Anti Reset (2024)

had hoped for more from this premise

Overall: an interesting premise that wasn't developed enough. 10 episodes about 20 minutes each. Aired on GagaOOLala & Viki. Note, there are extra scenes after some of the end credits.

Watch Suggestions:
- if you want to skip moping/flashbacks start episode 8 at 17:30
- unless you like (in my opinion) poorly done angst stop watching episode 9 at 5 minutes and then start episode 10 at 21:50

Content Warnings: non con picture taking, dub/non con kiss, non con touching, grief

What I Liked
- unique premise with a clear set up
- sweet/cute moments
- funny moments (the dream with the soap was a highlight)
- foreshadowing
- episode 6 Stay By My Side cameo

Room For Improvement
- slow pacing with a ton of flashback montages, also half of episode 8 was moping
- the only 2 female characters were cliches (repeatedly ignoring boundaries), too much time spent on them
- nonsense (and not talking about the obvious), do university students in Taiwan have their professor's personal cell phone numbers, his household supplies were stored in the living room on a bookcase, a supposedly intelligent and caring character is stupid and cruel
- they never really delved/explained the world building, and I realized this was a romance but there really wasn't any examination of ethics, only the human character focusing on himself and how he will be sad
- poorly done/cliche angst, there were many opportunities for drama but the writers chose the most cliche one
- that gap was waaayyyy too long and then there was about 3 minutes at the end???
- some of the camerawork felt low budget

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Actually a Robot?

After all these god, vampire, demon, now we got love story with a robot! But is he actually a robot? I have a feeling that at the end we'll know that he's just acting! Otherwise, why would he be embarrassed while buying underwear! ?

However, tho it's kinda cringy but also cute. First of all, which contract starts with a kiss! ? And a student asking her teacher "Can I come over?" like wtf! It doesn't make sense.

I don't have any high hope with it. At the beginning I thought it'll probably be a lightweight rom-com. But we can tell that Wu Ping probably had a bad past.

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The best one out of the 4

I placed spoilers at the end of this review.

I stand corrected, this is the best one out of the compilation series. However, I may be bias because I love sci-fi storylines.

The positive: Although it had some elements that did not make sense, the script was good. The pacing was great and did a decent job introducing the characters’ backstories with one exception. I like the underline analogy about relationships in general. The two lines from episode 6 that sticks out to me is “You are an independent entity.” and “None of us own anyone.” The actors did a great job with their characters and portrayed them very well. Had very good cinematography, graphics, and music.

The negative: The script had some underdeveloped section which were only minor problems. It did take some liberties with the AI concept which some may not like. They also didn’t do a good job explaining the backstory with Chu Yi Ping’s dog. The script has one of my most hated story elements, but it actually made sense for a change. Again, this was only a minor problem for me.

******Spoiler Alert******


My main criticism is the length of the time jump. I’m not against it in this story because it did serve some purpose, but 7-years seemed too long.

Their first few kisses were predictable, but still cute.

I sort of understand the dog and Ever 9 comparison they were trying to make but it was weird and seems like a stretch to me.

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Cringefest

The concept was great. Lots of potential questions that might arise when considering a love story between an AI and a human. However, so much is cringe and so far, not much depth. Its fairly obvious that we are SUPPOSED to think this narrative is somehow significant, and it could have been. But the questions are not explored. This presentation is sort of the opposite of Japanese anime, which often explains things to the audience in detail. Here, situations are sort of thrown out there, with very little nuance, and the audience just have to explore the topic on their own. A watch party might make this more interesting. Viewers could pause and discuss what COULD have happened or the unexplored questions.

A few of my issues:

(1) If your AI character is so perfect that it is indistinguishable from a real human, then where is the story? I mean who really cares if its AI or human if there is no difference?

(2) (a) The AI is supposedly an "emotional support" AI (who demonstrates deep knowledge in many areas), but then sometimes innocent and unknowledgeable with respect to emotions. (b) The explaining comes from a previously emotionally dry character, who is incapable of demonstrating even the most basic politeness skills, who then incidentally suddenly becomes a wise master of human emotions and is the dispenser of knowledge to the AI.

(3) If this is supposed to be the future, why are we using pen and paper? Sudoku on paper? And the AI can't beat a human? Couldn't we at least use tablets? Will future episodes have public pay phones? Who was responsible for set design?

