Only 2 out of the 6 episodes worked for me

It’s hard to review and rate a series that has episodes that are not connected in any way. So my score is an average of the 6 individual scorers. I’ve also decided to write a mini review for each episode. I’d only really recommend episodes 3 and 4.

Episode 1 (OhmFluke): was that episode supposed to be romantic? Nothing is solved in the end, and the fact that Pierce doesn’t say he’s got a boyfriend proves it. I didn’t understand the ideia of the episode. Score: 4/10
Episode 2 (JaFirst): this episode technically works for the concept of different types of friendships, but it’s a bit too weird. It’s not a guy that transforms into a cat, it’s a cat the whole time. Score: 3/10
Episode 3 (NatMax): I liked this story. It was simple and it had a beginning, middle and ending. It worked well as a self contained mini story. Score: 8/10
Episode 4 (YoonTalay): Yoon and Talay always work well together. I can’t believe it was literally written in the shirt!! This one deserves a second viewing. Score: 9/10
Episode 5 (TommyJimmy: it was an ok episode, I don’t feel like it’s a developed enough story compared to a few of the others. Score: 6/10
Episode 6 (KinmonCopter): this episode doesn’t make much sense but it’s kinda sweet, if you don’t take it too seriously. Score: 6/10

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We cant even have a simple special without Lhong showing up

I really liked 90% of this special, but the inclusion of that Lhong scene towards the end really annoys me. This is supposed to be a nice, peaceful story about Tharn and Type, without the fighting and crying. We got the short scenes with the friends, which I’m totally okay because it grounds the present day with the past, as well as ties it more with Love by Chance.

I liked the story of them going back to visit Type’s parents, which gave us cute couple scenes at the beach. But I’m glad we got to see Type apologizing to Kom and being proud of saying out loud that he got a boyfriend. It was also nice to understand that Type was Kom’s first love, so that explains why he always stood there listening to his hateful comments.

But they had to include that Thorn and Lhong scene. It only confirms that absolutely nothing happened to Lhong, who’s living well abroad. Zero consequences to the despicable thing he did. Regarding Thorn, I really don’t get him. How can he can pretend that Lhong only type a small thing and should be happier?! Thorn has two biological siblings, he’s creepy towards the little sister and sometimes looks concerned about Tharn. While he’s got two “I consider you like a brother” guys, both did bad things and hurt his brother. It doesn’t make sense. I can try to pretend that I understand how he could still care and be friends with San, who’s been his best friend for years. But Lhong? No way.

The fact that we got that scene of Thorn basically forgiving Lhong bring the whole special down for me.

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Just pretend the last scene doesn't exist

Even before I started Advance Bravely, I knew that the ending sucked and that the show got censored hard, so it influenced the quality towards the end. But, honestly, it would have been SO much better to just end it at the hospital or with a voice over saying that everyone is okay and landscapes/b-roll from the training facility. That animated scene is so random and out of nowhere that it’s, thankfully, easy to just pretend it doesn’t exist, so that it doesn’t ruin the overall show. I’d say that we can just pretend like the entire last episode, but the “confession” scene is the well is nice. But not as nice is the “don’t mess with my baby” from Yuan Zong’s revenge.

Yes, this show is not perfect, but I think they managed to get a few regular BL shot in there, like many Yuan Zong and Xia Yao doing romantic things and several scenes of them sleeping together. This show is basically carried by the chemistry between the two leads, since the main plot doesn’t make much sense. The ear bitting scenes are basically their version of kissing scenes, in this universe. The production used the songs in a clever way to say what the characters are thinking in those scenes where they couldn't go a step further, like the scene with the hot towel after the acupuncture.

The subplot between Da Yu and Wang Zhi Shui is not amazing but it’s not the worst either. Peng Ze as a whole didn’t need to exist because he doesn’t do anything at all. I’m still trying to understand what Yao’s job is and how did he manage to not go to work for many, many days and still have have that job. I liked the mom character.

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A super sweet show about adults

This show was such a surprise! Yeah, I had heard a lot about how it was amazing and entered many people’s favorite shows from 2020, but still. The concept is a bit weird at first, but I think the show explores it very well.

