This was a very grown up BL and I enjoyed it very much. It was told in a slice of life style, free of cowbells…
Please don't apologize for your spot-on comments above about the ridiculous notion of casting homophobic "idols" from homophobic production companies in BLs, which are, ,after all, freaking GAY. lol The stiff, motionless kisses from the "main" couple were jarring and completely stupid and immature.
You are also spot-on about the Republican party trying to drag us all back to the 1950s and further in American cultural attitudes toward gay people and other minorities. I am gay. I alternate between anger and sadness that having lived all these years, this shit is still an issue when I had fantasized, in my 20s, that by now we would have been beyond all that craziness. But the lesson is hatred and craziness will always be with us so we have to push back as a matter of course, and that will never NOT be the case.
Again, thanks for your comment. There are a LOT of people here who make excuses for gay-negative casting of lame "idols" in BL.
It's weird that every performer in every K-Pop group is called an "idol." This kid's group doesn't make any list…
OK, first of all, I don't "hate" anyone or anything related to this topic. Quit putting words in my fingers.
I don't care what his "reasons" were, he should not have been cast in the role. That couple's dead-fish kisses looked particularly stupid compared to the other couples' full commitment to those scenes.
It is beyond silly that you refer to "sex scenes" in BLs as "smut." Do you even know the definition of that word? It includes the words "obscene" and "lascivious." Please point out to me any BL ever that contained "obscene" material. I'll let you look up that definition on your own. Heavy making out in a scene that advances to shirts coming off and then fades to black is not "obscene." It is a depiction of actual, real life, which includes sex.
We got a split-second butt shot in KinnPorsche. Butts are not obscene, especially when you miss them if you blink.
Do you refer to such scenes in straight dramas as "smut?"
And no, neither I nor any other BL watcher has to be patient with the homophobic treatment of gay physical expressions of love in K-BL or anything else. You may have been brainwashed into accepting what you are given, but a lot of us haven't.
What is in it for you as an audience member to take into account the personal, homophobic reasoning of a participating actor? He should not have been offered the role and when he was, he should have honestly said "no homo" and walked away. Instead we get this weird thing where an actor plays gay but draws lines that distract from the plot and the characterizations. Would his CHARACTER do dead-fish kisses? No, he would not. So in those moments we're pulled out of the story and we're watching an "idol" Wanna-be refusing to do his job.
You're OK with that. I'm not. For what it's worth, there are a LOT of MDL members who feel just as I do. I get DMs from them all the time. They don't leave comments about this topic because they've been beaten into submission every time they do with accusations of wanting "smut!," "porn!," "graphic sex!" They get called "perverts" and are told to go watch online porn if that's what they want.
And as you just did above, it is implied they are overly emotional and told to take their "hate" elsewhere. I don't care what people like you reply to me so I say what I want.
Just know that your "patience" and rationalization of homophobic portrayals of gay characters and relationships is not helping. It's enabling.
The girl is so incredibly obvious from the very first time we see her, and the teacher so incredibly gullible that it's not possible to take this even a little bit seriously. So many dumb, blatantly, red-flag inappropriate BS moments in just a third of an hour. I'm out.
The actress is playing her character as an obnoxious stereotype we've all seen in films like this too many times. I dropped those too.
An underrated gem for 2023, it's a shame this did not get much attention. They could've released it as a separate…
It's weird that every performer in every K-Pop group is called an "idol." This kid's group doesn't make any list I could find of top-selling acts. He's an idol in his head and that's all. He's very pretty, but his "idol" status probably explains why he and the actor playing his BF in the series delivered the lamest, most wooden, fake kisses by far. They were like in from some awful Thai BL when it came to showing affection. I'm sure he thinks pretending he doesn't like kissing boys will preserve his career viability but, I'm sorry, he's gay af.
Also, I wish to god Korean production companies would quit trying to suck the blood-money out of the BL audience with these "idols" who don't commit to fully playing the gay characters they are assigned to portray. Those "god, I hate doing this" kisses are homophobic af.
What a unique and humorous, yet nicely angsty film. All three plot strands were engaging, the acting was good all-round and I cared about the characters.
My fave character was, I guess, the lead, though he certainly wasn't always onscreen. Borderline homely and with those bushy, Groucho Marx eyebrows! lol I came to really like him. He puts on such an asshole, bad-ass facade, but he's actually sweet.
