jpny01

People that like XS and YJ don't say so as much here because we're getting tired of being called rapists and rape defenders, and so we discuss it in private messages instead.

They're OTT when they're dealing with each other, but you can see their acting ability when they're interacting with the main couple. Li Cheng is really expressive and when he's being serious he can really get to you.

I like it way, way more. I like all the actors a lot, but Li Cheng & Mu Ren are the comic relief for the main storyline and their interaction is too childish and cartoonish for 30-year old men.

I only like the stepbrother couple. I like Mu Ren and Li Cheng when they're interacting with the othe couple's storyling, but their own is generic and boring to me, and too cartoonish. I watch it, but if it goes on more than a couple of minutes I get bored. When it got dramatic it hed my attention, and I thought the bathroom scene was twisted and beautifully filmed.

Wow, that was a really beautifully-written post.

That is a great background for how I feel about Yong Jie. Imaging his life - his father dies, his mother has to work herself to the bone for them to survive, and he's left alone with people who resent his being there and probably at least emotionally abuse him if not physically - and in an Asian society, he's likely to be extremely looked down upon for being poor and having a single mother.

Then the most beautiful man he can imagine enters his life and gives him all the love he's never had or believed possible. Is it any wonder he's so obsessively attached? That doesn't mean he's not responsible for the bad things he does, but it makes him an interesting character with an interesting relationship with his brother. Drama isn't here to present us with paragons of behavior - that's what religion is for.

Drama comes from imperfection - and really, doesn't love? Do you love people for their perfection, or their flaws?

Same with characters. Did people like ITSAY despite the fact that Krit is a repressed weirdo, or because of it?

It feels too exploitative. If they were being paid small fortunes, I would say "cry me a river", but they make nothing, so they're stuck with all the fan events just to feed themselves. Being a BL actor's gf must be stressful. What do you tell people at parties? If I were a Thai woman I'd avoid dating anyone named Bright just to avoid getting accidentally lynched. And it's a common name.

I'm perfectly OK with being predictable, although that might make it slightly ironic that I'm annoyed by predictability. :) This show, though, takes it to new heights. 99% of BLs are written by women but directed by men. I'd like to see a production that reverses that and see how it turns out. There would be a lot fewer gratuitous shower scenes, I'm guessing. Or maybe there would be more. Who knows?

The acting is natural, and the dialog was better this ep. This is non-linear, so it may get confusing. There was a lie one of the characters told this ep that doesn't seem compatible with the previous ep, but we'll see.

The production is nothing special, but better than average for an amateur production. I'm enjoying it so far.

He just plays a rich guy in BLs.

I made it to just under 3 minutes in. "We fall in love because of the person, not because of their gender". I can already tell this will be full of sanctimonious bullshit by that line.

Love Knows No Gender means that all love is valid and equal, regardless of what gender you love, not that gender doesn't matter to any given indivual in who they love.

Beyond that, how many cliches can you stuff into one monologue?

I swear, there's really only one BL writer, and they're holding her at gunpoint somewhere forcing her to write the same thing over and over. I think we should rescue her and she can start giving us some variety.

I don't get the shipping of the actors - that seems so creepy and intrusive. Plus, I want to see actors I like paired with different people, not the same one over and over forever.

I know - it's not fair! They should get their own series.

I wanted that to be the ending, but I thought it would have a conventional one with the main character running off with the less awful brother after an OTT struggle with the others. When it was revealed he was the nun's son I had a little hope, and they never explained how he fell off the roof without any harm, but I thought there was something supernatural about him that he was unaware of.

I agree - I find these discussions interesting and rewarding.

I tried to qualify the first sentence you quote by saying "some" but then I spoiled it by putting in "always", so I concede that. :)

While I get your point, I don't think its really the case that there are tons of gay dramas out there. There were initially some Filipino series that had a greater LGBTQ+ sensibility than Thai BLs, but they've mostly fallen away in favor of (generally inferior) copies of the Thai model. Or they're so sanctimonious that they're useless as entertainment.

