jarabaa

Unfortunately, the Chinese-language websites are full of endless stories about Aric Chen's many "girlfriends", past and present, secret and not so secret. It's fine for him to be heterosexual, but somehow it's a pity when an actor who plays a gay role in a drama makes such a big business of telling the whole world all about his heterosexual exploits. OK, we get the message, he's 101% straight. Is being heterosexual so important? The simple answer remains in 2020: Yes. Being straight is still the most important thing any man can say about his identity. "Gay" is just something you pretend to be on the screen - for the money.

I've been thinking about Su Hai Qing for a while. First of all, Aric Chen, the actor, is a young man of outstanding beauty. Totally compelling every second he's on the screen. But second, Su Hai Qing is a ... complicated character - and therefore actually a very interesting character. Moody, frustrated, prone to depression, unstable. Aric Chen communicates all of that perfectly. Su Hai Qing isn't adorable. He's not even entirely likable. But the way Aric Chen showed us a young man's aspirations, desires, griefs and frustrations - the passion of his creativity as an artist - the conflict of his varying feelings of love and desire for two different men - that all added up to an amazing achievement as an actor, I now realise. I often fall for beautiful young men in Taiwanese BL series, as so many are so totally enchanting to watch ... but Aric Chen is exceptional in every respect, including as an actor, regardless of his looks. "Dark Bue & Moonlight" was a series I'm still unsure about, to be honest, and I don't often feel any interest in re-watching it - except when I think of Aric Chen. Yes, a beautiful young man, but a fine actor who portrayed a complex, conflicted character quite brilliantly. Now that I think about it! I haven't forgotten Su Hai Qing and I haven't forgotten Aric Chen.

An electrifying, interesting, sexy young actor. "I am Your King 2" was a rather ... dreadful series, sorry. Ludicrous. But this young man, Boat Anakame Binsaman, soared above the silly plot and the other characters as "M" (sometimes transliterated "Em") - a complex, moody, volatile character who actually develops as a personality. Where the tears of the sweet young Pun were utterly unconvincing, when M wept, your heart was engaged, he looked like a young guy who was really suffering. When you see his aggressive, confused, fumbling attempts to approach Pun as a lover, you sense a real conflict in the character. Best of all, he emerges as an out gay man, courageous enough to own who he is.

I've just been in Taipei. I have to say I didn't recognise many settings - but that's where it happens - Taipei, capital of Taiwan. One place I did recognise - the bridge where Sun Bo Xiang approaches Lu Zhi Gang in the middle of the night and kneels and gives him his ring - it's called the Rainbow Bridge. It's a very interesting curving pedestrian bridge over the Keelung River in the Songshan area of Taipei. But I have no idea where other things we see actually happen[ed]. Of course, I hoped that at least one of our beautiful star actors (in my case, especially Thomas Chang - Lu Zhi Gang) would wander past me at some moment - but no such luck. Just as well, as I would have fainted on the spot, no doubt.

Finally, I saw one of the singers of the two Make Our Days Count theme songs in concert - Arrow Wei - she sings the song at the end of each episode, "I Still Don't Understand". I've translated it on YouTube. It has been become a very successful song, a bit of a hit, in Taiwan thanks to Make Our Days Count. When I was at Arrow Wei's concert, she sang all her songs in the normal way - there was a pause, she sang the song, she paused again to let people applaud; but when she sang "I Still Don't Understand", now her best-known number and a very heartrending lyric, she launched straight into it - and when it was over, there was a moment of silence - and she went straight into her next song - no applause. It was definitely the high point of the concert, and she was clearly aware of the song's powerful emotional impact, above all because of the role it played in every episode of MODC.

Ditto. Or write it myself. For heaven's sake, would it be difficult? What we got was not a "realistic" ending. Tragedy is not gay "reality". What we got was a slap in the face, as though a suddenly insane person leapt up and literally assaulted us, the viewers, and insulted the actors. What would "reality" be instead ... ? Well, here's my suggestion: it would be Hao Ting and Yu Xi Gu continuing to experience the reality of their relationship. They would face interesting challenges: Hao Ting's father's antipathy, everyday finances, figuring out how to live as a couple, dealing with the demands of their studies, making new friends at university, being out to others or not out, maybe even contemplating marriage - now possible for same-sex couples in Taiwan. Meanwhile, we would see them delighting in each other in their life together, plus exploring the everyday fact of m/m erotic love - because these two guys, remember, are virgins, totally new to the experience of gay sex, love and desire. Finally, but best of all, we would see the evolution of their wonderful friendship with our adored Sun Bo Xian and Lu Zhi Gang. There could be a zillion adventures they face as a foursome, there could be endless hilarious scenes (with these four brilliant actors) and endless perfectly realistic heartwarming moments. Wow! Competent, imaginative writers would have a field day. They could write and write and it could run and run. It would be fascinating, it would be compelling, and it would absolutely 100% be "realism".

