wellwellbelle

For a guy that doesn't know how to flirt, Sarawat is killing it

Totally agree. I think the couch scene in particular is a study in effective use of pause. Tutor also has several pauses, what's great is that between the writing, directing, and acting, the audience has enough information to see how these pauses come from different places and mean different things. --Like right after the accidental kiss, Tutor pauses and you can see this internal struggle between all the reasons he should let it go and his desire to push Fighter to admit what's going on and his just plain old desire to kiss him more.

YESSS! Also, there has been a bit of superfluous Tutor/Fighter (we didn't need the whole "follow him around while he looks for work" sequence to be quite so long) that would be really good to employ to a bit of what the heck is going on with Zon/Saifah's changes in attitude.

He might have improved a bit, but also the character in LBC wasn't written as well as this one (whatever anyone wants to say about the plot of this show, the character writing is *excellent*). There's less stereotyping of his role, and he gets a pretty broad range of emotions. He's in a one sided love, but they let him be sad and angry and confused and excited and hopeful, instead of just mopey. So, basically I think his acting is probably bit better, but it's more that the character is also more relatable and real feeling.

OMG that was adorable. The one-sided closeness! hilarious.

It makes me feel weird when interviews get suggestive or try to probe into how they felt in the kiss scenes or if they have feelings for each other or whatever. I can imagine wanting to prevent that sort of over-the-line stuff in your working life without being homophobic.

And I for one approve. Thinking back to the Mew/Art thing, where apparently Art felt pressured to keep up the role of being into Mew in his real life, and Mew either abused or misread things and it was just bad all round. I totally understand not wanting to root for a homophobic actor, but I don't think an actor wanting to draw a clear distinction between their own life/preferences and their character's life/preferences is homophobic, and especially in the context of Thai bl fanservice, I think it's pretty understandable.

Lots of fun moments in ep 2... I love the little touches. The friends sleeping positions while they're "helping" him practice made me lol.

I have to laugh, that review has a huge problem with the scene where Tine tries to drug Green, and then says the show isn't as good as 6 other shows, 4 of which include characters that have sex with people who are too drunk to consent. Like, draw your boundaries where you will and everyone has their problematic favs, but I just can't even with that.

I read the scene the same way (and I think it was on purpose), and as I was reading your comment, it struck me that this careful attention to the actual characters is how you can write a scene that includes both confusion/hurt AND consent. The writers don't rely on stereotypes to define the tension in the scene... instead we have all these very organic-to-the characters and intense emotions and a lot of denial mixed together to have moments where they both want and don't want things to happen. Because the writers are willing to let desire and denial happen simultaneously for they're characters, they can have Fighter scared of his feelings and Tutor being hurt by Fighter's denial and/or mad at himself for letting things escalate without either having forced themself on the other. It's really well done.

Ya, the screen chemistry was off the charts! I'm not sure I can think of another example that was as pronounced in the first episode!

Let me start by saying I completely agree that BL shows need to do better with LGBT representation, because their audience is growing and includes plenty of LGBT people. No matter how the genre got started, if you're going to be courting a large audience then you need to find ways to either ditch the harmful unrealistic stuff or clearly cordon it off as "pure fantasy that does not represent reality"

I've thought a lot about they whys and hows of women writing m/m romance for women. The phenomenon is not limited to yaoi or asian writers. I came across it in a western context many years before I was aware of yaoi, and it was my jam. Which was weird. Why?

I've thought a lot about it over the years, and as I've become aware of the whole fujoshi thing, it's added new information and layers. I found a woman who studies the phenomenon and calls it "cross voyeurism" which is I think a better sort of label in terms of dealing with the specific aspects of the by-women-for-women stuff.

My feeling is that cross-voyeurism isn't so much about fetishizing gay men as it is about having developed a sense of oneself in fiction as male or as gender fluid. So, this is not that one is trans or has an internalized male identity, but specifically when reading or engaging with fiction stories, one has a tendency to identify with male characters or envision oneself in stories *as* a male character. I think this is something that girls who have very immersive/escapist experiences with fiction can develop in part because so much otherwise good fiction has a lack of female characters (or they have such side roles you can't "be" them for the whole story).

