jpny01

Good, but a missed opportunity.

I really want to give this a 10, but I can't. The acting in this is better than any BL I can think of. All three performers deliver powerful performances, with Kaleb Ong as a standout. Enzo Santiago is as good as ever, and you might be surprised by Gio Emprese, who usually plays pathetic "comic" relief sexual predators, but here is wonderful as a deeply spiritual man put in a painful situation that he has to weather with grace and love.

The technical faults in this are inexcusable. The sound is terrible, the direction mediocre at best, tending towards melodrama in a story that that is already dramatic enough in content and in the strength of the acting.

The cinematography is also inexcusable. Half the shots feature people obscured by plants that are in the foreground, so it's not like the cinematographer could have missed them. If it was intentional, then I would ask, "Is this really what you want to do for a living?" There's a shot that occurs after Kaleb had been making me cry for 20 straight minutes that is so unintentionally funny that I burst out laughing. It involves a very critical moment in the series that represents a serious and spiritual moment, but it's a shot through Enzo's spread legs at a kneeling Kaleb - that's D/s sexual, which I suppose is appropriate for a gay boy and his gay angel. In gay angel porn.

The editing is also problemmatic, with scenes that would otherwise have been powerful dragged out so long that they're drained of energy and start to make you uncomfortable and feel sorry for Enzo, because they're almost all his. There's only one really long scene that had to be long, and it's doing a rosary, which the Catholics watching are already aware take forever, and the scene is really cute and funny.

If this had average BL acting, I wouldn't be writing this at all, because I would have dropped it half way through the first episode. But because the acting is a solid 10+, I feel comfortable recommending this, but just be prepared for a story that will make you cry, partly because you're moved by the story and the actors, and partly because your ears are bleeding due to the awful sound. It's worth it just for Kaleb - I'd watch anything he's in.

Warning: Do not watch the end credits scene, unless you want a beautiful story with a perfect ending reduced to a 1980s era sitcom. It's so bad and cringeworthy in every way (except how hot Enzo looked in it, but you can just google him) that I sat gaping at my screen and wondering if I really saw what I just saw. If you read the words "5 months after", you've gone too far, but there's still time to stop. It's up to you.

Outtakes begin at 32:40.

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It's not THAT bad.

A lot of the reviews and the comments section are a bit harsh, but I wonder if maybe people were reading the comments and letting other people's opinions sway their own - notice that most people said they watched the whole thing or that it's "so bad that it's good."

This is not so bad that it's good, and it's not bad at all.

I think we need to keep in mind is that there is a Thai BL formula which includes a huge dose of fantasy - for example, the whole school is gay, or nobody has a homophobic bone in their body. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, and it's often a nice break from the real world, where there is no escape from homophobia. But that doesn't make everything else "wrong".

So first, some negatives that aren't negatives:

The budget. Yes, it's low. So what? Almost all BL are low budget, and it's cheaper to film in the Philippines or Thailand than it is in China, not to mention the censorship and really, really difficult municipal regulatory issues. The issue isn't the budget - I'm sure we can think or a ton of Thai BLs that had healthy budgets that were terrible. The issue is what you do within the constraints of the budget. Do you have a competent cinematographer and director? Is it well-edited? Is the sound & lighting good (these can be the hardest, BTW - editing & cinematography are about talent, skill, and time - lighting & sound are about money [as well as talent and skill]).

This show did a good job with all of these.

The writing is just OK. The "I hate you" phase was better, and had some good ideas in it. The relationship part itself didn't work as well and was a bit rushed, but imagine the level of censorship this production must have faced - it's a miracle that it was made and released at all.

The acting - one of the leads is a bit stiff, but he's not BAD, just a bit limited in range. There aren't any embarassing or laughable performances, and by BL standards they're fairly good.

There is a toxic female character, but there are also two positive female characters, and the toxic one is an over-the-top villainess who does not consume a lot of screentime, nor does she make anyone in the main pairing irrationally jealous like the standard BL formula requires.

But what is most important is for there to be heart in the project, and this has that. You can really feel that everyone involved cares about this series, whereas so many BLs are just cashing in on the popularity of the genre - including a lot of the high-budget productions. Every single person involved in this production risked their futures to make this for us, and we should appreciate that and give it our support.

