Nolan Peale

Episode 2
The good:
1) Oh, so it was Once that they were seeing over and over again. I recognized the poster but couldn't quite place the name on it. Good choice. Great movie. Wonderful musical. Brings me back to the long ago days of my "youth" when I didn't spend so much time watching BL, but instead sought out good films to watch. So if you're bored with the pace here or just going to post up endless feelings about how cringe the age-gap is, I'd recommend you drop this and check out Once if you haven't seen it.
2) I really loved the last moment when Soon appeared to realize that he needs to get his head out of his butt and start living like a character in a time travel movie. I would recommend him going into the video store and checking out Back to the Future to realize what predicament he's now in. Although he's probably seen enough movies in his life that he's probably already watched it. Hopefully he's not too cringed out by the idea of a mother falling in love with her own son to have watched one of the better time travel movies.

The Meh:
1) It is kind of slow but I hope they go in the direction that I think they are going in. Ep 1, Suasoon and and Ongsa became boyfriends way too easily. Suasoon needs to train Ongsa how to love his younger self and it actually was quite hard for them to fall in love. Like this idea. But alas, I fear like a lot of Thai BLs lately, they'll just skip the drama and go right back to the romantic moments.

Yeah. It seems that at every point along the way they kept taking the least dramatic option available, though. I'm not a fan of contrived drama for drama's sake, and there are quite a few fans of BL who just want no drama. I think this was for them.

Look, I know the idea that debate could be interesting for 14 year olds to watch is a stretch, but I think the writers simply gave up and it hurt the series. Zo had two goals at the beginning of the series: get the girl and win the prize. He got neither in the end, which is fine, but that kind of wants/needs motivation switch probably worked better in the novel. After he swapped out "get Joke" for "get Nita" there wasn't anywhere for the story to go because they refused to make "win the debate" matter. This would have been fine, except that there was supposed to be this climatic scene where the judge announces the winner...and we couldn't have cared less about it by that point because all Zo needed was to just talk to his mom about her expectations.

Joke's character had only one goal the entire series - win Zo - so once again, Joong is cast as the flattest of all flat "ideal rich boyfriend" characters who could be replaced by houseplants. Willfully inserting in some kind of last minute resolution of his family situation that he had spent 11 episodes not caring about did nothing to save this character from stagnation.

There was so much that could have made this a more developed series. It could have turned out that once Joke was placed on the lead team that he was so bad a debating that it put winning the trophy in doubt. Or it could have turned out that he was a much better debater than Zo. Or the coach might have continued to try to kick Joke off the team because he, IDK, has some kind of "hidden agenda." Or that stalker dude - the other character with a clear hidden agenda - could have been from the opposing debate team trying to get inside the opposing team's head - letting us know that the stakes of winning were so high that people were willing to cheat and that their opponents are unscrupulous and crafty. Or maybe Zo's ex who was only around for one episode was on the other debate team.

I'm not saying those kinds of changes would have made this an S tier BL, but it certainly would have been more exciting to watch, or at least would have kept me caring for longer. GMMTV is overly concerned that we might suffer heart attacks if we got too excited for too long, so they make sure we never care about the series for long.

I would trust the fandom's ability to spot homophobia from edited BTS videos more, if they hadn't gone that year from calling out Perth and Mean for maybe potentially creating a hostile work environment for Earth, to turning on Earth and calling him a "groomer" for doing regular fanservice when he was paired with Santa. Because there's nothing more passively aggressively homophobic than labeling a gay adult a potential pedophile for being close with a teen boy. Especially in BL fanservice world, where we know that every couple slung together by a management couple to promote as a ship is "real." Just protecting their "baby" I suppose. They aren't just thinking "gays are gross and best assumed to be predatory." No siree. Couldn't be.

