This review may contain spoilers
I See The Intention But... Such A Wasted Opportunity
I've never tried writing a review before but I'm watching BL's for over three years now and I wanted to try writing it. So please bear it with me.Dare You To Death was one of the tough ones to watch it. Writing in this series is... well to put it kindly: childish, sloppy, unprofessional. I understand the intention when they produced this series. But, my god the story just kept getting worse and worse each episode. Irrational behaviours of police officers, stupid decisions of the victims, jarring tonal shifts from romance to "mysterious" murder scenes... The list goes on and on. Firstly, writer/s clearly did not know how law enforcement bureaus work because the errors that have been made during solving the cases is just stupid. Knowing the potential victims but not providing them protection, not asking for a full autopsy report for the first deceased, or even not interrogate the suspects/victims fully in a police station is wild. And these things I mentioned here is just a glimpse. Anyways, there is so much to talk about the script of this series; but if I get in to that, it'd be full on spoilers so I'll cut it short here. It's just full of many illogical things that doesn't even cover up other story plots and left us with a whole bunch of mess.
The acting very surprised me. In my opinion, we saw the potential of Dunk's acting in Heart Killers. He was really good in that series. But unfortunately, Joong kept getting the same roles over and over again which is a very boring caracter type for me, we couldn't see his acting range. But in this series, I believe he really outdone himself. both Joong and Dunk. They both play different characters from their previous works which is refreshing. And seeing Joong in a character that can actually show emotions was really nice. Their acting really carried this series.
If I really have to say something about the music, its just boring. GMM has stock music/sounds to play in certain scenes. And they used those musics so much that using it here too is just feels lazy at this point. Also, the production quality was a mess either. Especially for a series that's been produced for Netflix. The audio issues were jaw-dropping. The editing that caused tonal shifts were horrific. At one point, It felt as if the production team didn't like certain people who were involved in this series so they tried everything in their power to ruin this show. And clearly they succeeded.
It's such a shame that these good actors were wasted in such a sloppy series. The only reason I gave this show a high overall rating is the acting in this series.
As I said in the beginning, this is my first attempt to write a review. I know probably not many people will see this review but if there are things you want to discuss or just talk about the series, let me know so that we can discuss it.
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This review may contain spoilers
Not the Best But Still Good... And Supposed To Be Cringe.
I just finished this series and I must say, as I was someone expected nothing, I got more that what I was looking for. which is nothing lmao. After I finished watching, I came here to read some of the reviews and oof it was hard. So it was tough to write this review and I am new to this so please bear with me and hear what I say.Duang With You started very head-strong on to the viewers eyes with its very "vibrant" and "goofy" protagonist chasing his love-at-first-sight crush. And the crush who is "cold" and "distant" is not giving a fuck about his supposed chaser until things change at some point. I wanna say I don't want to give out much of the story but thats pretty much it. The script is very empty and poorly written. The main love story is just a classic college love chasing story and the side couple is even less interesting than that that I won't even bother to mention it.
It is a very cliche story, but I must say this time not in a bad way. I saw some poeple saying this series is so cringe and hard to watch. I totally get that but the whole point of this series is to be cringe and goofy. It is funny and one of the leads acts very cringe but thats how it's supposed to be for this series. Thats just it. Judging this series based solely on that is not okay for me. If you find this dosage of cringe uncomfortable, (and believe me if I did not and even my cringe bar is very low) you really are in the wrong series. Because that would mean you didn't get what's the whole point and therefore no need for you to waste your time any longer.
Duang is a very cringe and "dog-like" character that acts very cringy and irritating sometimes. But I don't know why, I felt his cringe level acceptable. The actor TeeTee did such a good job that the cringe level of his character never exceeds to the uncomfortable zone for me. His goofiness made me laugh once or twice. Qin is the "opposite" of Duang. He is "Cold" and "Distant" that I didn't surprised to see his character written like this since this show, again, has a very cliche story. Nevertheless, there are some things the Story/Acting did right about these characters. I used "dog-like" phrase while describing Duang which is not something we see usually see in a typical love stories like this. Normally we would see a "golden retriever boyfriend" archetype but this series wanted to change and perhaps go beyond that and made Duang act 'unnatural'. I find this bold move very enjoyable not gonna lie. And Qin is ,like I said, "Cold and Distant" which made him look like unapproachable and kinda selfish/narcicistic but in its core, he is just a boy who wants to take things slowly (he says this himself) and I saw some people find him "obnoxious" bc of he's quiet and him not being open towards Duang immediately considered he's treating Duang bad. When I read that I was like "????" But hey you do you babes. One thing to mention about Qin though is that the writers attempt to justify Qin's "emotionless behaviour" was a very bad decision. Choosing an abuse plot trope and not going on about this damages this series highly. I've had my share about being abused and one thing I know is that it shouldn't be treated lightly. They either should've talked about this more open and direct and show its consequences or they should've not mention it at all. The way it's handled in the series is just not acceptable for me and it was rather triggering to watch.
Qin and Duang together was fun to watch for me. Their relationship grew slow but very steadily that I am glad they did not rush it. Now I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this. But I believe this series ,and so many other BLs, are a slice of life stories that are happens in Utopian world. Yes it is unrealistic, yes this relationship is bullshit and cringe but we got so many realistic and serious films/series that talks about the hardships of life, difficulties being a queer and maintaining a relationship in those environments that we don't need to be reminded again. Life itself remind us that every second. So let this story be unrealistic and utopic and silly and mindblowing because in truth, there is no such thing like this. I know you guys will say this is escapisim and I say yeah it is and let it be one. We need more of these especially for people who are not be able to be themselves in their own society.
Music in this series was top-notch. I didn't know Por and TeeTee was a part of a t-group but after I watch them perform here, I felt like Domundi is trying to create another "NuNew" phenomenon. even some reactional sounds were cute which normally they use stock sounds. Production quality was also very good. all of the places, props, clothes were well chosen. Unfortunately tho Domundi being Domundi, all the ads that are forced on to us was very irritating to watch. Even I got uncomfortable about this which I normally just skip those scenes but this time there were too many.
I think that's all I wanna say about this series. Since I just finished watching this, my emotions is still raw and they might change in the feature when I will have more time to think about it. Let me know what you guys thought about it too I'd love to talk about it with all of you.
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