So Much in Love (2020)

UHHHH

Ok, so in all honesty I have no idea how I finished this show. It was a struggle, no lie! Watching it on LineTV there's a few spots in each episode that aren't subbed, but I assure you it's not enough to miss out on anything. Moving on... I gave it a shot since most of the cast were new actors and my ratings isn't caused by their acting, but by the awful storyline. The plot was a hot mess! I mean scattered and smothered all over the place. I legit skipped a good portion and I know for a fact I didn't miss much. The ONLY thing that helped me get by were the sex scenes(no shame)and they were few and far between. The actors were attractive af but that only gets you so far. I wish them all luck in their acting careers but I gotta say....My re-watch value is ZERO but I might consider recommending to my enemy.

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Ok, so it is not good but...it's not bad

So I read several reviews before I watched and I totally understand the perspective. I will say though that once you get to ep 7/8 I think the story really picks up. The first couple of episodes are an utter mess and you have no idea what is going on and it is not even because of missing or poor subtitling. There were just too many stories to try and organize at the beginning that was intended to bring the viewers in but it just caused a mess.

Once the individual plots start to develop and unravel it gets more interesting. The undertone in the story especially around North's mother and her irrational behavior and thinking, especially with the volleyball team is the driving force in the drama. I also especially like that there were no gay panic moments. There are four couples (well 5) and at no point does anyone do the I need to hide our relationship or freak out because they realize they like another man. The seemingly unconditional support of the trans characters. The side couples stories could have been more developed and because they were you were kind of like why are you here and then you remember it is for the sex scenes.

There were a number of moments that just were pointless and someone unresolved like the drug addicted boyfriend and the lesbian couple. There is one major story that just kind of ends without telling a major point. *Spoiler start* How can you show the sister get murdered and then never address that fact especially when she could literally tell you who did it? *Spoiler end*

Some of the VA side scenes were funny and made you like the actors more which drew you into their characters a bit more.

This had a lot of potential, but I'd say watch for the MC and if you want the sex scenes (especially Mai & Wan) you can fast forward through everything else

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It's not that great but it has a decent story

Assessment? Not great.

Quick thoughts:The Eng Subs are really bad. It’s as near to google translate as makes no difference. If you don’t understand enough Thai to at least self correct pronouns in your head as you watch, it will be difficult to follow.

The plot, however, is pretty decent. Or at least THERE, which isn’t always the case in Thai BL. It revolves around two sports teams (Volleyball & Swimming) at an “institute” which I guess is a boarding high school or junior college of some kind.

Main Couple Plot:
Ongsah is a super introverted new transfer student on a swimming scholarship. He meets a ghost who’s haunting the locker room, North. North recently drowned and his backstory, friends, and family guide the rest of the story. His friends don’t know where he is. His mom is the principal of the institute and very suspicious. His body is nowhere to be found. Ongsah is on his own trying to figure out what happened to North and why. Meanwhile, the two boys meet up every night and slowly fall in love. (Slow burn, low heat.)

Don’t worry it all ends happily. This arc is actually really solid and the leads have good chemistry and are decent actors. The denouement happens halfway through with Ongsah figuring everything out. And then there’s a nice twist and this couple’s narrative bisects with the overarching sports homophobia plot in a very clever way.

If you like He’s Coming To Me, you’ll like this take on a ghost theme.

Overarching Plot:
Meanwhile, North’s mother the principal of the institute is a crazy homophobe and is trying everything she can to shut down the volleyball team because there are too many queers. The queer rep in this story is actually really decent, and the femme and trans characters are not played for laughs, nor are they jokes of the narrative, nor are they depicted as predatory. So, that's different. The homophobia as a plot devise is a bit ham handed and tired, though.

B Plot:
There is a second ghost and a second investigation conducted by senior students Jedi and Indy. Jedi and Indy used to be close but something caused them to become enemies. They follow an enemies to lovers arc. This pair is okay, but not much chemistry, medium heat level.