(4) How do we interpret a self-centered man who finally falls in love with someone because he is waited on hand-an-foot?
The AI cleans and cooks and takes care of every need of the man. And the man falls in love. Keeping in mind that BL is written for a female audience and that the AI is clearly the uke/female, I can't see any other way of reading this other than:

>> a woman's role is to cook and clean and take care of her master, and by doing those things will she receive love and adoration from her master. The man's role is to merely exist and dole out his wisdom to her. <<

Considering the centuries of struggle that woman have had (and still have), while many self-centered men wait for women to fall in love with them and serve their every needs, do we need something that pushes traditional couples further in that direction? Do we need to encourage men to be more incompetent at self-care? Consider also that the AI, instead of merely being a fancy housekeeping robot, could have been presented as a source of knowledge for the master. We already have good AI that can summarize knowledge in effective ways. Realistically, our first AI results are more likely to be superior to humans in the intellectual/knowledge ways, not in the housekeeping department. The challenge of AI companions will be to communicate with humans in ways that will not threaten us, while simultaneously having significantly higher levels of knowledge than humans.

There is no question that reinforcing traditional gender roles is common in BL. But in many modern productions, these are softened, broadened, or turned on their head. While presenting itself as ground breaking, this series seems to be hawking nostalgia for an imagined traditional past, disguised as a story about future AI.

Update:
Episode 5 does bring up an interesting question. If a human forms an attachment to an AI, and the AI is reset and loses all memory of the human, the human will feel loss. Shared memories will be gone, and exist only in the mind of the human. Similar to having a partner suffer from dementia or memory loss and not remember the partner. Those who have had family go through this know how painful it can be. There is something reassuring in having a shared memory; its a way of feeling connected. In some sense it is worse than death, because the body of the loved one is still around, but the shared attachment is gone.

Episode 8 indirectly asks whether an emotional support AI is even a good idea. But having a human become dependent on an AI is no different from dependency on a human. Either one can cease to exist. Additionally, while we (as humans) have invented lots of religions with an afterlife, having an AI cease to exist sort of makes us face whether the "soul" of humans is really a thing, or just something we humans have invented to ease the pain of loss and the fear of death. Episode 8 does not directly ask these questions, but there is just a vague reference to this line of thought.

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Unreal How Much I liked This

Seeing the overall rating and some of the comments I've read about this had me really worried about this series, but after watching, I'm Ever 9 and Yi-Ping's biggest supporter. Anti-reset was exactly the series I needed to get out of my BL-slump, and now I'm back in (I think, ask me in another 2 days), and I severely love this series.

Let's Dive In.

I desperately needed something new, something that wasn't a bunch of uniforms or office jargon, and this series was just perfect. It's the first in the BL genre (to my knowledge) that takes on the robot/human trope and I ate every single second of this series up. The first episode had me hooked, mostly because Li Feng (Ever 9) was gorgeous in all of his shots, especially the ones with Yi-Ping touching him and seeing how he looked so real but was just a robot. But more importantly, I think the overall feel of the series had me seated and so excited. Before their second kiss, the tension between them is so strong that you yearn for them to do literally anything.

Now the story isn't perfect. I think they could've gone into more depth about how Ever 9 worked in general outside of being a caretaker for Yi-Ping. I think it's interesting that he can eat, but does that mean he can use the restroom? And there were times when his emotions were so human-like that I wondered if he was just some half-human-half-robot person. I think as well they could've made the plot a lot more interesting by having maybe added a couple of twists, like Yi-Ping maybe finding out Ever 9 was a cyborg which is why he loved him, or at the end, they did reset him, and we have to see him rebuild all of these memories again with Ever 9 -- I don't know, something to spice up the plot a bit. Also, they never go into any depth about the weird connection that the series kept making to Ever 9 and Yi-Ping's dog who died. Was his dog's spirit in the robot (weird)? Did Ever 9 remind him of his dog which was like him finally having a companion again? I'm not sure, it wasn't thoroughly looked into, and I think it could've just been scrapped completely cause it was a little suspicious on the moral spectrum (but then again, he is falling in love with a robot so...)

But again, I loved this, the tension, their outings, the small moments of Yi-Ping falling in love with something he knew he shouldn't. When you look a little deeper into it, of course it's weird and a bit creepy to fall for something nonhuman, especially something that's programmed to do just that, And if you think even deeper than that, it's sad that Yi-Ping's uncle had to program a robot for Yi-Ping, and he that he won't ever be able to just make that same connection to a human person. He technically has nobody except something that could shut off on him at any time.

Their intimate scenes were handled really well. Lots of great kissing, and I liked that they focused more on the love part of the NC than the actual NC part. The series didn't have to make the women so insufferable like his assistant who couldn't take a hint or his student. I also hated that they made Ever 9's lips the color of his skin any time he was shutting off or in the lab, it just looked a little funny. Just some nit-picky stuff, but overall, I loved the story.

Ratings

Story: 8.5/10 - Some hiccups, but overall I enjoyed it. I love the lab stuff the most and watching Ever 9's facial expressions as they programmed him. Their domestic life was so cute, it's literally one of my favorite tropes.

Acting: 9/10 - They did excellent! Especially Li Feng. I think they both had some difficulties in being able to cry (in some scenes, not all), but overall everyone did a great job.