I am following your wise advice!

Also .... tragedy isn't even gay "realism". Why or how should an ending as we get here be more "realistic" in the case of two guys? In fact, it's an incongruous, bizarre, ludicrously improbable ending. And, as you say, insulting and offensive. If, let us say, we had seen Hao Ting and Yu Xi Gu at the end of this series working hard to draw strength from their relationship day to day - truly beginning to get to know each other deeply, dealing with their major character differences, facing the demands of higher education, coping with the ongoing hostility of Hao Ting's father, but also having blissful domestic moments, exploring gay sex and love-making (new to both!), maybe experiencing attractions to other men - and if we had seen their wonderful friendship with another gay couple, namely our beloved Sun Bo Xiang and Lu Zhi Gang, developing through an interesting series of contrasts and similarities - ... if we had been allowed to see something like that, as we see in the dramatic development of countless straight relationships - well, THAT would have been everyday LGBT reality, that would have been realism. But what we got was literally an insane slap in the face, and a great insult to the actors, and that's why we're all so outraged.

I think there is some agreement here ...

Some people like Pun, a few don't - most are unimpressed with the actor - his crying scenes in particular look very unconvincing. Some feel he is a sweet young boy looking for love, but most think he isn't. (I wasn't sure one way or the other.)

Next - Sib. Everyone seemed disappointed by this character - to the degree that hardly anyone bothers to comment on the actor's ability. We've seen too many Sibs - too many ostensibly heterosexual guys (always equipped with demanding, unappealing "girlfriends") who are maybe really gay and in any event fall for some boy and end up all confused and ambivalent and thus torture the poor boy endlessly. This sort of character has to be very interesting to be ... interesting. That is, he needs to be really compelling, attractive and complex, so that his identity struggle means something to us, and above all he has to be so lovable and sexy that we understand why the gay boy likes (let alone loves) him. But Sib just doesn't cut the mustard - he isn't sufficiently fascinating or appealing for us to follow yet another boring confused-straight-boy-who-may-be-gay story.

Next Pan: she isn't an altogether simple dull evil-girlfriend character, fortunately. She is angry and bitter and it's hard to follow exactly why she finds Sib so interesting (see above), but she has a greater depth that some of other malevolent girlfriend characters. Her lesbian friend represents a range of neglected dramatic possibilities, and the fact that Pan is openly, frankly homophobic is also interesting.

Finally, M. Definitely the most interesting character - but developed in such an inconsistent, uneven way. Nevertheless, when he's on the screen, your eyes are on him. Yes, he's another candidate for my "Most Beautiful Men" list, but the actor is a good actor, his pain and crying touch your heart, the conflicts within him are intriguing rather than boring. At the end of the series, you have little or no interest in what might become of Pun, Sib or Pan - but you do wonder how the chracter of M might evolve. My reasons are ... "varied", I admit - but I definitely want to see more of Boat Anakame Binsaman - above all with a boy in his arms. He's a genuine romantic lead, gorgeous to look at, and he's powerful and sexy in any sort of erotically-charged male/male scene.

Hmmm. I went and looked at Podd (Plapodd) in an earlier series - indeed, I'd seen him before. I remembered (and watched again) the scene in Kiss Me Again where he's eating with Kao and Pete, not yet Kao's lover, petulantly seats himself with them, bristling with jealousy. Yep, Podd/Plapodd is charming and sexy there too - you feel the erotic tension, his interest in Kao - but here in DBK ... wow. It's not a transformation - more of a lovely ... further development of a nice, sympathetic character and a gorgeous man. Everyone is commenting on Podd's enchanting smile, the amazing way he looks at his boyfriend Mork, the sensuous grace with which he carries himself. We also come to see that the character of Sun has an interesting combination of ardour (he cannot keep his hands off Mork) and modesty, shyness, a certain self-protecting reserve. It just adds to what I called his "captivating dazzle" a month ago. (I wonder if I should have a look at this beautiful actor's role in "3 Will Be Free". )

This young actor is barely 18. And yet in DBK he takes on a very challenging role - and does a fantastic job with it. Non is an unloved, damaged boy who is nevertheless pampered and spoilt. His only example in life is his callous, distant father. AJ shows Non's vulnerability again and again; the craziness of his infatuation with Kao; the bitterness of his resentment, even hatred, of Pete; and the way he resorts to manipulation and lying to achieve his goal. It's a classic tragic device - he's a classic villain. He's also very beautiful and sexy yet in every scene he exudes that conceited pretty-boy arrogance which makes us ... dislike him. At the end, when he's dragged away by his ruthless, abusive father, I found myself listening carefully to the words of Kao's mother and hoping that these were supposed to hint at some possible redemption in this disastrous father-son relationship. My Thai "Oscar" for 2019 goes to AJ Chayapol.