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Dismal

I had expected an improvement over One Day Pag-Ibig, but this worse in every regard. The same technical errors and problems are present, the acting is not improved, and the story is just derivative, moves in circles, and you will be astonished that they could end it the way they did after we slogged through this series.

One character does something that takes 2 years, and it's never discussed between the main characters. Maybe that would have been a scene we would have liked to have watched instead of an endless sequence of Sef trying to hug Andrei, who invariably pushes him away. Addicted/Heroin is outright copied in several spots, but without the charm and wit of that series.

The acting isn't terrible, at least not from the lead pair, but it's not exactly inspired, either. There's finally a kiss at one point, and it's painfully obviously fake. Come on.

I wanted to like this, and I was expecting a lot more. At least some passion, instead of dreary BL by the numbers.

But there is no motive for improvement because the actors have large tiktok followings that will flock to see anything they're in. That provides me with zero motive to waste any more time on anything this production company drops on us. We're already 2/2 for the ship not sailing. Do I need it to be 3/3?

I want to say something positive, but I'm struggling to think of anything. The theme song is good, but after you've heard it 1,000 times it loses it's appeal. Allen has a beautiful everything and he and Ivo are both very cute. With proper coaching and direction, I think they have enough talent to be effective actors. That's about it.

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This is bad.

It's hard to imagine that someone would agree to finance this, so I can only conclude someone in the production had a rich relative.

The BL couple is cute, and you'll have an interest in them - especially the character Tokyo, who is extremely adorable. It isn't given enough screen time.

The main couple would have been OK with a better FL. I've been referring to the man as "bargain basement Zon" because he's like a washed out version of Tommy Sittichok in Why RU. The FL's acting is not great, but the writing for her character is so bad I'm not sure anyone could have pulled it off. Her interruption of her brother's relationship and her reasoning for doing it are so bizarre and out of character that it really slams the brakes on the show and almost everyone in the comments section wanted her to die horribly thereafter.

It's like BL writers have some irresistible compulsion to insert a toxic female into every single BL romance that exists, at exactly the same moment in the series. I'm becoming convinced there's only one BL writer, and she's either suffered brain damage that makes her write the same thing over and over, or she's being held at gunpoint by a homophobic madman. "I SAID MORE ACCIDENTAL KISSES! PUT IN AN EVIL GF! NEEDS MORE SCREECHING LADYBOYS!" In any case, whenever I'm watching a series, I need to take anti-anxiety medication before the 3rd to last ep, because I just know a misogynist stereotype will materialize to torpedo the ship.

Anyway, the other plot element that's this series' schtick is the old woman with Alzheimer's. Yes, Alzheimer's is super-funny, right? Let's pick a terrible disease that almost everyone has personally experienced within their families in a painful way. But surely they dealt with this sensitively, right? "I SAID BELITTLE PEOPLE WITH TERRIBLE AFFLICTIONS!" I kept hoping she was pretending to be senile in a plan to get all the ships sailing, but no.

The show is not 100% terrible. The production quality is reasonably good, and most of the acting is at least passable. If you're bored and it's Thursday, it might be worth it to watch this and ff through everything that's not Tokyo/Tam, because they are cute. And BB Zon is sexy and cute, too. Hopefully some of these people will get better roles in the future.

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Cute and Entertaining

I'm very confused by the reviews of this series. I'm not sure what is expected in terms of character development - these are all grown adults and don't need to go through puberty or come to terms with their sexuality like virtually ALL Thai dramas which are just variations on a theme. I thought all the characters were well-drawn. Oldest brother is a control-freak who tries to be cold like his father trained him but is actually a very loving person, even if he shows it by kidnapping people and locking them in his closet. Middle brother is kind of useless but sweet (e.g. when he soaks his hands in freezing water then dries them before placing them over his friend's forehead so he will be cool but not get wet, which is sweet but stupid). Etc. I think maybe because this isn't romantic in the standard way, e.g. they are a bit physically rough with each other, it didn't appeal to everyone. But if you're looking for a single-sitting watch that's funny, cute, sweet, with lots of attractive men, I'd recommend this. If you're looking for a Thai BL drama, maybe you won't like this.

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Beautiful short story

This is a fairly economically-written story in which more happens than in some longer series, and with an emotional authenticity often sorely lacking in BL.

