Reviews

Extreme quirk tolerance is an absolutely ESSENTIAL requirement for watching this

After completing this, I am disappointed but not particularly surprised by the low rating (6.7 on MDL at the time of writing). I think if you are 1) not a habitual watcher of J-dramas and are just coming here for Chae Jong Hyeop, 2) not a fan of quirky humor and exaggerated acting, and/or 3) expecting a proper romance drama, this will definitely not be for you. This drama also doesn't really start to get to its point until around the halfway mark, so even if you have a stronger stomach for this kind of stuff, I don't know if you'll find the journey to get to the payoff really worth it.

However, if you're able to get the vibe, you might have a fun time with it like I did, especially if you have a broader understanding of Japanese pop culture. There are a lot of references that will surely feel dated in the future (M!LK's "Ii jan", "AiScream", even the word "tradwife" gets dropped lmao), but I enjoyed picking them out. The spoof of dating reality shows also made me both laugh and cringe at the accuracy.

I personally liked the fantasy element, even if it goes pretty much exactly how you expect for that kind of story. I was very amused that Nishigami's reason for wanting to save everyone in the villa basically boils down to, "They may be idiots, but they're MY idiots!" Nishigami and Midori's romance was also not as much of a focus as the poster might lead you to believe, but I thought what we did get was cute. I'm a sucker for the "cold, gloomy man who melts from the warmth of love" schtick, and Nishigami fit the bill perfectly. Chae Jong Hyeop is a pretty random cast for the role, but I honestly I think I prefer that him being Korean/a foreigner wasn't a central part of his character arc like it tends to be for these Korea-Japan collaborations - he was just a normal bilingual Grim Reaper lmao.

Konta is by far the worst part of this drama, and since he commands so much of the narrative particularly in the first half, I can understand the temptation to drop, but I have to respect Katsuji Ryo for really committing to making Konta as obnoxious as possible lol. I think the documentary part at least helped in understanding him and making him a little more palatable.

Underneath all the antics, The Vacation Principle has the surprisingly poignant message of slowing down, not taking things so seriously, and discovering yourself in the process - taking a "vacation from life" as the characters say. In fact, I think the experience of this drama itself is like a vacation from typical drama land in its style and quirkiness, so I would overall recommend if you're brave enough to traverse the waters.

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Title: Through Thorns to Embrace You (2025) is a sensual, passionate, and fun romance miniseries with ML: Li Meng Ran (as Mo Yang) and FL: Cheng Zi (as Yu Jin) in the leading couple's role. The cast did a very good job bringing their characters to life and the leading couple had great natural relationship development and a sensual and passionate romantic chemistry. The antagonists were members of the female lead's family and they were all psychopaths. The male lead is a strong minded character with a heart of gold toward the female lead and he goes all the way to help the leading lady fulfill her desire for revenge and her need to overcome the physical and emotional pain that she had endured at the hands of her family members. Although the drama has abuse and mistreatment, the relationship between the leading couple is quite fun to watch; enjoy it!

In the meantime, you can watch the drama on YouTube under the caption: "Playing dumb for revenge, she unwittingly started a dangerous yet sweet romance with the CEO! #love" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEhtwnCxkPc)

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I'm Impressed

This is definitely one for the record books. it's nit like the typical romantic comedy. It delves into a genre not seen too often in GL stories which is refreshing.
the characters themselves are also new at this so it's exciting to see how they tell both the story and their comfort level telling it.
I love the way Master Bulan is not afraid to put herself out there without hesitation. she's been waiting and she now waiting for Peem to open not just her heart but open to something she can admit she doesn't know about or willing to accept.
The relationship through the time jumps shows both women are dealing with their own pain that they can only overcome together.
I can't wait to learn more

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This series is undercooked and bland

I’m usually a big fan of Japanese BL because of its creative writing and its ability to say so much with very little. But when you adapt a much longer Thai BL and reduce the running time by more than half, something is inevitably going to get lost. By Episode 7, I think I know what got lost here…the emotional connection.

