Swivla

Not great but actually some good comedy

First off, this is barely a GL, though it has women loving women, it just isn't structured like a romance drama, if that makes sense? It seems to be structured more like a sitcom.

Also it is overly focused on giving the large number of actors time to use the screen. It feels like MGI used this as a vehicle to test a bunch of potential actors?

As long as you go into it understanding those aspects, and managing your expectations, you may have a lot of fun with this.

Where it shines is the comedy and honestly even the acting is surprisingly good. Engfa and Charlotte show way more range in this than we got to see in Petrichor, this actually gave me renewed interest in their work.

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An amazing premise and start...

Overall an interesting magical story, however I personally enjoyed the first half way more than what they actually cooked.

THE GOOD:
- The premise is very interesting. The magic. The moral dilemmas.
- The vibes are on point. From how things are shot to the music to the lighting. Everything is put together really well to create a very cozy and magical vibe.
- The leads fully deliver. Pitcha holds most of the screentime focus, and she uses it amazingly, delivering a very emotional and rich performance. Natt has less focus, but still has a strong aura and some nuance.
- The second couple actually tackle some complex issues and take them seriously. Some rare representation.

THE BAD:
- The romance was nice, but personally I would have liked to watch them fall in love. It goes from "i dreamed about you" to "we are engaged" in 0.000001 seconds which feels like a big rip off to be in love because of visions of the future? Unearned romance.
- All antagonists are handled in an absurd way. Writers have no teeth as usual. By the end I feel sick about how much it wants to gloss over actual crimes.
- Repeated uses of the same tropes that didn't even make sense the first time. This seems to be a pattern when dramas want to use "crime" to spice up a series, but don't bother to make criminals actually behave like they are real people instead of just behaving in ways that are convenient for the plot device the writers want to force in.
- Age gap is pretty significant and never even acknowledged.
- The "rules" of the magic are arbitrary multiple times throughout, especially when it matters. This unfortunately robs us of any sense of stakes and really flubs what was very interesting moral dilemmas and tense conflicts by just handwaving the established rules.
- A lot of the plot that feels mysterious and interesting in the beginning is never developed. Maybe the novel had more to explain this? There seems to be an implication there are entire other lives or something?

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Amazing portrayal of the main characters

The good in this is very good. Amazing even. Shockingly good, considering its a mini show with 15 minute episodes.

THE GOOD

And the good that I am referring to is the main characters. They are acted extremely well, a league above expectations. Their characters are also written very well, it has been a while since I've seen a drama engage characters with this much complexity and nuance, walking a fine line as the story teeters as to what is actually happening and what will unfold.

This was probably created as a feminist drama, but it does so in a very well handled manner -- nothing is forced, nothing is just a message. The feminism is merely a willingness to not follow the usual tropes and let women have focus in a story.

THE BAD

Okay it would be disingenuous to give this a glowing review with no criticism. This mainly falls into 2 aspects:

1. Almost every character other than the leads, is poorly acted. They remind us that this is just a short mini show, and not a full production. Sometimes they're campy and maybe that can be fun, but often they are just bad, one note characters being overacted.

2. A few times the writing just jumps or forces something to happen and it feels like it just skipped the editors. It wasn't TOO bad (except one frustrating writing choice) but it also displays that this show is just a quick mini short, and not a full production.

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A beautiful start and then terrible writing

First, a warning. The summary is completely misleading about the tone, and is completely missing major, core parts of this premise.

This is a very hard show to just give a rating. I got like halfway through and it was sitting at 9+ in my mind. A show that makes me that invested in the characters, and has me crying at how powerful the moments are, normally has a guaranteed MINIMUM rating of 8+.

Shows that make me angry enough to think about dropping, normally get a MAX 7.

My spoiler-free advice is, if you get to a point in the early-middle of this where it feels like "this is actually a nice place to wrap the story" -- JUST DO IT. There are 2 big points where I had this thought, and I wish that I had. Everything that comes after is just so dumb and disrespectful to the characters, while adding NOTHING to the story. There really is no loss to dropping early.

