Great idea & purses

What to say about this disaster that the other 105 reviewers haven't already said?

Sometimes you need more in a drama beside cute leads, fluffy moments (ads!!!) and an idea!

Vice Versa is a bit of a convoluted, not fully thought out story of parallel universes. I love these kinds of dramas, books, movies...but here it is all undercooked and mostly left to our imagination to fill out the blanks they could not be bothered to explain. It was also very quickly obvious that the whole idea was not really sci-fi but a way to talk about soulmates. Fine, that's OK with me. I like that! But....

What I liked:
- episode titles: colours
- the original idea
- the cinematography: colour coded episodes
- Jimmy, cute as a button, carrying his heart on his sleeve
- Friends Credits
- creative way to present PPLs
and that's it!

What I did not like:
- messy storytelling
- music, annoying
- Sea's awful acting and total lack of chemistry
- gratuitous partial nudity
- man purses
- quantity of PPLs
and so much more!

Frankly I could have enjoyed this as a piece of mindless fun, if the main couple had an ounce of chemistry between them but unfortunately there was none to speak of.

Sea can't act and it was so irritating seeing him pouting and looking sideways and not knowing what to do with himself! He was also terribly written which was maybe the reason for his bad acting: his character is all over the place and mostly going with the flow without ever taking the initiative! And, I do not know what the costume designer was thinking, making him wear those purses all the time: they were ugly, unbecoming and I was so annoyed by them to the point that I only looked at them!

I was dreading the PPLs since I heard there were too many of them but I was pleasantly surprised since they were not often out of context. Though they did not manage to find realistic moments to use NIVEA or the toothpaste but the rest was not too bad!

The producers know how to pander to their viewers' expectations, so there were some really ridiculous scenes where the actors show their bare chest (waking up in the bed in the morning without a T-shirt but with shoes on!Really?!?).

All in all, this was a great idea badly executed though pretty and completely ruined by the lack of chemistry and too many purses!

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To be frank, I almost dropped this during the first episode: not another bullying series, I thought! And >>I do not like stories about bullied kids in school. There is so much such tragedies in real life: why watch a drama which does not provide a real , practical answer to the problem not the idealistic one, like here. But more about that later. Even though I wanted to drop it, I decided to finish at least the first episode at the end of which I thought I saw a huge twist. Unfortunately, I saw wrong but it made me continue watching and I actually finished it in three days!

This is a story of a teacher who wants to let the world know why one of his students killed herself and in order to achieve this, he takes a whole class hostage. Over the course of 10 days (=10 episodes), the truth slowly comes out revealing the ugliness behind the "innocent faces of children" and the "teachers' sacred mission". Spoiler alert! The kids are extremely cruel to each other, and the teachers don't give a damn!

The drama is well plotted and paced: the characters' stories and their connections with the deceased girl are revealed slowly. The suspense is palpable and the story is believable. Unfortunately everything falls apart in the idealistic and completely improbable ending: trying to speak to people's soft and reasonable side when everyone knows it is just talking in the wind. It is really silly. And even though what he says is truth, the facts are obvious, we also know that you cannot change people's base feelings, primeval instincts and insecurities and incite them to be nice to each other.

The acting is amazing with the best being, of course Suda Masaki. The rest of the cast of kids, are all pretty awesome!

The production looked a bit cheap: the camera work was really cold and clinical (digital cameras?). They probably did not have a big budget therefore the number of extras is very limited (only look at the number of parents who are there pestering the police: about 10! for 29 students? Where are the others? Calmly going about their daily life waiting for the police to free their child and send them home? As you can see this bothered me very much!!!). Another issue I have with this drama is the music. I liked it a lot but most of the time it seemed like they did not know what to do with it: they played the wrong music at the wrong time: very disconcerting! This is something I noticed in a number of j dramas, the wrong kind of music....

