MidnightReader

A relationship built on lies & manipulation

The whole plot of this series revolves around lies and manipulation, with a whole lot of fortune-telling and feng shui overlaying it.

I'm not going to say this series is a waste of time, but I will say that it was incredibly disappointing. I'll go into more detail later, but the writing for this series is so flimsy that I'm convinced that this was the screenwriter's first time writing a script.

THINGS I LIKED

* The acting was great. It was a lot of these actors' first role, and they honestly killed it. Sadly, good acting can only save a show so much.

* The only part of the plot I liked was when Ritt didn't get back together with Itt just because he got hurt trying to "save" him. That happens way too many times in drama series, and sometimes it's fine to do that, but like in this series, it made sense for Ritt not to forgive him because at this point every step of their romance has been built on lies and manipulation, and Itt risking himself doesn't solve those issues.

* Using rune stones for fortune-telling is different.

* NC scenes were surprisingly okay. The actors have good chemistry together.

THINGS I DIDN'T LIKE
(90% of these things can be chalked up to lazy writing)

* The actors for Pure and Itt looked so much alike that I got them confused a couple of times. Not for a few seconds either, but sometimes minutes. This was probably just a me problem, but it was still annoying.

* Someone needs to tell the writers that Fortune-telling and Feng Shui can not be a person's entire personality.

* Even if you love someone, you shouldn't pretend to be someone you're not just to be with them. Ritt has the excuse that he was drunk and not thinking clearly when he told the lie, but he should have cleared things up as soon as he got sober.

* Was Pure trying to turn Ritt into an alcoholic? He was drinking so much that I have no idea how he remembered anything. Honestly, this was a small example of lazy writing because he really shouldn't have been able to remember everything.

* Pure honestly wasn't a good friend.

* Can we go back to the time when, if a character wanted to pretend to have beaten or kidnapped someone, they have real footage or at least have made it so the said person is busy and unable to answer the phone? Or manipulate the person to the location to falsify evidence against them? I've only watched a couple of series where they pull this "it was faked with AI" bullshit, and yes, it shows the dangers of AI, but at the same time you can't rely solely on that to move the plot forward. It just makes the characters look stupid for falling for it, and in this case also Pure for thinking Itt is pulling a "Ritt was kidnapped" scheme to what? Make up with Ritt? Does that make any sense at all? This whole scene was just to deal with a blackmailer that honestly played such a small role in the story that he could have been written out completely, and they could have just had Ritt's guilt slowly eating at him until he couldn't take lying anymore, only to then discover that everyone around him had been lying to him.

* Ritt has no right to play the victim after learning that Itt knew he was lying the whole time. He had no reason to snap like that. He should have just said sorry and explained why he did it. It's only after Pure reveals that he had known for a while, and that Itt and Phitcha had known the whole time, that he had the right to be mad and hurt. Because let's be honest, Itt pretty much set him up to tell the lie in the first place and then manipulated things so that they had to have a fake marriage, live together, and go on a trip together. He also had everyone around him and Ritt in on the scheme as well. So to me, Itt was the worst of these two, and I honestly wouldn't have been surprised if they hadn't gotten back together.

* They showed the same scenes from Ritt and Itt's past multiple times with little added.

* They had Itt say at the end that he wanted to start over without any lies between them when he manipulated things to get Ritt to the event in the first place. At this point, it felt like Ritt gave in to get Itt to stop, more than him being willing to give them another try. At this point, basically their whole relationship had been built on a lie, so how do you know when the lying stops? Itt's a red flag & everyone is color blind.

