fluffbowl

ClaireBell met the expectations that the premise set. The cast was stacked and the acting beyond reproach. I liked the titular characters and was even more impressed by everyone else. The male characters were competing to find out who’s the most pathetically despicable. That’s especially effective because the story never forgets what power the men wield. The inmates all were varying shades of desperate, violent and toxic, which is perhaps even more entertaining. Until it no longer is, but more on that later.

I was genuinely invested in the plot, which, in part through my own fault, doesn’t happen all that often with the BLs and GLs I watch. But since I wanted to know where the story would go, my attention dipped during ClaireBell’s honeymoon period and I didn’t always care for their sweet moments (necessary though they were). Claire isn’t 19-stab-Claire, but she might as well be. Claire and Kae's last fight expressed so much about the characters, and I commend the show for how far it went. That's also when the violence turned into pure brutality for me. Without any melodrama or comedic levity, it was honestly too much for me. I empathize with Kae, so it's too bad there weren’t more sapphic couples.

There’s lots of high stakes drama and, for a long time, nobody’s happy, so this show should have been perfect for me. Even taking into account illogical elements. Not to mention that the series is stunning to look at. The way some scenes were lit and shot was, while not groundbreaking for cinema as a whole, still refreshing to see in a GL production. Despite the gripes I have with ClaireBell, I really appreciate what it did for GL.