Reviews

Whodunit? Who cares

J-dramas are full of quirky and off kilter characters and plots. This one is an odd mix but not in the usual way. Nothing outrageous or controversial. It just doesn't sit comfortably within any particular genre.

This drama draws us in with an autumnal romance between our leads. It was supposed to be love at first sight, yet it felt contrived considering their personalities and circumstances. Ask no questions, chingu. I am intrigued though. Will their whirlwind romance blossom?

Things get complicated when we are introduced to the FL's family. They are an odd bunch. Each have their own foibles. At least they are friendly and welcome him into their fold. Yet, something feels amiss. An unspoken presence lurks around the edge of their congenial gatherings.

We soon learnt that the FL's boyfriend died mysteriously 15 years ago. It was ruled an accident. Yet, one of the officer investigating was not convinced. He pushed to have the case reopened after all these years. He has his own reasons which I shall not elaborate further. As this is a murder mystery, I'll try my best not to spoil it for you.

If I'm being honest, I don't feel the mystery plot is well constructed. The writer-san drip feed us titbits of information and lead us down the garden path a few times. It is functional, but lacks the intricacies of a top tier crime friction.

Discounting a random killer, there are only 2 or 3 people who could have done the deed, we are literally running out of suspects. Fine, we can overlook the wobbly narrative if the romance is something special. Alas, I find this wanting as well.

While our leads would declare their love for each other from time to time, I'm not convinced. I even started to suspect the FL is using the old honey trap to get the ML involved as he is a high-profile lawyer. IMHO, it would have made more sense that way. I was perplexed. Is it really true love?

Here lies the problem with this series. It seems to think by throwing in the odd red herring and a bunch of eccentric characters, it can glow up an ordinary murder plot. It is a paper thin facade.

When we have the final reveal, I was not surprised. There are literally no other options. It was Occam's Razor after all. Having said that, there is a minor twist towards the end which was delicious.

Personally, I'd have preferred a stronger whodunit or a more swoon-y love story. What we got is a grab bag of eccentric characters pushing and pulling in their own orbits. I get the messages about family ties and freedom of choice, but the show took its time delivering them.

We got there in the end. I'm not sure the destination is worth the journey. Given the decent performances and on par production, this is a shame. Peace.

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It had so much potential

Okay, so I will be honest and say that I am new to BL dramas like so new that I've only discovered them three months ago. Crazy I know. But, in that time, I have been devouring them and the past month it's been nothing but Thai BLs that I've been consuming. Of course, when I looked up the best shows to watch, this show was always in the top of every recommended list.

This past week I finally sat down and watched it and well, I understand the mixed reviews on it, something I always saw when it was talked about.

Personally, I enjoyed the show and didn't feel like I wasted hours of my life like others said they felt they had after they finished the series.

I didn't really have an issue with the lack of kissing scenes because really a good drama doesn't even need one if done right. The two kisses they did share felt natural to me because I expected that it would be a bit awkward considering Sarawat had never dated anyone, and Tine had only been with girls before getting involved with Sarawat. I will give them some grace in that they would need some adjusting to being physically intimate with each other like any new couple would especially when both lack experience in their own ways.

Having said that though, I wished they would have had more sweet moments together and I know they did with the head patting and taking care of each other, but it left me wanting more. Like where was the hand holding? The cuddling? Outside of Sarawat getting beat up and the couple of times on the couch there was no cuddling. To drive my point home, they lived together for goodness' sake. I mean you would expect there to be scenes of them waking up with tangled limbs or spooning before falling asleep. Even Sarawat trying to grab Tine's chest like he had the first half of the series just disappeared instead replaced with sexual innuendos. It was like all of that stopped after they admitted they liked each other. And because of the lack of sweet moments there were times where I felt like I was watching a bromance instead of a BL.

But the misunderstandings are where I was getting a bit irritated. There were too many. So much so that they carried straight through to the last episode. And really, the majority of the misunderstandings could have easily been avoided and shouldn't even have happened at all especially since a lot of the time when the other asked if everything was okay, they could have said no it's not but instead said they were fine. It felt like they were using the misunderstandings for filler to extend the series.

Also, Mil's constant pursuing of Tine even while knowing he was in a relationship with Sarawat was just so disrespectful. Like dude, know when to bow out.

My biggest complaint/ concern with this show though was how they completely glossed over Green being abused by Dim when they would argue. It rubbed me the wrong way that Green was scared of Dim to the point that he ran away from him hiding out at Tine's place but then took him back like he never felt that way. Why even bring that type of scenario into play if it wasn't going to be addressed? They could have easily used a different way to explain why Green started to pursue Tine in the first place not that he was doing so to get back at his abusive boyfriend.