* LAZY WRITING! Everything written above for starters, but also the characters have no real personality or growth. The story focused so much on the fortune-telling and Feng Shui that there wasn't any room for either. They decided to add these things instead of building up good foreshadowing or tension, and defaulted to "let's just use AI". We only see Ritt struggling internally about his lie for the first couple of episodes and then again after he's being blackmailed. If Ritt's victim speech had to happen, they could have used better dialogue instead of making the audience completely unable to be sympathetic toward him. Some sympathy was possible because Itt did a lot more lying and manipulating. Itt supposedly tried to get Ritt to tell him the truth when really, after their first date, he didn't at all. Itt also used the excuse that he wasn't brave enough to hit on Ritt, but for some reason he had no problem lying to and manipulating him into dating him.

This series had potential.

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Don't expect anything intense or dark

I saw a few clips of this show before I watched it, and it turns out they were all from the side couples' scenes. After finishing the series, I get why; they definitely had better chemistry than our main couple. Kisses were stiff either way. I liked the back hugs and cuddles, though.

I liked that I actually learned something from this series; I had never heard of Hyperventilation Syndrome or Aplastic Anemia before, and it was nice to learn more about them. I'll remember them, whereas I probably won't remember most of the other details of the show. Not that it wasn't a good show, but it was . . . safe. I feel like this show was sold as something much darker with a toxic, obsessive, and possessive romance, and it did the bare minimum with all of those things. I had really been looking forward to those darker tones.

OST was good; it made me feel like I was watching an anime at times.

The acting was good. I have no idea who played Xiaosi, but he did a great job. I loved his character and the relationships he had with Li and Zhai Qiu Yu. Li is his most important person, and he wasn't going to give Zhai Qiu Yu an inch.

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Not the worst Vampire BL series I've watched

I liked what they were going for, but sadly, they couldn't do much with only 10 minutes per episode. It clearly had a limited budget, even though the effects weren't the worst I've seen.

For some reason, I found Lucifer saying "I'm also a Christian," really funny.

The fighting was laughably bad, and so short that it may as well have been cut out.

The kissing was . . . kissing, I guess. Chemistry wasn't there at all.

What was that ending? No, seriously, what was it? Is Minu alive or dead? If alive, how? And what were the repercussions of what Lucifer did?

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Trigger warning for self-harm and non-consensual sex

This series can be very frustrating for the first 5 episodes because we go from the past to the future a LOT. A ridiculous amount, really. None of it is in chronological order, which makes the story more confusing than it needed to be. It's enough to make someone want to drop the series after an episode or two, but besides this, I felt like it was a solid series. The jumping from past to present pretty much stops by episode 6.

The only other thing I didn't really like was the characters Ken and Lavid (Rawit) being so stupid. The dads are just as bad. I'm not a fan of stupid characters or ones that lack common sense. I deal with that enough in my day-to-day life. It doesn't bother me to the point of mentioning it often, but Ken is literally out here helping run to companies (into the ground but still) and trying to outmaneuver Kelvin & Vier. It just didn't seem believable that either of the fathers would have given him any power to make company decisions. Lavid just doesn't have common sense.

The GL couple was really good, but it did feel like their scenes were filled with literal filler sometimes. Nana kicks ass! I love seeing a female character who can fight.

The OST was great, but for the main couple's NC scenes, it was a bit wild. In a good way. I was not expecting them to use those songs. Also, the kissing noises? I felt like I was intruding.

I loved the acting all around. Peat didn't have many facial expressions, but I don't think the role gave him much room to give that many. I could tell Fort was really enjoying this role, and his crying was captivating.

Non-consensual sex in episode 5? Not sure. The scene cuts off, but it hints at it, so right now I'm going with yes.

There are several scenes where Kelvin hurts himself and has a panic attack. I'm assuming it was a panic attack since I don't know what else it could have been, but it was very tame in comparison to the ones I've had. As for hurting himself, Kelvin cuts himself a lot in the months after he and Vier go their separate ways, and Peat's response, the relief he gets from doing it, is accurate to how it actually feels when you cut yourself. How do I know? I've done it before when I was feeling very stressed and was in an environment that I had no control over, and it was a way of getting things to slow down so I could breathe. Don't worry I haven't done it in years, and I'm mentally in a much better place. The point is, it was realistic.

