Memoir of Rati (2025)

Intermittent review: Annoying ML has redeemed himself slightly

I know there's only a few episodes released yet, but the way Thee has been written after the first 2 episodes annoys me so much. I liked him in the first 2 and thought he was perfect male lead material - caring, funny, witty, handsome - and then with the reveal that he's actually a nobleman with a lot of influence as the Deputy Minister of Education...WHOO BOY!

But then they suddenly butchered him? His caringness made him ignorant of boundaries. He is clueless of the prejudices that Rati faces and does very little to protect him or put the ones that are bullying Rati in their place (of course it was also not his place but he's supposed to be the ML so there has to be a moment where he's trying to stand up for Rati but then Rati says 'I'll handle this.' but that doesn't happen yet). I absolutely disliked him wanting to be friends with Rati because to me it came from a selfish place. Rati is rightfully angry with him and Thee is not doing much to prove he deserves to be friends by being all up in Rati's face. Even his apology felt lame and self-servicing (the physical touch, the insistence of helping -> crossing boundaries).

I'd much rather like it that Rati on his own accords would listen to Thee and then decide whether or not he wants Thee back in his life as friends, instead of all the pushing from Thee's side. It really rubs me the wrong way.

Especially also when sexuality comes to play into this. Like c'mon can you be any more obvious??? You're supposedly in a time and society where it is not accepted and where you are rumoured to swing the other way, and now you're implicating Rati in it too? The man already has to deal with the prejudices against foreigners and social status and now you're doing this? I hate that Thee's not doing anything to deny it either as if it's just a walk in the park...maybe it will become better later on but I'm not a fan of the script. It just doesn't feel authentic to Thee's identity and that saddens me.
EDIT: OKAY HE HATH REDEEMED HIMSELF WITH THAT MONOLOGUE IN FRONT OF THE SHRINE ALTHOUGH THE PDA WAS UNEXPECTED I REALLY LIKED IT!!!

I do like AouxBoom of course. Nothing of note yet except that they are simply adorable.

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A Historical Period Drama That Leaves You Exhilarated!

Romance isn’t something that can be planned. It isn’t something that can be decided by rank, title, or the weight of someone else’s opinion. Love doesn’t care about decorum or boundaries, it simply begins.

And in Memoir of Rati, it begins quietly. With glances exchanged at a festival and curiosity sparked between two men who, by society’s rules, have no business falling for one another.

Set in 1915 Siam, this historical Thai BL opens with soft tension and beautiful restraint. Adapted from the web novel by P. Picha, it introduces us to Rati (Inn Sarin), an orphan brought back to Siam as a French interpreter, and Thee (Great Sapol), a marquis in the Ministry of Education. Their meeting is simple, almost forgettable, but under the stillness, there’s something unmistakable happening between them.

Rati is a man between worlds. Born in Siam but raised in France, he walks the line between two homes, two loyalties, and two versions of himself. His return to Siam isn’t met with open arms, especially not from the biological mother he longs for, a kitchen maid with ties to him she chooses not to acknowledge. It’s a quiet heartbreak that threads through Rati’s early days back in Siam, and we feel it as he tries not to unravel.

Read the complete article here-

https://the-bl-xpress.com/2025/07/04/memoir-of-rati-first-impressions-ep-1-2/

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An Ambitious Series Off To A Slow Start

This is an ambitious GMM series.

I’m all in for it to be successful, as anything to do with politics and military history is my bag, but I’m stumped they gave this significant project to someone with so few accolades as a Director in general and specifically to a production team with no BL success record whatsoever. Let’s see what they can pull off.

Will this be another GMM BL where the actors are expected to compensate for an otherwise weak creative effort and then take the blame when they inevitable fail to do the impossible? I hope not. This strategy is what GMM has largely been trading on for the last two or three years with very little success - yet they persist.