What I did enjoy was Sarawat being a total simp for Tine. The way he would always say he was Tine's boyfriend/ husband when they were going to record themselves playing guitar was really cute. Also, his not so lowkey obsession with Tine's chest had me rolling.

So yeah, for those reasons above, I am giving this show a 7/10. Like I said, I did enjoy it and will be watching Still 2gether after I finish writing this but yeah, I get why some were unsatisfied with the direction the show took especially when it had, in my opinion, a great start and premise to work with.

I'm hoping that in Still 2gether I will see Tine be more confident in his feelings for Sarawat like Sarawat was for Tine.

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it was cute guys

When I went to research this k drama I saw a lot of reviews about it so I was in doubt whether I saw it or not. I can say that I saw it and it was a good decision. I won't say it was the best drama ever, but people are very critical sometimes. It's a simple drama with a good story and without too much winding up. The main characters have chemistry, yes. I won't say it was something absurd but they fit well with each other. The couple's story was well developed and they managed to overcome all adversities and be happy. The secondary couple also liked especially the male character. Personally, the female character annoyed me a lot and I think they should have developed their story a little more because I got the feeling that any doubt on her part they will separate. Overall I liked it and recommend it to those who want a simple and light drama to watch.

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A distraction, and that's it.

First of all, I need to confess that I'm not a fan of short cdramas. I barely finished any of those I tried in the past. But this one caught my attention because I like how both leads weren't characters that were written with the sole intention to make them loved by the audience (at least in the first part of the drama).

Eps 1 - 13 : Very entertaining, creative direcring, cute chemisty, interesting grey areas from leads, good pacing, nice costumes, acting performances that were ok from the leads, not impressive at all but with potential from both (the rest of the cast was meh tbh), cheesy writing but a cheesiness that felt right LOL (if you get it, you simply get it. If you don't, then you don't).
The quality of the writing is not serious enough for me to even try to analyse it, I was there just to be entertained and clearly the writing wasn't trying to get my brain's attention, which is good since I had no intention to waste my braincells.
Let's say the storytelling was good enough to get my attention.

I have to add, that some scenes of v'olence were a bit too excessive imo, a bit triggering and of poor taste just too add cheap quick useless shock values ...

Eps 14 - 20 : Disastrous, absolute nonsense that didn't need to be seen. Ridiculous writing, boring and repetitive delivery from everyone.
The whole initial tone of the drama disapeared to leave us with a eww chessy (the wrong one this time) writing and fake candy taste of superficial romance that was way too obvious for me to pretend to not be bothered by it.

Eps 20 - 24 : ok, some cute scenes here and there, but frankly after ep13, the whole thing went mediocre.
The fl was lowkey trying to force the ml to do it with her in ep22, and tried to make him feel guilty for not engaging with her attempt to get phisicaly close, which was a psycho move we also didn't to have !!?? tf was that for?? Yikes.
And then she has to fake her death for the ml to kinda confess his feelings to her ... I was left speechless of how cringe the drama turned out to be, gosh the FATIGUE was real at this point.
The actual love mak'ng scene turned out to be the peak comedy I didn't see coming, was that scene supposed to be steamy??? HAHAHA.

The final of the drama was clearly just about how both were horny for each other .... yup, the writer had nothing else to write about... they added few others scenes just for the sake of not turning the drama into something else hmhm, ANYWAY.

I kinda felt some pity of the the 2nd ml at the end of the drama cause damn they really tried their best to make him look ridiculous, pure clownerie level.

Do I regret watching it? Nah it was entertaining until it wasn't. I can't get mad at a drama that isn't arrogant, or that never aimed to be more than it was aka a good distraction which it was.
Will I rewatch it? Absolutely not.

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Interesting story of Jiao-Liao couple!!

When destiny brings the demon, Imho, is a complete package. The story line is pretty interesting with a male lead who is super powerful and the last surviving heir of their clan, who crosses paths with a weak(powers wise) yet innocent and naive female lead who is transported to the world of Sima Jiao.
The plot, though slows down in some episodes, but keeps you intrigued for the next episodes. I felt that the plot could be much more serious with less dragging moments, but anyways it is quite watchable.
Chen Feiyu as Sima Jiao did an amazing job. From being domineering and powerful to showcasing his loving, caring and gentler side, he has really outshined in every moment. His costumes were also very good👍
Wang Yinglu was a pleasant surprise for me. Her acting and costumes were good.
All the other cast did excellent work in portraying their roles.
The costumes, cgi, action scenes, were excellent.
I loved the immortal arc more, to be precisebut the remaining 2 are also worth watching.
Finally, a good xianxia drama that will definitely entertain you and keep you glued to your seats. 👍👌

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I've only watched five idol Cdramas but I still laughed my ass off

I didn't know any of the actors and I'd watched maybe five period idol dramas when I started this, also I don't speak Mandarin or know anything about Chinese internet meme culture so I probably missed 2/3 of the jokes. But I still laughed out loud every episode over things like the BGM including the Sex and the City theme and music from Sergio Leone westerns, the Night Walkers writing fanfic for their boss, "It's fish abuse! Fish abuse!" and so much more. It's like they threw everything at the wall without worrying whether it was too dumb, in fact too dumb is probably what they were going for.

