TheDireBriar

What a weird, borderline inappropriate love-letter to a single performer this is.

I have never seen anything quite like it. From the first glimpse of Tar Atiwat Saengtien's juvenile knees I went 'uh-oh'. And it was downhill from there.

There really is no reason to watch 'I Will Knock You' except for Tar Atiwat Saengtien's performance of Noey Watphlu. It's a great performance, for the THEN SEVENTEEN YEAR OLD ACTOR. Which isn't necessarily bad, but ooof. Ooof. He's incredibly charming, bringing life to this passionate, impulsive, sentimental character. Don't mistake, this isn't well written, not by a long shot. The plot is nonsense, Noey is not a well-written character. Noey's vintage style and cringe romantic heart are at least unique, but Tar is carrying this on pure charisma alone.

And he's beautiful. It cannot be understated how much the camera loves him. It's impossible to forget what a pretty child he is, particularly because of the way they edited this strange show. Multiple times Noey would say something absolutely bonkers, they'd cut to Thi, he'd do a 'haaa?' face, and some voice over and halfway through the voice over they'd cut back to Noey, who'd then have another line. Which is BIZARRE. I cannot stress to you how much I'm like 'THI DIDN'T SAY A FLIP FLAPPIN WORD, THIS IS NOT A CONVERSATION, IT IS A MONOLOGUE, WHAT ARE WE DOING?'

Sure, each time I'd be like 'damn he's pretty tho'. But, see, his underage ass could not distract me from what a hot mess of NOTHING this show is. And because he's underage, they can't fill runtime with forced kisses or bawdy sex scenes. The story certainly didn't step up and provide anything else of consequence or sincerity.

I am somewhat accustomed to uneven writing quality between male and female leads in romantic pairings. Generally speaking, in hetero shows the ML is adequately written, the female lead is underwritten. In BL, there's often a mediocre standard which both leads meet; serviceable, but not remarkable. Nothing could have prepared me for how inconsequential, bland and boring Thi was. If Noey is not well written, Bom Tanawat Uthaikitwanit's Thi is...unwritten. He's negative space. He might as well not exist. We know NOTHING about him, except he's awkward AF and tutors kids. Oh, and his interest in the HIGH SCHOOLER makes him a PREDATOR, but the show is not prepared to deal with that.

Considering Thi's lack of anything except setting up clumsy set pieces for Noey to react to, there's no reason for Noey to like him. You could make a drinking game our of the number of times Thi just straight up didn't have dialogue in scenes, yet the scenes persist, perpetuated by some ghastly BL necessity. He'd have voice over along the lines of 'omg this crazy kid' or 'if I don't do this he'll beat me up for sure!' but not actual lines, not actual participation in the scene, not actual agency. He's a complete non-entity. He flounders around, a collegiate do-gooder intimidated by a high school junior, his thoughts and feelings on the courtship ultimately unimportant and insignificant. In fact, nothing happens in this show that Noey does not instigate, and not always for readily apparent reasons.

So Bom's part is crap, and he can't hold a candle to Tar's charisma. It's like watching a man trying to make love to a damp sponge. It's all kinds of weird and ick and uncomfortable. Perhaps the age-gap obstacle could have been overcome, but the story is vacant of a major character and any effort on the part of the writers. It's hard to have a romance with a non-entity, after all. So the script is a joke, Bom's performance is DOA, there's no chemistry, no intriguing side characters, though the other actors make a sound effort, except, again, the script and story are garbage, so? They resort to showcasing the single asset they have; Tar Atiwat Saengtien.

So. Admire him. There's no other reason to watch.