This show would be interesting to rewatch now that I have all the pieces to the story.

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This was frustrating

Trigger warnings for rape (acted out) and SA (both acted and real)

I'm going to start by talking about the things I liked.

1. Zhen Xin's girlfriend was actually really cool, and I liked her. I thought I would hate her at first because of the way she called Zhen Xin "honey" in that tone. It grated on my ears, and she did it too much. Thankfully, that didn't last long, and she turned out to be a very cool girl boss.

2. The ending. Both the one for Zhen Xin & Zhang Zhun and the one for Gao and Fang. I'm still wondering whether Gao and Fang's story inside Zhen and Zhun's was real.

3. The acting was really good & Ollie and Shu cried really well.

4. Good cuddles. It's sad we only got a couple of them.

Now, on to the things I didn't like, of which there are many.

1. The cheating was unnecessary. They should have just been single or broken up with their girlfriends right away. Zhen and Zhun barely get any screen time as themselves already, so why fill that time with something so toxic? I already didn't feel anything for the characters & I hate cheating, so I wasn't exactly rooting for them to get their happily ever after. Did Zhun ever talk to his girlfriend & properly break up? It didn't feel like it. I knew going in there would be cheating; I just didn't expect it to be handled so poorly, especially with Zhun's girlfriend.

2. I didn't really like any of the characters very much, besides Zhen Xin's girlfriend. We aren't given enough time with them to have any good emotional buildup or to really even get to know them. I simply couldn't make myself care about them.

3. The chemistry. To put it simply, there was very little to be had. I checked out during the smut scenes, which is honestly nothing new, but even the kisses were bland and dry. The kisses weren't the worst, but I expected a lot more from these characters, considering they "love" each other. Yeah, I really didn't believe that for a second.

4. Even with the ending being what it was, we should not have spent over half the show on Gao and Fang's story. I didn't even pay attention to the first scene because I thought it was something they would show small pieces of every couple of episodes. I didn't know we would be living through their entire story! Sadly, their story, which I was bored with at first, turned out to be the more interesting one to follow.

5. Where the fudge did that proposal come from? It was the most out-of-place proposal I've ever seen, IRL & in fiction. What was he thinking? What makes it worse is that it didn't have to happen. I'm assuming it happened to get the rings to both characters so they could reunite dramatically later. Could have just made them promise rings; it would have worked just as well and made it so Zhen didn't look like an idiot who was rushing things.

6. Why did their boss change their mind about them dating? What happened in those 8 months that made them say, "Okay, if they still like each other, just let them date"? I don't mind the change of heart; what I mind is not knowing why it happened.


I really don't understand the hype or the high rating. I think I'm going to stop considering the rating before I watch a show. I normally use it as a way to pick between two shows if I'm torn, but I've been disappointed almost every time. I was really looking forward to this show as well. I thought it would be a dark, fast-paced plot that would have me excited for each new episode, but instead, each episode became a chore to get through.

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The Sexy Buttocks was Flat as a Board

First of all, Okumi gave me the creeps; every time he smiled or was overly excited, it made my skin crawl. It didn't help that while the acting was alright and the chemistry was okay, the kisses and NC scenes were flat as a board. I have to give it to the actors and the ability to be able to watch at X2 speed for me being able to finish this series because there really was nothing of interest happening. They had plenty of time to add interesting stuff to the plot as well, with the sheer amount of unneeded recaps and flashbacks in each episode. The episodes are already short, and 1-3 minutes of each episode are things we've already seen.

It's far from the worst Japanese BL I've watched, but it's also far from memorable. If I remember anything from it, it's completely the titles doing.

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Perfect BL for beginners

This was an easy-to-watch series with solid acting & is very light on the BL. Light on the romance, really. The most intimate thing that happens is hand-holding. I'd recommend this series to anyone wanting to get into BL who doesn't want it to be the focal point of the series, or see any NC scenes. I feel like the pacing was also good considering very little was actually going on.