The reactions of the three characters are very realistic and age-appropriate, experiencing heratbreak, longing, jealousy, love, and especially loyalty in non-pathological ways. Loyalty is an important theme in the story, prioritizing it over attraction, and making it a primary characteristic to be attracted to. Poon has a fight with his best friend in which he even punches him, but it doesn't break up their friendship because the best friend understands Poon's motivation and even values it. It's obviously wrong to hit someone, but nobody, especially high school boys, has perfect self-control, and he apologizes and they discuss it like good and mature people.

It's a really beautiful story, wonderfully acted by very attractive boys and well filmed and edited. My only criticism is that there is too much flashback for such a short story. One is excusable as it's from the previous part, but there are others that are from the previous scene, which is tiresome and unnecessary. Also, Rachmaninoff needs royalties for the score, but it works well with the story.

I can highly recommend this - Mind Trio is batting 1,000 at this poiint.

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The first half was fantastic.

The first half of this series was beautiful to watch, beautifully filmed, an air of nostalgia in a beautiful setting.

But then the setting disappeared, and the "plot" was left unsupported, and the flat, predictable, and formulaic story had to bear its own weight, not helped by the strange decline of the sountrack.

It felt like the director lost interest halfway through and just had to tie it up and go home. The time jump wasn't as awful as these usually are, but it was also insufficiently supported and drained the narrative of what life it had left.

TBH, I barely remember this series. I binged the frist four episodes, and then had to force myself through the rest. It wasn't awful or painful, but it was difficult to pay attention.

This is short enough that it won't kill you to watch it, and the first half is beautiful enough to make it worth it, but a higher budget, better writing, and slightly longer run-time, and a longer attention span on the part of the director, could have made this a masterpiece.

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I wanted to love this so badly.

There is so much about this that's wonderful. The acting and cinematography are excellent.

That's a lot - and it's why I gave this a 7 instead of the 5.5 'suggested' rating. I like that this takes a more cinematic and sophistic approach to making a BL - this is not like a mainstream series where everyone is fantastically rich - the characters even take a train!

There is no way to escape comparison to I Told Sunset About You, which is another ambitious production about similar themes - I could watch that 100 times and was enthralled for every minute of it. The Yearbook was something to endure.

It's slow. I don't mind slow-pacing during scenes - in fact I prefer a scene that develops. The problem isn't the slowness of scenes, although they're really, really slow, it's the overall slowness of the plot and the reliance on flashbacks to fill time. I understand this is an expansion of a school project. It's not so much an expansion as an inflation. You will see the same scenes flashed back to many, many times - like a dozen or more - I'm not kidding. There are flashback scenes that have their own flashback scenes - I'm not joking, it happens many times.

Within scenes, the dialog is spoken in this unnatural slow and halting manner, with very long pauses and staring to the point that Bite Me seems rushed in comparison. Everyone moves very slowly, too. Like 90 year-olds. Heavily sedated 90-year olds. There's a scene were Nut takes a photo out of a drawer and sets it up on his desk. He opens the drawer so slowly I thought maybe he was afraid there was a bomb in it, then withdraws the photo really slowly, slowly places it on his desk, then writes a pointless letter that takes 5 minutes, and then he gives up and just calls Phob instead.

There is no point to this story. It's not about loss - there was an opportunity to delve into different types of loss and how you move on, but nope, just slow talking and flashbacks.

There is a scene where the main characters appear to have sex - offscreen, which is fine. But then the next day they behave exactly as they did before - there was no impact on their relationship, no discussion, it just disappeared and never happened again, and they resumed interacting like bro's. They even woke up fully-dressed and not even cuddling.

A little over halfway through, a character has to go somewhere for a few hours to take care of something life-changing. And the series comes to a screeching halt and there are three episodes that are almost entirely flashback. If you're expecting a fluffy ending, you're not getting one. It's not a sad ending, it's not really a happy ending, it just ends, as if the crew said "f@#$ it, this isn't going anywhere, let's just stop here." That sounds exaggerated, but you'll think I understated it if you watch this series.