When writing niche fiction for a tiny audience, I don't think there's much wrong in catering to that audience. In terms of yaoi/boy love, I think that the couples often have one character who is the male projection of the female writer/reading, and another character who is the subject of their romantic desire. Thus, the "gay for you" is a bit of mental gymnastics attempting to deal with the writer's heterosexual preferences and/or assumptions in a fictional setting where their character needs to have same-sex attraction.

It's not my favourite trope by far (although occasionally it can be done well, and I don't mind it as much if it represents the first stage of realizing one's broader sexuality; that is, if the character starts out with "only you" but eventually realizes that they are bi or that the feelings they had for women in the past were not actually sexual and they are gay or something like that). Personally, I don't need my characters to be het to identify with them. But I think that's a bit of what's going on with the trope--either that or just not knowing/caring how to portray a gay guy right from the beginning.

For me (if you're still reading! and thanks... I've never had anyone to talk to about this before), I first liked cross-voyeurism because of a few reasons, some more complicated than others. But one of the easy ones is that if you get rid of all the women characters, then the writer has to rely on things *other* than gender stereotypes to describe romance. So the early (North American) stuff I found had guys that had wide ranges of emotional and personality traits that didn't fit your basic het romantic gender casting. I really liked reading it for that, and also it helped me see guys as people who could be vulnerable and who could love (I was working through some stuff... which I think is probably another thing that is common among cross-voyeur writers).

I actually hate the extreme seme/uke stuff way more than the "gay for you" because it just re-writes gender stereotypes into the m/m relationship; but I've noticed in this genre, those tropes actually often go hand in hand. Anyway.... that's probably more than enough for this comment!

Right!? I mean, Rock Hudson managed to be a huge heartthrob with some pretty hot (for the time) kiss scenes, and he definitely wasn't into women! I've never quite understood the fujoshi desire for the actor to *be* the character in real life. For me, I just want awesome acting, and for the actor to have good working condition and be adequately compensated lol. I prefer them to keep their private life private and not interfere with my experience of the character! ;P

And why would their sexuality matter more than their acting? Do people assume that het actors are getting off on the kiss scenes? There's so many stories about het actors that dislike each other who managed to pull off amazing character chemistry. I'm sure that *sometimes* real chemistry will take marginal acting to the next level, but awesome acting combined with good writing and direction is all you need to create screen chemistry.

(lol, this is me saying to myself: don't write long comments!)

The "indecisive" character is the same person as the designer bag character. When she asks for the bag, it's as payment for doing her ex a favour, not as a girlfriend. And he's asking her for a pretty big favour, considering she actually has a boyfriend at the time.

The whole reason he's asking her for the favour is because he's not willing to fake being the boyfriend of someone who isn't hot. So we already have him as shallow and vain. When I watched this scenes, my impression was that I wouldn't trust his judgement of other people, so I don't trust his impression of any of those women. They came across as caricatures to me... I didn't think the audience was supposed to see those clips as the actual personalities of the girls but as Tine's distorted view of them.

I hate the clingy "psycho" rivals we often get in bl (and regular romance for that matter), and I agree women are often portrayed in a ridiculously negative light in bl. I think it's a bit too early to say where they're going to go with the female characters (the cheerleading senior seemed pretty cool), but I hope we go beyond caricature for sure!

lol, same!

When you combine a gay/bi character with a coming of age story, having the character start out not fully understanding/accepting their sexuality is pretty common.

And, I mean, I don't know about you, but I generally let my lovers figure out my sexuality based on my actions. I don't have conversations with my dates--or generally even my friends--about whether a person fits my sexuality spectrum, or whether I like other people of their gender. If I like them, then I like them. If not, then not. In terms of Tine telling his friends he doesn't want to date a guy, that can be true even if he's bi but not realized it yet OR if he's bi/gay and closeted. "Date" is not "desire" and he specifically tells his friends that he doesn't want to date a guy.

(Do his friends suspect he's closeted? Is that why they come up with the scheme of him dating a guy, which sort of doesn't make sense? Is that why they question him in that scene in such a teasing way? It sort of seems like it to me.)