The actors all have really good chemistry; It made the friendships and the family dynamics (even though some are VERY unresolved) more believable. It also helped that most of the characters were emotionally intelligent enough to understand what was happening without having to be told.

I do hate the miscommunication trope, but this time it bothered me very little because I could sympathize with them for not being able to confess & feeling rejected (confession or not), and not being able to move on. This show also showed how one lie can snowball into another & become a bigger & more stressful problem as time goes on, and I think they handled it alright. It could have been better; it could have been worse. Seung Won definitely learned from his mistake & that's what's important.

The way the scenes were laid out is also something I don't normally like, but they made it work in this series in a way that made the story feel complete instead of disjointed.

The only thing I would have changed is that I wanted to spend more time with Hui Su and Seung Won as a couple. We built up to it for so long that it felt like we deserved more.

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Triggers for drinking, date-rape drug use, SA, violence, cheating, & stupidity

I apologize in advance if this review is a little all over the place. I took a lot of notes, and it got to the point where keeping them organized was a lost cause.

First off, I love that this was set in the 90s. A little before and after I was born, so it was a bit of a nostalgia trip. The set design & prop crew did a fantastic job with everything.

Honestly, my only real complaints about the show were: some scenes being replayed at different angles & it just didn't look good seeing the actor do the same action again and again and again. I have a few unanswered questions that I feel are important (I'll get to this at the end), & the unwillingness to communicate. This wasn't just miscommunication; they just didn't do it. I'm also 50/50 on whether I liked the narration or not.

Normally, I would have cheating as one of the things I hated most, because it's one of my biggest triggers, but honestly, in this case it was valid. I'm not saying that because I didn't like Bei Lu Xin either; on the contrary, once she stopped being a drunk, I actually liked her a lot. I liked that she was bold, blunt, & I was 100% in her corner when she started telling off Lu Xiao Fan's family. I've never been so happy when she called Fan's family trash and shameless to their faces. No, the cheating was valid because Lu Xiao Fan was basically sold to the Bei family & there was no love there. It was also going on on both sides. Was it right? Hell no. But I didn't think less of either character for it. This is a massive first for me.

Specking of Lu Xiao Fan~ I really liked him as well. He kind of stays a doormat throughout the series, but he's one of those hard brisily ones that hurt your feet if you stand on them barefoot. He's overly polite and mild-mannered, has a hard time going against anyone or specking up for himself, & has little self-esteem. All that being said, we learn at the end that he plays the long con and will hit you where it hurts when you are least expecting it. The scary thing was that it wasn't even really done out of hate. I don't think this boy is capable of hate.

I can understand Lu Xiao Fan's actions as well when you think about everything that Bei Lu Qing was doing and planning for them to be together, but not explaining any of it, so all Lu Xiao Fan saw was Bei Lu Qing pushing him aside for someone "better" than him. Who wouldn't be hurt and have a plan of attack & a financial plan that has literally been years in the making? A lot of my unanswered questions actually got answered in the last episode, such as why Lu Xiao Fan was throwing random magazines away? Why is he collecting cardboard boxes & trash? Why is he in this random alley? Why was this random stock trader guy smirking? I LOVED seeing all of these little puzzle pieces being shown throughout the series come together to help complete a picture that was hidden within the bigger picture we were focused on. I never would have guessed Lu Xiao Fan had been planning all of that.

This show focuses heavily on family dynamics. The good, the bad, and the ugly. And in this specific case, the very ugly.