The life-changing event is fairly dramatic, and it does result in a character signing a song for the other character (over the phone, all to flashbacks, including a flashback to someone else singing the same song - and with vocals, not just visual). No hug, no "I'm here for you", certainly nothing to indicate there's any romantic connection. The song isn't about loss or moving on, it's expression of unrelated feelings that he could have communicated 10 years prior but somehow never did, even though they had sex.

This is not a BL. It's a bromance. There is a kiss, once, miss-it-if-you-blink, and the main pair do seem to love each other, but it feels to me that it was a bromance with one kiss thrown in to make it a BL so they could market it to us and Mean's fan base. This feels like an attempt at a BL by straight guys who think m/m love is gross and so it's barely in here. This is the BL equivalent of interior "decor" that's all white walls, black leather furniture and a huge TV for video games and watching sports.

There is more time spent by straight characters discussing girls they like than there is of the main characters discussing their feelings for each other, which, incidentally, they do not do, ever, even once. They sing their feelings, which is nice (although twice it's over the phone), but we needed to see them interact like lovers. After high school, the main pair were rarely even in the same room together. Except in flashbacks.

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Story: 3. Superficial, lazy, manipulative, and designed to make sure the main characters interact as little as possible.

Acting: 9. The delivery of dialog was terrible, but that's not the actors' fault - they otherwise did an excellent job showing us what they feel, which makes the endless flashbacks mystifying. Why hire such good actors if you're not going to let them do the heavy lifing?

Music: 8.5. This was well-done. The original lyrics were good without being carried away, the singing was what you'd expect from non-professionals, although someone who's a better singer should have been cast for Phob. Anyway, one of the series' better qualities.

Rewatch value: 1. If you held a gun to my head, I would still not sit through this again. It's probably worth watching once, but there's nothing that would draw me back.

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Truly Awful

I usually try to be tolerant of low-budget productions, especially when they have heart. This doesn't.

The story is boring, the acting poor. The main character has no charm or charisma, and the main pair has no chemistry at all. In their kiss scene they somehow managed to look like they were sexually harassing each other.

There is one bar of music, and it's played over and over until you want to poke out your own eardrums.

The female characters are just excruciating. There's a woman on the staff of the resort that, and I hesitate to use words like this, behaves like a shameless slut in heat. Whenever she's in Migo's presence, her tongue is hangling out, she writhes all over the doorframes and walls, rapes him with her eyes, and is so completetly inappropriate that any guest with any self-respect would have left the resort immediately, and probably called a mental institution to come collect her. Or maybe a vet to put her down. Later, when the mains get together, she shoots them such OTT evil-eye, right there in public when she's at work and people are trying to eat, that you have to ask why someone doesn't punch her out. Or tie her in a sack and toss her in the well. It sounds like I'm exaggerating, but it's really impossible to overstate how revolting this character is.

There are series that frustrate me, disappoint me, or bore me. This one somehow managed to do all three and make me angry as well. This could possibly be the worst BL ever. There are BLs that are of lower-quality production, there are BLs that are naked cash-grabs, and there are BLs that are so bad that they're good - but this one is somehow aggressively awful in a way I don't think I've seen before.

It's a struggle to find nice things to say, but I feel I should. So: the main character, while unappealing in almost every way, looks surprisingly good shirtless. Also, Migo de Vera has a beautiful body and you see a LOT of it - including butt shots, a rarity in BL. That's all I can think of.

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Well, that happened.

I saw the uncut version on GagaOOLala.

I really wanted to like this - and at first I did. The selfie scene at the beginning is profoundly funny, and the OTT campy action early on is really entertaining. But then it just bogged down and became dull. For some reason, Asian BLs can't help themselves - they all have to revolve around women, in this case a pair of vampire hunters who serve as mannequin villains, who take up way too much screen time. They could have been completely eliminated from the story and the struggle centered on rival vampire clans. I presume there was a producer somewhere who read the script and said "too gay. Put in hot chicks" as if crowds of straight men are going to watch this.

It is definitely BL, and it's not read-between-the-lines-of-bromance - it's explicitly BL. But it's not prominent. If you're planning to watch it for that, I would pass.

This was disappointing. Maybe it's worth watching the first 20 minutes or so for the campy fun, but after that there's not a lot of reward for your time. It needed to cut loose and go seriously OTT. It feels a little like that was the plan, and for some reason th brakes were hit. It's too bad this wasn't Japanese.

