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Oh my god…
Spoiler-free until warning at the last paragraph.A lot of characters in this one! In the end I didn’t mind too much but I was happy to see them more or less go away in the second part, whether that was entirely due to covid or not I don’t know but that was fine with me.
Fighter and Tutor - First of all, Zee is UNREAL in this. Saint’s acting is also superb. I honestly have no words for how much I adored Zee, the way he looks positively devastated by Tutor is like crack to me, his face when he’s afraid of going too far with Tutor kills me in the best way possible; and Tutor, who’s usually so cute and innocent looking becoming so strong and confident in their more intimate moments is absolutely mesmerizing.
These two not only lived up to all the hype but exceeded all of my expectations. They love each other so much, just seeing them stare lovingly at one another makes me cry.
Saifah and Zon - Just me who’s very disturbed by the fact that Zon’s sister is writing about his love life? That’s too weird… Anyway, these two are cute for sure and I enjoyed their story but Saifah said it best, so much back and forth. Make your mind up, Zon, please… They do have an adorable height difference going for them. Also, Zon really is adorable once he loosens up a bit.
Japan and Tanthai - I liked these guys! Not too much focus and just cute enough that I didn’t even mind that they’re pretty useless otherwise.
Blue, Dew, and Champ - Unclear ending but uh… anyone really rooting for Dew?? Not me… The heck… I’m underwhelmed that Nat and Max seem to have been paired up, the chemistry for me absolutely was between Nat and Mark but maybe I’ll like them in something else, who knows.
Spoilers ahead!
I was disappointed not to hear Tutor apologize about what he said but then again we didn’t see Fighter apologizing for what he did either. Speaking of, I see how that scene could be seen as problematic but even as the audience, I thought Tutor was giving in as in: "this is who I want, screw his dad," and it’s also clear Fighter wouldn’t have gone too far so I didn’t mind it too much. I was more sad to see them fighting rather violently when they’d been so gentle with each other up until then.
A highlight for me were the flashbacks of Fighter falling in love from the start. That broke me. Zee’s acting in that scene is so perfect.
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Relationships without any relations . . .
Prepapon:NO SPOILERS
Plenty unnecessary pairings (who were these football guys really?), shallow story (forced drama in the main paring, unfinished plot threads), one episode feels like a big, over 40-minutes-long commercial (ep 10) BUT I must admit, I had a really good laugh. A person responsible for the sound effects must really love their job. Or actor playing drums on Hwahwa's birthday party - pure beauty.
Few things I don't like - there were maybe 3 scenes with some form of harassment and they are left without any comment. Maybe I shouldn't pay attention to that now, because it seems to be recurring motif in these dramas.
Overall, I recommend watching while drunk. Much fun. (besides final episodes - they're quite boring)
Grellina:
SPOILERS
This is a story about relationships without any relations. We have two main parings. Tutor and Fighter. Saifah and Zon. First paring is about Tutor who is a tutor in real life, giving English lessons for other students. We get to know he is a "poor person" and has some money issues. He needs to work in 2 separate jobs to be able to pay debt. His parents are alive but we know absolutely nothing about them for whole series. They work somewhere to pay these debts. We don't know the cause of these debts and we will never know to the rest of the series. But Tutor HAS 1.5 MILLION BAHT debt. We don't know why, we don't know from where, we don't know by who.
So u should think he is living in very bad shape house. To save as much money as possible. But when u see "condo" he lives in u realize its not so bad as it should be. Moreover he is living in very expensive, luxury home XD But he does not have a car. So I guess that makes him poor.
Another thing what is absolutely terrible about the series is we know nothing about relations between tutor and his parents and fighter with his mother. There is completely nothing. We just get to know that tutor is lonely because he has no relatives next to him.
Another thing is Tutor and Fighter. They have no relations. Their story starts with hating each other. We don't know why and we will never know. But they literally can't even look at each other for some mysterious reason xD And after that Tutor is being stalked by Fighter all the time. Wherever Tutor works or is, Fighter is there to "help him" somehow. And this help mostly contains money. Fighter spends a lot of money to get to Tutor. And it successes XD After they "fall in love" with each other he pays for very expensive hotel and a travel.