The leads are handsome and individually they seem perfectly suited for their roles, but together I just don’t feel that chemistry. When they look at each other, I want to feel that little spark…the hesitation, longing, awkwardness, something. Instead, I’m watching two actors playing a romance rather than two characters slowly realizing they’ve fallen for each other. I’ve seen plenty of straight actors play gay roles so convincingly that one glance can say more than an entire scene. Here, those looks just aren’t speaking to me.

And strangely, despite being a much shorter adaptation, the middle still dragged. The endless flashbacks certainly didn’t help. Enough already! When you’ve cut the original story this drastically, every minute becomes precious. I don’t need another reminder of something I watched twenty minutes ago…I need those minutes developing the characters and relationships happening now.

Which brings me to the biggest question after Episode 7: how are they possibly going to fit everybody else in?

There are other characters with relationships that are only beginning to bud, yet they’re treated like side dishes at a Korean BBQ…a little banchan here, another little taste there, and just when I’m interested, someone takes the plate away. These relationships need time to simmer too. If you’re going to keep them from the Thai original, then give them enough room to matter. Otherwise, why put them on the table at all?

I love a good push-and-pull romance. The uncertainty is half the fun. But Your Sky: Hare nochi Koi has felt less like push-and-pull and more like push…and keep pushing away. Seven episodes in, I should be aching for Sora and Hinata to finally get together. Instead, I’m still waiting for their romance to convince me that they should.

Then we have an antagonist whose behavior has been pushed into such ridiculous territory that instead of creating tension, he simply irritates me. A good antagonist should make me fear what he might do next. This one makes me wonder why everyone around him hasn’t figured out how stupid his behavior is already.

And yes…I appreciated Thomas and Kong appearing for their little 15-second cameo at the end. Cute. A nice wink to those of us who know and enjoyed the Thai version. But let’s be serious…Thomas and Kong showing up for 15 seconds isn’t going to save this sinking boat.

The ingredients for a wonderful Japanese BL are all here…fake dating, friendship turning into love, jealousy, side couples, family, handsome leads and that delicious push-and-pull. The problem is we’re already at Episode 7 and there are still too many ingredients sitting on the kitchen counter. Someone needs to start cooking or get the hell out of the kitchen.

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Same director as Flower of Evil, and it suffers from the same flaws. The show repeats the identical information far too often (and overuses flashbacks) without adding anything meaningful to the plot. And so we end up with a hollow, boring Episode 8, while Episode 6 (packed with unexpected twists) is, on the other hand, particularly cool. Visually, it's a well-made TV production, with some good shots here and there, but they don't necessarily serve the narrative, they seem a bit pointless.

However, for quite a while, you find yourself wondering who's in charge of these people. Who decides on these contracts ? Why does executing strangers pose no moral dilemma for them ? These are aspects of the story we should know right away, but we aren't given them ; so they must come up later to shake up the main plot, right ? No. Of course not, we’ll never know. It's just like that, period. Who cares about understanding the logic of this world ? And in the end, they just go back to their assassination business as if nothing happened. The whole thing suffers from a lack of lore and world-building. I can't understand why everybody seem to accept this poor writing. Anyway.

Just like in Flower of Evil, the show plays on the closeness between two characters who are searching for each other and think they know one another. And things don't really move forward, or move very slowly. We're just not given the information. It was done well enough that I binge-watched the series. (Skipping tons of pointless scenes, of course. Especially the ones with the cops ! Please get those stupid characters out of your shows.) The intense stress I'm navigating due to personal problems has greatly contributed to this quick viewing.

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I want a ChangYang in life too.

This BL drama is so sensible; it made me really think about the things that we value, the way you can see your life, and different points of view that I didn't happen to think of. Sometimes having a simple life is just ok.
Their chemistry was always amazing to me; the way JingYu made ChangYang's character feel like a walking green forest, he just loved QingLang with all his bad habits and acts. And Yiwen made Qinglang so well, like how it is for an actor to have the urge to feel like two different people. The visual is so beautiful, the connection with nature, the culture inserted, and it was so good to see traditions. Cinematography was STUNNING. And yet, feeling that some things could have gone better in the plot, I cannot think that this series is anything but really good.
Their kisses are like nobody else's kisses; they have to be praised for that. Hope that they have a lot of more series, projects coming because I really loved this one.

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Cute but forgettable

I loved the first episodes and, despite having the same premise as many other Japanese BLs about a summer romance, I had high hopes that the story would be different.