Since it’s part of the show that the main character is 30, it’s so nice to see adults living adult lives in a BL story, no school, no university. Besides, the office scenes are great because all the characters there are interesting in their own way, like Rokkaku and Fujisaki. I love Adachi and Kurosawa, and how their relationship develops. Yes, in some ways it’s a bit uncomfortable that Adachi knows exactly what Kurosawa is thinking on fantasizing about, but he never takes advantage of that. In a way, knowing all that makes Adachi more open to new things and more comfortable with himself. I think the construction of Kurosawa as the perfect guy on the outside was done very well.

Unfortunately, I didn’t like the Tsuge and Minato stuff all that much. Both actors are great, but the relationship felt a bit forced. It was all so quick, there’s not much development, there’s no romance. It’s the polar opposite to the Adachi/Kurosawa relationship, and that’s probably the intent. I understand that Goto Yutaro looks younger than he is, and that Asaka Kodai might look a bit older, but I feel like the pushed it too far on making Tsuge look middle aged, even though he’s supposed to be 30. In the end, I feel like we lost too much time with a romance that is not fulfilling, while we could have had more time with Adachi/Kurosawa or with the office characters.

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More a flop than a win

Honestly, the series and the characters didn’t deserve this. They tried to do something different, but I feel like it ended up being a a fail.
Yes, the ending (after the trip) is nice. We get to see all the main characters in the restaurant, with a quick wrap up on their stories. We even get a Aey moment, which was one of my favorite parts because it shows that actions have consequences. I also like the callback to the bracelets from Gene’s dad.

I was okay with the abrupt weird beginning when I looked like just a fun bit to tie in with the new novel. The whole supernatural stuff on the beach was a complete mess. If Sib was not aware that something was going on, I’d 100% expect him to be extremely angry. Gene escalated his trick on Sib way too much. Sib’s lie was completely based on love, wanting to create a nice gift and spending time with Gene. While Gene’s only existed to make Sib look like an idiot and admit his lie.

Overall, though Sib is not perfect, and he did lie to Gene, with the help of their friends, this episode makes Gene look bad. Yes, Sib might be too much sometimes (we saw that on the show), but Gene sounds like the bigger problem.

Like so many continuations, this special ends up doing disservice to the characters.

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A very nice surprise

The first History season I watched was Trapped, which has many more episodes. So I was a bit worried how well 4 episodes of 45 minutes could deliver a well rounded story.

The show manages to develop, rather slowly, two couple with completely different stories. In one hand we have Wang Zhen Wen and Wang Zhen Wu, who’ve known each other all their lives and been inseparable since 7th grade. I personally get the feeling that they both kinda liked each other all along, and not a single sided love from Zhen Wen. I like their status in the end as “living our best life”. It’s obvious that they’re happy.

On the other hand, Zi Xuan and You Hao have to go through a lot of steps rather quickly, but it still doesn’t feel rushed in my opinion. They go from don’t particularly liking each, to being friendly, to spending a lot of time together to actually being together, by the end. I’m happy that this show doesn’t even come close to the “but he’s a guy!” territory with any of the characters. Zach and Fandy probably have one of the best chemistry level’s in my opinion, considering how short this show is.

From being on social media and youtube I had actually seen two scenes from the show (the net kiss and the “confession”). I didn’t realize until it happened that the confession scene, with the sister, was from this series. It’s probably my favorite part.

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Nobody deserved this, specially the cast

Not every story needs a happy ending. Not every couple stays together. But every series needs to have a story. If the production had no plot for Together with Me: The Next Chapter, this show shouldn’t exist.

Nothing works on this series. Korn/Knock continue to prove that they don’t fit together. Yiwha is not even the shadow of the character she once was. Farm is practically unbearable in every second he’s on screen. Cho is the same, which is to say he’s still there. Fai is the only aspect that continues to be good, but she barely has a story and usually is there just for comic relief or to show how everybody else is terrible. Phubet and Kavitra apparently don’t exist in this parallel universe. And then we have the families and the work environment… which combined take over the space occupied previously by the university.

We know from TWM that Korn has an older sister, she’s part of the show. We even see her visiting the family home in the last episode (before they moved?). Kavitra knows that Korn is gay. Now, we have a series that takes place after TWM and we meet Korn’s parents. They NEVER acknowledge the fact that they have a daughter. Not a single character remembers that she exists. I understand that the actress might not have been available, but it’s impossible that the character would not have tried to help her brother or that anyone would suggest asking her for help.