The family was its own headache. I swear they only had a few functioning brain cells between them all. Before I get too into this, I just want to say that I grew up on a farm. I still farm to this day; being a farmer means that you have to save where you can if you can, and you are going to take more losses than gains. Especially if you live and work out of a small town and sell locally. This is all to say that I have a good idea of how poor these people probably are, so I'm not judging them for being poor and wanting a better life. I'm judging them on the fact that they are money-hungry assholes, with only the mother being halfway decent. The little sister is a self-entitled brat that I'm glad we aren't subjected to for very long. The mother, as I said, is halfway decent, but she still sold her son and used him to get further in life. What made her decent is that she gave Lu Xiao Fan some money before he left, refused to take his money in the end, & took his side when her oldest son Ping and husband were trying to take advantage of Lu Xiao Fan. The husband really was just money-hungry and felt he was owed by the Bei family.

Ping gets his own paragraph because he's a special asshole. The stupid kind that never learns & leeches off others instead of doing the work himself. Lu Xiao Fan goes to Bei Lu Qing to get Ping a job, then another job; he then loses that job & his fiancée after getting a girl pregnant after a drunk one-night stand, so Fan has to ask for another job for him when all he's trying to do is get away from the Bei family. Then this asshole badgers his brother for money so he can enter the stock market & when he doesn't get it, he sells client information & takes money from everyone in his village. He loses in the stock market & leaves said village bankrupt. He does all of this and doesn't feel bad about any of it, only that he didn't make money. When Bei Lu Qing offers money for the Lu family to cut ties with Fan, he's only more than happy to sell his brother again. Ping is the perfect example of a waste of oxygen. He is one never-ending problem.

The family is also rude and ill-mannered, which has nothing to do with them being poor & everything to do with them believing they are owed the good things they are getting & everything bad that happens is someone else's fault. They have zero accountablity & that continues as far as I'm aware until Fan cuts all ties with them. They are money-hungry and an embarrassment. How did Fan turn out so sweet? I was so happy when he cut ties with them.

Lin Zi Yang is the last character I want to talk about. I didn't really expect him to have as big a role as he did. I didn't even bother to learn his name until episode 3. He turned out to be one of the characters I liked the most because, no matter how scheming, he was a loyal friend. I also found his reaction to Lu Xiao Fan pulling a meat cleaver on himself very funny. He backpedaled so fast lmao. Lu Xiao Fan is going to make him go prematurely gray.

I guess now I should get to the unanswered questions. If you know the answers, please feel free to share!

Why marry Lu Xiao Fan of all people? At one point, they make it sound like he was chosen, so who chose him? Why? I was hoping it would have been Bei Lu Qing, so we'd get a little more backstory on why he's obsessed with Fan. What did Lu Xiao Fan do with the money his mother gave him? What happened with Bei Lu Qing's mother? Why, in that one scene that we had to watch TWICE, did Lu Xiao Fan pull his pants down? What happened after? (Maybe don't answer that one?) What happened to the girl Ping got pregnant? Did she keep the baby? Was there even a baby to begin with? Did Li Wen Xi lose out on a lot of money in the end? How did Bri Lu Qing and his friends recover financially? On this, it would have been nice to see the search process for Lu Xiao Fan. What happened to the Lu family once they returned home to their now bankrupt village? What was in the box Lu Xiao Fan hid under the bed? Why was Lu Xiao Fan still wiring money to the bully/trader dude (I'm sorry, I forgot his name)? Did the trader dude tell Bei Lu Qing where Lu Xiao Fan was? If not, how did they find out? I know from the wire transfer, but how did they know about it/ come across it? They shouldn't have even known the two had contact with each other, right?

I feel like I have a lot more questions, but I just can't think of them right now. Honestly, if they had just answered the questions of how they found Lu Xiao Fan, what was in the box, & why Lu Xiao Fan was chosen in the first place, I might have given this series an 8. It was really good. The chemistry wasn't all there, & the kisses were just alright, but the story, production value, & pacing were really good.