Liu Yuning is legit fantastic in this. He has to be villainous, commanding, taken aback, confused, lovesick, noble, vulnerable, pained and he's good at all of it. He's also funny as hell. After learning more about his personal story and watching his livestreams I rewatched episode 1 and caught so many more jokes about Nan Feng that are directly taken from LYN's career.

I liked the FL but I think that the negative reactions some people have to her are because of structural problems with the script. The biggest problem is that Song Yi Meng's pain and suffering are front loaded at the start of the drama and mostly played for laughs. She's killed an uncountable number of times and wakes up in pain every time she's reincarnated but we don't see the deaths come at the hand of Nan Heng but rather an impersonal fate machine that requires her not to marry her the 2ML.

We do see her mentally go through the script and envision all of the ways Nan Heng mistreats her and eventually turns her into a human pig (cuts off all her limbs and puts her in a jar to die) but again a lot of it is turned into comedy and so it's hard to take her fears seriously, especially because she's a "salted fish" who isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer and often misinterprets what's going on around her.

Also, the audience knows much more than SYM and can see how Nan Heng feels about her and how much he's done on her behalf. But she doesn't know, esp because most of the nice things he does in the first half are when he's Li Shiliu. A lot of Nan Heng's actions look threatening to her given her lack of knowledge. Also, she tried many times to fight the script and it forced her and NH to do things against their will. So she's assuming all of the iconic scenes will take place as she read them and she's terrified.

Meanwhile, they had Nan Heng crying while Song Yi Meng was extremely mean to him and when I saw that I knew she was doomed with the audience because a crying man will always win over an angry woman, no matter how justified her anger (and it was justified, he lied to her about his identity for so long!).

Another thing the writers did that frustrated me was Yi Ting had to tell Song Yi Meng hey idiot, what do you think Nan Heng and Li Shiliu have in common instead of her figuring it out on her own. I think that was a big mistake. It made her seem too stupid and it lost her audience sympathy points.

I think a few things would've helped, like exploring SYM's backstory with losing her parents in a fire in the modern storyline. It's obviously a traumatizing event and would explain a lot of her fear. Another thing is if NH & SYM had worked together sooner to change fate, I think it would have reduced the frustrations of the audience a lot and made us root harder for them as a couple.

I also have to say that while Li Yitong was fantastic at the comedy, her performance lacked nuance in the middle of the drama. There were scenes where she should've looked more conflicted about saying harsh things to Nan Heng. It would've been good to see her struggle more to keep her distance from him.

Of course, inherent audience biases against flawed FLs and in favor of tragic suffering MLs (as the drama itself parodies) made it inevitable that many people would hate her.

Even with those writing flaws, I loved ADWAD and it's in my top five list of dramas for the year.

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So

1. I've watched this a few times solely because the main leads are cute/handsome, as well as the other swim team members. Who doesn't love eye candy??

2. There is definitely chemistry. Some acting points may not be the best, but for the main leads, I quite liked their acting. I've seen worse, trust me. And there will be worse.

3. Side couples: I was hyped that there was a lesbian in this show, but they just ended up making her straight?? And she's a wacko. Obsessive, pushy, mean, a big bully, and cheating on her girlfriend (I think? I can't remember the best). But ofc they had to go and make the lesbian straight/bi. What was with that move? Why couldn't she stay the way she was?

4. There are some touchy scenes, like anger issues, especially from Waii. He's just very angry, and what he went through does not justify being physically mean to Apo at the start. Don't get me wrong. I love Waii and Apo together, despite the whole Waii basically (he did) cheating on his girlfriend thing. Emotionally cheating, esp.

I hate what they did to his gf. Bro was stringing her and Apo along, and things got so messy. She's a sweet girl, and it was unnecessary to even have her there if the plan was to just have her as a wall between Apo and Waii.
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I love this drama, but it definitely has its flaws. But I would say you shouldn't go into this seriously. It's a comedy BL, and you really should just go in and watch it for some fun. I watched it 3 times so far. That says something (probably about me, but what can I say lol).

