Ryn

Yeah sorry I removed that part of my comment because it wasn't a helpful suggestion, but apparently I wasn't quick enough and you saw it before I did so. Apologies.

The 'she should just get a man' theme is definitely present in GAP, but only one (powerful) character expresses that viewpoint, and she's portrayed as pretty much just evil, and she doesn't win in the end. So idk it's up to you.

23,5 has no rhetoric about settling down with a man, and I hope you enjoy it :)

GAP's popularity kicked off a frenzy of GL's in Thailand. Keep your eyes out for: 'Pluto', 'Us', 'The Last Case', 'Be Mine', 'Reverse 4 You', 'The Loyal Pin', 'The Secret of Us' and 'Uranus 2324'. Based on what you said, you're not going to enjoy 'My Marvellous Dream is You', 'Affair' or 'Blank', sadly.
'Lucky My Love', 'Show Me Love' and 'Love Senior' are already out but I'm not majorly impressed by those. The lesbian side couple in 'Bad Buddy' are fun though. And the movie 'Yes or No' is really good.

Since you like Jdrama's you probably already know 'tsukuritai onna to tabetai onna'. If not, I definitely recommend the first season, but haven't watched the second season yet. There's also 'Joshi-teki seikatsu' about a lesbian trans girl, but I wouldn't call it a romance or say it's lighthearted, and it does have quite a bit of transphobia, but it's not all bad. 'Chaser Game W' had too much of a 'women should be good mothers, not career oriented'-message for my liking, so it's probably not for you either.

The Korean 'Our relationship ended before it began' is lighthearted and imo excellent. And 'Out of breath' is pretty good too. 'She Makes My Heart Flutter' is not bad but is just too short to really make an impact, same for 'Am I the Only One With Butterflies', 'Welcome to the Lesbian Bar' and 'Girlfriend Project Day 1'. I don't think you'd like 'The Handmaiden', but the 2005 adaptation of the same novel called 'Fingersmith' is excellent.

As for other lighthearted stuff, the Philippines has 'Pearl Next Door', which is kind of chaotic and frustrating at times, but the character of Alex makes it all worth it.
China's microseries like 'Legend of Yunze' and 'The Vampires' are absolutely wild. It doesn't take up much time and it is an experience to behold haha.
Taiwan has 'The Substitute' which is wild and a bit strange, but fun. And 'We are Gamily' was fun too. I thought 'Fragrance of the First Flower was really good', but you probably wouldn't enjoy it.

Outside of Asia I strongly recommend 'Touch' (YT channel Mon and Han), 'Barbelle', and the shorts 'From A to Q', 'Break In' (Alyssa Lerner) and 'Second Team'.

Watch 23,5 instead. 23,5 is actually light-hearted and silly. GAP is more of a drama than a comedy. I would not call GAP light-hearted.

Is this going to be gay?

🙋‍♀️

Sun doesn't realize this 'Earth' person that followed her on social media is actually Ongsa.

I need this to be good, please please please be good! We need GL to take off already!

This is the same universe as GAP. Nueng is Sam's sister. The actresses changed, but it's the exact same evil grandma.

(Nueng is Thai for 'one', Song for 'two', and Sam for 'three'. The sisters are literally named 1, 2, 3, in order of birth.)

Ah yeah I've seen the YouTube compilations. Thanks though :)

Is there a lesbian show like this anywhere? I mean one with sweet and wholesome vibes. I know western reality tv with lesbians exists but those feel so drama-filled and outrage-based. I'm not interested in watching people be mean to each other. I want something where people are kind and care about each other's feelings. Doesn't matter which country it's from.

I prefer it this way actually. I don't think it's a case of 'the writing/acting is falling short', I think it's a case of personal preference.

I didn't enjoy the predator/prey dynamic in the Japanese version, with which I mean that one of them was the confident pursuer and the other was consistently terrified and backing away. I prefer a more equal/mutual back and forth.