I agree that Green isn't all that bad. I actually find that his bad decisions and Tine's are fairly balanced against each other, which I think is an important part of why it doesn't feel so off. I just put it strongly in my point a) because I don't think we can understand Tine's decisions without recognizing that he has really done everything polite and reasonable to reject Green, and even some of the less polite-but-still-reasonable thing (like pointing one way and running the other).

I agree that the persistent chasing trope is common, but too often writers portray it as sweet rather than as disrespectful... that isn't the case here. I think the writers very carefully and deliberately created this balance between what Green does wrong and what Tine does wrong so that we can like them both--and I actually really appreciate that. Both of them need to learn a bit about how to treat others, but neither has bad intentions and so we can root for that growth.

I'm with those who hope that Green gets some decent development and a nice love line (even if it doesn't get the complete arc, I want the series to end with Green having a decent prospect).

I'll make a discussion for the topic too :)

I started this based on your review and am loving it! It actually makes me want to read a good translation of the book. I actually love the folklore aspect of it... I'm so tired of the basic hero's cycle, and I love a good pantheon of immortals messing with the world :) I'm glad the show went for a plot, though, because it suits the genre better. Thanks for the great review! I wouldn't have discovered this gem otherwise.

Not just that, but the very first interaction, where he chased down Sarawat and then failed to say what he needed to say, Sarawat responds to him almost exactly the way he spoke to the girl at the football field who he *thought* had sent him the message.

There was a lot of really tight character introduction in this episode, not just with Tine, but with his friend group. They seem so good-natured that it was a little shocking when we got to the scene where they'd decided to drug Green, and for some people (understandably) that was a step to far.

Although I'm on the side of people who didn't mind it, I don't think "it's comedy not real" is the right answer for why some people are okay with it. I get why it feels that way, but it's actually done through some careful attention to story-telling, action-consequence structures and character development.

So, I've written out why I think it doesn't cross the boundaries that many people have (including my own):

a) Green is basically a stalker, and Tine exhausts all the normal and polite ways of rejecting him before making any of these decisions (and we have the very reasonable tone-setting scene where his friends challenge him on whether he's overreacting because of Green being a guy, and Tine saying just because he doesn't have a problem with gay guys it doesn't mean he wants to date one). This all establishes a situation that none of them know how to solve.

b) For the "date" where they are "attacked", first it's very obvious that the guys are not going to actually attack them. Still, they are trying to scare Green. But notice what they say: "we hate people in love." It's an anti-couple threat, not a homophobic one. They want Green to leave Tine alone, but they have no interest in shaming him.

c) As @reefpicker points out in a thread below, the gay guy won! This is a serious trope-reversal, because we have this over-the-top "tootsie" type who turns out to be strong and protective. Without a threat, Green's character doesn't get to show that side. We also get the chance to like Green a little, because after he protectively brings Tine home, he teases him about staying in the room to take care of him, but then FINALLY TAKES NO FOR AN ANSWER, and leaves. It gives some hope that maybe at some point, Green will start to understand boundaries and respect them.

d) The fake girlfriend ploy isn't all that bad. Again we see that Tine only wants Green to stop pursuing him when he goes and talks to him, he doesn't want to hurt Green. Green's turn around ("you just wanted to test my love for you") is delusional, and in a character less comedic than Green, terrifying. Seriously, google "woman killed after rejecting man" if you want to know why I'm sympathetic to Tine's feeling of being trapped. My point being that what Green is doing is also played for humour, but if it were real life, his behaviour represents something at least as dangerous and morally wrong as what Tine and his friends are doing.

c) Drugging Green is a straight-up bad idea. Tine knows it. We can see he feels conflicted. The story structure follows through on "drugging is a bad idea" by having it go wrong. Instead of "drug a stalker, solve your problem," you get "do a stupid thing and fail"... which is actually the result of all of the stupid things he's done so far.

