This review may contain spoilers
Tide of Grunts (hope the actors get a better script next time)
Overall: I didn't expect them to do a safe, sane, consensual BDSM series (which would be amazing to finally see), but I was hoping to at least be entertained (I wasn't). 10 episodes about 10 minutes each. Aired on the app Shortime (my invite link is https://playground.shortime.app/en/invite/NKNIWI - the code is NKNIWI (those are all capital letters, that's the capital letter i) and it should get you a bonus); GagaOOLala https://www.gagaoolala.com/en/videos/5972/tide-of-love-2025 (not in Korea) and SEEKmeda for channel members https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwfmKArt9EtWOQm5LiWg9mKzvMpkpPCHe&si=ZRyYUHDRbQjrlHHh and iQIYI https://www.iq.com/play/tide-of-love-episode-1-24f4ukbxh0g?lang=en_us
What I Liked
- visuals
Room For Improvement
- started with a voice over exposition dump (continued voicing of inner thoughts)
- it wasn't enjoyable to watch 1 person being scared/reluctant in the "BDSM" scenes
- it made no sense in episode 2 that a character had plenty of money but continue when he doesn't seem to enjoy it, what was his motivation for staying? and then in episode 3 he was suddenly in love but disgusted during their NC scenes???
- I normally give indie productions a pass with editing/production value but SEEKMedia had extra time after they sold it to streaming platforms and needed to work on the editing which was terrible (sounds didn't match visuals, bad transitions, continuity errors like buttons that magically re-buttoned themselves)
- the grunting was bad (but almost so bad it was funny)
- did the writers not understand why BDSM can be sexy?, nearly waterboarding multiple times was not sexy, having a person write the other person's name multiple times was not sexy
- their kissing energy didn't match at all, one guy was sucking the other guy's face off whereas that guy didn't want to open his mouth or move any part of his face
What I Liked
- visuals
Room For Improvement
- started with a voice over exposition dump (continued voicing of inner thoughts)
- it wasn't enjoyable to watch 1 person being scared/reluctant in the "BDSM" scenes
- it made no sense in episode 2 that a character had plenty of money but continue when he doesn't seem to enjoy it, what was his motivation for staying? and then in episode 3 he was suddenly in love but disgusted during their NC scenes???
- I normally give indie productions a pass with editing/production value but SEEKMedia had extra time after they sold it to streaming platforms and needed to work on the editing which was terrible (sounds didn't match visuals, bad transitions, continuity errors like buttons that magically re-buttoned themselves)
- the grunting was bad (but almost so bad it was funny)
- did the writers not understand why BDSM can be sexy?, nearly waterboarding multiple times was not sexy, having a person write the other person's name multiple times was not sexy
- their kissing energy didn't match at all, one guy was sucking the other guy's face off whereas that guy didn't want to open his mouth or move any part of his face
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