Robert
Ohio
This review may contain spoilers
The Most Underrated BL Lakorn of 2018
Words cannot describe the love I have for this drama series, which is a hidden gem amongst the recent plethora of BL Lakorns that have been produced in the past seven years. I decided to review this because of the negative review that I saw about this (and which I will address) and the low rating that it has on this site.
This drama deserves at least an 8.3/10 as an average rating!
On first blush, the story seems typical: Boy has a rivalry/hatred with another boy. Boy loses his girl, gets other boy to be his fake boyfriend. They fall in love, and get together for real. Sounds familiar?
The story starts off with Mork- the typical badboy whose father owns a local barbershop. He's a delinquent, sells porn and is a general menace to the class. A prank by his classmates leads to the beginning of his rivalry with his polar opposite, Tee. Tee is popular, rich, a top student, member of the Cheer team, a local idol at the school and in a relationship with a beautiful girl who is also wealthy.
A school requirement forces Tee to get his hair cut at the barbershop owned by Mork's father, Muad. His dad starts the cut but rushes out due to unexpected news, leaving Mork to mind the store. He decides to get revenge by deliberately cutting Tee's hair badly, and later on fractures Tee's relationship by his lie that Tee requested illegal gay porn DVDs.
This leads to them clashing multiple times and eventually punished by their school. They're given the task of cleaning all of the toilets in the school for a period of time. Later on, Tee returns to the barbershop and Mork's dad fixes the mess his son made of Tee's hair. Then once again, he leaves for a reason.
Up to this point, you kind of have a general idea of where the story is going. Enemies slowly become friends, becomes lovers. Again, a story we've seen multiple times right?
Wrong.
It's at this point that the story pulls an amazing plot twist that based off of the first episode and most of the second, no one would have seen coming at all. They also created the greatest Thai BL scene that has ever been produced (the only possible rival being the harrowing scene in TharnType when Type opens up to Tharn and reveals how he was sexually assaulted by one of his father's workers when he was only a small boy).
Mork is tasked with washing Tee's hair while his dad runs off to do what he needs to do. Reluctantly, Mork obeys his dad and he begins the process of washing Tee's hair. That's when the plot twist comes to light:
Tee: Why did you pretend that we didn't know each other?
Mork: It's better this way.
Tee: It's been three years...how have you been?
Mork: Shut up.
While the budding sexual attraction was a given, it turns out that the story is not of enemies becoming friends becoming lovers, but friends who were already falling in love with each other are thrown together after years apart and complete the transition from friendship to love.
I suspect that this is one of the 'plot holes' that another review on this site is referencing. If you pay attention however, the rest of the season unfolds the story of how the two leads became friends 3 years before and developed a strong friendship that was torn apart by an incident that challenged both leads' perception of their orientation and a series of misunderstandings that led to them treating each other as strangers.
Then the story really takes off as Tee, already half in love with Mork suggests that he become his fake bf in a bid to re-establish his relationship with his now ex-gf. Mork decides to do so, but their pretend relationship quickly morphs into a genuine relationship as lovers as their feelings (as well as the schemes of his brother and friend) take off.
What follows is an amazing rollercoaster of emotional highs and lows as they become lovers and deal with their parents' reactions to their relationship, their challenges as a budding couple, friends and the threat of being forced apart by circumstances beyond their control. They laugh, they cry, they face scandal and sickness and through it all, keep a hold of their love for the other.
One plot point that to some might seem contrived is the illness of Mork that seemingly manifests out of nowhere near the penultimate episode and in the finale. He faints and is hit by a car and is later informed that he has a congenital illness that might take his life in a matter of years. This seems forced and out of the blue, but actually it's been set up since the first two episodes. Mork has a habit of getting nosebleeds in high stress or high emotional situations (like getting horny), that at first seems like a nod to the anime trope of horny people getting a nosebleed when they see a sexy person or situation, but is later revealed to have much more serious connotations. Again however, if you're paying attention to the episodes, it is easy to understand once the big reveal of his illness is revealed in the last episode.