Apart from the disappointing ending which still managed to wrap everything nicely up, I ended up loving this series after almost dropping it, the suspense, the complicated story, the intelligent plotting. A great ride!

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Down the memory lane

Recently, my rule of thumb when rating series was whether I play mobile games while watching the series on my laptop or not and, if yes, how much do I play! Some people fast forward, I multitask! With this series I managed to avoid games until episode 4, I played for 10min and then rewatched the episode and dropped the games till it was over! I do not remember the last time I did this! This drama is a short and easy watch so dropping games must be easy, some would say! No, no,no!!! I managed to play the games through a number of Thai short movies. So....

As the series was airing, I kept reading the comments and feeds which all generally started with a highly positive notes to end up disappointed with the last episode! I do not get it! Why didn't you like this? There is a couple with amazing chemistry, some serious skinship and a compelling adult(not school!) story! So why?

Jack O'Frost tells a story of a relationship going bust and how an accident provokes a reset for it. Lack of communication, the last drop, forgotten good times...accident makes them realize what is really important and how to deal with problems; talk, talk, talk!!!

This is a beautifully filmed series: all in beige sandy colours both interiors and exteriors. The writing is superb: the story is told in flashbacks, short and to the point. Music is really nice as well though not enough to put it on my playlist. It did fit the drama but it was forgettable!

I did not quite understand the reference to Jack O'Frost a cheeky winter elf playing pranks. The story does take place in the winter and when I saw Ritsu drawing it again in the same place like in the past, I thought that they were doing "he's only pretending to have amnesia". That was just a red herring, leading the viewers down the wrong path. The story is much simpler and so much better for it!

Anyway, this slice of life romance is definitely worth your time so give it a chance!

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Awful, just awful acting.....

Thank you HPriest for subbing this special. Your work is highly valued and appreciated!

After two joyful seasons of I Will Do Better In My Next Life, we were given this New Year's special continuing the story. The five members of Delta find themselves stuck in the office over New Year's holidays due to an unexpected late minute order. The story in itself was coherent and showed character development regarding their love life or family matters.

What ruined this special was acting: the two characters were just over the top of the highest mountain as far as overacting is concerned. Momoe was constantly grimacing, squealing, using a baby voice, moving in weird ways and making strange gestures. Hayashi, the bodybuilder was on par with Momoe: did the actors have an internal competition as to who can be worst actor?

Characters in j dramas often have this kind of manga behaviour and when I come upon it, I drop the series immediately. I stuck with this one since I saw the two previous series and wanted to see what happens next. But it was literally painful to watch these two characters moving like puppets.

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Shall we eat some ramyon...later?

When I started watching Kdramas a few years ago (thank you covid!), I was struck by the place eating and drinking take in these series: the characters eat huge amounts of food and drink until they fall into a drunken stupor! And when they emerge from it, they continue eating and drinking late at night! What was even more surprising was that no one had anything to say about the unseemly behaviour of those drunk people: often they are considered cute and people promptly fall in love with such drunks!

All The Liquors is just the same but a BL, apparently. A cold and serious chef keeps bumping into the drunken JiYu and falls for his dubious charms. THE END

JiYu is a drunk, almost an alcoholic, barely functioning during the day because he spends nights drinking himself into oblivion in order to forget that he had been dumped by his boyfriend on Christmas. Ten months on, he is still drinking heavily every day, and drunk and hungry one afternoon he stumbles into the chef's restaurant where he loses consciousness. The chef, who is very rigid and prohibits alcohol in his restaurant, in contact with JiYu changes the tune and starts admitting alcoholic beverages in his restaurant and drinking quite a bit himself.

