Love With Benefits (2021)

Well, I liked it!

DISCLAIMER: I do have notoriously low standards haha

I did go in with very low expectations after reading the main review but NO regrets watching it <33

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STORY:

PLOT OVERALL: It was like a cute little on-shot written with the synopsis ("Actors Play and First being made to live together for 10 days in a house to find/whip up chemistry for their upcoming series ") as prompt.


-1- I am pretty much sucker for a good "OBLIGATORY-LIVE-IN" plot, especially when mashed with an "HATE-TO-LOVE" ingredient. And I got it here.
Actors Play and First being made to live together for 10 days in a house to find/whip up chemistry for their upcoming series - was an acceptable and believable excuse. (I've seen series coming up with much more ridiculous reasons to push two people together).

-2- CHARACTER GROWTH: Personally I DID FIND subtle growth and changes in character - and that was all I needed. The story is of 10 days span and they pretty much had an slow steady built relationship, catalyzed by situations of close proximity and a third party, maybe hindered by personal inhibitions - common plot development but always realistic and understandable.

-3- DEPTH: Was lacking, or I am missing some details. But again, for a 5 episode plot explaining 10 day story with lot of fanservice scenes, it is not expected in an average show.

-4- PACE: Was slow, even super slow at times, I could safely skip 5, 10 seconds instead of waiting for something to happen and that's saying something. I was thankful to the speed controlled widget I have lol, I watched a lot of scenes between 1.2 to 1.8 speeds.

-5- HUMOR: It was a little bonus, to my humor sense, some scenes were funny, and I lowkey like Penelope (even though she was a little "clingy" at some parts haha).

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ACTING: GOOD.

MAIN LEADS: IMO CHEMISTRY WAS GOOD - their acting could show growth of their chemistry well, and the awkwardness in the beginning too. Nothing in to make me feel cringed or that it was unnatural.
There was indeed a little something missing in the chemi - a tiny little bump I cannot quite place - but as a casual viewer I was satisfied.

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SUPPORTING CHARACTERS:
I liked the variety in natures of the casting team. PRAEW was either aloof or just acts that way and probably a Y-girl, FAH was strict and more of a cold minded professional, PENELOPE was colorful character who could does have flaws but is also sensitive and fun, DIRECTOR pretty much impressed me in the tea scene lol-he gave his all, CHAI too surprised with acting skill in "that one scene". PLUTO was the sweet kind of second lead who in a well produced drama can give SLS induced heartaches.
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REWATCH VALUE: I am not big into rewatching but this definitely makes my list!!!!! It could be a cute comfort show for another day.

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Awful script-writing and character development

To start off with a positive, the two main actors had great chemistry and their acting carried the entire show. Intimate scenes were done well but they were often very abrupt and I had trouble understanding the characters' thoughts or intentions most of the time leading up to these scenes. In particular, the character of First (played by Folk Jakrin Sangruan). First's character showed no development throughout despite meaningful talks with the acting teacher - he continued to treat Play (played by Gameplay Garnpaphon Laolerkiat) meanly with an excuse of 'teasing him because his reactions are cute' and I'm not entirely sure how that led to them getting together, nor do I understand First's feelings towards Play.

The supporting characters added nothing to the plot and I ended up skipping all of the random side story parts as I really couldn't care less about Penelope... The love triangle was mostly unnecessary other than to give First a shove in the right direction and they should have allocated more time to focus on the two main characters and the development of feelings between them. It felt like their relationship kept going from 0 to 100 and then all the way back down to 0 again.

I only finished this since it was short, wouldn't recommend unless you have nothing else to watch.

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