Music: 7/10 - I didn't pay much attention to it, but it wasn't distracting.

Recommendation Value: 8/10 - I really think this one is a good one to watch! It's different from the plethora of BLs that we have at our disposals, and it helped me get out of my BL-block, so that's a big reason too (lol).

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Cute but a bit shallow

This was a cute romance with good chemistry between the leads - especially in the earlier episodes. The dialogue was fairly snappy and cute, and it had many nice moments.

I think the premise is a little wasted. There were two directions they could have taken, but didn't. One would be to accent that he's a robot and doesn't really understand humans and human society outside of what someone could read, and all the funny situations that develop from that. There's a scene where the main character is so turned on by the robot that he has to "relieve himself" - I would have liked to see him wondering what's wrong with him, and asking himself is Ever 9 is in effect sophisticated porn.

The second, and probably the one that would have made the most sense, is to examine what a person is. What are we? We're constructed with our DNA as a blueprint and we have basic emotional and behavioral settings also programmed by our DNA, and the rest of what we are is based on whatever we experience. Is an artificial being like Ever 9 much different?

We often blame things we do on past trauma, essentially "programming" that we have no control over, so why is an AI any less a living thing, provided it is truly autonomous?

This was totally ignored, even in the decisions his uncle makes.

This reduces the premise to a shallow gimmick and the plot is formulaic and predictable. I enjoyed it until the last 2 episodes, which degenerated into a tedious montage of past happiness played against a truly sappy love ballad.

Speaking of which, the music in this was tiresome and got on my nerves in the last two episodes.

The acting and production values are quite good. Ever 9 is just robotic enough to seem not quite human while conveying emotion clearly, and the main character is good at portraying how closed and clueless he is in dealing with humans and only able to open up to a robot (another lost opportunity for examination).

This is a good series to binge - it was hard to wait for a weekly episode at the beginning, and the last few episodes are better all at once, especially the last two. I wouldn't enthusiastically recommend it, but it's cute and entertaining and short enough that even if it's not really your thing it's not a huge investment of time.

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Good Concept, Poor execution

I am not being fair for dropping this before watching the entire series so my review may not hold water.
my POV: if there is no distinction between human and AI, what made the protagonist accept this AI when he is a recluse and introvert? The set setting is not matching the concept. AI is supposed to be aiding emotionally but so far, what I have seen was the AI being a physical help. The AI doesn't seem to be set with boundaries and has overflowing emotions - more than the human. The concept hooked me but lost me when I didn't see the execution matching the idea. I might have a preconceived notion of an AI that is clouding my judgment, so I may not be being fair.

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AI's ai (Robot's Love)

I've been debating for quite sometime if I should watch the series given it's scifi-AI storyline so I've read reviews and waited for the released of all the episodes before watching it.

Music: This is what I loved most in this series especially the opening song. I'm someone who love singing and the first time I watch any series I will let the entire opening song play without skipping and listen on it. If I found it beautiful I won't skip it every time I watch the episodes of the series but if it's not that outstanding then the forward button will become my dear friend.

Acting/cast: The casts and their skill is giving. I can see the chemistry just not the compound one. Not that chemistry which will make you look forward for the next scenes and which will make you giddy. There eyes alone conveys emotional conversation which transcends beyond the screen and that's amazingly however...

Storyline: however, I was reminded that the other ML is a robot. I have nothing against an AI and a human relationship but it is something that is quite different or should I say unsound? At least in a long run. I know, that many people may argue and say that... "we are now able to accept a relationship between man and man and of any kind so why not a robot and a human?" It may sound silly but it is not appealing, at least to me. I could've accepted it if the robot was unsalvageable an he accepted the fact that the love between him and the robot is not something that lasts but nope that's not what happened...some people may hate this but it is really not romantic for me... Thus, I created my own finale... (I imagined my own finale)

Instead of fixing the robot for their romance to continue why not make the robot permanently damage. Then, reveal to the ML that the reason why the robot act like a human is because someone is operating them and the robot was modeled after that person. Thus, having a person that has the same appearance with the robot. Then, the ML will come in contact with that person... the person who looks like the will deny that he knew the ML but the ML will insist in knowing him. Then that person will start to show actions or answers that the ML only revealed to the robot. Then the truth will surface...that that person is someone who controlled the robot. He is the one who chooses on how the robot should react and respond resonating his emotion through the robot. That way, the issue of the ML being unable to socialize will be resolved and he won't have a robot as his partner but a human. This plot sounds better right?

Anyways, just so you know. I won't be watching the series again. I even played latter episodes in 2.0x speed just to know what happened and to finish watching it because I lost the interest in watching it when I had the hunch that they will pursue the AIxHuman tandem.

That's all.

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