There is nothing I liked about this drama.
I do not like the message that is behind it: if you want to enjoy your life, you need to eat and drink heavily preferably with like minded friends. Otherwise you are a weirdo!
I do not like the lack of chemistry between the leads nor the character of JiYu who is a slovenly drunk; Though there is a bit of development where he is concerned: he drinks a little bit less towards the end! With a couple of dead fish kisses and talk about rameyon!
I do not like the music: it is boring and mostly played when not needed and vice versa. And the sound recording was atrocious: you could hear the empty space of a hangar they filmed in since the echo was really bad!
I do not like the clothes they wear: all those large high rise baggy trousers and oversize shirts are not nice!

The only thing I liked about this drama is its length and that's why I finished it!

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All bow before Great Kiyoi!!!

I loved the first season! It came out about the same time as Kieta Hatsuko and while I dropped KH after the first episode, I loved My Beautiful Man. It felt real. It was painful and emotional and full of life, real life.
So I was happy to see the sequel but was quickly reluctant to watch when I kept reading reviews and comments all saying same old same old.
This is the story of Hira and Kiyoi frome high school until university graduation. Hira is a shy, self conscious and servile boy/man completely devoted to adoration of his god, his schoolmate Kiyoi, a beautiful man and an actor.Kiyoi hides feeling of insecurity behind his beauty and popularity and accepts Hiras devotion gladly. But when Hira tells him that he will never have to meet his parents, Kiyoi is deeply hurt which starts to shake their weird relationship.

While the first season focused solely on Hira and his adoration of Kiyoi, in this one we get to see lore of Kiyoi's side while he explains that he is perfectly aware of the god/subject mechanics in their relationship but answering "Creepy!" every time Hira looks adoring at him or tries to be gentle. They are both aware the situation cannot continue for much longer, unhealthy as it is but it actually takes a comment by a famous photographer who reads him perfectly, for Hira to start changing very slowly and meeting Kiyoi as equal.
The story is beautifully filmed and told but I was also extremely annoyed with Hira and his doormat attitude. Still, Kiyoi loved him just as he is for four years but is now getting more and more upset with Hira and his adoration attitude.There are only four episodes in this season taking place about 4 years after high school and each covering one season (winter, spring etc.). The actors are perfect. I loved the music and the opening credits were cool with the main cast dancing with their arms: beautiful!
It is a good short watch that I probably should rewatch soon! Waiting for the movie!!!!

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Sulky kids in love

Everything felt somehow off here!

This is a story about a journalist and a photographer working for a investigative news magazine.They start off as enemies but very quickly things between them become serious as they investigate "case of the week". Things change when journalist goes investigating all by himself, without the photographer.

Ameiro Paradox is a weird title. The manga has been sitting on my "Plan to Read" list forever now but I never got around to reading it so I do not really understand the title!
Practically every episode deals with a different case they investigate. And in the background their relationship develop. It is mostly one sided. Onoe, the journalist very quickly falls for Kaburagi. These characters are such opposites. Onoe is a child, behaving and thinking like a 2 year old(vexed, sulky, throwing temper tantrums!) so much so one cannot help but wonder how he managed to become investigative journalist: every time he tries to follow someone, he is so conspicuous his target notices him immediately: he is clumsy and unconvincing! Kaburagi, on the other hand is an adult, with adult experiences in adult world, who knows how to investigate and in the beginning he cannot believe that he had been saddled with such an incompetent journalist child but he quickly falls under his charm.

And there is the word that keeps repeating: quickly! They go from enemies to friends to lovers in a blink of an eye! This is also based on a manga so there is some manga like exaggerated behaviour ! But I must give it to them they managed to tone it down quite a bit!

Other reviewers mentioned that the lack of communication as the plot feature moving the story forward, is a hge problem with this drama. I'd take it a bit further, and say that the problem is the characters: when you have a child and an adult interacting, the child will act as any child would by not speaking and sulking and hiding in their room. Towards the end, Kaburagi seems to have been too long under the child Onoe's influence that even he starts behaving like a child and sulk!

The love story is not convincing either: they have no chemistry. I was more interested in Editor-in-Chief and his sidekick: their story seems to be more interesting so I am a bit disappointed we never really find more about those two together!

