Before discussing Cha Eun-woo, people should stop talking about celebrity money as though it magically grows back the moment it is taken away. Kim Sae-ron should have taught everyone how dangerous that assumption is. She had worked since childhood and was once considered a successful actress, yet after her 2022 DUI, her career collapsed and she faced serious financial problems. Court records later showed that she was also listed as a creditor in her father’s bankruptcy for approximately ₩250 million, roughly €152,000 or US$176,000. Police ruled her February 2025 death a suicide. That does not mean her debts or her family caused her death, because no official investigation established that, and her mother specifically denied claims that the family had squandered the money she earned.
Cha Eun-woo’s situation is not Kim Sae-ron’s, and I am not pretending that the circumstances are identical. The relevant point is much narrower: the celebrity may be the person earning the money while relatives, agencies, accountants and other professionals are involved in managing the structures around that income. When something goes wrong, however, the public usually places every decision directly into the celebrity’s hands because that is the only face they recognise. In this case, the disputed company was established by Cha Eun-woo’s mother, and its former registered address was linked in Korean reporting to an eel restaurant operated by his parents. That does not automatically prove that the company was legitimate, but it also does not prove that Cha Eun-woo personally designed a criminal scheme. https://www.chosun.com/english/national-en/2026/01/22/7CXNJF6XCFG2XHJBZ4IAPCFZI4/https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/korea/nts-alleges-actor-cha-eun-woos-mother-runs-shell-company-for-tax-reduction-purposes/12001366
What matters is that Cha Eun-woo did not respond by hiding behind his parents, his agency or his advisers. In his April statement, he said that he had not examined the process carefully enough and that the responsibility belonged to him, not to his family or company. That was the responsible position for an adult whose income and name were involved, regardless of who handled the practical arrangements. It was an acceptance of responsibility for his lack of oversight, not an admission that he had knowingly designed a criminal tax scheme.
The business context also needs to be described accurately. The eel restaurant connected to his family was a genuine operating restaurant, not a fictitious storefront or a paper company. It had operated for years, was publicly profiled in 2023 as a 150-seat restaurant on a large site, and had real customers, staff and restaurant activity. The separate company involved in the tax dispute was registered at the same address for a period, but it was also a legally incorporated entity whose representative obtained official registration as a popular-culture and entertainment-planning business in 2022. Fantagio has stated that the company had a management-services agreement with the agency, performed management and support work for Cha Eun-woo’s activities, and submitted evidence of those services during the tax proceedings. The unresolved question is therefore not whether the restaurant existed—it clearly did—but whether the separate management company performed enough genuine, independent services to justify the income allocated to it and the way that income was taxed. That is precisely the issue now being reviewed, and it is very different from claiming that the restaurant was fake or that Cha Eun-woo personally created a proven criminal scheme. https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260408181051005 https://jstart.co.kr/bbs/board.php?bo_table=school_news&wr_id=1059 https://www.mt.co.kr/society/2026/01/28/2026012819361285820 https://www.dispatch.co.kr/2338101 https://imnews.imbc.com/replay/straight/6805784_28993.html
With that human context understood, the legal context still needs to be reported correctly. Lily Alice’s article is very short, and the expression “legal proceedings” may make readers think that Cha Eun-woo has sued the National Tax Service in court. That is not what has happened at this stage. Fantagio confirmed on August 2 that he filed a petition with the Korean Tax Tribunal in July, asking it to review whether the National Tax Service’s income-tax assessment was legally justified. The Tax Tribunal is an administrative tax adjudication body. This is therefore an administrative appeal against a tax assessment, not currently a criminal trial or a court lawsuit. No Tax Tribunal decision has yet been announced. https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260802017000005 and https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20260802002400315