I have seen no evidence that Perth is a homophobe. That label got put on him by fans who were mad at him and Mean Phiravich for saying during a press conference that Love By Chance 2 would be their last BL. The Mean made a joke that maybe he'd return to BL someday if he were broke. Fans took offense by that and went off and combed through BTS videos of the series and decided that Mean and Perth were homophobes for their treatment of Earth, who is openly gay. They released highly edited videos and shouted "Homophobe! Homophobe!" over what on the best day could be considered "microagressions", but didn't actually look like they were treating him all that differently than the rest. Unfortunately, that label stuck, but the fans were actually mad that they appeared to think that BL wasn't all that. Because we all know that BTS videos are the window to the soul.

His latest apology was about an incident with Marc where they were horsing around and Perth came up behind Marc and made an obscene public simulation of having anal sex with him while they were standing in line to get food on set. He had to apologize for the public obscenity as much as for the "OH MY GOD MICROAGRESSION HOMOPHOBE HOMOPHOBE" stuff.

I know fans think they mean well by bringing up this stuff, but I find it rather offensive that fans are so easily offended. Gay men, like myself, have experienced a hell of a lot worse that MICROAGRESSIONS BY YOUNG ACTORS and we're certainly a lot tougher than this. Please tell me how simulating anal sex on the street actually matters and maybe I'll change my mind.

writers. a lot of the writers probably majored in marketing at uni because even though they wanted to write, they needed something business related to prove to their parents that they weren’t planning on being poor. so write what you know.

I’m sorry, Hia Yi, but if I’m Kondiao and the choice is between Max and Boss Darayon, the Chen family is shit outta luck

Me to my screen: STOP DOING THAT. STOP IT. Could you please let us savor the present with them. So damn intrusive editing choices. LOL.

Huh. I guess it really was just 3 episodes. I don't even know if I'd call this a "BL."

And I really don't like Mei as a friend. Has nothing to do whether or not I think Right Man, Right Time is good or not. The character is what the character is. But I just can't stand her as a friend. She's horrible. She acts like the biggest issue Mhok is facing is that he's single. If he did just flee from the States to get away from a boyfriend who beat him, maybe the point of getting over him is so that he can get on with his life and adjust to living in Thailand again. But she's literally asking him every 2 hours if he's over his ex yet. She's like a grandma character who's sole purpose in the story is to worry that her grandchildren are single. Maybe its the translation but "Perfect timing" is not something you say when your best friend's abusive ex shows up unannounced at your door. Did she really urge him to go talk to him? Did they really just walk away to give him privacy so the ex could reach through the fence and grab Mhok's wrist? "No pressure, dude, but when you gonna give me grandchildren" would be her role in a heterosexual lakhorn. "He went to see a psychiatrist because of you...." what? Whose side are you on here? Are you really trying to amplify that guilt trip the ex is laying on your friend? Maybe the ex has eyebrows and thick lips or something.

I might be missing something about Right Time, Right You, but when did Mhok break up with his boyfriend? It seems like it happened recently...like he just fled from his abusive ex who he was living with in the states for six years. Other times, though, it seems like he may have fled to the states to escape from his abusive ex 6 years ago. When the ex shows up and talks about how he is seeing a psychiatrist and quit drinking, that would indicate some time has passed. Unless, of course, every character is naiive and thinks that quitting drinking for a week means you're off alcohol for good and one visit to a psychiatrist means you've done enough to make people think you're all cured.

Yeah. Unfortunately I have to agree that each episode since 3 has been getting worse. I guess I'm going to have to read the novel (ha!), but I'm guessing that the GL storyline isn't a part of that. There was too much emphasis placed into making Napdao into a character. O.K. not only is she a student teacher, so she read Sailom's college goals (and filling out those goals is what led to that phone struggle!), but she also somehow already knows that Sailom is tutoring Kang and living at his house and gives him lousy advice. And then we add some kind of task where to get a scholarship to study abroad, Sailom needs to...take another test, which supposedly he'll need to take before entering university. So now we've added "take a test" to the todo list that already included passing a test (and nothing is more exciting than watching people study for a test. So lets add more of that). And next week, burning the candle at both ends is going to lead to illness, exhaustion and a sponge bath, in true BL fashion.