And the most problem is not even this "pay to win" relation. The most problem: there is no relations between them at all. They never talk. If they talk is only love dovey bullshit how much they love each other and how much they are protective over their "ownings". There are no real honest full of feelings and emotions conversations. They dont talk about their problems. They dont talk about the issues they had with their relatives. No word about Tutor feeling lonely, parents leaving him behind. No word about Fighter without mother, having incomprehension problem with father. NO A SINGLE CONVERSATION. They are not close to each other. They are not supportive to each other. They just live their full lives spending money of Fighter's father, I suppose. Because we dont know from where Fighter takes the money. We dont know why he had these 1.5 million Bahts. And didnt have a problem to spend it all in one second. And also there is no a single word about Fighter working somewhere.
I would say relation Tutor - Fighter is just a physical thing. They are attractive to each other and Fighter can pay for everything. And Tutor has no problem. Although he has said that he will try to give back these 1.5 million baht once. But everything ended there. No more problem with spending money on him.
At least series is very light and u can relax watching it I guess. Producers didnt mean to make it serious. So we should take all what happened there casually.
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Why are you? Is it because of love?
Warning: this is the first review I'm writing on MDL and I have no idea if I'm doing it right. It will most likely be quite long since I have a habit of elaborating my thoughts thoroughly, so bear with me :)Where to begin... This drama gave me a real headache because I had to watch it twice to fully understand what it is about and how to rate it. I'm a fairly new casual watcher of BL and I'm evaluating BL dramas according to the same criteria I use for any other drama (more specifically - eye candies and steamy scenes have no impact on my judgement). With that in mind, I think it's fortunate that I've already seen several BLs (university and other) before watching this since I got familiar with the BL concept and usual tropes. If this had been my first BL drama, I would have probably considered it a complete nonsense - which it isn't. Far from it.
I read a lot of other reviews and I saw many people complaining about the lack of plot or a poorly developed storyline. They are 100% right - there is no actual plot here. All this drama has is an idea, which could have turned out as a masterpiece if only it had a better execution. Speaking of the execution, it's horrendous. It's full of repetitive dialogue, poor directing and sloppy editing. Pacing is changing constantly. Scenes are either too long or too short. All of that makes it really hard to recognize what this drama is trying to do. And it's actually trying to throw all BL tropes out of the window.
STORY
So, what do we have here? At the (very confusing) beginning we are introduced to four characters: Tutor, Fighter, Zon and Saifah. They are all university students (of course). The setting is as exaggerated as possible - there are 10 BL couples (it's not really 10 but feels like it), every girl is a fujoshi and everyone is obsessed with BL teasing, hinting and shipping. There's no need to bother memorizing and differentiating between numerous side characters because they are in fact irrelevant. None of them has a distinctive personality and they only serve as the background. Zon is the narrator of this story and an indicator of its self-awareness. He knows he is in a BL novel, paired with Saifah, and he is desperately trying to avoid his inevitable fate - which is really funny at times. Their characters and dynamics are totally typical for a BL. Development of their relationship consists of one cliché scene after the other. They have no real depth and they fall in love because they are supposed to, just like the rest of side characters.
And in the middle of all that, we have Tutor and Fighter. Their story and their characters don't belong here, they are in a completely different genre - a soap opera (as they said it themselves) with a typical rich/poor romance... but not exactly. Cliché, but somehow opposite of it at the same time. This is where the creativity of writing shows, despite overall being incredibly messy. We get to follow the progress of two relationships (Tutor/Fighter and Zon/Saifah) with almost the same scenes (first meeting, getting into conflict, rain, studying together, kissing, meeting the family, nursing etc.) but handled in a polar opposite manner. In a universe where everyone is rooting for BL couples, Tutor and Fighter are questioning their feelings and wondering if they are doing the right thing. Within their story, several problems of LGBTQ+ community are addressed. It's a well developed relationship between two equal individuals, intentionally placed in an unrealistic setting. That stark contrast is not an inconsistency or a flaw, it's the whole point of this drama.
ACTING
Acting was overall very good, with Zee being a real standout. He doesn't have to say a single word to express his thoughts and feelings, his eyes are saying it all. Natural talent. I genuinely enjoyed watching his facial expressions. Saint also did a great job with his overly melodramatic character. And their chemistry - it's seriously something. They didn't need all those steamy scenes to be convincing, in fact they didn't even need a single kiss. I lowkey wish they had a chance to work together in a drama with a strong plot, like Manner of Death. Tommy and Jimmy also did well in their respective roles, although they weren't given much to work with. Same goes for the rest of the cast.