I simply adore Wataru, and it's nice to see a series that doesn't fall into that "popular guy falls for the shy nerd" trope that japanese BLs love so much.

The pilgrimage, their passion for movies—there is something very interesting here. The acting is amazing, the cinematography is gorgeous, but from the middle to the end, the series loses steam.

It's way past time for shows to stop using the "moving to another country" narrative as a way to create conflict and drama between characters.

Especially when their reunion falls flat and the characters haven't changed at all. The series feels lost after Chiharu's return, and the chemistry between them seems lost too.

It lacks stronger emotions, more complex dilemmas, and a deeper narrative. Chiharu simply gives up the internship program and that's it, nothing more.

The ending, unfortunately, is quite lukewarm. It's a good show, it's cute, it's quick to watch, it has some random moments that adds nothing to the show —like their first meeting when they were kids — but unfortunately, it fails to sustain a plot that makes us fall in love.

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Lovebirds with the communication skills of sworn enemies

The Early Spring was such an unexpected dark horse for me. It wasn’t even on my watchlist; I simply wandered in after a few episodes and, unfortunately, never found my way back out. The story itself is nothing revolutionary—secret relationship, workplace romance, separation, reunion, the usual collection of emotional inconveniences. Yet somehow, this drama made all of it feel addictive. The chemistry, acting, direction, wardrobe, and overall execution carried what could have been a very ordinary story into something I became embarrassingly invested in. And then there is Luan Nian, a man who appears to have been gifted every possible advantage except the ability to communicate like a normal human being. He is straightforward, sharp-tongued, emotionally constipated, and occasionally seems to regard empathy as an optional software update. His mouth says something cruel while his actions quietly whisper I love you. He transferred to the US branch rather than let Shang Zhitao lose her job because he didn’t want their relationship to damage her reputation. He gave her the highest score for her specialist evaluation and simply… let her believe he had given her the lowest. When their relationship threatened her career, he was willing to resign or transfer so she could stay. What a considerate man. What an absolutely terrible communicator. Luan Nian really is the Chinese national flag: a red flag with five stars. And I still cannot understand how some people looked at this man and concluded “green flag.” Jing Boran himself basically told us to run if we ever met someone like Luan Nian in real life, which feels like the actor trying to save us from the consequences of our own poor judgment.

That said, I actually loved that the drama slowly let us understand where all that unpleasantness came from. The New Year family scenes revealed someone who grew up learning that affection could be absent, conditional, or simply expressed badly. He was left alone while his parents worked, heard words that stayed with him, and eventually learned harshness as a kind of emotional language. Even the people who pursued him seemed to love the polished version of him until they encountered the difficult parts and left, quietly confirming his fear that perhaps everyone eventually does. So when Shang Zhitao tells him she needs more support, more thoughtful words, more reassurance, we finally see him learning that loving someone cannot always be done silently. His growth is subtle but meaningful: he begins to regret the things he says, to understand that words can hurt, and eventually asks, “Have you ever missed me?” rather than simply asking whether she misses him. Such a small change, and yet somehow it says everything about his insecurity. The man who looks so certain of himself is quietly wondering whether he is loved as deeply as he loves.

Shang Zhitao, meanwhile, is almost painfully ordinary—in the best and worst ways. She is inexperienced, innocent, from the Northwest, and stepping into a prestigious Beijing company while standing beside someone who seems to have already won at life. Luan Nian is successful, wealthy, brilliant, intimidating, and apparently capable of casually snowboarding in Switzerland while she is still trying to establish herself. Her desire to keep their relationship secret was never really about being ashamed of him. She simply wanted her career to belong to her. She didn’t want anyone thinking she had climbed the ladder because she was sleeping with the boss, and that insecurity slowly became its own little monster. Sometimes her reactions felt harsher than I expected, especially because the drama softened Luan Nian considerably from his apparently much more manipulative novel counterpart. Some of her reactions therefore feel like they belong to a slightly redder version of him. Still, I understood her. Their biggest enemy was never another woman or another man. It was two people desperately trying to protect each other by refusing to say what they actually needed. A very noble strategy, naturally, if the goal was to make everything worse.