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Strangest BL I've ever seen. But not unwatchable.

This was better than the previous series the crew produced - it was insane, but entertaining. I'm not quite sure if it's supposed to be a comedy, or if it just ended up that way. I think it's a light-hearted horror/supernatural BL?

The acting is not great, but it's good enough for the concept, which is something new, for sure - but a bit repetitive.

They've really got to improve the editing. Considering the scenes were static, there shouldn't be obvious shifts to a different take. Also, if a guy is walking down a hill, you can just show if for a few seconds - you don't have to show him walking ALL the way down, although if that was supposed to be comical with the intense evil-sounding music playing in the background, it worked. In general the shots are too long, and it robs the action of its momentum.

For example, it is film "vocabulary" to have people under enchantment walk slowly. Usually in very old movies - nowadays even zombies are really fast. Another way that is often shown is by making the character's eyes turn red. But you don't have to do both. There is a LOT of people with red eyes walking slowly in this (and the contacts were making the poor short hot guy cry - that must have been painful). Why not have their eyes turn red and just walk normally?

The fairy using magic scene was way too long - we get it. about 5 seconds suffices to make the point.

Anyway, I did have fun watching it, but it won't be for everyone. You'll know if you like it or not in the first episode, so if you're in the mood for something insane, give it a shot.

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Not bad, but should have been better.

There are so many good elements to this story, but too many problemmatic ones were tossed in, and it dragged down the overall quality of the series.

The acting is good. Pak, playing the main character, Kaitoon, is very good and charming. Gun, who plays Valen, is also good - he's playing a surly good-for-nothing trying to be better, but you can connect with his awkwardness and inability to communicate affection in a competent adult manner, and you definitely feel his attraction to Kaitoon. The rest of the cast is good. The overall quality of the production is good, and the subtitles are great.

But - the central love triangle is not at all enjoyable. First, there is too huge a gap in Kaitoon's suitors' desirrability. Valen is obviously a good and giving person, but he's too immature to be Kaitoon's bf, and Non is more or less the textbook definition of a perfect bf. Being attracted to someone flawed happens, but Kaitoon is potrayed as too level and knowing what he wants and needs to chose Valen. Second, watching people sit sadly after being stood up is awful and really unpleasant to watch - and it makes the stand-upper really unappealing.

The secondary couple is not bad, and for once, there's actually a reasonable explanation for someone ghosting the other for his own good, but it's still an overused and not entirely convincing device. There is something that makes it look like they will have a love triangle too, but if you look up the ages of the actors, you'll see it's not possible. I hope. Because eww. Also, the secondaries are not integrated into the main story at all, so it's like a different series stapled to the main one for no apparent reason.

The pacing at times really bogs down and too much time is spent on unimportant things, or drains the life out of substantial elements.

There are some subtle touches, like Kaitoon refuses someone's attempt to wipe his lip and says he'll do it himself, which is leveraging a tired trope in a symbolic way - I liked that. They also made fun of product placement when Valen says to his sister, "you look beautiful today. What skincare product are you using?" which would normally lead to a placement, but she tells him to go away.

But all-in-all, the series needed more focus - there are too many plot ideas (and some are tropes) thrown in, like the BL photo which leads to screaming fujoshis. Was that necessary in any way? What did it do to drive the story forward? Thankfully we only had to endure fujoshis for half a minute. And I will say it's nice for there to be a total absence of the usual predatory and pathetic trans/effeminte gay characters screeching and pawing at every half-attractive man.

I also appreciate that they chopped the series into two so that the second part can be filmed after COVID rather than stapling together a miserable and infuriating ending like Top Secret in Love did.

I'm hoping the second half is more focused and stops torturing the most appealing person on the show. It just makes us sad, and serves no real purpose.

I would recommend this, but not strongly. If you're finding you don't like it after a couple of eps, you are probably never going to like it and should consider dropping it.

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This is not great, but it's watchable with judicious fast-fowarding.

I'll start with the bad to end on a positive note, because there are some fine qualities to this.

The acting is bad (but the main couple are good enough). A lot of the side characters are obviously not played by actors. There are so many that few of them got much screentime, so I don't want to be too harsh.