I laughed out loud a few times, but the best was the beach scene near the end. "What's wrong with you, Pecker? Get hard!" hahaha
STOP QUEER-WASHING!I will never be able to understand why they cast actors in a BL scenario who refuse romantic…
Totally agree, but have you not seen the "kissing" scenes from BLs in the first years of the genre's existence? omg...horrible. I had NO idea about BL being a thing anywhere. I am an old, gay, white dude in the U.S. and had seen a lot of the terrible gay flicks America turns out, but I stumbled across BL quite by accident. First, I watched every European, Latin American and Nordic gay film I could find on YouTube, and while I was doing that I got hooked on Jonghyun-era SHINee, the K-Pop phenomenon. And somehow, in some way I do not remember, I came across Asian gay cinema, and then BL, all at about the same. It is no overstatement to say my movie/series universe exploded in a supernova of Asian Awesome and I've never been the same.
Anyway, two of the first BLs I watched were SOTUS and SOTUS 2. First of all, I noticed the gay guys were very stand-offish physically, even after becoming romantically intimate, which seemed odd. THEN, near the end of SOTUS the main couple finally "kissed" and I was like "what the hell, wtf are they doing?" I had never seen such an awkward fake kiss in my long life. They were like two mannequins, completely motionless, who someone leaned together at the chin/neck and left sitting there. The camera swooped and swirled, all to keep the viewer from seeing any lip contact. Nevertheless, it was obvious there WAS no lip contact, you could tell by the angle of their heads that they were kind of chin-to-cheek. I was totally freaked, but enjoyed the stories being tole in ways I'd never encountered enough to not run away.
Then I finally came across "Together With Me" 1 & 2, and THOSE boys went to town like it should be done. Totally committed and actually making out like real actors. I've seen quite a bit of fake kissing in Korean BLs, which is unfortunate, because some of the shows are otherwise good. But I feel exactly like you: WHY would a director cast any actors who refuse to kiss as they would if the other party was a woman? Maybe he/she's banging one of them, is all I could figure.
Anyway, it pisses me off too, and it's long past time this shit should not be tolerated. Fake kissing is a huge, homophobic red-flag saying "we will only PRETEND to kiss because, well, we're afraid we'll ruin our careers or someone will think we're gay, even though we ARE gay IRL because we don't want anyone to know, etc...."
As I wrote in an earlier comment here, it looks especially bad and jarring in this series because Maru and Minwoo are going at it tongues and all, complete with delicious, wet, smacking sounds and the other couple is doing a pretty good job, though not as fully committed as the other two. and then we have the tutor/student couple doing a dead-fish-mannequin kiss. Ridiculous. Their last one was so motionless I thought the video was buffering.
FOR REAL!!! i think people have been taking it too seriously tbh. like sure the writing is far from perfect and…
Your hyper-sensitivity to the comments of people who disagree with you is entertaining, in that you choose to perceive them as personal attacks and then respond accordingly. I don't care about you as a person, I am discussing your opinion of this show.
It seems you interpret arguments against your position as saying "you have no right to this opinion of yours. Now stop thinking that and think as I do." You would never survive being on a debate team. You'd spend most of your time at the podium crying.
I like to discuss programs I like, ones I don't, ones I feel in-between about, and ones I hate-watch, like this one, because of Akira's beauty and big eyes. "OMG, HOW DARE YOU ATTACK ME FOR CONTINUING TO WATCH AND LEAVING COMMENTS AND RESPONSES IN THREADS YOU DON'T APPROVE OF ME DOING...OMG, OH BOO-HOO...HOW SHALL I EVER GO ON...?
As for being called a "baby," I didn't do that. But if the bootie fits...
Why did they bring in a team of Thai writers to pen that last, boring episode, featuring endless hours of idiotic fluff? For the rest of this comment, I shall pretend there were only nine episodes in this series.
Though this series seemed to want me to focus mostly on the tutor/former student, this was a classic case of side couples overwhelming the so-called "mains" and stealing the show. I am in love with Maru. Lee Kwang Hee is a very talented actor. That pillow-talk confession that opened episode 9 was beautiful, mostly because of his delivery. Bravo. This may be the most handsome/beautiful BL cast ever assembled, precisely because they are each handsome, but in distinct and interesting ways. Maru's ears are the hottest feature on any of them.