Mercifully it is short and easy to watch, there is no unnecessary toxicity or serious conflict. But the whole series is far from convincing: everything seemed unreal. Even the streets were weirdly empty!

You can watch it if you need something beginning with A for the Alphabet Drama Challenge like myself. If not, you won't miss anything if you skip it. Maybe just a couple of skinship scenes in the last episode!

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What is confidence?

When I started watching Kdramas almost three years ago (thank you, COVID!) I came upon the concept of short web dramas I had never heard of before. At the beginning I was reluctant to watch them thinking they were just a low quality sub produce but after finally giving them a try, I discovered a vast world of short, sweet, tightly woven stories that rarely have wasted moments.
To My Beautiful WooRi is just one of the better webdramas. It is only 30min long but it manages to tell a complete story including the main characters' past.
WooRi is drifting,she is jobless and treated as less than nobody by her boyfriend destroying the little confidence she has left. She unwittingly accepts to go on a blind date and there she meets a highschool friend . The tables have apparently turned on them during the years they had not met. In school she was a confident popular girl taking no nonsense from anyone and he a nerdy loser being bullied by the local gang and saved by her. Now he is confident and successful and she falls hard for him!
The story is not new or original in any way or form but it is sweet, they have a good chemistry, it is well written, the pacing is good and Kim Young Dae is so tall and cute. The music is there, I think since I did not notice any. And of course it features a magnificent fish kiss!
The confidence in one's self, why one loses it, what to do not to lose it and how to be more confident are the notions driving this web drama forward! The confidence shown by Woo Ri in high school inspired Jun Soek and his atttitide changed so much that WooRi did not even recognize him when they met again. Bur just by being there, treating her like a valued human being, helped her regain some of the lost confidence!
I guess we all need someone to show us that deep down we are good and competent persons and that life can throw lemons at you but instead of being hit by them, you make lemonade!
All in all, a cute and sweet watch, a nice filler drama that cheers you up!

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Missed opportunities and regrets

The synopsis is a bit misleading as in that this is not actually a diary just two people sitting together on a train and reminiscing.
It is quite a simple story: a boy meets a girl and is smitten but also is very clumsy and indecisive and cannot bring himself to confess his love to her. When he finally decides to do it, he is beaten by his best friend! The whole world crumbles around him and they all part ways. Ten years later, the boy is now a documentary director and going through a slump when he accidentally meets the girl on the metro. And they talk about the past.
This drama special tells the importance of good timing, of being brave, of having the courage to face challenges even if it will lead to defeat, not to be afraid of taking the bull by the horns unless you want to live with the regrets of the missed opportunities.
We all have moments in life that are similar, when we are afraid to say or do something because the outcome is unknown. "I could have, I should have..." we all say that, and so does the boy in this drama special.
The girl is rather cryptic, we do not know how she feels, she is always nice and smiling but does not let anyone close. She is aware of boy's feelings but does nothing to encourage or dissuade him either way. I guess that's why he is reluctant to say anything.
Meeting each other 10 years later, they realize they do not remember things the same way and also it makes her realize the error of her ways back then. Is it too late? The answer is unknown, the ending is open!
I must confess I watched this because I just finished watching The Forbidden Marriage and I am suffering from Kim Young Dae addiction. Here he is playing the best friend, serious and committed to his studies who never lets anyone know he has a crush on the girl.
The cast is all good, the writing is solid, the music is sweet. All in all one hour well spent!

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Can I have more, please? Pretty please?

Softly, gently swimming in the river of life and avoiding obstacles with determination and intelligence.....

A few days ago, I started watching Midnight Motel but the dark themed series left me wanting for something else, lighter and nicer so I decided to watch an episode of Moonlight Chicken. Next thing I know, I was finishing episode four, it was like 3AM and I was trying really hard not to watch anymore. I succeeded even though it was so hard.