So this is now a standard "High school BL" when what made the story exciting at one time was that one of the characters was waving a gun around at thugs who were going to burn off Sailom's face with an iron. That was promising to be something different. I hope they get back to that, soon. I like Name, who I think was just being helpful by offering Sailom a way to sell his ass to get out of debt, much more than Napdao, who is just adding more standardized testing into the story.

I love Chimon. I have for years. He's one of the better actors they have in the BL stable. He had a good thing going with Nanon where Nanon always played the same character in every series but Chimon would have a different role and that helped each series feel different. But...he's not a singer. And that is fine except that GMM wants its BL stars to be idols. I like Sailom and I'm rooting for the guy to realize he true dream of solving his families problems, getting the boy of his dreams...but he needs to stick with engineering and not be tempted to get that arts degree.

That may be true, but it was also something that probably worked better in the novel. They were really struggling to bounce.

Yeah. They had a conversation earlier about how he was expected to marry and have children. He felt that that was the primary expectation on him. Since one of his big motivations is to have more expectations than that placed on him, he's probably concerned that he's failing at the one thing he's been asked to do by falling for Sailom. Pimfah is just the closest and easiest girl to date.

IDK. It makes sense to me that Kang would chase the closest girl and probably what he would think is the easiest target at this moment. He's confused. Sailom is confused. We're confused along with them.

Yeah. Thought not knowing how Kang will react at the point is part of the fun. He isn't exactly the brightest boy to ever be an heir to a vast fortune, so I'm hoping his next move isn't going to be something like "I'll see if this kid is really gay so that I can warn Pimfah not to date him."

You might still get that, but come on. Let's at least let Pimfah graduate from high school before she starts dating her teacher.

O.K. Its funny to me that Chimon actually played this role 5 years ago where he fell in love with his former bully and kind of started dating him secretly like this. LOL. Lordy, I think Inn and Sun ended up in couple shirts and basically Sun thought that if he could make Inn behave like a boyfriend, he'd become a boyfriend without them ever having to talk about it. And same result. Oopsie. Chimon's reactions of confusion and then dismay and hurt over Kang's behavior around Pimfah were as always, on point. "I'm an introvert, sure, but the kind of introvert who is going to chaperone your date and find out what the heck is going on."

Now the bad. Which I will have to put mildly. This isn't actually a bad story and it doesn't need all of these "BL Moments" to prop it up and convince us its a BL. They draw me out of the series rather than draw me in, and that's a problem. Now, not all of them have been bad, but there's at least one every episode that I wish they'd just have skipped. Last episode it was ending that discussion in the bathroom where Sailom refused Kang's help with a trip and fall on the bathroom floor. Or ending that discussion where Sailom sought out Kang after his birthday party because he knew he'd be feeling down with the boys falling into the pool. This episode it was having them end the struggle over the phone where Sailom was hiding his major from Kang with them falling and staring for 10 seconds, and the silliness of having live CPR demonstrations. And adding thump thump heartbeat sounds are a distraction when we know how they are feeling without them. I know BLs are really judged by how many "moments" can be packed into a series, because each of those "moments" is a bit of endorphin squee for the audience, but not by how engaging the series is. But I wish they wouldn't rely on that when they don't have to. Just having Kang start to strip in the bathroom or win his fight in the car by licking Lom's ear (Ha! Two can play at that game, Sailom) would have been enough to make Sailom confused about whether Kang "liked him, liked him," and hurt when Pimfah came into the picture.

Also, while I've liked the production quality overall this series, the next time a scene calls for boys to bounce in a bed, they need to test the mattress they are using to make sure it bounces. LOL.

Despite being a scoundrel, Praew was actually trying to groom Punn to be an actor/model. So they mentioned a few times that he was taking acting lessons or he asked to be excused from them so he could do his studies when he was sneaking off to Japan. I was worried that she would have stepped on Punn some more by making him perform "special sexual services" like she did with Bank, without any intention of promoting him. But if we look beyond the reason she signed him, she seemed interested in building him up once signed.