B Plot:
Wan and Mai have been dating, sort of, for a while. Wan is North’s best friend. This couple seems to exist in the narrative only to provide a high heat level. It’s pretty awkward and shoehorned in. Mai is also on the swim team. They don't really have an arc.

B Plot
Arm and Ten are best friends and roommates. Arm has been trying to get together with Ten for ages. They are the defacto leaders of the volleyball team since North is gone. They have a cat and mouse friends to lovers thing going on, and I really like that Ten is playing an out gay femme character, and Arm is REALLY excited and into that aspect of him. (Reminds me a bit of Yok and Mo from Make It Right 2). They’re cute, but never really get together.

Final Thoughts
Aside from the main couple, the acting is awkward across the board, the heat levels extremely uneven, and there are too many superfluous characters. The eng subs are abysmal so I can’t judge the script. However, the plot was decent. Finally, the actor playing North had a really long pinky nail which I kinda hyper-fixated on. (I spend too much time worrying about what this industry does to younger actors ANYWAY, throw possible drug use in and I just... can’t.)

If you’re a huge fan of Make It Right, you might like this one. Or if you really like a high school-ish narrative and/or He’s Coming to Me.

Otherwise you can probably give it a pass.

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This wasn't it for me

I'm sorry, but this wasn't it at all for me. I don't even know how I managed to finish this series, but I did. They were SOOOO much things wrong with this series.

Story-4/10
I am only giving this score due to the MC. Thier story I was able to follow from beginning to the end and yes, even with the atrocious subs. Half way through I was also able to grasp the storyline of Jedi and Indy. These two couples storyline was unique with the mixing of a ghost story. But, it wasn't able to be portrayed in a good way in the writing of this series. The rest- I have NO clue what thier storyline was and also what was the point of them in this series. Like, really?! No amount of make out scenes with the secondary couples saved this series for me, cause I STILL DON'T KNOW WHAT THIER POINT IN THE SERIES WAS?!

Acting/Cast-4/10
Again, only for the MC. All of thier acting may suck, but I still favoured the MC.

Music-6/10
It was actually okay- maybe can even be said one of the two only good things about this series (the next being the MC).

Rewatch Value-1/10
Why? Because I can't give it a zero or a half. There is no way that I will watch this series again.

Overall-4/10
This series had such a unique storyline and it is unfortunate that it didn't live up to the potential that I thought that it could. I would not recommend this series to anyone.

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The beginning was worst, then it started to be quite well...

At first I thought I won't write review about this series because the beginning was so complicated and confused... Actually I wasn't sure shall I watch it at all. But I watched it to the end (I'm happy that I finished it)... The storyline was confused at times but I figured out that (so proud). I watched the episodes from dramacool and the subtitles were... horrible. There wasn't all lines and sometimes not them at all or the timing was towards trees... If the subtitles had been better, the whole series could have been much better, I think. I loved these bed scenes ;) The actors were good too. Maybe sometimes a little too cheesy, but it's not a big deal. This ghost/spirit thing was quite unique and I liked it, only that bad subtitles made it hard to watch and realize some things... I don't know is this worth to watch (because the friking subtitles), but I liked :))

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Embarrassing to Say the Least

Plot Summary:
North some how falls into a coma (we think he is dead) after getting into a fight with his mom and jumping in a pool which we later see he is tall enough to stand on. After falling into a coma, he becomes a ghost that only Ongash can see. The two start to develop feelings for one another. We find out that North's mom is the principal of their school and she does not want the volleyball team anymore because there are trans individuals on the team. We have a bunch of gay side characters whose stories are irrelevant to the story. We find out North wakes up from his coma with amnesia and has to figure out how to stop his mother who is hellbent on getting rid of the gays and trans folks from her school because North's father left her for a man, and she doesn't want her son to become like his dad...In the end, she has a change of heart when she loses both of her sons because of her behavior, and then we get 2 happy ending episodes where everyone apologizes for acting stupid, and all is forgiven...