This series gripped me from the beginning with its music first and then the slice of life story. I am a sucker for a good slice of life romance and this one was almost perfect. Now I just want to rewatch it!

The story is deceptively simple: in a diner in Pattaya, different people meet and forge relationships. Uncle Jim is the owner and one night he meets drunken Wen: they end up spending the night together and Wen falls for Jim who does not want to continue this relationship. Jim's nephew, Li Ming is wrongly accused of breaking a valuable bottle during a delivery and has to work to pay it back. There he meets the house owner's deaf teenage son and they become friends.

This drama deals with some important everyday, mundane issues: work, money problems, redevelopment of areas, unrequited love, unwanted pregnancy and so on but it shows friendship and love and family with a minimum toxicity. There are no forced and invented problems and issues: everything is very quickly dealt with by TALKING. Well, that was quite refreshing since most of dramas thrive on misunderstandings and lack of communication. Not the case here.
Rarely seen as well, is a deaf character. The description of a handicap and the way the boy's family struggle to accept it (by hiding it) is shown in stark contrast with Li Ming's attitude of "there is nothing wrong with being deaf! Let's communicate and be friends!" Their story was beautiful. It showed young people completely unphased by adults' fears of difficulties and rejection.
And then there was Wen. He is a troubling character. He is still living and sleeping with the ex boyfriend. Their relationship is toxic and problematic and spills over into the new relationship he is trying to start because he seems stuck and unable to make a clean break. His ex, Alan, tries to hold onto him and as a result they are both unhappy.

Moonlight Chicken, with all its lightness, managed to touch upon and deal with a numerous life problems, small and big but realistic.

As for the cast, they were hit and miss. Firstly Earth was miscast: he is supposed to be almost 40! He does look older than the rest of the cast but not that much! And also, somebody should just tell Earth (playing Jim) that e cannot act and that he should remain a model: he's a handsome guy but has a single expression throughout the series wooden eternally surprised expression. Frankly that bothered me already in 1000 Stars! He shares no chemistry with Mix, who played Wen and I found their interactions, when they were lovey dovey, stilted, unnatural and unconvincing! Mix, on the other hand, is a king of microexpressions, his eyes tell a thousand stories but what happened to him? He looks like he is made out of putty, all soft and pudgy and soft, maybe too soft. But he has great chemistry with First who plays his ex Alan. I must say that First was a revelation! He is an amazing actor. Unexpectedly so since he did not leave a lasting impression after The Eclipse.
And then there are the two hottest BL stars of the moment, hot on the heels of their huge hit My School President. Gemini plays the deaf kid Fourth as Li Ming befriends. And they are just perfect§ Playing a daf character is not easy since you are not allowed to react to sounds all around (there was a scene where he unwittingly turned his head when a note was pushed under the door he was not looking at!Just a minor flaw!). They were the right measure of cute and serious and fun and real, just like every teen is nowdays! Open, with surprising maturity and without prejudice. And, by the way they were much better here than in MSP!
Finally there was Kaotung who has mastered overacting. Some of his scenes were hard to watch because of his grimacing face!

The producers should stop repeating actors' couples from other series. Earth and Mix as well as First and Kaotung were wrong here! That did not stop me from enjoying this series a lot but some moments were rather cringey especially scenes between Earth and Kaotung (who plays a chicken stall owner with a crush on Jim!).

The cinematography was stunning: the colours were in the brown, dark and warm tones. Everything felt soft and gentle. And the lighting and the colour palette corresponded the characters.
The music was so right for this series! The old taiwanese song the six main actors sing is giving me goosebumps and spills something warm inside my soul.

And in spite of all the flaws, I loved this series. It was just perfect for me at this moment in my life when I was looking for a serious story but with no toxicity. And I need more of all of them!

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Larger than life

Well, well, well this was a very strange trip.