The amount also needs to be explained more clearly. The figure originally reported in January was more than ₩20 billion (roughly €12.2 million or US$14 million), but that was not Cha Eun-woo’s final financial burden. Fantagio later confirmed that previously paid corporate tax and VAT had to be adjusted or refunded because part of the calculation overlapped. The effective amount paid was therefore approximately ₩13 billion (roughly €7.8 million or US$9 million). He paid the assessed taxes in April after receiving the official payment notice. https://www.chosun.com/english/kpop-culture-en/2026/04/09/B3FFZURX6BAA7LFDEEHMEO7AFQ/ and https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10713205
Reports now state that his earlier pre-assessment review did not overturn the National Tax Service’s central position. After the final assessment and the tax adjustments, he paid approximately ₩13 billion (roughly €7.8 million or US$9 million) and later filed the Tax Tribunal petition. This means that the current stage is different from the pre-assessment review discussed in January. It is now a formal challenge to an assessment that has already been issued and paid. https://v.daum.net/v/9mGwginQw9?f=p and https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/korea/cha-eunwoo-files-appeal-over-13-billion-won-tax-bill/12803532
Cha Eun-woo’s April 8 statement confirmed that the taxes had been paid, accepted personal responsibility for not examining the company’s establishment and operation carefully enough, and stated that the remaining procedures would continue. His later appeal is therefore not proof that the April statement was withdrawn. He complied with the assessment while preserving his right to request a legal review of it. The result could uphold, reduce or cancel the assessment, but no decision is public at this time.
Finally, I found no public court case, criminal indictment, prosecution announcement or Tax Tribunal ruling concerning this dispute as of August 5, 2026. The only newly confirmed proceeding is the pending Tax Tribunal petition. Calling it an “appeal” is accurate, but describing it simply as “legal proceedings” without explaining that it is an administrative tax appeal may create the false impression that a criminal or court case is already underway.
I agree that agencies should normally protect their artists against fabricated allegations, sexual harassment, invasions of privacy and genuinely unlawful attacks. However, this article needs an important correction because it has made the announcement look as though it was issued specifically for Doh Kyungsoo. It was not. Blitzway consistently used “our affiliated artists” in the plural and never named Kyungsoo anywhere in the statement. This was a general legal notice covering the agency’s roster: Ju Ji-hoon, Jung Ryeo-won, Chun Woo-hee, Doh Kyungsoo, Woo Do-hwan, Chae Jong-hyeop, Kim Ye-rim, In Gyo-jin, Moon Chae-won, Son Dam-bi, So Yi-hyun, Yoon Bak, Park Ha-sun, Han Bo-reum, Jung In-sun, Kang Min-ah, Kim Woo-seok, Jeong Ji-hoon, Yoon Ha-young, Cha Joo-wan, Lee Yoon-hwan, Chae Seo-an, Choi Tae-joon and Lee Ga-yeon.
The agency said it had found numerous posts involving alleged false information, defamation, insults, malicious attacks, sexual harassment and privacy violations, and that civil and criminal proceedings were already underway. It did not say which artists were targeted by which posts, nor did it announce a new incident involving Kyungsoo. As Usual Lily Alice simply took an agency-wide notice and placed its most recognisable name at the centre of the story, creating confusion that was not present in the original statement.
So yes, this kind of protection should be normal rather than exceptional. But accurate reporting should also be the norm. Kyungsoo should not be made to look as though he personally demanded legal protection over a new controversy when the announcement concerned Blitzway Entertainment’s artists collectively.
Calling an adult man a “pussy” because his agency is taking legal action is not the fearless defence of free speech you seem to think it is. It is simply childish mockery dressed up as social commentary. You looked at a promotional photograph, invented an emotional state for him, and then used your own invention as evidence that he is weak. That is not analysis. It is playground behaviour with longer sentences. Your second point might have been worth discussing if you had actually understood the announcement. Nobody said celebrities should be protected from criticism. People are free to dislike Kyungsoo’s acting, music, personality, career choices or public behaviour. The agency’s notice concerns alleged false information, defamation, personal attacks, sexual harassment and invasions of privacy. Criticism and deliberate harassment are not the same thing, no matter how convenient it would be for you to pretend otherwise.