This matters in terms of storytelling because the story is structured such that his idea is clearly a bad idea (unlike, say, when Tarn assaults Type in their shared bathroom, which leads to a romantic relationship: Tarn never feels conflicted, there's no narrative acknowledgement of wrong doing, and consequences of his actions suggest that if someone doesn't like you but you force them to orgasm, you can make them love you). So, it's not that it's comedy and fiction so it doesn't matter, but that the story itself doesn't condone the bad actions of the characters.

d) The drugging was borderline for me, for sure. I thought, though, that the story did a good enough job of letting us know what the 4 friends were like that I was very sure if they had successfully drugged Green, they wouldn't have hurt him.

Also, having characters make bad choices in the *first* episode sets them up for character growth, so the fact that this was a beginning, and that none of the bad ideas led to desired outcomes lets me trust/hope (about 60/40 at this point) that the writers have clear boundaries and will work the story within them.

There's some dubious behaviour in the first episode that people are discussing. I think it's always worth considering how the narrative frames bad behaviour... stories would be boring if no one did anything wrong, but on the other hand, we don't necessarily want to root for characters doing terrible things.

The episode framed the behaviour in terms of "make bad choices and fail," which for me is a good frame for watching characters I like do the wrong thing. More thoughts in the spoiler comment below.

I actually think the writers put some careful attention into these scenes to show that the guys made poor choices but without any actual intent to do harm (which, as a viewer you can still disagree with! Not trying to change your mind on where your boundaries are... just this was something I thought about as well).

So, here's what I noticed:

a) Green is basically a stalker, and Tine exhausts all the normal and polite ways of rejecting him before making any of these decisions (and we have the very reasonable tone-setting scene where his friends challenge him on whether he's overreacting because of Green being a guy, and Tine saying just because he doesn't have a problem with gay guys it doesn't mean he wants to date one). This all establishes a situation that none of them know how to get rid of.

b) For the "date" where they are "attacked", first it's very obvious that the guys are not going to actually attack them. But still, they are trying to scare Green. But notice what they say: "we hate people in love." It's an anti-couple threat, not a homophobic one. They want Green to leave Tine alone, but they have no interest in shaming him.

c) As reefpicker points out, the gay guy won! This is a serious trope-reversal, because we have this over-the-top "tootsie" type who turns out to be strong and protective. Without a threat, Green's character doesn't get to show that side. We also get the chance to like Green a little, because after he protectively brings Tine home, he teases him about staying in the room to take care of him, but then FINALLY TAKES NO FOR AN ANSWER, and leaves. It gives some hope that maybe at some point, Green will start to understand boundaries and respect them.

d) The fake girlfriend ploy isn't all that bad. Again we see that Tine only wants Green to stop pursuing him when he goes and talks to him. Green's turn around ("you just wanted to test my love for you") is delusional, and in a character less comedic than Green, terrifying. Seriously, google "woman killed after rejecting man" if you want to know why I'm sympathetic to Tine's feeling of being trapped. My point being that what Green is doing is also played for humour, but if it were real life, his behaviour represents something at least as dangerous and morally wrong as what Tine and his friends are doing.

c) Drugging Green is a straight-up bad idea. Tine knows it. We can see he feels conflicted. The story structure follows through on "drugging is a bad idea" by having it go wrong. Instead of "drug a stalker, solve your problem," you get "do a stupid thing and fail"... which is actually the result of all of the stupid things he's done so far.

This matters in terms of storytelling because the story is structured such that his idea is clearly a bad idea (unlike, say, when Tarn assaults Type in their shared bathroom, which leads to a romantic relationship: Tarn never feels conflicted, there's no narrative acknowledgement of wrong doing, and consequences of his actions suggest that if someone doesn't like you but you force them to orgasm, you can make them love you).

d) The drugging was borderline for me, for sure. I thought, though, that the story did a good enough job of letting us know what the 4 friends were like that I was very sure if they had successfully drugged Green, they wouldn't have hurt him.

Also, having characters make bad choices in the *first* episode sets them up for character growth, so the fact that this was a beginning, and that it was not condoned, so to speak, by the story (in that none of the bad ideas led to desired outcomes) lets me trust/hope (about 60/40 at this point) that the writers have clear boundaries and will work the story within them.