Reviews

I want to watch this...why?

After 2 episodes with fast-forwarding, I don't get the hook to keep me watching. It feels more like a commentary on the serving the obsessiveness for kids to test well to get into college from the Cram School's perspective vs. students/parents--which of course Sky Castle and Penthouse series have made famous. And there have been several dramas lately featuring 'famous' afterschool teachers who find love--Crazy Love, Crash Course In Romance--so if you like the apparent 'slice of life in Korea' regarding the maniac focus on grades and college entrance with a romance thrown in, keep watching.
I thought a far more compelling school based drama was 2019's Black Dog about the hurdles of an aspiring teacher to get a permanent job in the school system.

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Actors did a tremendous job portraying such complex characters. (Did not like the romance)

Ep 1: It was a rollercoaster of emotions. I started out liking Young Soon, she was such a strong woman not just physically but at the time mentally as well. It was nice to watch Young Soon & Hae Shik's romance progress into marriage. They were good to each other and Hae Shik was so damn nice. One of the reason it saddens me to see how Young Soon treated Kang Ho. She isn't wrong though, being nice did get Hae Shik killed. That doesn't excuse the trauma she inflicted on her son. Even knowing her reasons doesn't make her a good mother. As if that wasn't enough, she has to blame her son for his father getting killed? Shitty parenting, right there. That's the kind of twisted mothers that we don't need. Her mental strength in the beginning was clearly a facade that shattered with the death of her husband. I read a comment somewhere from a twisted woman that she wouldn't forgive the FL for ruining ML's exam like that. How are people so emotionally stunted? Are you going to leave your partner who has just had an accident to fend for themselves to just attend an exam that can be repeated? That's right. Exams' can be repeated, you can't treat your people like shit. People who treat you well are precious. They need to be treated the same. Overall, such a good story with depth. The FL is an interesting but silly character, but that's exactly what the poor guy needs after being treated the way he was by his mother.

Ep 2: Since the drama was highly recommended by numerous Instagram accounts, I am sure that the ML isn't a bad guy but is plotting something. The mother and child are alive somewhere, no need to be fooled by only parts of what they are showing us. Even though, I detest Young Soon, it did seem like Kang Ho was harsh on her. But you could see that even with what he was doing, he was conflicted. I'm not sure that woman ever apologized for the harm that she caused to her child. I liked that he iced her out. He is giving her everything she gave him, except for the warmth she failed to give. Mi Joo's life seems to be going in a different direction. With the way, things were left hanging about their relationship in previous episode, it was natural to assume that Kang Ho broke up with her so that he could not be swayed by things and focus on his exams. I thought she was the aunt to the children but she is actually their mother. It would have been better had the father of her children been anyone other than Kang Ho, because once he broke up with her he didn't look back.

Ep 3: Did not think that Ha Young would be like that. I didn't like her for her interaction with Mi Joo, when she acted bratty. But she seemed to liked Kang Ho, so I figured everyone has a right to move on in their life. Right now, I'm wondering why she took the decision she did. Did she figure out the reason Kang Ho was hell-bent on marrying her? Coming to the Mom, she finally behaved in a manner of that a Mom should. She finally cared for him in the right way when he was paralyzed. So much for having a new father, who didn't look into what was happening with Kang Ho once he was paralyzed. I'm sure Kang Ho was disgusted to even interact with that guy, but he probably did so seeking revenge. I'm a bit divided on how to feel about her withholding food from him to motivate him. It worked, so I'm happy that she is aiding his recovery. But there could have been other ways. She is just someone who isn't equipped to find those ways and would instead stick to her character. At least, she knows that she is a bad mom. But not all of her accepts it, because she did say that she treated him that way when he was a child was for his own good. That was a cop out.

Ep 4: Although I don't like her for how she treated her child, I'm slowly growing to respect Ha Young for who she is now. It is good to see Kang Ho play with the kids, something he rarely got to do when he was a kid. In a way, this is like a second chance for him. I though Kang Ho had broken up with Mi Jo after he missed his exam. It was surprising to see that they picked up again, especially Mi Joo being so forgiving when he left without a word. This time around, he might have broken up with her because he wanted to pursue his revenge. Mi Joo life is going downhill now, her partner stole all the money and ran away. Now, she has to climb out of that hole and also find another way to make money for her kids. The only thing I didn't like about Mi Joo was that she kept her being pregnant from him. I imagine their lives would have been better had she told him about it. But you never know, he still might have gone down the revenge path.