Note to director: YOU CANNOT HAVE TWO COUPLES WHO KISS LIKE PASSIONATE, LIVING, BREATHING HUMAN BEINGS AND ONE COUPLE WHO KISSES LIKE TWO DEAD PEOPLE LEANED AGAINST EACH OTHER, MOUTH TO MOUTH. The kiss on the bench in episode 9 from tutor/student was so static I actually thought for a moment the video was buffering. Seriously.
Enough with the fucking clown-white makeup on these guys, Korea!
OK, since episode 10 does not exist in my universe, I am giving this thing a 9/10. Had the tutor and student been cut out completely, we're bordering on a 10/10 here.
A lot of ideas about the nature of love, falling in love, jealousy, unrequited love as a source of pleasure, etc. being explored here are nearly as lovely as the two leads.
It's scary how much Higuchi Kohei looks - face and body both - like a Manga drawing come to life. So funny to see the flawlessly beautiful Yoh contort his face into such a goofy/ugly mask of jealous despair. lol
FOR REAL!!! i think people have been taking it too seriously tbh. like sure the writing is far from perfect and…
I have watched more BLs than you, easily. And I drop 99% of the cliche'd, trope-done-lazily, badly written ones out of Thailand within the first episode. This one is badly written as well. I'm in the company of hundreds in this thread who have said so. I can enjoy a trope, a cliche, a stock character, IF they are written, directed and acted with some hint of originality, from some angle slightly different than everything that's been done before. This show has none of that.
Little babies slurp up their pablum every morning and love it, over and over, but that doesn't change the fact their pablum is bland slop, prepared with no thought or creativity.
FOR REAL!!! i think people have been taking it too seriously tbh. like sure the writing is far from perfect and…
Weird. How is it possible to enjoy watching the same characters, acting the same way, acting out the same tropes and cliches as in every other BL with bad, lazy writing like this? Does it not get boring knowing what will happen, how it will happen, and when it will happen over and over and over again in every show like this?
I'm picturing you in front of your computer, completely zoned out, brain turned off, loving watching the same show for the 1,345th time in a row.
Your BL character "archetypes" apparently are the result of writers who can't come up with new ways to tell a story. And the thrill with which you watch what you've seen countless times before is...odd.
No. It's because he is unattractive and has a dour, depressed affect, even when we're supposed to think he's happy or being nice. And when did we see see him doing this work "on his feelings?" There was none. He just turned on a dime all of a sudden.
I'm not here to defend the character of Minato. He IS emotionally constipated. I'm here to look at the beauty of the actor who portrays him.
FOR REAL!!! i think people have been taking it too seriously tbh. like sure the writing is far from perfect and…
Hey, thanks for putting some thought into what you shared here. I get where you are coming from much better than before. Sorry for coming on so strong.
My problem, if it IS a problem, is that I don't seem able to do that "turn off your brain" thing that is frequently cited regarding shows like this. I'm always analyzing and noticing everything; it's simply the way my brain works.
I liked what you wrote about different types of shows in which bad writing can be gotten away with, and those in which it can't. I will never be able to enjoy such shows like you do, but at least I have a better idea of where you're coming from.
As I've said, mostly I just like to look at Akira's beautiful features and big, round eyes. :D That keeps me coming back.
I do hope it turns out Shin if faking this memory loss. That at least would show some effort toward something different from the writers. I've never heard of amnesia in which one remembers everything except one particular person and everything about them.
I'll be honest, it felt good watching Minato squirm and suffer this episode after this hellish season. Things…
"...hellish season." lol Indeed. I tune in just to look at Akira's beautiful face. The rest of the show is too dumb and poorly written for words to describe.
FOR REAL!!! i think people have been taking it too seriously tbh. like sure the writing is far from perfect and…
This is just the type of thing commenters such as yourself always write in defense of shows that suck. It is not wrong to have standards for BLs. Do you believe it's not possible for a show to be "cute and fun" and also well-written?
Finally, something happened, but what a slog getting here. I'm still suspicious Shin is faking it. I like how Minato leaves his laundromat, where there are never any customers anyway, wide-open to theft and vandalism for hours at a time. lol I wish Shin had forgotten he likes to wear women's maternity tops as shirts. I wonder: Has shin forgotten he likes d**k and boy-butt?