As I was watching it, I thought it had been based on a manga. It gave me that feeling of being out of proportion, fantastically real. Even the main protagonists names tell a story: Summer, a boy, and Winter a girl.

Winter used to be called Alice and was a student of a particularly twisted school in England training children to become assassins. One day she decides to escape and severely injures the school principal, a psycho of the tallest order. She escapes to Korea and hides in Summer's school. He is a loony kind of a boy, suffering from a trauma, put on suicide watch and constantly asking to be beaten up in order to feel alive. The principal activates his criminal network in order to find Alice. And when he does, all hell breaks loose!

You have everything in this short drama, so much so, I wished it were longer. Just read the tags. What I liked the most was the black humour in this. Every character in this drama is seriously twisted, the world they live in is a genuine nightmare. And Summer is the king of this world. He is deadpan, untouchable in his school. He is so calm that he scares the local bullies. And he finds a soulmate in Winter, who is his opposite, trying to be normal. He does not care about being normal, he is only looking for a reason to live in this cutthroat world. Winter gives him that reason.

What is this about? Only gratuitous violence? Not necessarily. In a twisted, strange way it tells you a version of "nature or nurture". Can you be taught to be a killer or do you need an incentive to kill? Alice was raised to be a killer but could not kill until her soulmate was killed (or she thought so!). Both of them, ultimately, do not think twice and kill in order to protect each other.

The actors are all amazing but especially the one playing Summer, Song Geon Hee. He managed to express Summer's feelings and states of mind through a single almost invariable wide smile: that could be goofy and cute quickly becoming crazy and ending up surprised all within a minute! Amazing! Give this guy more lead roles!

This is not an easy drama to watch: it is very bloody and violent but everything, at the same time, is so exaggerated. Cinematography goes well with this: it is gray, dark almost monochrome.

Ultimate Weapon Alice is not for everyone: the violence, the ugliness, the violence, the insanity and the violence is the main theme here!

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Shirts & Showbiz

Let me elaborate on the title!

The first thing that struck me in this drama were the wardrobe choices: I kept "admiring" the more and more extravagant shirts as the series progressed and wandering who the fashion/costume designer was! And there were some very original shirts' cuts on display on human coathangers!

The second thing is: the show business! Why get into it and why not and how far are you willing to go in order to succeed, what or who would you give up on for fame and fans! Every character in this drama was put in front of a choice related to showbusiness.

Ando and Ryou met when they were children when Ando, dressed as a girl for an ad shoot, made a lasting impression on Ryou. When they meet again 10 years later, Ryou, now a famous actor, is still unaware that Ando is a boy, not a girl, and when he discovers that he is under a huge shock but still can't help thinking about Ando. They eventually start dating but a rival actor's agent outs them and Ryou's careeg goes into a nosedive.
There are a couple of side stories. One involves Ando's parents, who being themselves celebrities, want him to get into acting which he vehemently refuses but they keep on insisting.Some people called them toxic: they are not really, they are open and understanding and helpful. The other story is about Ando's big brother , the rock star Tee. He is a beautiful specimen of masculinity, all shiny muscles and wavy hair and tattoos and on the surface he seems to be a brainless dude. But he is actually very smart, cares for his little brother very much and is in a secret relationship with the family's assistant!

The first half of the series is just some plain fluffy and cute fun as Ryou chases after Ando after having read a number of BL novels in order to find out how to flirt with his crush! Those scenes are so funny.
The tone of the drama changes when, after their first date, Ando falls asleep and Ryou kisses him. So this was a huge red flag for me! I might have forgotten about this if it had been a quick peck (I do not condone that either!) but Ryou kept on going for more, deeply kissing the sleeping Ando three times. Who never woke up! Weird! That kiss marks the end of the comedy series and the beginning of a serious drama!
After that start the honeymoon period, very steamy and seriously well filmed! And then of course the SCANDAL that ruins careers!