Blitzway is also not “abusing the legal system.” It collected evidence and submitted it to the appropriate authorities. The police, prosecutors and courts will decide whether the reported material violates Korean law. Apparently, allowing judges to evaluate evidence becomes an abuse of justice only when the person seeking protection is someone you have already decided to ridicule. That is a remarkably selective understanding of the legal system. As for the courts having “more important issues,” courts do not operate by choosing one single important case and abandoning every other offence. Different courts, departments and investigators handle different matters. Reputation, privacy, threats and sexual harassment are also legal rights, even when the victim is famous. Being successful does not turn a human being into public property.
And quoting “sticks and stones” as though a children’s rhyme settles questions of law, harassment and reputational damage is probably the weakest part of an already very weak performance. Words can destroy careers, spread false accusations, damage families and encourage thousands of strangers to target one person. Children are taught that rhyme to help them cope with teasing. Adults are generally expected to develop a more sophisticated understanding of consequences. You presented four “takes” as though their number somehow compensated for their lack of substance. In reality, you gave us one childish insult, one argument against a claim nobody made, one misunderstanding of how courts function, and one nursery rhyme. That is not intellectual provocation. It is confidence arriving several pages before comprehension.
I honestly wish this article had been checked against the original Korean notice before being posted, because the headline and the wording give people the impression that something new has happened specifically to Doh Kyung-soo. That is not what Blitzway Entertainment announced.
The Korean title of the notice is “Legal Response Regarding Infringement of the Rights of Our Artists.” Throughout the statement, Blitzway refers to its artists in the plural. It says the company found numerous posts and comments involving alleged false information, defamation, insults, malicious attacks, sexual harassment and privacy violations against artists represented by the agency. Doh Kyung-soo is one of those artists, but he is never individually named in the notice. The same statement also concerns the rest of Blitzway’s roster, which includes Ju Ji-hoon, Jung Ryeo-won, Chun Woo-hee, Woo Do-hwan, Moon Chae-won, Chae Jong-hyeop, Park Ha-sun and many others. The complete statement was also reproduced by Star News. Unlike this article, the Korean report clearly explains that this is an agency-wide announcement and lists several of the artists represented by Blitzway: https://v.daum.net/v/20260805210143900
There is another difference in the wording. The article says that the agency “will pursue” legal action, but Blitzway actually said that civil and criminal legal procedures are already being carried out. The agency also warned that deleting a post or making an account private does not necessarily remove responsibility when the evidence has already been collected, and that anonymous writers may still be identified through legal procedures. Fans can submit the URL, author information and screenshots of relevant posts to [email protected]. Most importantly, Blitzway did not reveal any particular rumour, post, suspect or new incident involving Kyungsoo. Therefore, the answer to people asking “What happened?” is that no new personal scandal or case concerning him has been announced. MyDramaList has taken a general notice protecting all Blitzway artists and presented it as a story specifically about Doh Kyung-soo, probably because his name attracts more attention. Even Soompi made the same misleading choice by claiming that the content was directed at him when the original Korean notice does not say that.
There was a separate case involving Kyungsoo under his former agency, Company Soosoo. Complaints were filed against malicious posters in 2024, and on February 25, 2025, the agency announced that investigators had identified a suspect accused of repeatedly spreading false and defamatory material. Further legal proceedings were expected, with no settlement or leniency. That information is real, but it is an older and separate case. Blitzway did not say that its current agency-wide notice was an update on that investigation. The previous case can be checked here: https://sports.donga.com/ent/article/all/20250225/131104745/1
So yes, Blitzway is genuinely taking legal action, and Kyungsoo is protected by that policy as one of its artists. But no, the official announcement was not made only for him, and there is currently no confirmed new event involving him that would explain the way this article was written. That distinction matters, especially when a misleading headline immediately causes readers to assume that he is involved in another controversy.
