4Minutes

The cast had less chemistry than Bible with his motorbike

When I saw the trailer of this series I hopped on the moving hype train going on full steam, just because I was anxious to see Bible back on screen.

In the end, Bible did terrific work. But that's pretty much it for this series. The plot was all over the place, every single lick of chemistry was already seen in the trailer, and the pacing made this feel like it was 40 episodes instea d of 8.

I mean cinematography was nice. They made this pretty at parts, at least.

Also Why Don't You Stay should've remained in KP.

Conclusion: I wish to see Bible paired with someone else and in a no-paranormal series.

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What could have been

4 Minutes was a missed opportunity on so many levels. The premise that the 4 minutes after a person’s heart has stopped beating, when they are in a state of hypoxia, events from their life will play out in their consciousness was novel. Back when the author of the series was announced as Sammon, a medical doctor, I knew that 4 minutes referred to that brief few minutes between life and death, if the victim is not revived.

At first, the viewer is not aware of what the 4 minutes signifies. Instead, the tendency is to take Great’s explanation at face value, that at times he can see 4 minutes into the future and has a chance to make different choices. For the first few episodes, everything is grounded in this point of view. But gradually the viewer becomes confused about what has happened and is happening. Clearly, everything we are seeing cannot all be reality. More and more contradictions creep in to the story line. We see events that don’t involve Great at all, and then variations of those same events. Whose reality, or 4 minutes are we witnessing? Sometimes we never find out.

Basically, the entire plot is constructed on the premise of reliving choices and potentially choosing differently a second or even third time. All of this takes place in a hypopoxic state, but whose? So many possibilities are thrown at the viewer that at times we aren’t sure what is real and what is imagined. That might have been interesting to explore, but the script never tackles the fundamental question, What is consciousness, what is reality? Instead, we get a repetitive muddle of a plot laced with soft core porn scenes, graphic violence, and individuals you wouldn’t want to meet in real life. By episode 8, I was repelled by all but two of the main characters (and I was certainly no fan of Great and Tyme by then). I especially take exception with serious actors being required to act in soft core porn scenes that do nothing to advance either plot or character development. A less explicit scene could have communicated what was needed. Instead, in these scenes the actors are presented exclusively as sexualized bodies engaged in explicit coupling solely for the titillation of the viewer. The CEO of Be On Cloud is credited as the Intimacy Director,, so the decision to treat his actors in this way was definitely his. How can an actor say “no” to the CEO when called upon to film such scenes and not lose his job? It smacked of exploitation and this did not sit well with me.

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Once again BoC is trying too hard

4 Minutes has the exact same problem as DFF: too much time wasted on elements that feel like nothing at the end, and the plot gets dumped and rushed in the last 2 episodes. BoC is again trying too hard to make something different and artistic, without making it enjoyable. We know BoC can make a good show, like KinnPorsche, and we know Sammon can write nice stories that turn into good shows, like Manner of Death. Maybe the problem is BoC and Sammon together.
In terms of acting the highlight is Fuaiz. He’s constantly the best part of every episode. An interesting character played by a good actor. Bas and Bible are good, even though Bas doesn’t have much to do. The same can be said about Job, since his character is basically just there, like his girlfriend. I believe Jes is a good actor, that short film/MV he did with Bible was great, but I didn’t really enjoy him as Tyme, specially toward the second half of the episodes.

This series could work as a binge watch, but I’ll not be trying to test that theory.

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4 Minutes That Seemed Like 8

Essentially, you must buy into the premise that our physical brain will cease to function after 4 minutes without oxygen. This of course, is a truism. But what this series then does is push forward a premise that during those 4 minutes without oxygen, people who are experiencing that trauma, relive ‘life’ in various manners within that 4-minute window period. For some, they can perceive events that will occur 4 minutes in the future. Why this series is so confusing is that it attempts to project too much story with too many people. Admittedly, I am old, and I have a difficult time following a train of thought for one individual and I am pushing it for two people. But when you have multiple people affected by the advancement of 4 minutes in the future with a number of different alternatives for each, my mind begins to jellify. Logic becomes inoperative here. Everything makes sense because nothing actually does. It depends upon the time frame you are currently in. Therefore, there is no logic. Consequently, I am lost.
I am bemused by criticism of this series from people who state there are too many NC scenes. I did not see any, so I am not sure what they are talking about. For those who read this, this IS an adult series with an adult theme. There is nothing pornographic or even sexually offensive. If you find it so, then stop watching. Do not impose your standards on others for that will become a dangerous precedent There are way more obscene subject matters such as infidelity, murder, suicide, illegal gambling, bullying, abuse, and yet we are concerned about a few scenes of two guys laying in bed semi-naked? Incongruent, silly, and cretinous thinking.