The script is bad. It's so full of extraneous nonsense that it makes this hard to endure and almost submerges the theme of the story, which is good (more on that below). Drowning twice, both times taking only 15 seconds and in 3 feet of water while all your friends stand around watching because they don't want tor ruin their outfits is OTT ridiculous - there's a point to which you can suspend disbelief, but it was LOL absurd the first time, and when the exact same thing happened again, complete with friends standing around watching, it was just an eyeroll and a sigh.

Enemies-to-lovers will always work as a plot device. But from visceral hatred to best friends in an instant is not credible. This was a fairly short series, but there was plenty of time to do this more smoothly if so much runtime hadn't been wasted on pointless side characters.

Speaking of which, I'm getting to the point where I will not watch anything with a pathetic trans character, even if Allen Caiguoa is in it. Trans women are not pathetic, and they have enough obstacles to deal with without a supposedly friendly space being so cruel. And definitely no more fat-shaming. To be fair, Roi's surrogate mom is a relatively positive character, which was welcome.

Also, there's a lot of overt and implicit homophobia in this (and BL in general). There's a scene where someone expresses his interest in the main character, who reacts so violently it's hard not to attribute it to homophobia. It was strange and out of nowhere. It was an overly direct and ungraceful pick-up attempt, but not something to wake the entire resort over. Also, does the seme always need to be straight? For that matter, does there always have to be a seme and an uke? This dynamic is heteronormative, and making the dominant/top "man" of the story more-or-less straight, what is that saying? Why are the effeminate gay men always loud, pathetic, and predatory?

90% of the finale was consumed by unnecessary flashbacks. They are making a revelation, which should have taken 30 seconds at morst. Do you remember The Sixth Sense? That was a much more complex revelation and it was covered with mere seconds of flashback, and was far more powerful as a result. Here it was tiresome and greatly diminished the emotional impact.

How many times can you use the "just about to kiss but interrupted by someone even though it's 3 in the morning and you're in a secluded place" device to get out of having the characters get phyiscal?

The sound and camerawork is terrible. Even scenes that were lit by natural light were botched. If you don't know how to do something, find someone that does. Film professionals are very generous.

On to the good. As bad as this is, there is a lot of heart and effort that went into it.

The basic story idea and overarching plot are quite good - the suicide element was brought in and covered without being suffocating or taking over, and tied nicely into the ending.

The two main actors are good enough - not dynamic, but not embarassing or cringey, and with enough ability and charisma to pull off a couple you care about.

All-in-all, this series was good conceptually but let down by execution. It's heart almost saved it, but in the end it was disappointing - but it did leave me wanting to see more from this production crew. I think they can accomplish great things if they put a little more work into developing technical skills, and put a little discipline into the screenwriting.

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Great sequel.

A fine sequel to the original, following the theme but with a stand-alone story. You actually don't need to watch either to understand the other, but it's better seeing them together.

I'm surprised at how well we get a sense of their characters in such a short work. I'd like to see both these guys again, especially WinWin.

Half a star deducted for the stupid triple-take that BLs always do at important moments which only drains them of emotion. That trope needs to be taken out to a field and shot. Then buried, dug up, and burned. And then buried again. But other than that, this was an enjoyable watch.

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A pleasant watch

This was really sweet and I enjoyed watching it. I thought Cheng Chang Fan was a standout as Kane (I dont know why the subtitles call him that) and Alan Song as Soda was great too.

I was a little surprised that what I thought was the main pairing ended up taking a backburner to the side couple, and I ended up wishing they had paired the two most appealing actors instead of what they did. I didn't really feel the love from David Chiu as Sung Yi Fan - his performance was too cold with not enough subtle hints about how he felt, except for the way he kept wiping frosting off Kane's face, which came off slightly creepy rather than cute.

Kane is a young man who wants to be a musician but is being suffocated by pressure to hide who he is, and I think the actor did a great job - he's one of those people that's way cuter when he's sad than when he's smiling and I just wanted to hug him all the way through this.

Soda is having pre-wedding jitters aggravated by trauma he's suffered from his parents' disastrous marriage, and the actor did a great job with one of the better-realized characters in this drama.

The production values are great, and all-in-all this was a solid BL, although it's probably not going to make anyone's Top 10 list. Unless you've only watched 10 BLs.

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