Maggi64

Exactly. I had to come to MDL comments to figure out why the hell Mieko knew it was Eiji's baby when the 3 of them had slept together at the same time in order to not know who the father was. But next thing we know, she's talking about how she knows it's this one or that one's baby based on how many week's pregnant she was. I was like, wtf just happened?

Then somebody who read the manga explained that she'd continued sleeping with Eiji and that's why she knew it was his baby. But the actual show did nothing to illustrate this, and did not show us how Mieko and Eiji had gotten close and were having sex to make a baby. It simply jumped to this plot point without fleshing it out in the least.

I also thought that Makki jumped into a relationship with Eiji without the show illustrating the two of them developing romantic chemistry. They were rarely even shown alone -- Mieko was always with them. Then, suddenly, Makki says to Eiji, "Hey, sure, I'll try dating you." And -- bam! -- they were a couple. Their romance was not developed at all, and was very disappointing. At least to me.

I regret if I came off as making assumptions. But you are also making an assumption that I do not watch Japanese films. The fact is, for the past 4 years I have watched exclusively Asian film, most of them Japanese. I get my film recommendations from the Japanese Art Film magazine "Kinema Junpo." So I know the Japanese style, just as I know the French Avant Garde style, better known as French New Wave. And this show's style is actually more French than Japanese.

For instance, it was the French Director Auteurs like Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, and Éric Rohmer who started this thing with long scenes of nothing happening but characters sitting around smoking, or banal conversations that did not reveal character or propel plot and were there, rather, to invoke realism. But the New Wave directors used such scenes with discretion. This show, conversely, uses no discretion at all and is riddled with such scenes . It's as if the director is copying French New Wave cinema because he's impressed with it, but is a novice at the form and, hence, overdoes it. Incidentally, if you check this director's credits on the MDL page you will see that this is the very 1st thing he's ever directed (he produced 4 dramas, but never directed before).

You know, there's a joke about this in "Blueming" where Si Won is at a bar with fellow film students and pretends to love French New Wave but later admits to Da Un that he was lying and much prefers fun stuff like "Mean Girls," lol. I did my undergrad and grad degrees in English at Columbia, but Columbia has a top film school so I met tons of film students in my time there and, trust me, they are all like this and copy the French New Wave until they find their own individual style. Well, the director of this show comes off as someone who's fresh out of film school and still so besotted by the French New Wave that he's copying it.

At any rate, I really wanted to like this show and began in good faith and kept with it until, by ep 6, I grew weary of what I found to a pretentious overuse of vagueness which resulted in an underdeveloped story and characters. But if you are liking the show then, hey, that's great. I don't want to piss all over other people's enjoyment. So keep on enjoying it. Besides, this is the 1st time I've ever disagreed with you about a show, and I've agreed with all your other favs. ;)

Thank you for your polite reply. I am having a hard time seeing these characters as developed or fleshed out because the writer is presenting them making decisions without letting us know why the characters are really doing so. It just quickly jumps to the next plot point. I realize that with stories a viewer/reader must fill in certain blanks on their own, but a good drama/book helps the reader to fill in those blanks by developing a character with more fleshed out scenes or dialogue than this show has given us. At any rate, that's how I see it. But I am glad you are able to enjoy the show even if I am not :)

Yes, you are supposed to wonder why based characters being developed with context, motivation and revealed emotion. This show gives us none of these things. Instead, it just keeps dumping new plot points. Good writing does not just dump a bunch of plot points without bothering to develop any of them. In short, this show is the epitome of poor writing.

Well said.

But Ximmich, you are understanding these characters better because you read the manga. The show itself is not doing a good job of revealing the characters' inner worlds. We just keep seeing them do things and say things that are not contextualized in the bigger picture, and thus make no sense to the audience. I think that if you had not read the manga and were just watching the show like of lot of us are, you'd agree that many of the characters' choices make no sense. We are not shown their motivations, or who these people truly are. Only Mieko's motivations make sense cuz her voiceovers show us that she is needy and manipulative and wants to be part of Mieko and Eiji's relationship. And let's face it, her motivations suck. She manipulated a gay couple into having a baby despite the guys never having voiced a desire for a baby before the dad said anything.