Ep 5: With the way their past relationship was developing, I had a feeling that Kang Ho would abandon Mi Joo in the way he did. What a cruel way to dump someone who was there for you. It would have bee better for Mi Joo to end up with Sam-Sik. He is chaotic as hell but he would have been a better choice. Kang Ho really lucked out with his accident. He's going to be forgiven by her because she feels pity for him. I do not like it, especially since he made such a selfish decision and tried to buy off her love. This is the kind of romance I avoid watching. Let's see if he does anything to make up for the hurt he is caused once he regains his memory. If not, then I'm gonna feel more sad for Mi Joo and her children.

Ep 6 & 7: I have come to realize that the Drama's name is very apt. The Good Bad Mother, although so far a lot of it was bad with some rays of Good shining through. I was pretty shocked with her decision to give up on her life. Instead, I thought she was going to get some treatment so she could live at least a while longer. But I guess she felt pushed into a corner so its hard not to feel bad for her as well. Poor Kang Ho had to see her at that moment. He must have been so scared. I feel bad for Mi Joo as well. From the way things are going, it looks like she has more empathy than the past Kang Ho deserved. She is going to soften and probably look after him when his mother dies.

Ep 8 to 10: It must have hurt Mi Joo so much to have seen Kang Ho with another woman while she was there with their children. She will forgive him, but will she ever forget the pain? I want Mi Joo and her twins to be happy. I want Kang Ho to be happy as well, but not before he makes amends. Even when he dumped her like that, she still waited for him, only to be dumped again. I hope Mi Joo gets the closure she deserves. I didn't much like Kang Ho's explanation about how he loved her too much, when the idiot never even knew that it was to fight battles together and not leaving people in the dust after you have used them.

Ep 11 to 14: What bothers me the most about this drama is that it gives out the message that its okay to treat people poorly as long as you have a reason to do it. Young Soon had a reason for being an abusive mother. Kang Ho had a reason for abandoning Mi Joo then he got together with Ha Young. Mi Joo & her mother's reason for loving men who didn't love them enough. Well they all got what they wanted so a happy ending for them.

Kudos to the cast for pulling off such a great feat. I'm off to watch "Welcome To Samdalri" because some parts of this drama reminded me of my fav's Cho Young Pil & Sam Dal. My heart needs healing from all the stress this drama put me through.

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"Song of Life"

"Dandan" is my eighth asadora thus far. I chose it because of the twin angle as well as Mikura Mana appearing in "Natsuzora," which I'm planning to watch soon. "Dandan" has a harsh score of 6.7 on MDL. To be fair, it's only been rated by eleven people but it doesn't feel very balanced. "Dandan" isn't bad; it's just not the best asadora anyone has every seen.

The premise for this asadora is basically "The Parent Trap" so it's a bit derivative. However, I enjoyed this sort of "reimagining" of the premise and it was initially what hooked me into watching it. Two girls, Megumi (Mikura Mana) and Nozomi (Mikura Kana), meet by chance as if fate is pulling them towards one another. Megumi is an ordinary high school student living in Matsue, while Nozomi is a maiko (apprentice geisha) living in Kyoto. I think both girls have interesting, realistic reactions to finding out that their twins. Some of their family members reactions may seem harsh, but I also think it's realistic from the point-of-view of Japanese culture.

Megumi initially wants to become a professional singer, but then lands on deciding to be a caretaker [i.e. looking after the elderly at retirement homes]. She moves to Kyoto to go to college and starts living with Nozomi and their mother (Ishida Hikari). Ironically, this not only knocks Nozomi off her life's course, but also the story. After a lot of badgering from Ishibashi (Yamaguchi Shogo), the girls become twin singers in the same vein as The Peanuts (if you've seen Mothra, you know them). Strangely, their time as actual singers is very short compared to the build-up. Megumi almost immediately disbands the duo as soon as it grows in the wrong direction. Nozomi tries for a while on her own, but eventually goes back to being a maiko. As such, this whole middle section of the drama ends up feeling pointless.

The last section of the drama was what they should've been doing with the whole dram in my opinion. Megumi decides to become a nurse on top of a caregiver. Her love interest, Ishibashi, also leaves music and decides to become a doctor. Nozomi goes from being a maiko to a geisha. Her love interest is her former bandmate and manager, Kota (Kuboyama Tomohiro). His earnest admiration of her and willingness to watch to support her from afar is just sweet. I would've rather watch more of this even if it had the twins being in separate cities for most of the time.

Honestly, even the singing career path had its potential. What I'm frustrated with is the noncommitment to either storyline. "Hanbun, Aoi" comes to mind since it had a similar problem, but it was able to stick the landing better in my opinion thanks to the supporting cast. "Dandan" has some lovely side characters, but two of the male characters are particularly frustrating. Additionally, while I did cry, it wasn't able to hit all of those emotional notes I love so much in the last week.