Which is why I’m actually glad they separated. Painful as it was—and oh, did I enjoy watching Luan Nian cry his eyes out—the three years apart felt necessary. He needed to learn how to love someone with words as well as actions, while Shang Zhitao needed to build her own confidence, career, and sense of worth outside of him. The separation taught her how deeply he loved her, while teaching him how to properly treat someone he couldn’t bear to lose. I only wish we had been given more after the reunion: meeting his family, marriage, children, all those little domestic moments that would have made the journey feel more complete. Apparently the drama was cut from 32 episodes to 24, and somewhere in those missing eight episodes is probably the peaceful life I was owed. I would like them back, respectfully.

But the true reason this drama worked was never the plot. It was Jing Boran and Sun Qian. Their chemistry is absurdly natural—the kind that lives in glances, pauses, body language, tiny reactions, and all the things characters don’t say out loud. They genuinely feel like two people who have been tangled in each other’s lives for years. Jing Boran completely inhabited Luan Nian; his poker face, fashion, tsundere energy, and those microscopic changes in expression did half the emotional dialogue for him. And apparently he brought around 120 pieces of his own wardrobe or personally handpicked a lot of his outfits, which explains why Luan Nian consistently looked like he had a private appointment with the fashion gods. We believe in the king of fashion taste. Sun Qian was equally lovely as Shang Zhitao, especially with those innocent, vulnerable expressions she does so well. Even the camera direction deserves applause—the way some intimate scenes were framed made them feel unexpectedly sensual without needing to do much at all. Whoever thought of those angles, I hope you know I noticed. And can we please appreciate the OST placement? The soundtrack knows exactly when to arrive. There were moments when that special track started playing and you could already predict what was coming next. At this point, the OST was basically the drama’s personal fortune teller. The music would start and I’d be like, oh no… here we go.

For all its flaws, The Early Spring is a drama I’m strangely grateful for. The production apparently started as a relatively modest project, with plenty of indoor filming and some very questionable CGI whenever we suddenly arrived in Phuket or Norway. And yet, somehow, the drama grew far beyond what it seemed destined to be. The story is familiar. The timeline is occasionally confusing enough to make me wonder which year we were apparently living in. But the execution, the performances, the chemistry, and the direction gave it a heartbeat. No unnecessary love triangle, no exhausting second-lead romance—just two insecure people repeatedly failing to communicate while loving each other very much.

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this show has many flaws but it's still a gem

I went into this a little bit wary given the amount of negative reviews and this is yet another reminder that I need to stop trusting the consensus for anything on this site LOL. As is the case with many of the CDramas that have stuck with me, the show goes in some unexpected directions in the final third, but all the negative reviews are blowing it out of proportion. The resolution, while not my ideal ending, is very in line with the rest of the show.

I've seen a handful of complaints about the acting, and while there is *something* not fully there with the production, I don't think the issue is the acting. (Also, if you're willing to meet the show where it is, it has a lot of charm!) Wu Jinyan and Chen Zheyuan are BRILLIANT in this, and while I don't think the rest of the cast was at their level, I still found myself immersed and engrossed. I've also seen a ton of people claim Wu Jinyan and Chen Zheyuan lacked chemistry, which just makes me convinced that ppl with that critique watched a completely different show. I watched the show with a friend and it is typically disinterested, if not outright repulsed, by most onscreen romances and yet our dms for the first half of the show was like 80% us screeching about how explosive their sexual/romantic chemistry was. Most of the rest of the complaints I've seen are about plot holes/inconsistencies — which I did notice some as well; but narrative messaging, characters, and dynamics matter to me more than plot — or people just being misogynistic and hating on Tinghui.

Speaking of Tinghui, let me talk about what a f*cking powerhouse she is. She's bold and fearless; relentless in her pursuit of justice. Her integrity is unshakeable, as is her loyalty. She's been hardened by the horrors she's had to endure but is still full of so much love and care and a desire to protect. The scene where her childhood abuser comes to taunt her and she chases him down before stabbing him repeatedly in front of a crowd of civilians, because she was determined for that man to die regardless of the consequences, was literally one of the most incredible sequences I've ever seen put to film. Ying Gua was also so so good — a young ruler desperately trying to push for progress while being repeatedly blocked by older officials in his court who want to cling to how things have always been; who has the same desire to protect as Tinghui does, but keeps having his hands tied. Ying Gua is methodical and never does anything rashly, no matter how impulsive any of his decisions might appear to others.