Are there any Asian gay dramas at all out right now? I can't think of any. I don't think it would be hard to reconcile BL with gay expectations, in a way that would probably be a superior experience for women as well. If I were to suggest 3 rules:

- No toxic females. Unless it's funny and doesn't chew up the entire run time.
- The boys should touch. A non-bro hug is fine. Cuddled on a couch watching TV is fine. Sex is not necessary. Kissing isn't even necessary. Alternatively, there can be an explicit declaration of romantic puruit, which is an acceptable substitute.
- The line "I'm not gay, I only love________" is banned.

It's just the things that reject gay that are the issue - lines like "I'm not gay..." are offensive and unnecessary (unless they really are gay and are still in denial - that's fine). That's different than just not mentioning it at all, which is fine, i.e. not distinguishing sexuality is not the same as rejecting it.

I get it. I'm really just commenting on the writing - I'm saying they made PI too hostile to Mork for too little motivation, to the point that it's not really credible that Mork would be interested in him, or if he is, there's something wrong with him.

It would have been better to offer more motivation, like Mork doing something that seemed like he was overtly pursuing Mix - there isn't anything to substantiate the misunderstanding, as they're very clearly just normal friends, so Pi comes off too negatively. They could even have used the BL staple of Mork wiping the corner of Mix's mouth with a napkin in slo-mo.

One of the most frequent failings of BL is the implausibility of miscommunication - it's so heavily relied on that it's getting as tiresome as accidental kisses.

It's not a super-important point, and it's not like the show is ruined - it just made it harder to invest in Pi - my interest in the story is for Mork (and of course Neo). I'm sure I'll love Pi eventually too. I think Phuwin is doing a great job.

You weren't hurtful, just not on the same wavelength. But note that the distinction made in this drama between BL and gay drama was a negative commentary on BL, which was portrayed as exploitative, not positive.

But don't men face the same indocrination?

And doesn't BL accomplish the same thing you describe when it's boys who haven't come to terms with their sexuality yet? So why not do it that way and be more true to life?

The other thing that happens constantly is that a girl gets in the way, and a man gets insanely jealous because his bf has a conversation with a woman - that implicitly places a higher value on heterosexual relations, as if he'll go back to being straight if a suitable candidate presents itself.

It's hard to even describe how disturbing that feels - I'm sure you know quite well from seeing the same thing happen in f/f stories.

Re: final point, that's why many women love gay bars so much. But it's also how gay bars end. Canny straight men realize it's the best place to pick up women and eventually it loses its gay character. That's an interesting metaphor for BL.

I'd only correct your statement about lesbian storylines to say there are plenty of lesbian storylines, but they're only there for straight men to enjoy. There are a whole lot of lesbian scifi characters, and virtually zero gay characters.

If you like sci fi and you're a gay male, you're SOL if you want representation. You're also SOL if you're a lesbian wanting REAL representation outside of a straight male's fantasy depiction.

But that's exactly what BL is doing, too.

I love Cheat so much. I did not see the ending coming at all, even thought I remember thinking "wouldn't it be funny if..." so when that really turned out to be the case, I think I was jumping up and down screaming.

This is really good.

It's not that anyone is advocating for BL characters to be having crazed sex all the time - the issue is that in many cases there's no outward sign at all that the characters are actually physically attracted to each other, and it's really just a bromance. In many cases the uke (and that trope is a entire topic in itself) appears to find the seme phyiscally repellent and is endlessly shoving him away even in private.

In Hello Stranger, there was a hug and that's it - that was fine, though, because the intensity of their love was way beyond what could pass as bromantic. In other shows, the relationship could just as easily pass for very close friendship.

So I think what comes off as fetishization is two men falling in love and NOT having physical intimacy (and that doesn't necessarily mean sex).