Wait how do you see people's watchlists?

History time! Chai Ji Dan's 2016 BL called Addicted/Heroin was fairly spicy and it was insanely popular in China (but I personally didn't like it). Because this series was so popular, the government made a new law banning online gay media, and the series wasn't allowed to continue being released, despite already having been made.

So Chai Ji Dan's spiciness was literally the catalyst for all of China's BL censorship. Her subsequent works had to be bromances instead of BL, because that's all she could get away with. I imagine she's fairly pissed about the whole thing.

BL (耽美) is still incredibly popular in China. Chinese companies are funding a large portion of Thai BL, and I mean, would they be doing that if their Chinese target audience wasn't finding (definitely illegal) ways to watch it?

Based on the names of the main characters in the summary on this page, I think the actors will be Thai, and this will be mainly a Thai production. Given that this is a Thai production, Chai will not have to censor herself here, and I bet this will explicitly be a BL, not a bromance.

If these Chinese companies funding this stuff want more of their target audience (Chinese people who'll buy the product placements) to watch this, it only makes sense to offer them an uncensored Chai Ji Dan series, if only for the name recognition. Chinese fujoshis don't want their series censored either.

Also, Golf Tanwarin is FABULOUS. They were the first ever openly transgender House of Representatives MP in Thailand, they're a queer activist, and I'm a gigantic fan of their previous BL's so yeah no way in hell I'm giving up on this yet. Even if Chai wanted to (and I really don't think she does), there's no way Golf Tanwarin is going to settle for censored nonsense.

YouTube. On Fix Entertainment's official channel.

I think we're on the same page then :)

My bias lies with Taiwan, but that's probably because I lived there for a while and it's my absolute favorite country to exist in :).

I meant to use the example of Addicted as a series that's not Thai and still has a toxic relationship that's endgame and is portrayed as a 'happy ending'. I meant to prove that illogical happy endings are not just a Thai BL thing, but are common in all BL.

Given your username, I knew you'd watched that one, so that was the series I referred to, because it would be kinda useless to refer to a series you haven't watched. It's not like I expect someone to watch a whole new series just to see if I made a good point or am talking out of my ass.

I guesss my underlying frustration here is not with you, but with a growing sentiment among fans that goes something like 'ugh, all Thai BLs currently suck and they're all basically the same, and BLs from other countries are all better and artistic and unique, so we should just give up on Thai BLs before they even air'.

(Yes quite a few Thai BLs suck and are formulaic, but the same is true for some Korean and Japanese BLs. And productions like 'I feel you linger in the air' are brilliant and I'm sad that so many people never gave it a chance simply because it's Thai. I think that's prejudice.)

Your comment reminded me of that general sentiment, but I don't think that was a fair assessment for me to make. So. Sorry about that. I was wrong.

Is that unique to Thai BLs? I think that's all BLs.

I mean the Chinese series your username is based on has the single most abusive love interest in any BL I've ever watched, and somehow Bai Luoyin still agreed to date him.

Man I really hope they don't force a happy ending with Peach and Shin. Would be great to have a BL in which you're meant to see red flags and give up on shipping the main leads.

BL love interests often get away with too much, but I hope there's a limit to how much fans are willing to accept, and I think that limit has been reached here.

I have since learned two things.
1. People have in fact been put in prison for writing popular BL fiction in China, but since authors are often semi-anonymous, and the government probably doesn't want them to be talking about the fact that they were imprisoned because that would create unnecessary uproar and backlash, information about this is hard to come by and not super solid.

2. A lot of Thai BL productions are funded by Chinese companies, presumably because they expect a Chinese audience to be watching and buying their product placements. So we do in fact still have the popularity of BL in China to thank for the BL content we can all enjoy today lol.

Namtan and Film are the main couple in the upcoming GL series 'Pluto', so anyone knows what the chances are that their characters will have a GL subplot in this one as well?

Let me know if there's somewhere to watch this for free with eng sub thank you!