Tinghui and Ying Gua's romance was MAGICAL. The fact that they're both immediately drawn to each other even though initially he doesn't trust her and she feels like she has to manipulate him for her safety... The scene of them playing weiqi demonstrating how they know they are playing mindgames with each other... The way he was constantly concerned about her safety and his need to protect her no matter what, even at times when he thought she was potentially plotting against him... The way when they first meet Tinghui leaves him for dead, but before they've even confessed their feelings to each other, she's jumping between him and danger, ready to die for him... As we see them work together and grow closer, it's so easy to believe they understand and know each other's hearts better than anyone else and that Tinghui comes to view Ying Gua as safety and that he comes to trust her more than anyone else. Genuinely, they came to mean SO MUCH to me that I am trying to keep myself from crying as I write this out.

Now onto my ACTUAL complaints. I'm convinced someone in the crew or a producer or smth gets off to women being brutalized bc the violence towards women was so gratuitous. We get so much detail of baby Tinghui and A-Xiang's abuse; we see a graphic scene of a woman who was sex trafficked being tortured, the scene where two men attempt to rape Tinghui that feels like it lasts for an eternity, a lengthy scene where a woman is murdered... etc, etc. While I would argue that the show does have feminist leanings, these scenes just go to show that we are always filtered through a male lens first and a reminder that there are men out there who truly enjoy our suffering. My second big complaint is the Fuzhi x Zhishu romance... the show repeatedly stresses Fuzhi and Tinghui's relationship and how much they mean to each other in a way that hits a lot of romantic cues (i.e. the scene where Tinghui is planning to sacrifice herself to the villain in order to save Fuzhi after she was abducted) and there's even a scene when Fuzhi straight up gets dazed upon seeing a pretty woman, so she does read as a lesbian imo. The mere existence of Fuzhi x Zhishu comes off as an attempt to obfuscate the (imo unmistakable) GL vibes of her relationship with Tinghui, so it already inherently irritated me. But then Fuzhi x Zhishu decides to play into the "we want each other so bad that we just have to bicker bc we don't want to admit how we feel" bs that I despise and then the scene where she seems to realize her feelings for him is when he comes to her rescue after being traumatized (another trope I despise!) and then the first time she even voices an interest in him is when he manipulates her into visiting him by holding onto a permit she needs for her business LIKE GOD JUST THROW THIS SHIP IN THE TRASH. I can't believe most ppl view this "romance" as the best part of the show like we are still in the trenches!!! Also, one final complaint bc I feel wrong not mentioning it: I've seen accusations of the opening credits using AI and while I do not have the eye for discerning human art vs AI, it did have a very generic look that makes me feel like the potential that it is AI is greater than zero. And bc I couldn't shake the feeling that the opening credits might be AI, it made me worry about whether landscape shots were AI as well.... ugh I hate that creatives are jumping on board with this tech.

There's definitely more I could say, but as always I've written an already lengthy review so I'll leave it here.

TL;DR: Even with it's many flaws, I think Royal Betrothal is absolutely worth the watch.

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Thoughts so far

1. Great to see a female director in charge. And she is an acting teacher too. No wonder William and Est's performances are so natural.

2. I have to say that You Maniac does feel like a true contemporary romance! Dean and Moth are definitely two very recognisable Gen-Z archetypes in 2026.

Dean is that performative guy who posts everything he does on Instagram, slides into all your friends’ DMs, goes clubbing every week, and will lovebomb you one week and ghost you the next, then try to gaslight you into believing you were delusional to think he ever liked you. Moth is a different side of the same modern-day decease: the fear to relinquish a bit of control and admit that you want/ like someone. He is the type of person who will give you signs that he likes you, then withdraw, then give you signs again -- all because he treats relationships like a game he must win and wants you to admit you like him first because confessing his feelings looks like losing to him. Tell me you haven't met at least one of these types!

