Maggi64

Other than that one scene of the side character living in a box, this show is not portraying homelessness as manifest in that way. Rather, it is something where the characters are constantly moving from one dump to another and have no accounts for electricity, internet, etc. They don't even have furniture and just grab their clothes and bolt every time they need to move again. So I suppose "vagrant" would be a more apt term for how the leads live in this show.

In America, however, when we say homeless we mean that one literally lives on the freaking streets. You live in NYC, so you know what I am talking about.

I wonder if the approval rating in Japan is distinctly different for people under the age of 25. The younger Japanese are also more Westernized and would view LGBT acceptance as hipper because they see it represented in hip Hollywood movies. Yet I'm guessing that their parents would still disown a gay child as the parents did in HOTE. In short, this would be a cultural phenomena where attitudes are drastically different between the average 20 year old and average 45 year old. Even in America, the attitude toward LGBT has changed more rapidly than any other social phenomena I've witnessed in my 50+ years here.

As for Gregg Araki, I liked his movie about the 2 guys with HIV, called The End or something. But his other stuff is rather pretentious and/or pointless. I've noticed that his films are consistently stuffed with utterly beautiful young people which, ultimately, is his most salient defining feature as a director. For me, anyway. But maybe i'll check out Mysterious Skin if you recommend it.

I know, she was not only wrong about 6 out of 7 of those hetero romances lacking a kiss, but stooped to including a Jane Austen movie on the list when NO novels from that era included kissing.

Besides, the movie DID have a kiss at the end. The director added that to an otherwise faithful adaptation because none of Austen's novels include any physical contact. It's as if the director knew that contemporary audiences expect to see a kiss in a romance so they added it. If audiences have come to expect a kiss in even a freaking Jane Austen story (ie, among the most sexless novelists there are), then why not expect the same in a contemporary gay romance?

Thank you! I wonder if the manga that you're citing was not adopted for a live action drama because it was too dark. After all, "Happy of the End" is wonderful, but if I were to judge by MDL's number of comments, viewers and rating, it's not as popular as the lighter BL's. I prefer the darker ones like this and Doublemints, but it's the lighter ones like Kinn/Porsche that had over 300,000 comments, and an 8+ rating. Thus, I imagine that producers avoid adopting BL mangas that treat disturbing topics such as prostitution.

Oh, little "brother" in "Unknown" was absolutely the seme. The big brother was not only shorter, but he also wore glasses in many scenes, as well as a button down sweater (ie, soft, cuddly fabric). At the end, his co-workers asked who was top or bottom and the big brother said, "Isn't it obvious?" I thought, yep, it IS obvious, because the wardrobe department put your character in glasses and soft sweaters.

As for Gonin, I am so glad you saw that. An American critic described it as "Reservoir Dogs, but gay." I laughed at the scene where Takeshi Kitano does it with his lover right in front of the corpse of the salaryman's daughter. It was grotesque, while the stuff he was shouting at his lover was so over-the-top as to be funny. One thing is for sure, he did not portray a gangster as a pretty boy who'd just finished auditioning for a Boy Band.

From what I can tell about your taste by reading your MDL comments the last couple of years, you will love HOTE. I know you liked Doublemints and Light, so you will like this because it also feels very authentic, uncontrived and more LGBT than BL.

It's got 6 eps out right now, about 25 min each, making it about 2 and half hours, so you can binge watch all 6 eps.

The white sheet sex scene is, so far, the only thing about this show that would classify it as BL rather than LGBT. It's odd that the director got peevish about a sex scene when they were willing to depict a man being dragged across asphalt by a moving truck. Other BL's don't depict violence, so it's not surprising for them to be prudes about sex scenes. But in HOTE there is a disparity between realistic depictions of violence and child abuse, and then a sudden unwillingness to depict sex.

