually, all the 'show background trauma source' scenes in BLs are... well, definitely feels quite scripted. The dad retrieving the remote with his feet killed me. 🤣

I wonder if it's the screenwriter's impact here? But it doesn't look like they have anything else.

I'm weirdly loving this age-old classic tropey story! So far, I think the characterization of the MC is very reasonable and believable. The danger of this trope is the tendency to make the MC very tsundere or too overly angsty. (I appreciate a good angst, but there's only oh so much I can feel sympathy for a student with unrequited love... like... there are bigger issues out there in life lol. )

So I'm loving the soft / quiet / undramatic pining from the MC. Curious to see how the jealousy and realization will play out... hopefully also believably. And I'm glad (and hope) the other guy that instigates this jealousy is not actually romantically interested in MC, but just a genuinely good friend kind of person. Love triangle instigated realization also gets a bit cringe most of the time.

Ah, I'm in a mood for the one-sided love angst (but requited at the end). Got any additional suggestions while we wait for this to air?

Lol the extra episode is just cute / fun. Quick summary - Someone sent Liang Yin flowers with a cutesy romantic sounding note, so the whole team go into major protective big bro mode and try to investigate who her secret lover is. They can't abuse their power as police, so are stuck with very manual attempts like trying to search her phone history. And that's why they pulled in Lu Fengping - he's the only one whose personality makes sense to ask for access to Liang Yin's phone somehow over some premise of food / socializing.

After finding no leads from the phone, they decide to just go to the florist for leads. And cue the scene where Luo Fei keeps wanting to just arrest the dude and Lu Fengping is like 'wait ok maybe that's a bit of an overkill??' And then they find out the florist has a girlfriend and they're both like 'dafuq is this dude cheating on our little sis'

In the end, it turns out the girlfriend was part of a case Liang Yin was on, and she was the one who sent Liang Yin the flowers.

Yeah... I definitely don't buy China holding its police to such strict measures, let alone clearly unreasonable ones... The power is definitely in the police's favor. Forget this, even the scene where public opinion could sabotage the police? LOL. Just consider all that happened during Covid. The police are way more powerful and less beholden to 'laws' than this show portrays. It's definitely amped up unrealistically for drama. But hey, that's also the fun / interesting part of police dramas, so I don't mind it too much. If they were portrayed as all powerful, it wouldn't be an entertaining story.

Now I understand why it's nobleman with a singular 'a'... Lan Jue is the nobleman and the league is his harem of boyfriends. 🤣 Despite the lack of BL origin or any physical moments, there's no shortage of tense / protective moments among the boyfriends over Lan Jue, just saying...

I expected to enjoy this, but not as much as I did because Zhang Ping as a character is a bit... well, you have to be able to tolerate him. Didn't expect much more of the story to be focused on Lan Jue instead, who is way more interesting of a character beautifully portrayed with Jing Boran's A+ acting.

(Side comment - I still can't reconcile Jing Boran being Lan Jue here and Zhang Qiling in Time Raiders. They look so different! Is it just the magic of make-up / character design or did he change a lot?)

Ok this series seriously confused me... are there like.. multiple writers or something? I feel like the character designs (i.e. their personalities, motivations, backgrounds) were done so well. I really liked Palm's mom, for example. It's not the typical 'mom', which was really refreshing. And then the execution was... lulz. So many melodramatic scenes and lines.

It's like that meme where one artist started a painting with beautiful technique and a six year old finished it with their crappy skills.

I don't know how to rate this haha. It's actually high level really good, but the details are rather cringe in many parts.

Yes, ofc lol. You're kind of preaching to the choir here. I don't think anyone here will disagree the censorship sucks. But I'm saying compared to other BL works, where sex and the physically demonstrative aspects of romance is core to the story line, there's less this story has to censor. So we don't have to be as worried about things getting 'cut' compared to a lot of other BL novels (e.g. 2ha / Immortality). A lot of their interactions can be left open to interpretation early on, since it's not established yet. It will certainly be painfully obvious to us, but like... you know, the platform can spin it with plausible deniability.

Honestly, this story is probably one of the least impacted by the censorship. The core spirit of the story and their dynamic is HC's loyalty to XL, which they can easily spin as brotherhood. The romantic aspect of it is almost secondary. I don't even remember if anything explicit happened between them... if so, likely it was in the extras.

Hey it's the two from Bad Buddy! They had hella cute chemistry there. Alright, I have zero interest in GL, but still this makes me super happy to see this being made. They're way cute and it looks like it'll be great.