Latest News: we now have much stronger evidence that it is 10 episodes, not the provisional 12 I had previously estimated. It premiered with Episodes 1 and 2 together on August 25, then moves to the regular Wednesday schedule from Episode 3, with the projected finale on October 21, 2026. Tailai itself currently confirms the Wednesday 8 p.m. WeTV schedule, while multiple updated episode databases now independently show 10 episodes.
Reading these comments made me realise that I had never written a proper review of Burnout Syndrome, even though I liked it very much. Some viewers described the characters as flat, poorly explained, or impossible to connect with, while others saw the same behaviour as realistic complexity. Ritual’s comparison to entering a conversation halfway through particularly stayed with me.
Psychologically, burnout, emotional avoidance and unhealthy attachment can make people withdrawn, contradictory and difficult to understand. They often act before they can explain what they feel, which can resemble inconsistent writing. I do not think the series was perfect, but I believe much of that emotional distance was intentional rather than accidental.
I have now written a full review explaining why Koh, Jira and Pheem worked for me, why Dew impressed me so much, and why some viewers may understand the series differently after revisiting it. I would genuinely like to know whether the review changes anyone’s perspective, or confirms why the drama still did not work for them.
I feel like the problem is with the characters, they aren't well written. They don't give us anything to bite…
Thank you for this comment. I liked Burnout Syndrome, but somehow never wrote a proper review until your words made me reconsider why these characters worked for me despite feeling incomplete to others.
Psychologically, emotionally exhausted people often become withdrawn, contradictory and difficult to understand because they no longer explain themselves clearly. That can look like weak characterization, but I saw it as part of the series’ portrayal of burnout, avoidance and unhealthy attachment. I explained this more fully in my review, and I would genuinely like to know whether it changes your perspective at all.
The cameos were hilarious, especially because nobody can play Pond better than Pond. 😂 But they also showed how much potential there was for a full series: different couples, ridiculous acting jobs and all that chaos could easily have supported far more than four episodes.
You were right—there are 8 episodes. The figure of 10 came from the DramaBL listing, but I checked the official platforms again, and both iQIYI and Viu confirm a total of 8 episodes. I have corrected the information. Thank you for pointing it out.
The production has one important advantage: its story is appropriately small. A first-love drama centred on two classmates, a few school locations and intimate conversations is much better suited to Lovememory’s resources than the supernatural world attempted in Sweet Blood. The studio does not need expensive sets or complex effects to make this particular story work.
However, its greatest weakness remains the extremely short format. Eight episodes lasting roughly six to eleven minutes will probably produce only about seventy minutes of finished drama. That leaves very little time to establish the friendship, develop reciprocal feelings, explain the separation and provide a satisfying present-day resolution. Lovememory’s weaker series were criticised precisely for missing important backstory and replacing emotional development with repetitive dialogue.
The first episode attracted approximately 55,000 views and 1,600 likes during its first weeks. That is respectable for an independent channel, but it does not indicate a major breakout, especially compared with Lovememory’s 131,000 subscribers. Since only four episodes have been released and reliable audience scores remain scarce, judging the finished series would be premature.
My current assessment is therefore cautiously average. The title, emotional structure and two-character focus give Love Hurts more potential than some of Lovememory’s weaker projects. However, it still visibly belongs to the low-budget Korean YouTube BL category that many viewers are beginning to ignore. Unless the second half provides a strong explanation for the separation and gives the actors enough material to make the relationship emotionally convincing, it risks becoming another pleasant but forgettable short drama rather than a series capable of rebuilding international interest in Korean BL.
Love Hurts (2026) Original title: 첫사랑니 Alternative titles: First Love Tooth, First Wisdom Tooth, Cheotsarangni
The production has not released a detailed official synopsis. This version is therefore based on the first four episodes, the trailer and the confirmed character information, without inventing events from the unreleased second half.