In its defense, the Japanese don't do nude gay sex scenes in general. Even the Pornographer did not show any bare asses. It's only the Thais who show a man's bare backside during a sex scene. Also in HOTE's defense, the sex scenes are not prudish because you can clearly see that a guy is getting a hand-job and/or screwing. It's just that there's a white sheet over their private parts.

I totally agree that Doublemints and shows like Happy of the End are not really BL's. But whenever I say this on an MDL post the replies pounce on me for being narrowminded in how I categorize shows as either BL or LGBT. But, hey, there is clearly a difference in these genres else the term BL would not exist at all. The BL fandom seems to get annoyed when I distinguish between BL and LGBT cuz they sense that I take BL's less seriously. Well, yes, I do take them less seriously. Indeed, the genre was conceived to be taken less seriously.

BL is a largely Asian phenomena and it's distinct from LGBT content insofar as its created by women, marketed to women and consumed by women. It is apolitical and largely sexless. It never features violent, scumbags who rape and kill, nor hungry, impoverished homeless people (all of which are featured in HOTE, and why I consider HOTE to be LGBT rather than BL). BL is fantasy where everyone is good looking, has a nice home, nice job, and no problems outside the realm of romance. It's a world where there is no homophobia in East Asia and everyone either accepts the 2 male leads dating from the start, or eventually accepts it. If it weren't for shows like HOTE and movies like Night Flight, I would have thought East Asians accepted gay people as openly and as easily as Americans do. That's why I also classify HOTE and Night Flight as LGBT rather than BL.

God, yes, an utter meltdown. Some of the fans even call it incest when the stepbrothers meet as post-pubescents. They clearly like the stepbrother trope, else it would not appear so often. Yet they have an unspoken rule that the boys must meet after a certain age.

As for the stepbrother trope in The On!y One, I don't know why they needed it at all. These 2 boys could've simply met as classmates and not one single thing in the plot would changed.

I can see how you'd forget having seen Stay by Side. The term "fluff" basically equates with "forgettable" -- ie, something light, airy and sweet that quickly evaporates. I liked the scene where ghost-boy hides behind a sheet from the laundry line when his seme lands his first kiss. I'd call it fluff done right because as forgettable as it was, there was at least some heat between the two leads (largely emanating from the seme). Most of what the fans call fluff means it's an utterly sexless Hollywood Romantic Comedy, but with a 2 guys instead of a guy plus a girl.

As for MBM, I think I liked that so much cuz it was my very first BL and I did not expect the boys to hook up. At that point, I did not know about the BL rule that it MUST end with the leads together. Even if somebody dies, they still hook up and declare love first (ie, History MODC). Since I did not know about this rule in BL world, MBM's plot genuinely surprise me. In short, I did not expect the beautiful, snotty boy to actually love the gentle weirdo. If I watched that same show today, I would be expecting that to happen and, thus, would not like the show as much. But I'd still say MBM was good because the character Hira was refreshingly weird.

The author is a novelist who likes oddball characters. She wrote an award winning novel that was adapted for a film . It was about an abused 10 year old girl who runs away from home and is taken in by a 20 year old guy. He's accused of pedophilia, though he was actually her savior and couldn't even have sex due to an affliction with micro penis. They meet again when she's an adult and fall in love. It was pretty good. I will try to find the title if you are interested.

Yep, it's called Stay by My Side. It's Taiwanese. And it is pure, unadulterated fluff. It's what it set out to be, so you know what you're going to get. I would never re-watch it, but it was fun while it lasted. HOTE, on the other hand, I will re-watch. I have also re-watched Doublemints, and The Pornogrpher and My Beautiful Man. Now, My Beautiful Man could be called "fluff" but Hira was such a weirdo that I delighted in the show nonetheless. The author, tellingly, is a novelist who's written outside the BL genre.

Exactly, they meet as post-pubescents.

I read a study about the bonding of adopted children with siblings and parents that said it largely happens in the period from infancy to about 10. If one enters another family after the age of 10, neither the child nor the family are likely to ever feel bonded by unconditional love. I figured that this is why the step brothers in these BL's are always specified to have met as post-pubescents. It would feel like incest if characters had grown up as siblings since infancy. In other words, it's not about being a blood brother or not, it's about the age at which one is adopted.