Now that I'm done complaining. I will talk about its good points. Mana and Kana are wonderful as the heroines, though I preferred Kana's Nozomi to Mana's Megumi. Both heroines are played beautifully nuanced and I loved how their facial expressions perfectly encompassed their characters feelings at any given time. The female side characters were almost all amazing. I loved them all. I particularly found the girls' grandmother (Mitsubayashi Kyoko) to be poignant at this time for me. The girls' mother (Ishida Hikari) and Megumi's mother (Suzuki Sawa) were also stand-outs. And finally, the best point of the asadora is the music. It was all so good from the theme song to all of the songs that the girls sing throughout. "Ue o Muite Aruko," "Akai Sweet Pea," "M," etc.

So, in conclusion, I would argue that "Dandan" is worth watching, especially if you're an asadora enthusiast. I probably wouldn't recommend it to a beginner because it won't hook them in immediately. I enjoyed my time with this asadora and I will be singing the music it introduced me to for a long time.

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Great Premise and Promise not delivered Upon

So you've read the summary it sounds great. You start watching and it is great, its fantastic, the FLs personality combined with her gift is endearing. The ghosts who come to visit have a lovely assortment of poignant and bittersweet tales. The ML is i troduced hes cute the chemistry is great ah thus is just great........but then of course there will be more. What "more" we get is unfortunately a total shift of focus from the FL and her stories to the ML, his tragic past, complete with murder mystery, his relationships and to a lesser extent his relationship with FL. Her story even the ghosts all play 2nd fiddle to the MLs story(s) from here on out and suddenly we have a mish mash of worn out tropes character assination and a draggy contrived resolutions Such a pity. It really lost its way.

One aspect of the story that essentially ruined it for me was the MLs back story with his ex. It was a really poor inresolved plot line that really just made the ML come across as a heartless horrible guy and his lack of any kind of empathy toward her any kind of remorse of how he treated her, he has no sympathy about how their relationship ended. It diminished him and the FL so much I couldnt root for them after that. In Ep 14 or 15 the ex gf initiates a meeting with him where she graciously accepts they are over and attempts to leave on goid terms. He just sits there saying nothing it is pathetic weak and cowardly. That waz the last straw I just dropoed it their and then because after that I could nit care for him or the FL at all. Again such bad writing ran through the drama.

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Almost wore out my fast forward button

What I liked:

1) Cui Yi Xin as Quan Quan. What an adorable little boy!! He was absolutely the highlight of the show. I didn't like his tendency to call his parents by their first names, but his interactions with them was cute.
2) The main couple, when they weren't fighting. They were sweet together, not fire chemistry, but no fish kisses.
3) We got a wedding!

Not so much:
1) Wow! So much extraneous stuff. I didn't care for the two side couples. This one went on entirely too long
2) The sleazy sexual predator males.
3) All three women seemed like they took turns "playing" their boyfriends. Stupid reasons for breakups (2nd couple), stalker (3rd couple), the FL decides arbitrarily that she doesn't want to see the ML anymore for no apparent reason, and makes him jump through hoop after hoop to try to win her over.
4) Dubbing. A couple of the ladies sounded like Minnie Mouse on helium.
5) The doctor has liked Min Hui for years, then suddenly he likes the irritating woman that has been stalking him.
6) Small, yet irritating thing. They weren't wearing their wedding rings in the scenes following the wedding.
7) He went to another country for six months to have surgery, but she didn't go?! However, their reunion was cute.
8) Way too much "we're together", "we're breaking up", we're together.

I realize I'm in the minority here, but I can't recommend this one, except for the little boy.

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Mix of variable genres with really good outcome

I'm writing this review really late, because there was no time when I finished watching the series, and then I completely forgot about it. At first I initially avoided The Sign because I wasn't in the mood for anything action-packed with a police setting, but the internet was full of edits with the main characters, so I thought I'd give it a chance. The high rating just confirmed that I should check it out.

I found out very quickly that it is not just a police story, but that it is full of fantasy elements that are very unusual for BLs (at least the ones I have seen up to that point). Overall, I haven't come across anything like this in Thai art so far, but that's probably only because I watch only a fraction of what they create.

We can meet fantasy elements in several series, but mostly it's about ghosts, time travel, and then there are a few exceptions like soul mates or a talking teddy bear, and in the new ones, the creators like to play with parallel worlds. The sign brought something completely new (for me). Not only with the story, but also with visual effects, which are not necessary for the mentioned types of fantasy.

A little research confirmed that the fantasy part was a part of Thai mythology, which really interested me. The combination of action, mystery plot, love and urban fantasy is very dangerous. It can burn really well, but also end up being very, very bad. Here, unfortunately, it was the first option.