The cast is exceptional. The chemistry between the actors is there, nothing extraordinary but they were really at ease with each other and it shows! The music was there but unremarkable! I loved the way Ando was completely tone deaf when singing! The actor pulled it of brilliantly!Funny! Costume designers outdid themselves in finding or creating all these incredible shirts! And of course, the eternal problem with Thai bls: sound recording! They should have by now figured out how to record dialogue, when the actors are hugging and talking into each other's necks, instead of muffled sounds we keep getting!

This drama deals with a lot of issues within the entertainment industry: the stage fright Ando suffers from,how to get inside and how to survive. They show us the pressure the fans put on celebrities and how they can be ruined just by a few tweets. And so on and so on....It is light and superficial, it is not meant to be too serious but it still touches upon some serious issues thai entertainment industry suffers from!

I have not read the manga or watched any of the japanese versions but this one was surprisingly fun and enjoyable to watch, with the exception of that stolen kiss! The series is full of clichés, it is predictable and the production is a bit lazy. Except when they filmed shirtless Film (who plays Thee, Ando's brother!) frolicking with water all in slowmo! Hilarious and hot! But I had so much fun watching it, it was funny and never cringy! Not the best out there, but good nevertheless! Give it a go, you might like it!

It is entertainment industry, my dear! is the closing statement of this bl drama.

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What is happiness?

Happiness is a state where you lack nothing!

I would like to write a review but apart from synopsis I do not know what to write about!The drama is bland, not boring but forgettable. Unfortunately!

Summer is the name of the main character who decides to spend the summer doing nothing in a seaside town! Therefore the title Summer Strike as stopping every professional activity by a person called Summer during a summer!
Yeo Reum is not very happy. Adepte of avoiding conflict, she is taken advantage of by everyone; work, friends and family. Until, one day she cannot take it anymore and, leaving everything behind and only with a backpack, she goes travelling. After a few days she finds herself in a charming little seaside town and she decides to stay there renting cheeply an abandoned building with a bad reputation. In the town she meets a prickly teen Bom (spring) and a mysterious librarian Dae Beom, she adopts a dog named Winter...(running joke, ha ha!) and slowly gets involved with the townspeople !
Summer Strike is a slice of life drama reminiscent of Hometown ChaChaCha but better as it does not exaggerate the local colourfullness or the fish out of water side of Yeo Reum. The librarian is a mysterious character who is silent during the first two episodes but is not mute. He is actually suffering from the PTSD and the reasons for it are slowly discovered.
There are two, maybe three, romances in this slow burn drama. The first one are a couple of teens who just go forward and connect. The second one is Yeo Reum and the Librarian whose love story is very slow burn really, really slow burn considering they fall for each other at first sight but take forever just to hold hands(last frame last episode! No kisses!). The third one is the longtime unrequited love by the local store owner for the librarian's friend who end up finally connecting.
The drama deals with the concept of happiness: what it means to each one of us? Is it professional success? Is it calm and uneventfull life? Is it loving someone from afar? Is it having enough to eat? Is it having a loving family?
There is a murder mystery involving the building Yeo Reum rents which makes certain events clearer!
This drama also touched upon a lot of issues but we were never offered a solution: abuse in workplace, bullying, prejudiced adults, local gangs, psychiatric problems, mental health in general etc...
They give us a general solution for everything: Stand up for yourself! The heaven helps those who help themselves! It is mostly true but I find it hard to accept because sometimes you need someone by your side to encourage you in order to be brave enough!
The actors did a great job. Im Si Wan is cute and secretive as usual. I love his voice and the way he speaks!
The music is nice but not memorable: it is there and that's all...

Slow burn dramas are my favourite genre and I love the slow development of characters and events. On the other hand I never rewatch them. The appeal of this kind of drama is in its pace, discovering things slowly, getting to know the characters slowly. If I had to rewatch it, I'd be probably bored out of my mind!