Review:
I have mixed feelings about the acting. I think it's admirable to hire and employ actors that might actually be trans and gay. Too many times in BL dramas, the actors are completely straight, and so they don't really give off the vibe that they actually might be gay. So I liked that I felt that. However, please invest in acting classes for them. I don't know who taught them to nod while other people are talking. Although we might do that in real life, I'm pretty sure we don't incessantly nod while others talk, it becomes distracting. Probably the two actors with most potential: Ongash and North and their story isn't even hashed out.

Whoever edited this show did a horrible job. Sometimes you can tell the voices were re-recorded post production but the video shows the character's mouth moving and saying other things.

I wish they would give more of these actors acting glasses because some of them did seem like they could identify as LGBTQ+ and I would love to have more representation in media.

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Begins confusing and english subs are not great

When North suffers an accident in the pool after arguing with his mother, Director Wadi, his soul is permanently trapped there. Wan, his best friend, had warned him of the risk of over training and having a cramp while swimming. Now it is rumored that there is a ghost in the place, and Ongsah, a new student who practices swimming, will be able to know very well this being that roams the pool.
Wan does not forgive that Mai left without saying goodbye to him and North three years ago, as they were an inseparable trio. Now that he's back, Wan just doesn't want to be around Mai, until a night of fun and booze makes the couple reconcile, but this time they'll be more than just friends.
Jedi and Indy stopped sharing a room because they began to develop feelings that go beyond companionship. Although Indy is very clear about his feelings towards Jade, the latter is confused by what is happening, and sometimes he gets carried away by the situations and Indy's affection, but at other times he is suspicious of how close his ex-partner wants to be of room.
Arm and Ten are best friends, but when Arm's mother asks him to meet someone, Arm refuses and asks Ten to pretend to be her boyfriend in front of his mother. The relationship between these two boys has always gone beyond a good friendship, and although Ten refuses Arm's request, deep down he has more feelings for his friend than he wants to accept.
Phi is very much in love with her boyfriend Thun, but she can't help but question their relationship when she remembers that Thun has serious drug problems that make him disappear for weeks on end, so she must ask her friends for help to find the boy she loves, though sometimes you have to find it in a sorry state.
Oam and Paul are coaches of the academy volleyball team, but director Wadi wants to close it because there are boys with different sexual tastes, something that she does not accept. It is when the members of the club begin to fight so that this does not happen led by their coaches, causing Oam and Paul to have to work together and begin to feel that they are more than just colleagues.

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13 Episodes of what?

This series is very confusing and seems to be all over the place. The ghost aspect is not too realistic. The story line seems to be all over the place, or maybe it's just the subtitles. It's pretty long and not much happens. I really couldn't tell if this was supposed to have a serious or humorous tone. The acting isn't very good either. Honestly the shows one redeeming quality is the bl make out scenes which are better than most bl's, even though the depth of the boys feeling for eah other is missing from other scenes.

I don't really think I will ever rewatch this series.

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Better the second time.

So I initally dropped it the first go because it wasn't making sense to me and the subtitles were missing in a lot of the scenes. This time around they were still missing lol but I immersed myself in the facial expressions and what was happening within the scene at those times. From what I was able to get of the story I slowly started to enjoy around half way through. Much lessons to learn within the story.

Production of course be 100% better on every level. The audio was buggy at times and I found some of the shots weird with how they were framed.

The acting was good, not great but not horrible either. At least of the couples that had the most screentime in my opinion anyways. I felt chemistry when there needed to be.

Would I recommend? Yes if you're bored and want something new to watch.

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this was great, if u only consider North and Ongsah, they were the cream of the crop, they made this drama from the start and cause of them i pulled through no matter how ruff and annoying it got - everyone else (all the moronic unrealistic "filler" side stories fell to the side lines) Ongsah + North made this worth the headache to figure out what was going on. they were a class act to the end and even their "coming together" was lovely and fitting for a BL romantic conclusion -

the rest was a mess - each so called couple was a bad parody of what couples r, load of stories and scene went nowhere, if this focused on one or two instead of branching off every which way, just to fill each episode. this would've been less of a mess to view.