HOTE is the currently airing Japanese BL, "Happy of the End" and it's got 6 eps out right now. I put it in the same league as "Light" in that it is, for lack of a better word, realistic. Indeed, I think it does the show a disservice to even categorize it as a "BL" and, like "Light" it is more of an LGBT story.

Though there are only 6 eps out, I would safely add it to my Top 10 list of Japanese drama series. Not just Top Ten BL's, but Top Ten series overall. It's just a good show that could be appreciated by non-BL fans.

LOL, that's dead on accurate. I actually prefer BL's that are at least honest about being fluff and don't pretend to be any more or any less. For example, there's a pleasant bit of fluff out right now called SugarDog Life. It doesn't shoot very far, but since it only intends to be cute, it achieves its goal. So my problem is not with fluff per se, but with these shows that pose as "realistic" when they are just tricked out fluff.

I particularly loathe when BL's feign to be realistic by tossing in gangsters. Yet the "gangsters" look like idols from a Boy Band and are as nonviolent as boy scouts (eg, KinnPorsh, Kiseki Dear to Me, and History Trapped). The only BL's to ever give us realistic gangsters are Doublemints and Happy of the End. The gangsters in these 2 BL's are violent, predatory scumbags.

Doublemints was a step above the average BL since it was a feature film and was directed by a man who has a lot of non-BL films under his belt. If it were done as a series directed by a woman, I doubt we'd have gotten that wickedly disturbing gang-bang rape scene. Happy of the End is also directed by a man, which may account for it feeling grittier than the average BL, and also its ability to portray gangsters as scumbags who prey on innocent, homeless children and tie a screaming man to a moving truck and drag him across asphalt. Other than Happy of the End and Doublmints, I'd not only call the BL Genre fluffy across the board, but intentionally so. The creators know their audience is 15-25 girls and, hence, they cater to that demographic by creating fluffy shows. Again, I don't mind a pleasant bit of fluff, but let's not kid ourselves that it's anything more than that.

I can barely get through ep 9, with all this filler about Sports Day or whatever it is. I will move onto ep 10 out of interest to see how they handle the gay father's character but, like you, I haven't much confidence. Once a show introduces silly plot points, it breaks my ability to suspend disbelief for the rest of the show, even if the rest of it does improve. In short, I am torn out of the reverie necessary for literature/drama/film to work and I can't slip back in.

I'm hesitant to even watch eps 9/10 based on comments about ludicrous bits with bandits and kidnapping. And the comments that said the show dropped the ball came from people whose opinions I trust. But I am still interested in knowing about Tian's father, who is gay according to comments by those who read the book. I took it to mean that Tian has likely understood himself to be gay for a while now, because people don't suddenly realize they are gay when in college, despite the BL worlds insistence on such. You know which gender attracts you when you hit puberty, or even earlier. So, can someone whose read the book tell me how the dad's homosexuality is handled? Does the story suggest that his son has a genetic predisposition for it?

"Thai replacement writers" reflects something you said elsewhere about Taiwanese BL's in general becoming more and more trope-ridden. At this rate, they are on track to becoming like Thai BL's, which I categorically do not watch anymore. Taiwanese BL's are already long like the Thai BL's (always 45 min and 8+ episodes), which forces them to rely on filler like the Thai's do.. I think many of the Japanese and Korean BL's should've been longer (eg, I wanted more of Old Fashioned Cupcake), but it's better to have quality brevity than bloated, fatuous length. Which is ALL the Thais give us from their factory of 100+ BL's a year (that's not hyperbole, they literally produce over 100 a year).