1 
1 
You are also spot-on about the Republican party trying to drag us all back to the 1950s and further in American cultural attitudes toward gay people and other minorities. I am gay. I alternate between anger and sadness that having lived all these years, this shit is still an issue when I had fantasized, in my 20s, that by now we would have been beyond all that craziness. But the lesson is hatred and craziness will always be with us so we have to push back as a matter of course, and that will never NOT be the case.
Again, thanks for your comment. There are a LOT of people here who make excuses for gay-negative casting of lame "idols" in BL.
I don't care what his "reasons" were, he should not have been cast in the role. That couple's dead-fish kisses looked particularly stupid compared to the other couples' full commitment to those scenes.
It is beyond silly that you refer to "sex scenes" in BLs as "smut." Do you even know the definition of that word? It includes the words "obscene" and "lascivious." Please point out to me any BL ever that contained "obscene" material. I'll let you look up that definition on your own.
Heavy making out in a scene that advances to shirts coming off and then fades to black is not "obscene." It is a depiction of actual, real life, which includes sex.
We got a split-second butt shot in KinnPorsche. Butts are not obscene, especially when you miss them if you blink.
Do you refer to such scenes in straight dramas as "smut?"
And no, neither I nor any other BL watcher has to be patient with the homophobic treatment of gay physical expressions of love in K-BL or anything else. You may have been brainwashed into accepting what you are given, but a lot of us haven't.
What is in it for you as an audience member to take into account the personal, homophobic reasoning of a participating actor? He should not have been offered the role and when he was, he should have honestly said "no homo" and walked away. Instead we get this weird thing where an actor plays gay but draws lines that distract from the plot and the characterizations. Would his CHARACTER do dead-fish kisses? No, he would not. So in those moments we're pulled out of the story and we're watching an "idol" Wanna-be refusing to do his job.
You're OK with that. I'm not. For what it's worth, there are a LOT of MDL members who feel just as I do. I get DMs from them all the time. They don't leave comments about this topic because they've been beaten into submission every time they do with accusations of wanting "smut!," "porn!," "graphic sex!" They get called "perverts" and are told to go watch online porn if that's what they want.
And as you just did above, it is implied they are overly emotional and told to take their "hate" elsewhere. I don't care what people like you reply to me so I say what I want.
Just know that your "patience" and rationalization of homophobic portrayals of gay characters and relationships is not helping. It's enabling.
The girl is so incredibly obvious from the very first time we see her, and the teacher so incredibly gullible that it's not possible to take this even a little bit seriously. So many dumb, blatantly, red-flag inappropriate BS moments in just a third of an hour. I'm out.
The actress is playing her character as an obnoxious stereotype we've all seen in films like this too many times. I dropped those too.
1/10
Also, I wish to god Korean production companies would quit trying to suck the blood-money out of the BL audience with these "idols" who don't commit to fully playing the gay characters they are assigned to portray. Those "god, I hate doing this" kisses are homophobic af.
My fave character was, I guess, the lead, though he certainly wasn't always onscreen. Borderline homely and with those bushy, Groucho Marx eyebrows! lol I came to really like him. He puts on such an asshole, bad-ass facade, but he's actually sweet.
I laughed out loud a few times, but the best was the beach scene near the end. "What's wrong with you, Pecker? Get hard!" hahaha
Loved it. Thanks for the rec. 9/10 for me.
Anyway, two of the first BLs I watched were SOTUS and SOTUS 2. First of all, I noticed the gay guys were very stand-offish physically, even after becoming romantically intimate, which seemed odd. THEN, near the end of SOTUS the main couple finally "kissed" and I was like "what the hell, wtf are they doing?" I had never seen such an awkward fake kiss in my long life. They were like two mannequins, completely motionless, who someone leaned together at the chin/neck and left sitting there. The camera swooped and swirled, all to keep the viewer from seeing any lip contact. Nevertheless, it was obvious there WAS no lip contact, you could tell by the angle of their heads that they were kind of chin-to-cheek. I was totally freaked, but enjoyed the stories being tole in ways I'd never encountered enough to not run away.
Then I finally came across "Together With Me" 1 & 2, and THOSE boys went to town like it should be done. Totally committed and actually making out like real actors. I've seen quite a bit of fake kissing in Korean BLs, which is unfortunate, because some of the shows are otherwise good. But I feel exactly like you: WHY would a director cast any actors who refuse to kiss as they would if the other party was a woman? Maybe he/she's banging one of them, is all I could figure.