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Tae was done wrong

I'm going to be honest; I wanted Tae and Jaeyeon to end up together & not just because Tae has literally no one else in his life. They had history. Jaeyeon and Geonwoo knew each other for a couple of days before they kissed & who really knows how long they were together before agreeing to date. Yes, I know attraction doesn't work like that & Tae was only ever seen as a friend, but I can't help feeling that Tae was honestly never given a chance. I also feared that he was just going to disappear from both of their lives once he learned they got together. It wouldn't have been so bad if they had just given Tae a boyfriend at the end to show us that he really did move on and found happiness.

We don't see Tae and Geonwoo rebuild any part of their relationship either. Jaeyeon seems to be the only thing making them talk to each other. Why couldn't we have gotten some resolution there? Tae said he's glad they are happy in the time-skip, but that isn't enough. They already were doing a lot in the little amount of time they had; they could have included a little brother heart-to-heart. Especially if Geonwoo was going to end up with Tae's crush of like 10+ years.

Also, what chance did the fortune teller give him? From what I saw, there was no chance for him, so that part just felt unnecessary.

What happened to the stalker who stabbed Geonwoo? What happened to their mother? The woman was apparently glued to Geonwoo as a child, so where is she now? And like I said above, did Tae move on? If he did, I don't believe it was easy at all since EVERYONE he's loved has chosen Geonwoo over him. It felt like the show was enforcing the saying "once second best, always second best" in the cruelest way possible.

This is far from the worst short BL I've ever watched, and I think that's why I got a bit upset with the way they handled the brothers' relationship & the romantic relationships. If they weren't going to actually do anything with the stalker other than use him to push Jaeyeon and Geonwoo closer, then they could have just cut him out completely. If they were going to end up together, they would be stabbing or no stabbing. Use that time instead to fix the brothers' relationship. Use it to make it believable that Jaeyeon and Geonwoo like each other. Use it to give Tae a decent ending! Give this abandoned boy some love from SOMEONE!

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This was everything that I wanted

First off, I really love how down bad Arthit is for Dao. His love for Dao feels all-consuming & Ngern does a great job conveying it through his eyes alone.

This special episode was 100% necessary. Phoon and Fah's episode was basically just a fluffy check-in, but this special actually gave us much-needed closure for this couple. At the end of the series, we are left with Arthit not being able to propose to Dao, & we finally get it here in one of the most touching ways. It was so sweet & I couldn't be happier with how it turned out.

It was also nice to know that at least Arthit and Fah stay in touch. I'm assuming if they do, it means all of them do. It's normal not to keep in touch with friends if you take different career paths, so it was just a relief to see that they still talk to each other.

As always, I'm a sucker for good cuddles & I was well fed~

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Domestic Fluff

This story takes place after a few years' time skip, and we get to see a glimpse of Fah and Phoon's adult life: their jobs, kind of their day-to-day routine, and overall, just them being in love with each other. It's such a soft love as well. No drama or NC scenes, and the cuddles were so nice. It makes me a little jealous.

I'm kind of torn on whether we needed this or not. On the one hand, I loved this couple, and I'm glad we got to see them again after they have settled into their adult lives, while on the other hand, I've already said goodbye to these characters twice before this & at this point it feels like I'm getting strung along. As much as I love them, I hope this is the final goodbye.

P.S. I still can't get over how small and adorable Tonliew is!

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I came for the post Love Mechanics VeeMark moments

They did a surprising amount in 3 episodes. Was the relationship believable? No, but I honestly treated this as a special set after Love Mechanics. It was nice to see Nuea find someone after everything that happened with Mark, even if I felt like it should have gotten at least a couple more episodes to really make the relationship feel like they were something other than casual acquaintances. We didn't get a lot of VeeMark moments, but I enjoyed each one, & we got more of Mark in this series than in the others (outside Love Mechanics, obviously).

Specking of Mark, I kept waiting for him to explode with how fed up he looked with all of his upperclassmen. I'm kind of sad that all we got was his death stare, which was really good imho.