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The worst

I was not sure whether to watch this drama or not since I have heard nothing about it but after perusing the two reviews and a great number of comments all saying the same thing; a clunky first half but a brilliant second, I decided to give it a try. And I finished it. And I am still waiting on the brilliant part to show up. I have not seen it. Unless under brilliance people are talking about NC scenes and they really do start in the second part and there are lot of them. They are mostly superfluous. And they are boring as hell! Why? Because the PLOT is non existent! And voyeurism was never my cup of tea!

After the first episode, I had to check the year it was made because the plot was reminiscent of all those university bls from 6-7 years ago. The plot was the same (it was bad!), the acting was the same (it was bad), the sound effects were the same & omnipresent (it was bad), the costumes were the same (it was bad). The only part I liked a bit was the music but even that was the same (though not totally bad).

The plot: the rivalry between two dorms (2&3) of engineering (original, huh?) students which is not real since they are all attending classes together and are friends. There are like 5/6 different dorms. In the Dorm 2 there were pretty boys (they actually measured their facial features with a ruler! So CREEPY!) and in the Dorm 3 athletic guys. They are all apparently boys' dorms so there are no nasty and annoying girls shipping our couples (the other boys are doing that!). There are no girls. Period! There are three couples but the only interesting one was Meen & Bright. The rest was awful! Some things happen, and then some others none of which are remotely interesting. It finishes on an "uplifting" time skip of three years after their graduation. Ai is an engineering hotshot and Songkhram is a commercial airline plane captain. They both must be like 26 or so.... yeah, right! Nothing is convincing in this plot, there are some ridiculous gangsters and family drama but really left unsolved and forgotten. The overall plot is full of tropes: enemies to friends to lovers, fake adversity, getting together at a beach trip (usually in EVERY thai bl it happens halfway through!) some silly misunderstandings, faking fights and finally coming out all lovey-dovey. Beurk!!

The actors: none of them can act even a little bit, have zero chemistry with each other, some are cute (Meen, Bright, Song), the rest are ugly because they have been massacred by the hairdresser. At least they paid attention at workshops so their bedroom scenes were really long and they gave it all. And even that became boring and repetitive. Also, why are russian tourists playing english speaking businessmen(women)? The producers needed some western looking "actors" so they asked one of the numerous russians hiding in Thailand?

Cinematography was run of the mill though they did make an effort in creating dorm colour identities: one was red so everything was red and everyone was wearing red. The other blue...After an initial appreciation it became really cringe worthy!
And of course the comic sound effects! Please do away with those! Please! People are smart enough to understand what is going on without it being underlined by "funny" sound effects...

This is probably one of those dramas I will have trouble forgetting since it was so bad and I cannot believe I actually finished it.

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Silent & toxic

And another amazing butterflies inducing and very toxic and unhealthy BL is over. And I want more...

This is a story of two men deeply in love with each other but who never ever talk to each other. Lack of communication leads to misunderstandings and a kind of very toxic master/slave relationship they both seem to be addicted to.

Usually this trope, lack of communication, is something I find really annoying but here I just accepted it since the whole story is based upon that. It brought forward another kind of love story which never got a solution in the end. They admit that they do not speak to each other about anything important, accept the status quo but made sure to show in a non verbal way that they have a strong attachment to each other which is as solid as a diamond and never to be broken. Those silences, those looks gave me butterflies.

Beside the main couple there were barely any other characters worth mentioning except for Yoh's friend and fellow mangaka who watches their relationship from outside and sees more than either of the other two!

The whole drama has very little dialogue but a lot of voiceover which explains the feelings, the situations, the relationships. The acting is excellent but I found Higuchi Kouhei, the actor playing Mizuki, too thin in spite of the abs. And since he wore oversized clothes outside work, he had added fragility so much so I thought he was going to break! Excellent costume designer.

Japan is taking the lead now for the complex and intriguing BL stories : which one is the next? I cannot wait!

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