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Whatever you do, you can't change what is destined to happen!

A story of a lost soul who tries to make things right in the present after being in the future for 4 minutes. 

It had a grand start filled with thrills, naked white butts, and lots of anticipation of great content. Another BL with a time travel theme got me interested in watching. It was going very well; I understood what was going on and created a link in my mind. But soon after episode 4, things started going downhill. I lost track of what was going on and totally got confused with the storyline. If I were to name a drama as a show-off, then this is the shinning example of it. Wait, this is literally synonymous to BOC now!

Even though I understood what was happening at the last 4 minutes of EP 8, in general the story feels like a fever dream where you feel like you understand the situation but still can't figure out what and why that is happening. And after waking up, you completely forgot what it was all about. The storyline is so erratic that I lost interest in the middle. There were different storylines, and they wanted to give attention to every one of them, but while doing that, they lost the actual significance of the show. Maybe it's not that complicated, but sure, it is confusing. Still, I watched it because I wanted to reach the conclusion. So I can't really point out what I liked or disliked, as I feel like I'm in a daze to conclude anything. 

It had a big budget, great artists, and beautiful and aesthetic cinematography, but it fell short in terms of storytelling and binding the whole thing together. Again, it is proved that BOC failed to deliver a compelling story and tried to hide it with NC scenes and handsome faces. I had high expectations, but now I'm utterly disappointed. I can't rate this show high just because of its high content value. I do enjoy the complicated storylines, but I can't lose my brain cells over 8 episodes of content. Maybe I'm too dumb for this; it's not for me.

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Sadly lacking real story and development.

The actors are good, I enjoyed the 2nd pairing but the main pair are not for me. The series is lacking chemistry and strong story. Especially when all they do is use NC sex for story that makes no sense. It feels like sex is all they want to focus on for lack of acting and story line and plot that does not make sense. Sadly disappointed. Feels like characters are one dimensional and typical with lack of growth. Please focus more on storyline next time instead of their NC moments. Especially since call their trailers only emphasize on the intimate moments just to try to get fans on board.

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What can you do in 4Minutes?

You can listen to Why Don't You Stay by Jeff Satur.
You can watch an episode of Back to Seventeen.
You can drink a Thai Milk Tea.
The things that happened in four minutes here though..

Saying anything would spoil something, in essential, that would mean I can say nothing about the story.
But even this statement is an indicator of how mind bending the plot is, it keeps you on your toes, makes you come up with theories and you're invested throughout, just waiting to get all the answers to the tens and hundreds of questions that will inevitably pop up in your mind.
The synopsis is basis enough to go off on, at least according to me, since that way, there's no ideas on what you can expect, you can just let the complexity and intrigue of the story surprise you.

What you can expect though, in addition to the above, is great acting, NC scenes and brilliant cinematography. You'll want to rewatch the episodes over and over again to see if you missed any details and with eight episodes, it's a series you can watch quickly and revisit as many times as you want.

So grab your notebooks and pens, grab someone to discuss theories with, and just go for it. If you're not in the mood for something this complex and confusing, set it aside and come back to it later, because it is so worth it.

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The main couple should have been Korn and Ton Kla

4 Minutes is okay but it got me so confused of what is really happening that I don’t think that the show really worked. The story is about this rich kid and a doctor that got entangled in this crazy family drama but it is also about a character named Great, rich kid, who got the ability to see 4 minutes to the future. Now, I will have to say that the premise is good and that the premise is strong. We have a good set of characters here and they are put in the story so well that I think they were able to serve their purpose. The love story of Great and Tyme felt more secondary to the story which I won’t mind but their love story is not even as interesting as the love story of the secondary couple of the show – Korn and Ton Kla. The time travel aspect of the show is where things got a bit trippy and I feel like the execution I confusing. The story on its own is pretty good already. The story is interesting because we have a strong family drama with the story of Ton Kla and Korn. Bas as Korn is just really good. The character had a good character development and we got to see him try both options that he was put in and it is actually sad to see how his character ended because we got such a good portrayal and a good contrast to what is happening to him mentally. It must have been hard for him to be in such position where he cannot do so much but had to so many things. His relationship with Ton Kla took a very tragic turn considering that they are both cheating on each other for different reasons but they died together. They are in a very sexual relationship and we got to see the naked body of Bas in this show and I will never complain. I feel like the love story of Korn and Ton Kla had so many good scenes and the story is just more interesting. There was a point in the show that I was wishing that they could have been the leads and the show will focus more on their perspective. Compared to them, the love story of Great and Tyme fails to deliver that and the time changes were just pretty much confusing that everything that happened in the first five episodes were erased in the sixth episode as they go back to the timeline. Basically, what they did is to show how things will actually happen if the four minutes thing will not occur and the way it changed the story is not even that drastic. Therefore, the entire phenomena felt very much unnecessary as the events will all still be the same. This is what is disappointing because this just says that everything that we watched so far were erased and that we just wasted our time. It is just bad storytelling and writing in the main storyline and I feel like I invested in the wrong story considering how slow things were in the first few episodes and how quick it is for the sixth episode to catch us all up to what happened. This is all a miss and I am a bit disappointed. I also would have wanted to see more of them together because the interest with their love story never really picked up. They have few good scene here and there but they have spent most of their times apart and the romantic relationship was never really or strongly established. This is where my dismay is and I feel like the concept that we got introduced to at the beginning really meant nothing to the main story line since we just got to hear it again in the last episodes in a few seconds before the end but, other than that, there is nothing there. The story is basically just 3 episodes long and that is it. It could have been so much shorter but this could still be so much better considering that Bible and Jes have good chemistry when they are together but they failed to use this in the show to its full potential. They are also very hot individuals and we got to see it. I am thankful for that. For the story, it could have been handled and executed for so much better.