I entirely agree with you. I haven't even watched the final episode but I simply cannot believe it shows us Hao Ting getting together with a girlfriend at his parents' instigation?? The implication of that would be that his relationship with Yu Xi Gu was some short-lived deviant aberration and now he can return to the real, normal world of heterosexual relationships. And yet - over 9 episodes his and Yu Xi Gu's love for each other - a passionate, erotic, homosexual love - was given so much rich and explicit development. I can't bring myself to see Hao Ting being turned into a conventional heterosexual "boyfriend" for Phoebe - as though Yu Xi Gu never lived.

And in fact HT does more or less state that he's gay: way back in an earlier episode, his friends are jokingly asking Sun Bo Xiang all about gay sex, and Hao Ting joins the conversation and shocks them by most definitely identifying as a boy who likes boys ( and within that context he hints that he likes a specific boy - without naming Yu Xi Gu). In that scene at least, he most certainly does not claim to be uninterested in boys and "only gay for Yu Xi Gu", no way. Also, in his very extensive arguments with his parents, he defends same-sex love openlyu and never once retreats into the subterfuge of "I-don't-like-guys-at-all-just-this-one".

An exceptional young actor. He was given a hugely challenging part in Make Our Days Count. He's almost constantly on screen, he has demanding emotional scenes with numerous other characters, and the script itself veers off in a completely crazy direction at the very end, presenting yet new challenges - which he somehow rises to. Many have criticised the poor writing, the holes in the plot, and above all the preposterous and incongruous final episode. So Wayne's achievement is all the greater. Though he is not helped by the writing or (it seems) the direction, he manages to outshine the writing by megawatts and turns Xiang Hao Ting into a towering performance, truly - a passionate, powerful gay romantic hero - when did we last see one of those? Just about never. It's an outstanding achievement.

Just figured out that I seem to be watching double episodes. 1+2, 3+4, etc. There are 20 eps, so that means 10. However, the last one goes out on ... 18 December?? (When I'll actually be in .... Taiwan!) Oh well. As it's now the 15th of December, I don't think anyone can have seen the "end" of the series, though many here on this page do seem to have seen ep 10 (= 19+20) already. All very mysterious. Call me "Perplexed of London". So far, though, HIStory has absolutely not been about giving us miserable tragedies, not at all. The previous three series (e.g. Trapped) had dramatic twists and turns, adversity & loss, but the love of the starring couples always triumphed. And I think the makers of HIStory know that's important: there are young men and women watching who are really in need of an ultimately positive (=inspiring, affirmative) message about LGBT relationships. Same-sex marriage is legal in Taiwan and people need to see that same-sex love & romance are 100% real, possible and beautiful. Therefore I hope Make Our Days Count will NOT be the exception. Your sincerely, ... Perplexed of London

Maybe the Chinese government is close-minded, like countless other governments around the world. But the Chinese-Taiwanese-Thai cultures seems to be amazingly open, free, affirmative. I live in London. I can assure everyone that these lgbt & "BL" series, especially in the HIStory sequence, are unique. Yes, we have had films and television series in the West that were about gay men's lives or which included stories of gay relationships, of course, though only in the past 30-40 years - and very, very isolated productions at that (My Beautiful Launderette, Queer as Folk, Brokeback Mountain). Often the men are tortured and the love stories tragic - which can be true of reality, of course. But these Taiwanese and Thai series today are a true revolution - within the span of a couple of years, since 2016 or thereabouts, they are more and more an open celebration of love between men. When have we EVER ever seen that? A romantic, beautiful, sensual exploration of male/male erotic passion? Never, I would suggest. My feeling is that there is something in Far Eastern Buddhist spirituality that is ultimately more affirmative of the beauty of love than our culture(s) in the West - which have a way of always focusing on sin, danger, suffering etc.

I'm curious - how on earth does one find out about such events? I will be in Taiwan shortly. On the other hand, I don't speak Chinese ...