The acting was just as good as in TOSSARA, but Win did a better job; maybe because he got to do something besides acting lovesick.

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Better than Future at least

I don't understand why so much of the dialogue between the characters has to be teasing or flirting. Do they have a quota they have to meet with each series or something?

Gun & Bar have no chemistry & despite the pacing of the relationship being alright, it wasn't believable. What would have been believable was Bar telling Gun to fuck off. No one who gets peer-pressured into letting someone hit on them is actually going to let the person hit on them. And the confession? Worst part of the show, in my opinion. It wasn't cute. It was a public sob story that anyone would have been an ass to say no to & it went on way too long. And I'm normally a big sucker for size differences & cuddles, but they did nothing for me this time.

Going in, I was expecting great acting from Yin and War (sadly, we got very little of War), but I was pleasantly surprised that the acting was alright overall. Folk especially surprised me both in his acting & with how much he reminds me of Nunew, looks-wise. The only person's acting I didn't like was, unfortunately, Win's (Gun). No character had any personality, but I feel like the main characters should be the exception. Folk did a decent job of making his character a tsundere, while Win's character only thought of or cared about Bar. I don't know anything about him that didn't revolve around Bar. War (Mark) was on screen for less than 5 minutes & his character had more personality.

I preferred this over Future, but it's only better because the acting was much better.

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A waste of time

Why was this made? We didn't need it. Did anyone want it? This was such a nothing show that it may as well not have existed.

There was zero plot, & all the drama came down to jealousy and the most nonsensical breakup I've ever seen. The script was also mostly teasing, flirting, or arguing with little in between, which almost made me drop the show. Honestly, I'm still not sure why I finished it.

The acting wasn't the worst, but it definitely wasn't the best either. It felt constricted, and maybe that was because of the script? There isn't much you can do when the script is mostly you making doe eyes at a boy & bragging about said boy. Them speed-running the relationship also didn't do the actors any favors since they didn't have time or wiggle room in the script to actually build up the character past 'love-sick' or build chemistry.

Also, why did every online conversation between Fuse and Ana have to be public? Are DM's not a thing on whatever platform they are using?

The OST reminded me of retro video games that repeat the same beat the whole time you play and will slowly drive you crazy if you don't learn to tune it out. It was horrible, loud, & distracting.

Vee & Mark are mentioned WAY too much. I get they are the most popular couple, but bringing them up at least once an episode won't save the dumpster fire that is this show.

I hate giving it 1.5 stars because I've definitely watched worse shows & rated them higher than this, but in those shows there was at least 1 thing, no matter how small, that I liked; whether it be an actor, a scene, a plot point, OST, a cuddle, etc., there's something. Here, there was nothing. It really was just a show, one of many, sadly, that lacked any substance.

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The "Honeymoon"

This special covers, in my opinion, the most boring part of the novel & that's the "honeymoon" after the escape from Daddy Dearest. The most interesting part during that section of the book was the encounter with the SWAT team & somehow they over- and underplayed it here. Overplayed it by making it way more public than it was meant to be, & underplayed it in the number of SWAT who were actually there and how they were dealt with. So the scene came off as ridiculous rather than tense. I'm also surprised they included the girl from the novel, even if they did remove the kissing scene.

COVID *eye roll* it wasn't a part of the book, so it doesn't need to be included. Nothing would have changed plot-wise.

The recap in the beginning was way too long; recapping the last couple of episodes would have been enough.

I don't like that they are also setting up the car accident already, not because it means they are going to skip over anything important, but because it was so blatantly done, and they set up the character to know that the brakes weren't working, so if the accident happens now it's going to make Poppy look forgetful which is something his character isn't supposed to be.

Also, why does this series keep making me think Seal has a thing for Hero? I can't remember if the other adaptations made me feel this way, but it's very in my face in this one, and it's making me cringe. If there were no blood relation between them, I could easily understand it, but they are blood-related. And this is not The Mortal Instruments.

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