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A visual stunning midnight BL drama with good acting and a decent plot for a midnight drama.

Virtues:
-The gorgeous cinematography.
-Jespipat Tilapornputt and Asavapatr Ponpiboon's performances are really good.
-The 4 minutes concept and the near death experiences theme.
-The mix between the mistakes of the past Great wished could fix, the raw and messy reality the characters lived and the things that never happened to Tyme but wished would have happen, all of this three timelines told with the central context of being on the verge of dying.

Flaws:
-Some events happen out of the blue, with a poorly elaborated build up, so the development and the characters' relationships, actions and reactions lack credibility at certain moments of the story, special mention to episode 6.
-Some scenes, like the one when Tonkla has the camera right in front of his face to show he's succumbing to his dark side born from his traumas, the one when Great and his father "argue" about the video or the one where Tyme comfronts Great's father are badly directed and filmed, and therefore, acted.
-Sammon repeats things she'd already used in previous plots without giving these resources proper personality.
-Some sequences feel like being watching a TV spot, a beautiful advertisement or a promotional ad for the actors. Including all that in a series is perfectly fine and common, but you must know how to integrate those promotional things in the general story in a proper manner. Unfortunately, here and in Thai series in general, they just throw the promotional things to one's face, which took me out of the story more than once.

To sum up, 4 MInutes is an interesting and enternaining midnight series that is not perfectly written, but is still worth watching if you're looking for a decent BL to watch.

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Disappointed 4 Minutes

First off the acting was superb. Second there was a lot more ass on display than I care for and I am not opposed to nudity when warranted. It wasn’t but not to say it was done in poor taste. I am just not an ass person. So it just looked like it was done for shock value than needed scenery. If they showed back or abs it would be more pleasant for me. But that’s just a style choice the director. The sex scenes were definitely soft porn. It looks like they were really doing it.

The chemistry was there for all 3 couple. The main couple. The second couple. The cheating half of the second couple with the officer. They really deliver on the sex and kissing. That 17 year old actor was not a frigid actor who have qualms about kissing and nudity. I know people are mad about him being young and doing it with older actors. I don’t know about y’all but 17 year old boys are full of hormones and a lot have sex at this age. Women need to stop portraying girl’s safety issue of rape and pregnancy into gay male norms. It stigmatized gay boys with straight girl social norms which is what most of the BL fandom consist of.

Anyway, I am disappointed with this series being in a loop of 3X. I don’t know if this is an alternate universe series or whatnot but I feel cheated of a good beginning middle and end series. I don’t know what I expected but this was not it. I don’t think I had any expectations other than to see a well written series. I feel like this series was a screenwriter writing the same idea of a story and the rewrote it 2 times more. This was the result. As someone who use to write stories this was something did a lot. This was very reminiscent of that writing exercise I did in creative writing class.

This is why I gave it a low rating in story but high marks for acting. In the end I was very disappointed with this series. Not the actors.

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4 Minutes

I will keep it short simply because I just couldn't get into the story. At times I was lost but did carry on watching the whole series. The acting was good. the script was OK but the MLs.. only my opinion didn't connect for me. Yes the Sex scenes were there in all there glory. Tonkla and Korns sex scene at the beginning was well acted but after that we didn't see them till much later as Korn was playing the field so that turned me right off him. Great and Tyme were the other MLs but nothing really happened between them that stood out. Series could have been a lot better. There were to many storylines to follow for me and at times was a frustrating watch.
Well worth watching to make your own take on the series as to some it was great series.

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