The amazing story was made even better by the actors and their characters. Billy and Babe starred in the main roles, and sometimes Khem stole my attention. All the actors did a great job, they put exactly what was needed into their characters, enriched each scene exactly what it required and I'm not even talking about the chemistry. Billy and Babe went their separate ways, but so did the others. Friendship, devotion and on the one hand psychopathic obsession were shown as they should have been.

I liked how it all fit together. Everything was connected and together formed one big puzzle. When combining as many elements as were mixed here, it can turn out differently, but it can be seen that the creators paid attention to every detail.

However, I have some reservations about the ending. The following text may contain spoilers, so I warn you to read at your own risk. Despite what I will say now, I find the story really perfectly thought out. I didn't like Chalothon just letting Tharn go, though. Tharn appeared out of nowhere and said that someone who was downright obsessed with him and just wanted to be with him the whole time just said he was going to heal him and let him go? It does not make sense. Chalothorn would never behave like this. I have a theory (unconfirmed yet, but I hope the special won't disprove it) that Tharn killed him and told Phaya something completely different. It's the only explanation for the ending that comes to mind in my eyes.

As I said before, regardless of this small detail, for which there is an explanation, it is just doubtful whether the explanation will be part of the plot, it is really well done. The first trailers for the new projects have already been published, so I'm very excited because I saw something similar between them and I'm glad that BL production decided to work with such a type. I hope that they will not overdo it and that they will choose only good projects.

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What Can You See..?

This story is truly one of a kind, heartfelt, bittersweet, and gut wrenching. Watching each case as it unfolded was truly mesmerizing! This was a nice, subdued role for some of the actors cast in this show which gave the story itself a big spot to shine.

This story wasn't fast or slow paced, it was really exciting to watch how evenly each episode was as it built up to the final episodes. Fair warning, I watched this series with the last five episodes not subbed, so while I do understand the bare minimum of Japanese, it was a little tricky to fully understand. Though nothing was too confusing or inexplicable really. The music was really beautiful and fueled my need for wanting to continue watching. Even without subtitles, I am really very glad that I continued watching Natsume Emi's story.

I feel like this show may be a bit more philosophical than mystery in genre; though the detective's cases were interesting and a few were impossible to figure out. The cast for each episode was extraordinary, especially the last 2 or 3 episodes. Though that may just be my bias since I really like Kubota Masataka. Also, if you want to watch this show specifically for a certain actor, then that may be okay, too; depending on who it is. Every person cast got their moment in the spotlight, so it never really felt like there was ONLY ONE main character.

If you like detective, slice-of-life, family centered, criminal, about 40% (or 45% i can't really decide) thriller, roller coaster of emotions stories then give this show a chance!

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Why are women portrayed as...

I don't understand why women are portrayed and conniving, evil, shallow people in so many Thai BLs. That is what ruined the Thai version of Why R U.

In Together With Me the women are loud, rude, manipulative and always out for themselves. Is this to make the men look better since this is a BL?

I liked the main characters - good chemistry. Good story development. Good cast - they got along well. The pacing is on point too.

I do appreciate that at least in this drama - there are some normal people who are part of the story. They offer some foundation to the series and some of the characters.

I still liked it but, it could have been so much better.

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Short, dark, left me wanting more

This is a really good slightly dark, depiction of the slightly twisted mind of the broken teen, and while I admit it does have a moment or two of healing (my old nemesis), it idd not take away from the dark humour, the lovely lead and the brilliant use of umbrellas.

One of those dramas that gets to the points without waisting to much time, keeps you on your toes and while it is in no way incomplete, I still would mind another episode or two for ore couple time as well as the granny and unnie. I really wanted more of those two, a soin off or second season... anything goes.

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Absolute comfort show

To start, I love this show, it's become such a comfort watch for me, so what I say in this review, I say with love.

Don't go into this expecting a "good" show. The acting, other than the main couple, is pretty bad. The story makes no sense and it's really just a bunch of tropes with light-hearted music playing in the background. HOWEVER, the main couple are very cute together (sickeningly so) and the show is just sweet and funny nothing particularly bad ever happens which just make this show so easy to watch. I can just turn my brain off for 20 mins and enjoy the rose-tinted world that is Be Loved in House.

Make sure to go in with the right expectations, this is not a show to be taken seriously, just enjoyed.

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delightful characters but not delightful plot

Overall: we've seen this plot device in numerous specials but I enjoyed seeing the characters again. Aired on GagaOOLala https://www.gagaoolala.com/en/videos/3342/our-dining-table-spin-off-2023 My review of the series https://mydramalist.com/profile/blcompilations/reviews/268835

What I Liked
- the supportive dad and that he gave them space in the hot spring
- Tane
- a couple sweet moments

Room For Improvement
- the premise/poor communication is a tired cliche in special episodes, wanted to see them growing more as a couple and a bunch of fluff

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