3. As I wrote in one of my comments, if the show is going where I think it's going, we are in for a wild ride. There is always a possibility that GMMTV will mess things up in later episodes, but I like how the story is developing so far. I don't think that catching feelings quickly is contradictory to red-flag behaviour. When people are toxic separately and incompatible together, catching feelings for each other often brings out the worst in them! Not to mention that "feelings" might be generous: Dean seems to like Moth just because Moth's an exciting challenge, while Moth seems like he is simply in lust with Dean, lol.

Let's see how it goes. I'm having a lot of fun watching it so far. WilliamEst's chemistry is off the charts!

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Things that go boom in the night...and the day

If you watched Hard Boiled and thought, “Hmmmm...there weren’t enough bullets and bodies,” Heroes Shed No Tears might be the film you are looking for. One of, if not John Woo’s first action film, he pulled out all the stops for this mercenaries attempting to get a drug lord safely from the Laos/Vietnamese border across hostile territory to the government of Thailand to claim their rewards.

Chan Chung leads a squad of Chinese mercenaries. Their mission is to capture the drug lord, General Samton, and take him to Thailand. Chan is promised an American green card. His co-harts are in it largely for the money. Capturing the general proves to be easy. The journey not so much, as it turns deadly fast as Chan’s family has to be rescued, the General’s men are on their trail, and along the way he manages to infuriate and wound a Vietnamese Colonel who vows to hunt him down with his men.

From beginning to end, Woo found an excuse to blow things up. In one fight I thought to myself the only thing missing was a flame thrower. Voila! A dude with a flame thrower showed up! The combatants’ shooting style appeared to be pray and spray as no real aiming took place. Fortunately for them, the stunt men were quite adept at flying and falling. People were shot, stabbed, set on fire, impaled, blown up, tortured, and then shot again. There were numerous creative ambush scenes. The final battle between Chan and the Colonel was brutally realistic, even when it included flaming poles.

Eddy Ko did a solid job as the squad leader and father of an annoying if not resourceful child. Lam Ching Ying (Mr. Vampire!) was the merciless Colonel tailing Chan Chung. How he lost his eye was actually the most interesting effect in the film. Chin Yuet Sang’s Chin was given way too much time for his “comedic” antics.

Aside from the sketchy details of where they were at any given time, there was a glaring issue with the intrepid band of soldiers. The colonel hired local tribesmen at the point of a gun to track Chan Chung’s group. Why this was necessary was beyond me. Chan’s group was hardly stealthy. Most of the time they were on main roads and well used paths. They were loud, slow, took time to gamble with the locals, and strip bodies of anything valuable. They acted like no one was after them regardless of evidence to the contrary. Aside from the boy who was always yelling for his father, they’d also picked up an annoying French woman. Coupled with the problematic Chin, the Triangle of Irritation was a bit much. Chan Chung also had powerful plot armor and healing abilities, he went from being mostly dead to back in action without missing a beat. Ridiculous 80’s action tropes were strong in this story.

If you are a John Woo completionist, you cannot miss this film where he began to hone his bloody resume. Or if you just enjoy watching things blow up and relentless carnage, this might be one to try. If none of that draws you in, probably best to skip.

14 September 2026

Trigger Warnings: Nudity. Sexual situations. Sexual assaults. Multiple impalements. Dismemberment. Eye torture. Snake. Smoking of drugs.

Multinational note: The cast included actors from Hong Kong, Thailand, France, and South Korea. The movie was filmed in Thailand.

Release day note: The film was completed in 1984 and released in SK that year. Wider release was held until after Woo's A Better Tomorrow (1986)

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no notes

honestly, this is probably the first time i’ve ever reviewed a drama that ive considered needing no corrections on. the pacing was spot on, the 8 episodes in one season didn’t feel super short, the acting was OUTSTANDING especially from 박지훈, etc etc. i don’t understand anyone who thought the repetitive nature of the gruesome bullying was unnecessary. the repetition made the bullying feel relentless, but imo it was necessary to show how deeply ingrained it was in the characters’ lives. also the show is literally titled exactly how it is, why get mad for ordering something vanilla but expecting chocolate? i definitely saw different versions of myself in many of the characters, and some parts hit a little too close to home. i will forever feel horrible for what 박지훈 went through to play this role. im super excited to start season 2. 10/10

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