jpny01

But Xing Si is wrong, and the story depicts it that way, i.e. he thinks it's his fault but it's absolutely not and that's very clear. Showing something isn't endorsing it.

Did you not see the part where Xing Si slapped him, sent him away, and refused to speak to him? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm wondering if you skipped over it. Younger brother was most certainly called out for his behavior. When you say "called-out", do you mean something more extreme?

Xing Si and Yong Jie are the first couple. Li Cheng and Mu Ren exist for comic relief and for contrast against the primary couple. The only time they are anything but cartoons is when they're engaging with the main plot.

I didn't think they romanticized the bathroom scene at all. Li Cheng was deeply disturbed by his dream. There are people that have condemned Yong Jie for the drunk scene that somehow think the bathroom scene, when Li Cheng was engaging in extremely horrible nonconsensual behavior. It was even deliberately shot as red and infernal, not romantic. Even the way Mu Ren was grabbing himself was strange and violent, not sensual.

I recommend a rewatch - there's so much that's easy to miss in the early eps that are obvious now in hindsight. I'm even typing it all up as a guide.

He's my favorite character in a long time. I never block people, but I've had to start to just to get rid of all the pollution in this thread. I'm looking for a post from a couple of days ago and I can't find it in this mess!

Wait, one-dimensional?!? I can see not liking him, but I don't understand what you mean by that - he's one of the most complex characters I've seen in a BL in a long time.

A little earlier than that, gay characters had to be complete saints - they were all so flawless in every way that there was no way to include them in any storylines except to give sage advice to everyone else, and inevitably most of them were written out because it didn't make sense to pay an actor to sit around and do nothing.

We seem to have returned to that. We live in a very ideological age - you can't ever present someone in your "tribe" as flawed, hence we get the level of unhinged hostility to any character that's damaged or imperfect.

Some of the BL audience just wants fluff - cute boys being cute to each other - and to me that's the female version of lesbian porn for straight men. It's forcing a whole class of people into an archetypical box for their titillation. And I have absolutely no problem with that, but then maybe they ought consider how a gay man might view their pastime before engaging in sanctimonious preaching.

If a series isn't for someone, I'm happy to read even a lengthy post or even several about why they don't like it or find it problematic - but there are people who have spewed hate for dozens of posts in this thread - no arguments, no reasoning, just "makes me sick" etc.

I'll conclude by noting how polite and reasoned the [warning - simplification ahead] "Yong Jie is not a rapist" crowd is, and how viscerally OTT the "alcohol = rape" crowd is. I'm happy to discuss the topics brought up, but the level of personal attack is really disappointing in a BL audience - I would hope for tolerance and less judgment.

Having certainty that something is inherently morally wrong is what homophobia is about - how do we convince anyone to open their minds if we can't open our own?

The script itself is not messy at all - it's very tightly written with very little being extraneous. If you mean it's about messy situations, I couldn't agree more, and that's how you get compelling drama. If people want to watch cutesy fluffy stuff, then they avoid something that not only labels itself r-rated, it warns the audience again before every scene that contains adult material.

If you didn't care, you wouldn't have responded.

So showing holocaust footage is promoting genocide? Depicting something isn't promoting it. Drama comes from problems, not perfect people being perfect to each other. Yong Jie is depicted as seriously damaged, not as some ideal to copy.

How could anyone prefer Sarawat over Tine?

Agreed, but Y Destiny (you meant Y Destiny and not Gen Y, I believe - I keep mixing them up in my head) had Chap playing Tue, who I can just stare at and ignore everything else. I think I'll wait a couple eps and check back here to see what everyone thinks before I commit. The actors and production quality are good, but the writing... But you never know.

It's at about 12:15 when Ayato is talking to Tojo. It makes no sense and totally disrupts the flow of the scene. It's hard to remember specific things because the whole thing is so funny.

I can't find it - is it possible you typed it and didn't hit 'post'?

Yes, but his reaction was so strong that we needed to see him processing the situation or Sib having to work harder to win him over. Even if the ep had just showed Gene sitting alone and then presenting the flashback as his memories might have been enough, Maybe he has the damaged dragon there and picks it up and smiles. Something other than going from total meltdown to getting together with Sib like a lightswitch being flipped.

That sums it up for me too. The thing about early memories is that they tend to be flashes of images, but rarely the emotion you felt. I remember having to pee really bad when I was in kindergarten, ran home, and just about but not quite made it to the toilet. At the time I'm sure I felt intense shame and humiliation, but now it's just funny. With people it's different - I can remember times with my grandmother, and the feeling of loss is still there when I do think of those times, but I can't on an emotional level remember what I felt in any particular memory (although oddly scents bring back emotional memory).

So Gene is likely to remember warmth for Sib, but not any specific feelings - and that isn't going to be a hindrance to wanting to be with him now.

I'm an introvert and trust is very important to me. It's possible that I might react like Gene when I was that age, but I would also process events while alone and develop a more realistic analysis of the situation, and any anger or hurt I felt would evaporate the moment Sib showed up - actually probably when I saw 31 calls (or I might have thought he was a psycho). But we never saw Gene really processing, so even though his reaction was OTT, his getting over it so easily didn't flow either.

Anyway, after a couple of days, Sib should have put on a puppy-dog look (I would recommend while wearing one of those sleeveless shirts) and said he'd been waiting for Gene to recognize him but he's realized it's not going to happen and then come clean.

When was he an ass to Gene? Does it bother you that Gene is an ass to everyone and Nubsib is too with the exception of Gene?

The movie version has extra scenes that make the story much better. I almost hated this when I watched the series, but the movie was great. The scene where In Soo is at home imagining Sang Yi playing the keyboard is not in the series, and that's crucial to seeing that their feelings are mutual. The extended scene of them working on the song isn't there either, and that shows the connection between them, and these set up the ending better.

Have you ever replied to the wrong post and then felt super-embarassed when it's pointed out? That's me right now. I don't disagree with your post at all. Sorry about that!

There are of course people who want more sex in these, and there's nothing wrong with that - but I think most fans would agree you can't have too much intimacy, even if it's just teasing each other or splashing each other while swimming. Although even then they swim with all their clothes on, which is weird. I tend to resent it when the last three epsisodes are devoured by a manufactured crisis caused by a seriously implausible failure of communication or an evil ex-gf's scheming (which usually leads to a seriously implausible failure of communication).

But it is irrating when people argue for even LESS physical demonstration. When you love someone, you want to touch them, even if it's just cuddling on the couch watching a movie, or your knees touching under the table. IN some of these, the boys behave as if they'll catch some horrible communicable disease if their bf touches them.