Anyway, it pisses me off too, and it's long past time this shit should not be tolerated. Fake kissing is a huge, homophobic red-flag saying "we will only PRETEND to kiss because, well, we're afraid we'll ruin our careers or someone will think we're gay, even though we ARE gay IRL because we don't want anyone to know, etc...."
As I wrote in an earlier comment here, it looks especially bad and jarring in this series because Maru and Minwoo are going at it tongues and all, complete with delicious, wet, smacking sounds and the other couple is doing a pretty good job, though not as fully committed as the other two. and then we have the tutor/student couple doing a dead-fish-mannequin kiss. Ridiculous. Their last one was so motionless I thought the video was buffering.
It seems you interpret arguments against your position as saying "you have no right to this opinion of yours. Now stop thinking that and think as I do." You would never survive being on a debate team. You'd spend most of your time at the podium crying.
I like to discuss programs I like, ones I don't, ones I feel in-between about, and ones I hate-watch, like this one, because of Akira's beauty and big eyes. "OMG, HOW DARE YOU ATTACK ME FOR CONTINUING TO WATCH AND LEAVING COMMENTS AND RESPONSES IN THREADS YOU DON'T APPROVE OF ME DOING...OMG, OH BOO-HOO...HOW SHALL I EVER GO ON...?
As for being called a "baby," I didn't do that. But if the bootie fits...
Though this series seemed to want me to focus mostly on the tutor/former student, this was a classic case of side couples overwhelming the so-called "mains" and stealing the show.
I am in love with Maru. Lee Kwang Hee is a very talented actor. That pillow-talk confession that opened episode 9 was beautiful, mostly because of his delivery. Bravo.
This may be the most handsome/beautiful BL cast ever assembled, precisely because they are each handsome, but in distinct and interesting ways. Maru's ears are the hottest feature on any of them.
Note to director: YOU CANNOT HAVE TWO COUPLES WHO KISS LIKE PASSIONATE, LIVING, BREATHING HUMAN BEINGS AND ONE COUPLE WHO KISSES LIKE TWO DEAD PEOPLE LEANED AGAINST EACH OTHER, MOUTH TO MOUTH. The kiss on the bench in episode 9 from tutor/student was so static I actually thought for a moment the video was buffering. Seriously.
Enough with the fucking clown-white makeup on these guys, Korea!
OK, since episode 10 does not exist in my universe, I am giving this thing a 9/10. Had the tutor and student been cut out completely, we're bordering on a 10/10 here.
It's scary how much Higuchi Kohei looks - face and body both - like a Manga drawing come to life.
So funny to see the flawlessly beautiful Yoh contort his face into such a goofy/ugly mask of jealous despair. lol
I love this show.
Little babies slurp up their pablum every morning and love it, over and over, but that doesn't change the fact their pablum is bland slop, prepared with no thought or creativity.
I'm picturing you in front of your computer, completely zoned out, brain turned off, loving watching the same show for the 1,345th time in a row.
Your BL character "archetypes" apparently are the result of writers who can't come up with new ways to tell a story. And the thrill with which you watch what you've seen countless times before is...odd.
I'm not here to defend the character of Minato. He IS emotionally constipated. I'm here to look at the beauty of the actor who portrays him.
My problem, if it IS a problem, is that I don't seem able to do that "turn off your brain" thing that is frequently cited regarding shows like this. I'm always analyzing and noticing everything; it's simply the way my brain works.
I liked what you wrote about different types of shows in which bad writing can be gotten away with, and those in which it can't. I will never be able to enjoy such shows like you do, but at least I have a better idea of where you're coming from.
As I've said, mostly I just like to look at Akira's beautiful features and big, round eyes. :D That keeps me coming back.
I do hope it turns out Shin if faking this memory loss. That at least would show some effort toward something different from the writers. I've never heard of amnesia in which one remembers everything except one particular person and everything about them.
I tune in just to look at Akira's beautiful face. The rest of the show is too dumb and poorly written for words to describe.
It is not wrong to have standards for BLs.
Do you believe it's not possible for a show to be "cute and fun" and also well-written?
Finally, something happened, but what a slog getting here.
I'm still suspicious Shin is faking it.
I like how Minato leaves his laundromat, where there are never any customers anyway, wide-open to theft and vandalism for hours at a time. lol
I wish Shin had forgotten he likes to wear women's maternity tops as shirts.
I wonder: Has shin forgotten he likes d**k and boy-butt?
3/10