Synopsis
Kim Dojin has never been a particularly successful student. After receiving the worst grades in his class, he is placed beside Lee Jaewon, one of the school’s strongest students, and ordered to study with him. For Jaewon, helping Dojin should be nothing more than another responsibility given to him by a teacher. For Dojin, it initially feels like another humiliation. They are not friends, they have little reason to spend time together, and Dojin has no interest in being constantly reminded of how far behind everyone else he has fallen. Yet forced proximity has a way of revealing what distance keeps hidden.
Behind Jaewon’s serious and dependable appearance is someone far gentler than Dojin expected. Jaewon does not simply correct his work or lecture him about his grades. He listens, notices the details others overlook and gradually becomes the person beside whom Dojin feels most comfortable being himself. Their study sessions begin to matter for reasons that have nothing to do with school. Ordinary conversations become memories Dojin returns to long afterward. A glance lasts slightly too long, physical closeness becomes difficult to ignore, and the friendship developing between them begins to carry feelings neither boy knows how to name. For Dojin, falling for Jaewon is both exciting and frightening. Jaewon becomes his first experience of being genuinely seen, but first love also arrives with the constant fear that he may be misunderstanding everything. Kindness is not necessarily attraction, and the person who makes his heart race may never have imagined their relationship in the same way. Jaewon appears more controlled, but silence does not mean the absence of emotion. As Dojin’s feelings become increasingly visible, Jaewon must decide whether to protect the friendship they already have or admit that their closeness has changed him as well.
The story is not told only through the innocence of their school years. An older Dojin remains unable to forget Jaewon, suggesting that whatever began between them did not end cleanly. Their past survives through memories that return unexpectedly, carrying both the excitement of first love and the pain of knowing that something important was left unfinished. The Korean title gives that emotional wound a physical form. 첫사랑니 plays with the words for first love and wisdom tooth: something growing quietly beneath the surface until its presence becomes impossible to ignore. It can be removed, but the empty space remains—and even years later, touching that place may still hurt. Love Hurts therefore treats first love as more than a sweet memory. It is the person who taught Dojin what attraction felt like, but also the person whose absence continues to shape him. Meeting Jaewon changed his youth; understanding what happened between them may be the only way for him to finally move beyond it. The central question is not simply whether two former classmates loved each other. It is whether feelings left unspoken can survive the years between them—and whether returning to a first love can heal an old wound or only make it painful again.
Series information
Production company: Lovememory Main cast: Kim Changyu as Kim Dojin and Kang Seonho as Lee Jaewon Number of episodes: 8 Current runtime: Approximately 6–11 minutes per episode Members’ premiere: July 8, 2026 Free public premiere: July 10, 2026 Public release: Fridays at 6:30 p.m. KST Time in metropolitan France: Fridays at 11:30 a.m. CEST Platform: Lovememory’s official YouTube channel Expected members’ finale: August 26, 2026 Expected public finale: August 28, 2026
After Moving Seats, the Boy Behind Me Has a Crush on Me (2026) Original title: 席替えしたら、どうやら後ろの男が俺のこと好きらしい Romanized title: Sekigae Shitara, Douyara Ushiro no Otoko ga Ore no Koto Suki Rashii Japanese short title: Sekisuki
Synopsis
For Hare Mayama, changing seats should be one of the most insignificant moments of the school year. He is a quiet second-year student who rarely attracts attention and is comfortable remaining somewhere in the background. Being placed near the back of the classroom therefore seems like a small piece of good luck—until the first worksheet is passed forward from the desk behind him. Written across it is a confession: “I like you.” Hare assumes it cannot possibly be intended for him. The student sitting behind him is Kosei Asamiya, one of the most attractive and popular boys in their class. Kosei moves easily among the confident students at the centre of school life, while Hare has never imagined that someone like him would even notice him. When Hare finally asks whether the message was a mistake, Kosei answers without hesitation: he wrote it for Hare.