MUSIC
I liked the songs, they were all really nice. Sound effects were a bit overused but they fit the vibe of the drama.
REWATCH VALUE
Tutor/Fighter parts are highly rewatchable (all of them, not just the beach scenes haha). The rest - not so much.
OVERALL RATING
This is objectively a 7.5 drama at best - it's hard to give more to something with a nonexistent plot and a bad execution. Still, I'm giving it 8.5 although it's generous, just because I appreciate what it wanted to be.
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-TutorFighter story is the center of all and other couple have just a little bit of screen time and there was so many couple, I just don't understand why they introduced us so many characters if half of the time we only see the main (not kidding, they have all the screen time from the middle to the end) and we wonder what happened to the others, even the second lead is left behind.
-It's gonna be extremely long if the main couple isn't your favorite
-Another reason why it's dragged on for some people is because the story isn't original, the novel thing wasn't really my thing but at least it changed from other stories but it's just the starting point (plus we understand quite easily it's not real) and it's the overviewed enemies to lover story
(-some scenes seemed forced because too cheesy but this point is subjective)
There is still some positive points though:
-The chemistry is good most of the time
-Love scenes work really well because of that
-Tutor is a teasy bottom wich I had never seen and Saint is perfect in this role. If there is a reason to watch this series, it's his perfect interpretation.
-The drawing effect is quite pretty
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Cringe & All Over The Place
I watched the Korean remake first and wasn’t planning on watching this one since I heard it wasn’t good but I liked the Korean remake so I wanted to watch more. Therefore I gave this one a try, at first it was okay, I was able to watch it pretty decently, sometimes it was hard to continue because of how cringe the characters were (mainly Zon) and just how boring the whole storyline was in general. The only reason I kept going was because of the relationship between Tutor and Fighter but after they went on their beach vacation that was enough for me to fully get bored, because there was nothing for me to be excited for anymore and since I’ve watched many BL’s I can guess what’s gonna happen in the last 3 episodes I skipped and decided to drop. Therefore I didn’t even finish the show because I won’t sit for 1 hour and 5 min to just watch some cringe content and arguments form. I don’t want to compare this one to the Korean one because at the end of the day this is the OG, but I think the main reason why I liked the Korean one better was because it was short and simple. The story was told fast and with the perfect amount of information we needed for context and that’s it. I really hate long shows and BL’s but some are worth watching every minute of it. This one on the other hand. Wasn’t the best. Was it the worst? No. But could’ve been better. Also I watched “Peach Of Time” before this show and seeing Zafiah and Zon together as a couple just seems wrong to me since I saw them having more of a friendship/brotherly bond rather than a relationship bond. But they’re actors so ofc they’re gonna have different roles and I’m sure they’ve acted in multiple shows together. But I just wasn’t used to it. Anyway, if you like lengthy quirky shows with some cringe in it, then this is for you, if not then I wouldn’t reccomend.Was this review helpful to you?
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Sweet and Fun
I really enjoyed the series a lot. It had great chemistry and character growth. It had my emotions all over the place from crying to happy. There was so much going on with different characters but it kept a great story going. The two lead couples both had their time to shine and I love that each couple's story showed them all growing with time. There were many happy and sad moments but they were great to see happen and grow from. The cast was amazing in pairing together the leads and the side couples were all so much fun. Over all this was a totally fun series to watch play out. Love the intimate moments as well and a great ending together.Was this review helpful to you?
I do wish that there were more focus on some of the smaller couples as well, as I saw potential in each of them, but in reality, many of the couples could've been omitted from the main series, to create a smoother and less confusing show. These couples were somewhat just thrown in to simply add more couples, which is fine if you're able to convey their arcs in a good way, which sadly Why R U did not manage to do. The stories were nice, but cut way too short, giving the viewer a difficult time to fully enjoy the couples. One was suddenly rushed due to them not having screen time for the majority of the last episodes, and another one just seemed to suddenly disappear and show up again in the last episode. Honestly, these couples weren't needed, the show could've been just fine with its main focus being on only FTTT and Saizon.