THE GOOD:

The leading actors give amazing and rich performances.

There is a trauma aspect to this plot, that is handled better than many... until its not.

hrm, thinking about what else to say, it really is just the leading actors and their (initial) characters that make this good to me, it seems

THE BAD:

Major, plot altering decisions are given no basis in character motivation. It is so jarring that it (more than once) seems like entire scenes are missing.

The men in this are completely controlling and end up being a large focus, and despite them being bad and harmful in their decisions, they never receive any consequences or even are portrayed as their actions having been bad. They are literally thanked and apologized to instead. Gross.

The bad people (except 1) receive absolutely no consequences. This is actually disappointingly typical in this genre, but this show is notably worse about it. Actual horrible person who does horrible things never even apologizes, and just suddenly becomes trusted and relied upon. I still get sick even thinking about it.

And the things that make me want to be sick go on. Just idiotic plot choices, forcing characters into situations just for angst or whatever. The entire second half is both gross and poorly written.

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Style but no substance

THE GOOD:

The second couple is amazing

Lookmhee is an amazing lead

The soundtrack has some bangers

Lots of rich people style

THE BAD:

Nothing to care about. Characters have almost nothing compelling about them at all. Most don't even get a setup. Most won't get any motivations for why they do anything at all. Which is especially rough when there is not even any transition into people getting together, just *blast music* and start making out -- that's all audiences want right? :(

Tons of SA scenes and references treated completely flippantly. Some writer really just pulls the same card out every time to make someone "wronged" and feed the tension. Or worse, it isn't even treated like a big deal. Roofies? Screaming r*pe just to get your way? These are things that THE LOVE INTERESTS do to each other and never acknowledge as wrong.

The writing in general is very bad. Which is extra painful since the story centers on the premise of its business and conflict plotlines, which requires writing. Regularly characters act in inexplicable ways just to move the story along to the next scene.

Whole plot points are just dropped. Why was her mom sobbing? Is it really okay to roofie someone you love and never tell them and never apologize? Is it okay to beat your kids and threaten the life of their best friend if being a dad is "hard"? Another dad is going to gaslight his daughter into thinking he's dying so he can manipulate her but we just never acknowledge it or come back to it. The list could go on, but at some point the reviewer is putting in more energy than the writers ever did.

Especially disappointing is the writing for the FL, without a proper setup or motivation, she just comes across as entitled and immature. Her whole thing is that she wants to take her dad's job right out of college with zero experience, lmao, and wants to force people to accept it in one go by getting this deal as proof that she "deserves" it. She will go on to do nothing at all related to the business the whole time, other than trying to seduce one competitor. And for some reason make a whole point that she won't work with anyone because it will diminish her "accomplishment". The entire accomplishment this show is centered on is just picking a number for a bid.

Once the characters start fighting, the reasons for it are thin and don't even bother to engage the majority of the wrongs they actually did to each other. Each side mentions 1 wrong and thats all we will go on for 3 or 4 breakups. And for whatever reason one feels like she is way more wronged, even though she really isn't.

All around just no reason to care about the characters or the plot.

Well except for the second leads, I would watch a whole show about them. Too bad they get dropped for the entire middle arc. In fact the leads become so self involved that they don't even ever find out their assistants are dating. Can you imagine ending a show and not even bothering to include the leads ever even finding out about the second couple? It's not like they're strangers, they are your best friends and assistants. Was this even a romance drama? Just whiff whiff whiff.

The sound engineering at times gets carried away trying to be "cool" with some kind of styling for what it thinks suits rich/nightlife themes of this show. It can be quite jarring.

Villains are all one note performances. Get used to that face they're making, because they arent going to change expression ever.

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Very cute little romance

Flash review--

THE GOOD

Very cute romance

Pretty fun supernatural concept

Both leads are excellent

The FL is absolutely adorable but also a very refreshing (and needed) perspective.