The work place drama is even worse most of the time. Yiwha and her boss never really have any chemistry and their story is very forced, same with the jealousy towards Cho and his female boss. The factory is a whole different mess. We have 2 main storylines and both are horrible. The office guys x factory guys is SO bad, so bad. The show just needed villains with no purpose. With the exception of the machine breaking, every problem looks like pure incompetence from the factory guys. And they obviously, because it fits the story, are also homophobic. And then we have the boss…

He’s creepy, at least the show achieved that. And Cho kinda realized that early, but never thought of mentioning it. I’m almost sure that Pete only exists to make Korn the "villain" and the one screwing up for once. Everybody knew that Knock was always the one being an idiot and acting like a teenager, so this series had to try to balance things out. I’m not against the idea of Korn cheating, but the way this show does it is awful. How was it not clear to everybody that Pete was a bad guy once the picture of Korn in his room got leaked? Who else could have leaked that picture if they were alone in the room?! When Dr. Bright appears to be a reasonable character, compared to the others, we might have a big problem.

Long story short, this show exists because people wanted more MaxTul and that means money. Unfortunately, there were no good ideas, so we got this mess.

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I’m glad I didn’t love the ending

This series is not horrible, but at least half of the show is not good. The biggest problem with the Shipper are the plot lines that are either bad or don’t get developed enough. The show is helped a lot by some strong performances by Ohm and First. Jennie is also good as the Angel of Death.

I’m glad I didn’t love the ending, because around episode 11 I was getting worried that I’d have to say that I liked this show. The fact that I don’t love the ending doesn’t me it doesn’t make sense or that it sucked. Kim wanting Way to go on his own path, even though it would take them to opposite sides of the world, makes sense. It would allow both of them to make their own decision and be free for the first time. That’s the real love.

I’d say the last 2 episodes are actually good, but not enough to make the first 2/3 of the season a good watch. The only big redeeming quality of the first half are the visual effects. The Kana/Bii story is very bad, even after you learn why Kim did all that. Actually, even after you learn why Kim acted the way he did, I don’t feel like it’s satisfactory enough. Most shows try not to paint the main character in such a bad light as a way of making it easier for the viewers to like them. But this show did the opposite. Once you realize that Kim has been dead the whole time, and not coming back, we understand that he show doesn’t need you to root for him, you just need to understand the message he left. Live life today.

The real true love in the show is really between Kim and Way. We don’t actually get a “he loves his brother and family in secret”. We see via Way that Kim doesn’t hate Khet, but we never got a real sense of him liking or taking care of Khet. He knew about the hair salon but never did anything. He also knew that Khet blamed himself or their broken relationship but never did anything either.

Unrelated to Kim, the hair salon is a big problem to the show, it doesn’t make sense. How did a 15 year old learn to do hair well enough to get a job doing that? Did Khet only do it to find a hair treatment for Pan or that’s just a bonus? In the end, is Khet still missing class to work in the salon?

Overall, I feel like this show had good ideias for the ending, but the execution and early story was weak.

PS: I don’t think this show did well enough for the story to continue from that extra Kim scene in the end.

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The "best part" of the trilogy

It’s important to start by mentioning that Together With Me is far better than Bad Romance or Next Chapter. I decided to watch the “trilogy” chronologically, so Together With Me was the first one I watched.

This series does have in it’s favor that most of the plots move forward in a good rhythm. The show has also a great set of characters, mixing the best of the other 2 parts. This is the Korn/Knock show, but the side characters have great stories and the acting is good. Single Yiwha is the best part of the show, because her story can focus on being a boss 100% of the time. Fai really shines in this series too. At first I was a bit annoyed by the Phubet/Kavitra romance, bit they grew on me. I was never on board of the Farm/Bright boat, but it was not the worst part of Together With Me.

Unfortunately, the worst part of the series is related to Korn and Knock. Firstly, we have many big inconsistencies about their story before the show, since they’re meant to have known each other from childhood. But the definite major problem is how their story does not evolve. There are 13 episodes of this show and they do dumb stuff in all 13. Everybody knows that Korn and Knock will end up together but this series likes to prove with each episode how stupid this characters are. The shrimp scene is a clear example (it takes 2 seconds to say "he's allergic"). They don’t talk and never trust each other, so I could not root for them. I mean, to be fair, it’s a Knock problem 90% for the time. Their stupid hook up/fight cycle combined with the devil girlfriend cliche kinda ruined the show overall for me.