With that being said, the acting was really nice. The weakest actor of the main 4 comes from Jimmy who played Saifah imo. He was not bad as per se, but he was also nowhere near as good as either Saint (Tutor) or/and Zee (Fighter). The reason why Tommy wasn't mentioned next to those two, is because he lays on the 2nd place on my list, with Saint and Zee having a shared 1st, he did great at portraying the character that Zon was. His face was full of great expressions but there were times where he lacked, but both Tommy and Jimmy are getting there, so just give them a few more acting jobs and they'll be able to seal the deal.
Saint is great as always. I've only ever seen him in Love By Chance, and although I see similarities in both Pete and Tutor, Tutor is definitely a much more outspoken character, and it was nice to see Saint play someone whose personality is close to his irl persona.
As for Zee, it was my first experience with him and he did great. His eyes said tons and oof you can't forget his crying in ep 12, that shit hurt. I'll make sure to keep my eye out for him in the future.
I can't really say much about the other actors, as I don't personally think they got enough time to show off their potential.
Despite the unfairness of the screentime, this show was still enjoyable. The abundance of FTTT made me miss Saizon tons, and the fulfillment was great when they finally got their screentime. I can't wait for their special.
The plot tho, if you ommit FTTT and Saizon's main arcs, was messy. What happened to Zon's sister? Her role was much larger in the beginning but she suddenly disappeared. Also, Hwahwa moved on so damn fast, it was pretty funny ngl. But the way they showed Day, in the beginning, made me believe that their storyline would be more fulfilling, but everything happened so fast and suddenly they were out of the picture, which was sad as I would've loved to see their development better.
To conclude,
Why R U is an entertaining show if you don't take it too seriously. Ignore the messiness of the side plots and the unbalanced screentime and you'll get two great relationships to follow. The chemistry is great and the kiss scenes are there in an abundance (FTTT, I'm looking at you). Stay for the chemistry and not the structure and you'll be sure to have a great time.
And tbh, despite not liking the theme song, I jam to it everyday.
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why r u... why r u... why r u...this bl is not "good," but sometimes things that are not good still have the power to drive us absolutely insane. i loved the characters. loved them! as i go about my day, i still think about them, which is a sign of strong writing. the editing, the cast, the music, the editing were all great... that being said...
the episodes that came out before CO-VID 19 are good. actually, they're great. if they kept up that level of quality, why r u? could be my favorite bl. the setting is familiar, students at university, but the premise (at least for zon's character) is unique. he has premonitions of being in a relationship with his acquiescence, saifah, and his twin sister, zol, writes gay fanfiction about them on the internet. the premise of zon's sister writing gay fanfiction about him and saifah creeped me out at first, but odd as it sounds, i eventually grew to enjoy it. after all, if zon can see into the future, and they're twins, can't i conclude she has the same abilities? once i started seeing them as psychic twins, i found the idea of her turning her gay premonitions about her brother's love life into fiction funny. she is adorable, and i missed her character when she was gone!
saifah and zon are adorable and hilarious. once tutor and fighter get together, they are so into each other it's sickening, and they have the hottest makeout/sex scenes i've seen in bl. i was literally mystified by them, and by saint (actor who plays tutor), as a whole. outside of their respective pairings, zon and tutor have a cute, supportive friendship. tutor has a gay boss who supports his relationship with fighter, which i love to see. the three other side couples (1 het, 2 gay) were a little boring, but cute!
however, after CO-VID 19, why r u? turns into the tutor/fighter show, with saifah and zon appearing for a few minutes an episode, if at all. even then, their scenes together seem incomplete. it's a huge letdown, when they seemed to be the main couple...
obviously, why r u? had some production issues it couldn't help, which will leave you angry and disappointed. the end feels rushed, and leaves interesting plot points unresolved. i think it could potentially be redeemed with a season 2, or a re-edit, if the cast were able to get together later and refilm.
SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT:
why r u? becoming the tutor/fighter show would have been fine, if not for their awful break up melodrama. tutor and fighter's dad meddles in their relationship, and the pressure makes tutor break up with fighter. it's during this arc fighter assaults tutor. it doesn't go beyond kissing, but it's still extremely upsetting to watch. even more upsetting, they get back together soon after, and fighter's dad is magically no longer homophobic...