Once you love this, there is so much more content! There is a movie with the same actors, as well as 2 "bonus episodes" that are great.

THE BAD

Way too much circular angst. Tons of time just spent watching characters living in their own heads and freaking out about their own thoughts. It isn't fun to just watch someone have anxiety for so much of the runtime. And because that is the focus, very little actually happens, other than the main plot.

The FL is not in nearly enough of it.

The BFF is really obnoxious. The overacting is so over the top I nearly started skipping his entire plotline. Weirdly, if you watch the bonus features about his plotlines, he isn't like that nearly as much in that.

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Great leading couple, everything else is background

Flash review--

THE GOOD

The leading couple is everything in this. Their portrayal. Their chemistry. The way they treat each other (except--). Just a pleasure to watch.

Some fun magic.

The FL characterization is just fun.

The 2ML is a cutie both in appearance and his characterization

THE UNREMARKABLE

Pretty much everyone else in this are painted in shades of gray. And it kinda works? Like, it mostly just forces the focus to stay on the leads and that is great because they are wonderful

But seriously, almost any time there's another character, I'm like "who is that" followed by "why do i care" but blessedly also followed by "oh good they're offscreen again quickly, back to the leads"

THE BAD

There is some really unpleasant plot stuff about halfway through. And unfortunately it isn't brief, it drags on for multiple episodes, way longer than it needed to.

Multiple times the FL is sidelined or has her agency removed. Really frustrating, especially when she's carrying the series.

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Both better and worse than I expected

Flash review - low thought, rapid fire notes, mostly for my own future reference

I was recommended this like many people, as the pioneer Thai GL. I set my expectations accordingly and I would say it was both much better but also worse than I expected.

# The good:

- The production quality was good, totally modern and on par with other dramas imo. I expected it to be more low budget, but that wasn't the case at all

- Freen is top notch in this. She knows how to work the camera and always looks like she is in her element. She has an incredibly wide range and gives significant depth to the smallest actions and thoughts of her character

- The friend group and similar types of characters are tons of fun. And often saying exactly what we're thinking and moving to impact the plot for the things that as an audience member, I want to yell at the main-type characters

# The bad:

- The top of this list has to be the writing. Lots of premises are paper thin or make no sense or characters make decisions that are just to feed the melodrama. At best stuff makes no sense, at worst its regularly infuriating

- A pattern with many of these shows, but possibly the worst in this one, is characters being portrayed being actively, viscerally bad. And then no worthwhile redemption, just flip and we are supposed to forgive. Really unpleasant stuff, which feels like the writers just doing stuff to get an emotional reaction, and then not bothering to treat it seriously

- Seriously, add a second bullet and just repeat that. Just disgusting stuff in what would otherwise be such a cozy drama. I'm avoiding spoilers, but more than one character got me so mad I almost stopped watching

- A lot of het romance tropes that I like this genre for not being attached to usually. But the control/communication stuff is all handled in ways that are pretty typical of hetero romance dramas. I guess we have to not hold it against this one, since it was pioneering these issues, so it probably needed to "stick to the expected" a bit more, than the later Thai GL dramas have had to.

- I don't want to say Becky was bad... but it really felt like a student actor or something. Like you could tell she was reciting lines, or "acting happy" by forcing smiles. It.. was awkward, especially for a main character. And especially next to Freen who seemed so good at not only acting natural, but expressing nuanced things

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Interesting blend of scifi and fantasy

The thing about this movie that really stood out was the genre blending. We have futuristic aliens, the modern day earth, historical earth, AND historical fantasy magic. Most projects would have done one or the other, but this movie fully embraces all of the genres it uses. There is magic. There is scifi tech. The is aliens. And all of them have lots of fun.