Jedi and Indy couple were a joke - all cause of his sisters death that went nowhere - she was murdered but that not important as long as we got them making out?? same with Arm and Ten even more of bad joke - what was the point of them? other then just character's to gossip about Ongsah and North, follow Indy on his ghost hunt - what was the point of them? But the worse by far Wan and Mai - that pairing felt abusive, exploitative and a very bad stereotyping about what gay guys r all about - i.e. horny animals - all of the time, Wan looked like he was being forced into something he didn't want and then just going along with the more aggressive, dominant, sexually manipulative Mai - as if it wasn't enough that these two started out after being blind drunk - they had to end with drugs - again? that was funny? cute? sweet?? this was sick - considering the actors ages even more so...

whatever - not a rewatch and bummer - cause won't suffer the others just to watch Ongsah and North. btw his mother and Ken's weird connection turned out to be nothing - aish like i said a lot of carp cluttering the main really sweet story - sad

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Lots of potential but was blemished by subtitle issues

I think most of the other reviews are pretty accurate. There is so much to like and dislike here.

For the good: The guys were cute, and the actors seemed to have done a decent job. There were a few hot scenes with some of the couples. There seemed to have been some care taken to make the story realistic, and to have many types of LGBT representation. Nothing was overacted or over the top, and no offensive stereotypes of LGBT people. There were very few of the tired tropes, nobody tripping and falling, no truck of death, and not even a breakup episode with a stupid misunderstanding in episode 11.

For the OK: The camera work was fine, and the picture quality was decent. The sound had a few issues here and there, but not bad overall. I have seen these same quality issues on occasion even with the major studios like GMM, so this wasn't all that different. The story was a bit confusing and slow at first, but got better about halfway through. I would say this is a mid-tier quality show, it isn't Tale of a Thousand Stars or SOTUS, but way better than Ghost Runner or even What the Duck. There were some themes we have seen before in other series, although not a rip-off of other series, some parts are vaguely familiar.

Now onto the problem: This story was almost completely ruined by the abysmal subtitles. Almost nothing made sense. In almost every episode, there were long periods where there were no captions. The grammar and pronouns were atrocious throughout, which of itself isn't always bad, but combined with other issues just exacerbated things. There was at least one episode the captions were completely out of time with the spoken word, and they ran the captions for the previous scene right through the introduction. It is like when you use Google to translate English to Thai back to English, it all just comes out a tiny bit wrong. This could have been a decent show if they would have properly captioned it. It is so disappointing that this otherwise OK series was wrecked by something that should have been easy to mitigate.

Also of note, why change the intro to the series for the last episode? That is a bit odd in my opinion. Also North's mother changing her mind about everything was a bit sudden to be believable. I get why she was angry (ex husband issues), but literally from one scene to the next she was all the sudden accepting of everything, a complete reversal of her previous hateful personality. She even seemed to encourage North and Ongsah at the end to have sex.

I would be interested to see if this production company can fix their technical issues, and improve things in their next series. I would love to see these actors again in a different setting. There is lots of potential there.

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So much love, so little budget.

In all honesty, it wasn't that good.
(A) The PLOT, the idea, wasn't bad at all. I hate sad endings that are usually associated with paranormal/supernatural love stories, so I really liked the early twist (ML was comatose, not dead) which lead me to believe there would be a happy ending.
(B) Too many characters, too many sub-plots. There's no need for that. Some support characters really didn't need that much screen time.
(C) The ACTING was pretty much amateur. The characters were most of the time either not emotionally invested or overreacting to everything and anything (think "extra", like really extra!). I would usually blame to the young age, but this is not the case. The coaches (all of them) were specially bad, and the Director was borderline campy. The guy playing "Jedi" (Oat Pasakorn Sanrattana) was the only one who seemed more natural, which is sad, because is the ML who has the least amount of time on screen.
(D) The AUDIO was terrible sometimes, and the english SUBTITLES (Line TV) even worse.

It was an OK show. I think the same story could easily be told in 7 or 8 episodes.

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