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This can be so frustrating...
This one can be very frustrating. What they do for comedy just doesn't make sense. And, the things they do to each other - can be cruel sometimes yet, they all act like it is normal everyday stuff. Zon's sister is awful. Apparently, the series must have had some serious blowback due to what she did and they wrote the new Sai-Zon episodes to make her look like she wasn't as bad as we saw for 14 episodes. And, how Zon's friends - talk about him to get Sai-Zon back together proves my point about how worthless they are.Girls/family members using real names in fiction just to get popular? Girls ruining reputations for their own selfish pleasure? Shipping innocent people together for their own entertainment and then, embarrassing them into an event so, they don't look bad?
The most evil characters - consistently, in this entire drama are the women. No matter what they say and do later - it never erases the pain they caused to everyone involved. The shipping pair simply celebrate that they used people for their own benefit. At least you could understand the father of Fight, he ended up having to face his son and realize the damage he had caused over the previous years to his own family.
It took more episodes than it should have but, the real stories finally started to weed out the lesser characters (and that is a good thing). Half way through - and it finally pulled itself together.
I finished this because the casting/acting is acceptable though, so many scenes have you wondering if this is really a university or, if there is too much lead in the water. Really bad directing - first timer? Or, just bad at directing? The writers should have been penalized for the red flag incidents they created for viewing pleasure and then, glossed them over by simply leaving those characters out later or, not even mentioning the pain they caused.
Thank goodness the production doesn't understand how to do the product placement stuff. You see it but, you never know what they are drinking or, if they even like it. A breath of fresh air on that note. I just finished one where the episode would end early just so they could do a several minute long in character commercial for a wireless carrier. When they got to the make up - it was more apparent but, never overly done. Again, a breath of fresh air.
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this show is a mess and I still enjoyed it because I was isolated and depressed
Story: I did like the original idea of the story, especially the surreal/supernatural aspect; sadly, the show didn't go all in. At first, it seemed to be dancing around the question "Is this happening because of Zol's fanfictions or because it's just life?" And after a few episodes, it was dropped entirely and only brought up again when it was convenient. I don't know how much they had to cut short and/or change because of COVID, but you could feel something was missing. Aside from that, there was way too much going on. We don't need like 4 (?) couples in a show. Especially if those couples aren't even given the necessary screen time or like a coherent storyline that accomplishes something. They felt very out of place and pulled you out of the moment. We definitely didn't need the cat couple. You could've cut them out, and literally, nothing would've changed. And I'm choosing not to talk about the things that upset me about Dew/Champ/Blue because I do not condone the bullying and how they just glossed over it and made Blue get together with Dew at the end (also the rl age difference wasn't doing the story any favor).This show also has all these problematic things that I apparently chose to forget while watching it the first time and only remembered after rewatching a few episodes. Like all these very over-the-top support characters and, just in general, the amount of slapstick sound effects and cringy moments.
And the more I think about the 'Zol writing fanfiction thing', the more it bugs me. Zol writing fanfictions isn't the issues here, it's totally okay if she does that. But she is writing fanfictions about people in real life... (I mean, I guess she asked *some of them* for their permission sometimes?? Which is like the bare minimum but still). About Her Own Brother... And nobody...not a single soul found that at least a little bit weird??? Right.
Also, not to mention how effed up the whole Fighter/Tutor/Hwahwa situation is... This show tries to paint Tutor as a great friend who is a great friend and an angel but all the while he's in his room having a hot make-out session with his best friend's boyfriend.
Acting/Cast: It was fascinating to see Saint in a role that was so different from his previous one (Pete in Love By Chance). For the others, I have to say that I adored Jimmy and Tommy's chemistry, which had a very innocent and sweet vibe and managed to carry the over-the-top comedic duo into a semi-serious relationship. Zee and Saint had fantastic chemistry as well. The producers hit the nail on the head with them. Perfect choice.
Music: Actually, I've watched this show like two years ago, and I don't remember a single song or background music that impacted me in any way, so I can't say anything about it... which isn't a good thing; I guess? But also not super bad because bad and annoying music stick with me as well. So, I think the music was meh. But what I do remember is the absolute insane amount of slapstick soundeffects, they were driving me nuts. At some point I turned the volume off.
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