The main criticism for me, is that the plot is a bit jumbled. It doesn't seem willing to commit to a main character, and by the end of the first movie the story has suffered for it because the emotional investment in any individual character us a bit thin. There are some good emotional beats, just personally I would have liked more, and with the amount of time we spend chasing side characters or lingering on bits (that were not as funny as they seemed to think), it feels like there was space to make the actual plot more focused than it ended up being.

One last comment is that this movie does not stand on its own -- only watch it if you are planning on watching the sequel afterwards. This should have been titled "Part 1"

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Average Rom-com

This is a pretty standard kdrama romcom. Personally I felt like it was only okay, though to some degree that may be because I am not a big fan of comedy and this has a lot of pretty silly stuff in it.

For me though there were still a few standout aspects:

- Uhm Tae Goo (ML) portrayed his character with more depth and nuance than many male leads bring.
- Yang Hyun Min (ML friend) brings a huge amount of comedy to the show, while also a lot of heart. The writers really gave him stuff to work with and he made it work.
- Im Chul Soo (antagonist) also brough tons of depth and nuance to his character. He was very vibrantly portrayed.
- All the gangster friendships are very wholesome and nice to see male friendships handled like this.
- Moon Ji In (2FL) is a character I enjoyed though she doesnt get that much screentime, I felt like her character was very realistic and had character

To be a bit critical of some things:
- The female stories are largely brushed aside. In a lot of ways, the FL is just a centerpiece that the actors revolve around, and doesn't actually get to be the focus of the story very often
- The FL and her main antagonist get their resolution basically off screen, another failure to focus on the female stories going on
- Way too much slapstick stuff for my tastes. The ML not being able to handle drinking was utterly absurd. The main antagonist (while entertaining) was also hard to believe he could maintain his position or power while behaving the way he was.
- The romance didn't feel warranted, they mostly just like each other because they have history together, they don't really have anything in common or vibe that well together, which in a situation like this makes it feel like he only likes her because her innocence represents something he lost. Which would be a pretty shallow reason to love someone.
- The final episode was a very weak ending, just a lot of filler and checking boxes

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Fun and beautiful fantasy movie

I really enjoyed this film, it is saturated with high fantasy and wonder. The setting is very much xianxia, with sects of cultivators and flying on swords and the whole works. They really portray cultivator magic much more than most shows in this genre.

The main 4 actors are all amazing, giving strong performances and making me want desperately to have more time with their characters.

Unfortunately this is a film and not a show, so the time passes much too quick. Also it seems that this is only a part of the story it is based on, but they never made the rest of the films, so the ending is pretty abrupt and not entirely satisfying.

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Charming Cozy Ghost Drama

This drama was very enjoyable. A lot of it is a very typical ghost drama plotline, there is not anything very unique about the plot. But in many episodes I found that the writing was very well polished, an attention to detail that many dramas do not have. Many dramas just force in a trope even when it does not make sense, but this show seemed to care that everything makes sense. The twists and emotional arcs are very well thought out. The performances are also very good. The side stories are especially rich.

One criticism is that the final arc has some odd pacing. I am not sure if it was "bad" pacing, but they make some strange choices to reveal things before going back and showing stuff leading up to it. In a way, a lot of surprises are not a surprise because they show you the reveals so early before building up the tension. I am not sure if those were bad decisions, but I would say this is not a drama where you will be guessing a lot. There is some suspense, but it is pretty light.

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Okay drama but paced for web

Pretty straight forward drama that gives you exactly what you would expect from a light romance drama.

Unfortunately for me, shortened web dramas like this just don't have the depth to really dig into emotionally. It feels more like an outline of a story that just hits the main scene beats, rather than taking the time to flesh out the characters.

Also, "web drama"ness quality-level, means a lot of the plot points or situations don't make sense if you think too much. Does it really make sense that a CEO is renting an apartment right next door? A lot of things like this the audience is expected to handwave because "well its possible and it sure would be cute if it happened!"

In the end, the show isn't bad if you accept what it is, and it presents itself as exactly what it is, a light short web drama. If you turn your brain off its a cute show.

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