What I can say so far is that this series is interesting because it examines the ... texture of male/male love very slowly and acutely, in a very focused way. So far, we have not been distracted with alternative heterosexual entanglements. Indeed, the male characters have openly avowed their gayness, their attraction not just to one other guy but to males in general. That's an advance. So we're dealing with gay love. But the characters are rather diverse and some of the plot developments startlingly realistic. People may think the characters are so extremely disparate to be implausible. But believe me, passions like this are very real. I can testify that guys of all ages who are very different can fall madly in love with each other. At the beginning, I found our four rather wildly over-unique: one is tall and manly, sensual and passionate (Hao Ting), another slight and ascetic, intellectual and reserved (Yu Xi Gu), the next beautiful and sweet and wise and compassionate (I admit, I am crazy about Lu Zhi Gang/Thomas Chang!), and the fourth a pure, spontaneous youth, volatile and impetuous (Sun Bo Xiang).

But when I reflect on my own life - such characters do really exist. And as gay/bi men all share the fact of being male, quite often stark differences can be incredibly ... stimulating - and play a major role in relationships. At any rate, I've grown very fond of our four here. Plus I love the way that gay male love stories receive focused attention - to the point of s...l...o...w development - in the HIStory series. How often have I encountered that in life? Never. I've grown up in a world of 99.9% heterosexual love stories, romances, dramas, images, advertising, etc etc etc. Only here there (until recently!) just a glimpse, often lurid or distorted, of "my" reality. Yet I know from my reality that it includes passionate love stories, genuine romances of the highest order, devotion, ardour, sexual obsession - everything, you name it. And "Make Our Days Count" lets me immerse myself each week in the stories of these two relationships between men who are full characters - not damaged, not criminals, not otherwise-heterosexuals who succumb to one gay passion, not fantasy figures who are totally divorced from gay reality, not male stick figures acting out heterosexual love stories. Well, so far that's how I am experiencing this series ... I hope it doesn't let me down!

This is an exceptional series. Not a lot has "happened" through to episode 9. I've seen the spoilers - obviously something happens in episode 9. I am not sure why many viewers think it's the end of the series, however. It says above that there are 20 episodes! Ep 9 can't be the end, therefore.

This has to be one of the most beautiful men on the face of the earth. My jaw really does drop when he's on screen. He is pure enchantment to watch. I will soon be in Taipei for a week (I live in London) and if I were to catch a glimpse of Thomas Chang just crossing the street, well, my life would be complete!

One or two recent little illustrations. In the scene where our two heroes Xiang Hao Ting and Yu Xi Gu exchange news of exam results in Lu Zhi Gang's café, they get so carried away that Zhi Gang has to remind them of his presence. As soon as the camera moves to him, you're transfixed. No one could overlook his presence, no way. Neither in reality, nor in a fictional café. Or at the end of the previous episode, when his young lover Sun Bo Xiang is asking him whether he enjoyed the sex they had in the shower. Here too Thomas Chang had to convey a reticent shyness which is slightly assaulted when others are talking about sex. He did it perfectly, showing the upset reserve of a startled person yet also revealing his ... pleased recollection of a highly satisfying sexual encounter.

All I can say is: lucky Wilson Liu! What I'd give to be in his shoes ...

I asked a question here a whole month ago about when we could expect to see any of this series with English subtitles. I've been referred to "lazysubber" and her Facebook page and to 9NAA's channel on YouTube. But the "information" there is of little help. We read that full episodes will be posted 15 days after airing. But nothing like this is happening. So far, only 3 episodes have been posted anywhere. But according to my information, 8 or maybe 9 episodes have aired in Thailand. Meanwhile, the last ep available is 3 - which went out long ago, over a month ago. On the other hand, there are teasers all the way to ep 9.

Meanwhile, right here on this page, all sorts of people are discussing twists and turns in the plot all the way to ep 8 - how is this possible? May I ask: what are you watching...? I am assuming you are all Thai speakers and watching in Thailand. I cannot even find a Thai version available online. Anyhow, I am totally baffled. It'll soon be 2020 and the series will have finished. Some people know exactly what's happening and are fully up to date, and the rest of us have no idea what's going on and are just giving up.

The song at the start is indeed by Xiao Bing Chih. It's called "Live Again". The words are all very upbeat - it's about being brave and living with PRIDE ... so if we like "Make Our Days Count", we like this inspiring song. So that means I'm wondering why every ep ends with Arrow Wei's very sad song ...