I don’t think we can discount that they’re trying to make another hit as big as To Sir With Love but I think they’re going need much more than aesthetics and expensive color techniques. TSWL has an accomplished Director and a technically strong, culturally confident, very senior writing team that really immersed themselves in every second of the translation of this story to our screens as their critical and commercial success attests. However, not even that entire creative team along with the two superstar actors who helmed the TSWL production have been able to replicate that level of success in a BL with a greatly reduced-in-quality script. This matters.

The Episode
Thailand has a very interesting and complicated history with the Imperial nations and though it was not directly colonised by Europeans it still had a tense relationship with them for hundreds of years. Thailand also had relations of domination with some of its neighbours and had its own imperial ambitions in the region so I’m keen to see how this plays out in the story. This should provide much of the foundational dramatic tension for the story, but somehow so far, it has not put in an appearance.

It’s good that they try to depict some of the cultural norms and past-times from that period which is pretty cool even if they’re mostly limited to extensive scenes of fighting arts. I hope they will expand on this area in due course besides the few seconds of a music theatre show.

It was very nice to see some familiar props, sceneries and even sets from TSWL and I think that’s a useful welcoming nod to a community that already has positive associations with these symbols.

When Rati describes himself as a Frenchman and Thee describes a few of Rati’s actions and instincts as Thai, I’m not sure where the politics of the narrative will take this but it suggests a core struggle for Rati’s character will be his own political consciousness as an indigenous person and this development is surely going to make huge impact on the choices he will undoubtedly have to make. Looking forward to this if so.

I’m hoping that they don’t do the usual rushed relationship that has become a hallmark of GMM TV flops because in the very first section of the first episode they seem to already be into each other which is not a promising start given a context that precludes it, but perhaps they have too few episodes to accommodate the depth and breadth of the original story? Let’s find out.

A few things that gave me pause:

Someone who looks like a stranger to the locals and is even associated with a European embassy at a time when France has violently colonised pretty much all of the immediate surrounding countries, is going to be beset by spies monitoring his every move and you can triple that during wartime. So Rati’s immediate bonding with a Thai stranger without a sense of his own security is very odd but again, maybe they have to rush it because they haven’t got enough episodes; I don’t quite understand, and the flashbacks don’t make this more compelling. A French-speaking operative would be regarded as a hostile, not a friendly, force in occupied Indochina and certainly with good reason during WW1.

These contextual oversights might help explain the forced intimacy which logically seems much too much too soon in the way it is introduced before the end of the 1/4 parts. This is usually the sign of a writing team that is not confident in its ability to maintain dramatic tension so they substitute for it with sexual tension instead - once more not great. The dramatic tension heightens all the other sources of tension, even some of the jokes might’ve landed if a modicum of dramatic tension could’ve been generated. Urgent sounding music scores do not make up for this lack.

As a brand new member of a diplomatic corps in a new assignment he/sh would be drilled to be on maximum guard. Even if attracted to someone sexually you have to regard them as almost an enemy, and losing a necklace doesn’t constitute such an extenuating circumstance that would make one abandon precautions that could literally save one’s life. If Thee’s trying to seduce Rati sexually, we haven’t been given even subtext that he is aware of Rati’s sexuality as a factor that could help him and not endanger him and his mission, so I feel Thee needed to have put in a bit more work in order to persuade Rati to let down his guard so prematurely, but maybe there’s more that we don’t know yet.

Let’s see what unfolds with episode 2.

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First Impression: Memoir of Rati

Overall: I'm into the historical setting but nervous about pacing. This is based on the book "Memoir of Rati" (จาฤกรติชา) by P.PICHA which I haven't read and am reviewing the series based on its own merits. Airing on GMMTV's YouTube channel everywhere except Southeast Asia https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLb6_2JamS9iM2MJATWfoFPY-piHFDtvEC and Netflix in Southeast Asia https://www.netflix.com/watch/82056609

Content Warnings: fight, blood, past death

What I Liked
- historical setting
- tension/chemistry
- styling

Room For Improvement
- exposition dump to start the series
- unrealistic to volunteer him in episode 1
- the pacing was a bit slow and I'm worried that we have 11 more episodes

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