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Not so easy to hate

Like many people, I imagine, I watched this series because of Jaemin. He actually surprised me with his acting. It’s not that I was expecting him to be bad, but he was better than I was hoping.

This is a short series, so I was not expecting an incredibly developed and complex plot. And being a college students focused show, I knew that the romance would be very central do the story. I liked all the characters but felt like the conflicts were a bit too forced. But that how college aged young people act.

I’ve never watched anything else that has been adapted from a webtoon, nor am I familiar with the source material. So, I can understand how that can present a different set of challenges versus a novel, which is more detailed by nature.

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A great show from start to finish

The theme song from his show was on my playlist even before I finished the episodes. It’s probably my favorite BL theme.

Enemies to lovers dramas are not usually my style because it usually feels like either since is very forced. With HIStory3: Trapped we get enough of a backstory to understand why they don’t like each other from episode 1. But they also don’t hate each other. Tang Yi is annoying by Shao Fei, who in turn suspects that Tang Yi is involved in bad stuff. I mean, the iconic gun scene from the poster is very much like their relationship in the beginning, just loud screams and not much action.

I feel like the way their relationship flows into romance happens at a good pace. It’s not sudden nor do I feel like it takes too much space in a show that’s not just about the romance. Trapped is as much about the mob stuff as it’s about the couple. We also get a secondary couple, with Li An and Jack, that works well as both a couple and a balanced comedy relief. I don’t know if I’d say Jake and Chris have amazing romantic chemistry, but I think they work very well together even in the more steamy scenes.

The whole dad reveal was obvious from a mile away, but it, at least, gave us a rare father in law - son in law scene in a BL. The side story with the annoying sister was very much forgettable.

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Bad is in the title

Bad Romance is basically 10 episodes of filler and not much consequence, and then we got the last 3 episodes with actual story development. I’m still surprised by how this show managed to get a prequel. It’s not like Korn and Knock worked well in this show. The biggest issue is that we can see from Together With Me that the actors are good and the characters have potential, the material they’re given is what’s Bad. The secondary plots on this show make no sense, specially the central one in the end, which brings everybody together.

With all that being said, I have to admit that I like the giant bear scene.

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Pretty heavy themes

Let’s be fair, going back into your younger self’s body is not a super original story. But at least in this case, Kyung Hwi also goes back in time too, which makes it interesting. Minho proves that he’s got the role not just because he’s a famous idol, but because he can act.

This show deals with some heavy subjects, like bullying and suicide. It’s not all the time, but it’s something that's always floating above every plot point, specially regarding Na Bi. I feel like I enjoyed the ending more because I’ve seen the “unreleased” extra scene, but it’s still an open ended story. But I can also see how someone might feel like the ending is not fulfilling enough.

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It could work in a different format

I feel like the concept of mini stories that are connected, but not that much, would only work with less episodes or 2 episodes a week. I personally was more interested from the start on the story of Hia, Masuk and Tir, so it’s easy to watch just the last 3 episodes and skip everything before that. But for people that like the first couples, they had to wait 10 weeks for the conclusion. With that in mind, this show is very easy to rewatch if you go directly to the 2 episodes that you like, but I cannot imagine rewatching everything unless you love every couple.

Focusing on the couple +1, which I wholeheartedly enjoyed, 2 episodes was way to little for that type of story. It could have been a nice 8 episode series. Those episodes have a high cry potential.

We've seen a regular series with Talay+Perth (My Engineer) and a regular series with Talay+Yoon (YYY), so we now need a full on drama with the 3 of them together.

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I loved it! But you may hate it

This show is definitely a you love it or you hate it. For me, the YYY Special is everything that the original series lacked and more. It’s so cute and so funny to the perfect balanced amount. I feel like they incorporated the pandemic in an interesting way.

This show might work for you if:
1. You understand that YYY was crazy and stablished that they don’t live our normal real world and that there are no limits.
2. You REALLY like the main couple and not have problem with cheesy scenes


If you keep that in mind from the very start of the first episode, you have a chance of loving YYY special.

My favorite moment is the washing hair scene with Princess Leia's towel hair and the pet names.

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