Try it, and if you don't like it, that's okay.

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More Than Just Romance

This drama delivers an excellent blend of romance, crime, and suspense. The romantic storyline was well-balanced and never overshadowed the main plot, which kept the show gripping from start to finish. While some of the criminals were fairly easy to identify due to the filming choices, the final case involving Yan Ze was a genuine plot twist that completely surprised me.

I particularly appreciated how the story came full circle with the society organization, tying all the loose ends together in a satisfying way. The writing was strong overall, and the performances by the cast were outstanding. That said, I did feel the female lead was written a little too perfectly—she solved every problem with ease, leaving little tension in her arc. Still, ARP’s performance stood out to me, and it was refreshing to see him take on this kind of role. I truly hope to see him in similar characters in the future.

One of the aspects I really liked was the moral resolution: every character who did wrong faced consequences, which made the story feel complete and just. The pacing was consistent, and the touches of romance added warmth without taking away from the crime-driven narrative. Unlike many recent shows with “enemies-to-lovers” tropes, this drama offered a straightforward, natural love story that unfolded smoothly. It was a refreshing change of pace.

Overall, this is a very well-executed C-drama that I would highly recommend to anyone who enjoys detective mysteries with suspenseful twists. With its balanced storytelling, strong acting, and satisfying conclusion, it’s a must-watch for fans of the genre.

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Not the best drama of my life

This is one of those drams that starts off okay, and has almost all of my favourite tropes.... Especially when you count the second couple that more or less out shine the first one.

The female lead is kind oh so kind, a part of me wondered if they would name a street after her. She also lacks self a steam and could use trying to communicate over assuming stuff. The male lead is frustratingly slow (yes within 14 episodes) devoted, possessive, cold didn't really impress me much even though I usually love my icicle leads. The cat is however cute.


But then it gets draggy, oh so draggy, and preachy making my eyes role yet again.... So much that I considered dropping it at episode 14 before I realised it only had 14 episodes so I pushed though that last episode and was greatful they didnt try to make it 24.

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If you love dogs....there is overwhelming cuteness

Sky (Meen) and Kong (Tul) were adorable together. This was Sky's first BL role and we will see him again in My Dear Daddy soon. This was also Kong's first BL. I wish people would take that into consideration when they review the roles and series. Were the intimate scenes smooth and flawless? Of course not, they are new to the BL Industry.
The story was a little confusing at first and the dog sounds and references were a little too much in the beginning but you can see the importance of it. I love a new love storyline from new actors. You can see them try to navigate their way through the different scenes. I would recommend this series if you have patience to see it unravel

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Lukewarm Suzume

I went into this with the hope that I would be thrilled like I was with Old Fashioned Cupcake. Same premise. Older boss, bolder subordinate. Fairly attractive and likeable cast. The first few episodes did deliver. The last didn't. Mainly because of Suzume-chan. Its expected that in the beginning he would be completely opposite to Keishi and over time they would grow closer together. In the story line they did, but visually it never clicked. The directors allowed them to check off the list but forget to check off them visually complimenting each other to finally be a couple.

The script lacked the charm past the awkward stage. Suzume remained in that stage to the end. Wardrobe was lacking with Keishi who didn't look the part outside of his suits. It's a given that Suzume would be conservatively dressed as he was on the threshold of turning 40. Keishi didn't have the finesse in casual clothes which was a bit offputting next to Suzume.

Their conversations were base level with nothing outstanding or humorous. The entire feel of the series was hindered by 11.5 episodes of Suzume's reclusiveness and self denial. It's as if they lifted the blueprint of Old Fashioned Cupcake and left the majority of the good bits behind.

The office environment was shown to be hectic but very complimenting and helpful. So, we are left wondering, how self deprecating a person can be with so much positivity and good will surrounding him. It stands to reason that he would have opened up to at least one person without putting up any walls. Here Keishi fits in. Though he was triggered by Keishi impromptu response at a certain point, he himself was not ready then to open up to everyone around him. He knew he loved him but was choosing to stay alone for what reason? It shifted from safeguarding his heart to protecting Keishi's reputation and finally to desperation.

It was enjoyable to a degree but so less than what it could be. I appreciated the part where Keishi refrained from pushing the sexual part of their relationship due to Suzume not being ready. The numerous stuffed toys gave insight to his desire to create his own world. The cute plushie speaking reminded me of Love is Poison but without the humor. Still was cute. The entire staff offering assitance and rooting for each other was a welcome change. Especially Keisuke who was genuinely concerned for his happiness. This was a pleasant enough watch. I just expected more.

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