The two actors who headline this drama are so amazing. They also seem to have a good working relationship since this is the first of several projects in which they are paired together over the past two or three years. You'll find them in 2gether the Series, it's sequel, Blacklisted, and the followup to 'Cause You're My Boy', 'Our Skyy'. This is I believe their first series together as a pairing, but the chemistry that they have is so amazing and it shines the brightest in this story. Some claim that the acting wasn't that good, but I respectfully have to scoff at such a statement in utter disbelief. The sheer depth of the emotions that are shared between these two actors in every scene, the dialogue, their facial expressions, the tone of their voices is hard to comprehend and is magical to watch on screen. There's a reason why nearly every single followup project that they star in together has them paired as a couple. They are glorious to behold.
The production level is not the greatest admittedly, but I still rate it near a 10 because it carries a lot of the nostalgic vibes of Love Sick season 1. Unpolished a bit, rustic maybe, but super affecting and genuine. The sets don't look fake or deliberately staged, and the story truly seems like it could have actually taken place in a high school in Thailand. And the editing is much better than several other dramas that have been given higher ratings on this website which tend to have terrible transitions music wise from one scene to another, or have issues with the sound quality when transitioning from music to spoken dialogue.
Altogether, this gem of a series has cemented it's place in my mind as one of the Top 5 BL lakorns that have been produced in the last seven years. I've seen dozens of BL dramas over the last few years, but this one has a special place that few currently in existence can rise above.
It isn't as overtly melodramatic as some other lakorns out there, but it has plenty of drama, and an overload of intimacy and romance, not just for the main pairing of Mork and Tee, but also the supporting characters of Mork's baby brother and his best friend, Mork's friends from his school. I can so easily re-watch this over and over and over again and never get tired of seeing their love story come to life.
I so wish that this drama could get a second season, but I'm satisfied that at least more is explored about their relationship in the anthology series, 'Our Skyy' along with some other popular BL pairings that we know and adore. Watch this drama! You won't regret it! Never mind the naysayers, they have no clue about what they're talking about. This is a real good drama. Only the series TharnType (and it's new sequel) could rival this series in my mind.
My Rating: 10/10.
This drama deserves at least an 8.3/10 as an average rating!
On first blush, the story seems typical: Boy has a rivalry/hatred with another boy. Boy loses his girl, gets other boy to be his fake boyfriend. They fall in love, and get together for real. Sounds familiar?
The story starts off with Mork- the typical badboy whose father owns a local barbershop. He's a delinquent, sells porn and is a general menace to the class. A prank by his classmates leads to the beginning of his rivalry with his polar opposite, Tee. Tee is popular, rich, a top student, member of the Cheer team, a local idol at the school and in a relationship with a beautiful girl who is also wealthy.
A school requirement forces Tee to get his hair cut at the barbershop owned by Mork's father, Muad. His dad starts the cut but rushes out due to unexpected news, leaving Mork to mind the store. He decides to get revenge by deliberately cutting Tee's hair badly, and later on fractures Tee's relationship by his lie that Tee requested illegal gay porn DVDs.
This leads to them clashing multiple times and eventually punished by their school. They're given the task of cleaning all of the toilets in the school for a period of time. Later on, Tee returns to the barbershop and Mork's dad fixes the mess his son made of Tee's hair. Then once again, he leaves for a reason.
Up to this point, you kind of have a general idea of where the story is going. Enemies slowly become friends, becomes lovers. Again, a story we've seen multiple times right?
Wrong.
It's at this point that the story pulls an amazing plot twist that based off of the first episode and most of the second, no one would have seen coming at all. They also created the greatest Thai BL scene that has ever been produced (the only possible rival being the harrowing scene in TharnType when Type opens up to Tharn and reveals how he was sexually assaulted by one of his father's workers when he was only a small boy).
Mork is tasked with washing Tee's hair while his dad runs off to do what he needs to do. Reluctantly, Mork obeys his dad and he begins the process of washing Tee's hair. That's when the plot twist comes to light:
Tee: Why did you pretend that we didn't know each other?