Tim, this is the comment I'd made yesterday

Thank you for your thoughts. But I still see Makki never having shown having a deep connection with Eijii even before getting hurt. Also, even the way he became Eiji's boyfriend had an element of an emotional slacker. Remember, when Eiji confessed to him in Ep 3 Makki said, "Well, I don't like any girls at school, but you're fun, so maybe I'll try being with you." In other words, it's not like he was in love and, rather, he was just rolling with things cuz Eiji had confessed.

Just watched this and you are right in your observations about a film, as always. He's a loser, but not a "likeable loser" like many movies portray, because the film does not gloss anything over or shade it in pink. This poor sap has never been taught social skills because he had no family, nor schooling. He had to drop out in 8th grade and go to work as a young teen (I guess high school is not mandatory in Japan as it is in the USA). My heart broke for him as it went on, even as I was constantly cringing and thinking, "Noooo, don't do that!" because I was so afraid he's commit yet another anti-social act while being utterly clueless as to the fact that he was doing so.

But as heartbreaking as it was, it did end well. For a while there, I was afraid he'd kill himself after throwing himself out his window and falling into the alleyway trash. Instead, it ended with him sitting down to write. That made sense because, you see, I'd read that this was based on a semi-autobiographical novel. Meaning, the lead was based on the novel writer who wrote about having had this kind of life.

BTW, I love when I just happen to find you somewhere while poking around on MDL. I often see your reviews when I'm poking around and it helps me decide if something is worth watching or not. This was definitely worth watching. The leading actor put in a phenomenal performance.

THOUGHTS ON EPISODE 9 -- SPOILERS

* Aaaand another endless, silent blow drying scene.

* Maki's face in the close-up shot while getting his hair washed was truly beautiful. It's the first time in the show we were able to appreciate his good looks, which were hidden by a bad haircut in prior eps.

* When Makki suddenly asked Asato to stop washing his hair cuz he felt "itchy" and wanted to be alone in the bath, does that mean he suddenly got an erection?

*It took Asato a while to finally respond to Makki's obvious, repeated advances, and there were many (eg, Makki hugs Asato when he's cooking, he leans on Asato's legs while watching tv, bumps his head against Asato's crotch and then even asks, "Can I lick it?", he asks Asato to wash his hair while naked in the tub, and crawls into Asato's bed and cuddles and kisses him). But I actually liked all the advances Makki was making. It showed a romantic vibe that was entirely lacking in eps 1-8 between Makki and Eiji.

*When Asato finally responded to Makki's advances and they had sex, it was an utterly unsatisfying scene. Asato enters him anally, yet Makki shows no sign of lust. To the contrary, his blank, passive facial expression looked like he was bored and thinking about what to have for lunch the next day.

* Despite Makki making all those advances on Asato, he still did not behave as someone in love with Asato, any more than he did with Eiji. His character seems to just go whatever way the wind blows. He just shrugs and says things like "Hey, guys and girls are no different." He says to Asato after sex, "Hey, it's no big deal." Later he says, "What does it matter, getting involved with people?" While Eiji's character was spineless, Makki's character is that of an emotional slacker with no capacity for big feelings, nor deep connections. For instance, when Asato tries to talk to Makki about his grandfather, Makki blows off the convo by being vague and saying only, "Is that so?" When Asato asks for advice about his career, Makki blows him off again by shrugging and saying "Only you can decide." In other words, Makki couldn't care less.

* With Eiji being spineless; Mieko being manipulative, needy, and self-hating; and Makki being an emotional slacker; Asato remains as the only likeable character in this entire show.



I await Eng subs for ep 10, but overall this show has been an utter disappointment. It's full of pretentious "slice of life" indy style scenes of pointless, banal banter and scenes of characters silent and doing nothing (ie, slurping noodles, knocking on a door and standing there for 2 minutes silently, drinking water, flipping thru a book, or blow drying hair for 2 minutes with no dialogue). Moreover, most of the characters' choices and actions defy the dictates of natural human behavior (ie, having a baby on a whim; Eiji being gay but marrying a woman; Mieko's mom having no comment when her daughter says she's pregnant and doesn't know which guy is the father). I won't go so far as to say it's a bad show (the actors seem like pros), but it's certainly not a good show.

Exactly. I thought the same thing.

But look at this in the historical context. Kings in those days gave commands which had to be followed (such as ordering some of his subjects to become his lover), and they executed people for far less than what his lover did. Given this fact, the king was not as crazy as he seemed to we modern viewers. I thought that was why his acts had a certain logic.