I am still willing to give a Taiwanese BL a shot, but I have less and less hope for a good one as time goes by. The only Taiwanese BL I've liked this year is "The Unknown," but even at that, I disliked the pretty boy Gangster bit. I despair of gangsters who look like models from a Gap ad. HOTE and Doublemints are the only BLs to depict realistic scumbag gangsters who rape, torture and murder people. How telling that these are also both Japanese BL's, huh?

Yep, they code top/bottom roles with the lighter personality (uke) versus the grouch (seme), just as you say. They also code the seme as being the guy who does the pursuing, while the uke is passive and waits to be pursued (ie, just as the man is aggressive and the woman waits for the guy to ask her out in real life). The gender coding of uke/seme is done with these sorts of behavioral differences. But it's more than just behavior, since they even code uke/seme with clothing, wherein the uke wears more sweaters and soft cuddly fabrics. The seme will wear more denim and even, sometimes, have tatoos. Also, the uke often wears glasses. Or, put it this way, if a guy is wearing glasses, you can be sure that he's been coded as the uke in other ways too.

I'm sure there are other ways of coding, but for now the big 3 are:

1) the friendly guy versus the grouch

2) the aggressive pursuer versus the passive prize

3) sweaters and cuddly fabrics versus denim, wife-beaters, the occasional tattoo, or even going shirtless altogether.

"My boner had called an uber." LOL, your one-liners are terrific!

This is wonderful! Thanks for directing me to it. Funny, but I was not thrilled with The On1y One even at the start because the eps were too long for what it was trying to say, and it took at least 5 eps before any heat was generated between the two. Then it picked up and I liked eps, 6, 7, and 8. But now, after your comments and other people's, I likely won't go back for the rest of the show. The same thing happened with that show about the deaf kid, although that one started strong for me, it phased out by the end.

Like you, I've noticed how the Taiwanese BL's are getting increasingly lame. Not as bad as the Thais, but on their way. There is the tropes galore you mentioned, especially with the step-brothers bit. Why is that considered such a draw for BL world? And then the writers use it as a central conceit for a whole drama when it's just a lazy way of getting two guys to meet each other. I even see step brothers in the good Taiwanese shows, like History Crossing the Line (with adorable Fandy Fan). There was the step brothers as a side couple. The next History show included step brothers as the main characters (eg, the one with wedding planners as the leads).

I never noticed the bit with cameos from actors in other BL's till you mentioned it, but you're right. The Taiwanese do used cameos a lot. The On1y One also had a cameo from that short that I really like, Light. The actor who played the character Light appeared in The On1y One as a student in one of the earlier eps. Light is actually a fave short movie of mine, because I loved the dynamic of the abused prostitute and the cop. I would love to see that short extended, but it's been years so I doubt it will happen.

I love HOTE because it's similarly realistic the way Light was. We see the actual drudgery and the abuse that the poor and disenfranchised endure. When I compare shows like HOTE and Light to crap like The On1y One, I have even less tolerance. I don't mind fluffy shows, I just think that if it's going to be a fluffy show, at least be honest and go full throttle on the fluff, and don't pretend to have anything deep to say.

That's how it was with the BL about the guy who heard ghosts. I can't recall the name, but I'm sure you recall it. It's where the one who heard ghosts ate potato chips off the other lead's chest, lol. That show was just out and out fluff. It set out to be cute, nothing more, nothing less, and thus achieved its goal so I liked it. The same with a fluffy J-BL out right now called Sugardog Life.

But so many of these Taiwanese shows pretend to be heavy. They use gangsters when they want to pretend there is substance. Bad enough that the "gangsters" look and act like models from a Gap advertisement, but the plots are even worse. There was that god awful Kiseki Dear to me wherein a "gangster" became a teacher overnight to do undercover work. And he not only got the credentials to teach overnight, but his "undercover" work just happened to be at the same school where his beloved went. I just stopped watching at that point.

At any rate, there are few good BL's across the board and I drop most. My faves are the Japanese. I won't watch any Thais at all; I won't even start them. With the Taiwanese I'll give it a shot, but then often drop them. As I've just dropped this show too.