Mork: It's better this way.
Tee: It's been three years...how have you been?
Mork: Shut up.
While the budding sexual attraction was a given, it turns out that the story is not of enemies becoming friends becoming lovers, but friends who were already falling in love with each other are thrown together after years apart and complete the transition from friendship to love.
I suspect that this is one of the 'plot holes' that another review on this site is referencing. If you pay attention however, the rest of the season unfolds the story of how the two leads became friends 3 years before and developed a strong friendship that was torn apart by an incident that challenged both leads' perception of their orientation and a series of misunderstandings that led to them treating each other as strangers.
Then the story really takes off as Tee, already half in love with Mork suggests that he become his fake bf in a bid to re-establish his relationship with his now ex-gf. Mork decides to do so, but their pretend relationship quickly morphs into a genuine relationship as lovers as their feelings (as well as the schemes of his brother and friend) take off.
What follows is an amazing rollercoaster of emotional highs and lows as they become lovers and deal with their parents' reactions to their relationship, their challenges as a budding couple, friends and the threat of being forced apart by circumstances beyond their control. They laugh, they cry, they face scandal and sickness and through it all, keep a hold of their love for the other.
One plot point that to some might seem contrived is the illness of Mork that seemingly manifests out of nowhere near the penultimate episode and in the finale. He faints and is hit by a car and is later informed that he has a congenital illness that might take his life in a matter of years. This seems forced and out of the blue, but actually it's been set up since the first two episodes. Mork has a habit of getting nosebleeds in high stress or high emotional situations (like getting horny), that at first seems like a nod to the anime trope of horny people getting a nosebleed when they see a sexy person or situation, but is later revealed to have much more serious connotations. Again however, if you're paying attention to the episodes, it is easy to understand once the big reveal of his illness is revealed in the last episode.
The two actors who headline this drama are so amazing. They also seem to have a good working relationship since this is the first of several projects in which they are paired together over the past two or three years. You'll find them in 2gether the Series, it's sequel, Blacklisted, and the followup to 'Cause You're My Boy', 'Our Skyy'. This is I believe their first series together as a pairing, but the chemistry that they have is so amazing and it shines the brightest in this story. Some claim that the acting wasn't that good, but I respectfully have to scoff at such a statement in utter disbelief. The sheer depth of the emotions that are shared between these two actors in every scene, the dialogue, their facial expressions, the tone of their voices is hard to comprehend and is magical to watch on screen. There's a reason why nearly every single followup project that they star in together has them paired as a couple. They are glorious to behold.
The production level is not the greatest admittedly, but I still rate it near a 10 because it carries a lot of the nostalgic vibes of Love Sick season 1. Unpolished a bit, rustic maybe, but super affecting and genuine. The sets don't look fake or deliberately staged, and the story truly seems like it could have actually taken place in a high school in Thailand. And the editing is much better than several other dramas that have been given higher ratings on this website which tend to have terrible transitions music wise from one scene to another, or have issues with the sound quality when transitioning from music to spoken dialogue.
Altogether, this gem of a series has cemented it's place in my mind as one of the Top 5 BL lakorns that have been produced in the last seven years. I've seen dozens of BL dramas over the last few years, but this one has a special place that few currently in existence can rise above.
It isn't as overtly melodramatic as some other lakorns out there, but it has plenty of drama, and an overload of intimacy and romance, not just for the main pairing of Mork and Tee, but also the supporting characters of Mork's baby brother and his best friend, Mork's friends from his school. I can so easily re-watch this over and over and over again and never get tired of seeing their love story come to life.
I so wish that this drama could get a second season, but I'm satisfied that at least more is explored about their relationship in the anthology series, 'Our Skyy' along with some other popular BL pairings that we know and adore. Watch this drama! You won't regret it! Never mind the naysayers, they have no clue about what they're talking about. This is a real good drama. Only the series TharnType (and it's new sequel) could rival this series in my mind.
My Rating: 10/10.
Was this review helpful to you?