#1 RULE OF WRITING: "SHOW, DON'T TELL"

The problem with this drama isn't merely that the characters all make such bad choices, it's that they are never shown discussing or thinking about those choices. The result of the choices simply happen as a plot point, and then the drama moves on to the next plot point. Hence, the drama Tells us what happening, but never shows Why it is happening. In short, it breaks the #1 rule of good writing, which is to "Show, not tell." But it just keeps "telling" us new plot points without ever "showing" them being fleshed out fully

DEFIES THE DICTATES OF NATURAL HUMAN BEHAVIOR

Ep 7. When Mieko tells her mother she's pregnant all her mom says is "Congrats, let's go to a bar." Now, I know the show wants to establish that the mother is uninvolved in her daughter's life, but even a freaking stranger would have a dozen questions if someone just told them they are having a baby with 2 gay guys and doesn't know which is the father. I know I would ask a stranger questions if they just revealed something like that to me. And a mother in real life would certainly have questions, regardless of how uninvolved she was in the past. That is natural human behavior, while this show continually portrays people acting in utterly unrealistic ways that defy true human nature. You know, like having a baby simply to prove a point to a homophobic dad who said gays cannot have kids.

Ximmich knows what she's talking about in her comment below. I have read a lot of Japanese mangas now after being introduced to BL (Double Mints, Old Fashioned Cupcake, and Pornographer), and found that the live actions are EXACT replicas, word for word, frame by frame. The live actions based on Korean manwas (eg, their version of a manga), however, will change things. The K-BL "Blueming" changed a lot of things, and for the better. "Cherry Blossoms After Winter" was more faithful to source material, but it also changed some things in order to improve the live action (eg, the hot dream sequence was added). A J-BL would never have added a scene like that if it was not in the manga first. The J-BL "My Beautiful Man" was perfection because it was based on a novel, not a short manga, so the screenwriters were forced to make changes and creative choices to shorten a novel into a 2 hour show. Otherwise, the Japanese seem fanatical about being faithful to mangas. I must assume it's because mangas are so revered in their culture.

Yep, the show is utterly unrealistic. Human nature simply does not operate the way the show is depicting it. People don't go and have a baby just to prove that their dad was wrong for saying gays can't have babies. The characters did not even show any real desire for children before the dad said something. Sorry, nobody has a baby based on one mere sentence from a homophobic father. Because having a baby is a HUGE decision. To me, the show felt pretentious and unrealistic. I wanted to like it at the start, but it increasingly became a disappointment.

Yea, it's a serious omission. They don't need to hire extra actors to play Makki's family or take time in the show to have scenes with Makki's family, but Makki could at least have a couple of lines of dialogue to tell us about where his family stands on his relationship. Otherwise, it's bizarre to only have one person in the couple discuss his family, while the other half of the couple acts as if he's an orphan with no family at all.

True, the eps are short, but I still think they could've done a better job of having the guy from the future not act so bizarre as to have the audience wondering, "Why isn't the guy from the past freaked out by him yet?" Otherwise, yes, the actors are good and the production value is good. I am gonna hang in there and hope it gets better next week.

If she was going to sleep with them individually, at different times, then what was the point of the group sex in order to not know who the father was? The subsequent events revealing that she'd been sleeping with these guys separately means that the group sex was pointless in this show.

At any rate, if she's only 13 weeks I hope she has an abortion, because these little kids are having a baby under horrendous circumstances (ie, "Let's prove daddy wrong and show him that gays can have babies too, because we never expressed any desire to have a baby until daddy said this!"). I am 55 and must assume that the writer of this manga was very young, because adults can see how irresponsible this behavior is. I just hope this show does not influence the thinking of real people this young, and make them think it's ok to bring children into the world in such a casual way.

Sorry, but I was with this show up until this plot turn, but now I am genuinely disturbed by its message.

I wanna know the same thing. Maiko said to Makki, "I'm 13 weeks, so the baby is probably yours." Doesn't this mean that she had sex with Makki, alone, 13 weeks prior? And that she and Makki were having sex even before the time that all 3 of them did it together in order to not know which one was the father?

If someone who's read the manga or seen all 10 eps knows, please clarify this.