For Kosei, the confession is not the beginning of his feelings. It is the moment he finally stops hiding them. He has apparently liked Hare for much longer than Hare ever realised, and sitting directly behind him removes the distance that previously allowed Kosei to remain silent. Once the truth is spoken, he does not know how—or perhaps does not want—to restrain himself anymore. His attention becomes increasingly direct, his jealousy more visible and his affection sometimes so intense that Hare has no idea how to respond. Hare’s confusion is not simply caused by discovering that another boy likes him. He genuinely cannot understand why Kosei would choose him. Hare sees himself as ordinary and unremarkable, and the original novel gives him insecurities connected to always feeling less noticeable than the people around him. Being loved by someone as confident as Kosei therefore feels almost more frightening than being rejected. Accepting the confession would also mean accepting that Kosei sees something valuable in him that Hare has never been able to recognise in himself.
Kosei may appear fearless, but his confidence disappears whenever Hare fails to understand what he means. His feelings are obvious through everything he does, yet the two boys are inexperienced enough to misunderstand even the clearest words. Hare sometimes wonders whether Kosei’s affection is really romantic, while Kosei struggles to express his devotion without making Hare feel trapped by it. Their romance develops through the smallest parts of school life: worksheets passed between desks, conversations that would never have happened before the seat change, walks home, shared umbrellas and the constant awareness that the person they are thinking about is only a few centimetres away. What was once an ordinary classroom slowly becomes a private world built between two desks.
Kosei’s friends, Toma Sakaki and Mitsuki Tsunekawada, understand the situation far more quickly than Hare does. Toma uses humour to reduce the awkwardness and gently pushes his friends forward, while the calmer Mitsuki often sees directly through the misunderstandings neither boy can explain. Rather than creating another romantic rivalry, they appear positioned as observers and supporters of a relationship that is already obvious to almost everyone except the person being pursued. The story is therefore not really about whether Kosei will confess. He has already made his choice from the beginning. It is about how Hare gradually learns to believe him. Kosei has spent too long holding back and now loves with an intensity that can become overwhelming. Hare has spent too long assuming that no one would choose him and cannot immediately trust something that appears too good to be real. One needs to slow down enough to let the other understand, while the other must stop searching for reasons why such affection cannot possibly belong to him.
After Moving Seats, the Boy Behind Me Has a Crush on Me turns a very simple school event into the beginning of a relationship neither boy expected to experience in the same way. For Kosei, the new seating arrangement finally places him close enough to say what he has wanted to say for a long time. For Hare, it becomes the first step toward seeing himself through the eyes of someone who has apparently been looking at him all along.
Series information
The drama is adapted from Mashiro Ito’s novel of the same name, illustrated by Ayukawa. The story won the top prize in the first Novema! BL Short Story Contest before being published by Starts Publishing under its BeLuck Bunko label. A manga adaptation has also been announced, while a second novel is scheduled for publication on August 20, 2026. The television production officially credits the first novel as its source.
Eito Konishi plays Hare Mayama, while Gennosuke plays Kosei Asamiya. Ken Hiramoto appears as Toma Sakaki and Hayate Iijima as Mitsuki Tsunekawada. The series is directed by Yoshika Nakayama and Yudai Nara, with a screenplay by Kento Goto.
The opening song is “Hakugei” by Kimino Virus, written specifically for the drama. The main theme is “NPC” by SUPER★DRAGON.
Airing information
Number of episodes: 8 Episode length: Approximately 30 minutes Japanese streaming premiere: Wednesday, August 5, 2026, at 25:30 JST—technically Thursday, August 6 at 1:30 a.m. in Japan International platforms: Viki, GagaOOLala and Youku Taiwan: LINE TV Japanese television: TV Aichi from August 5 at 25:00; BS Fuji from August 7 at 25:00 Japanese catch-up streaming: TVer after the BS Fuji broadcast Projected finale: Wednesday, September 24 in Japan. Viki and GagaOOLala have already created official international pages for the series. Availability can still vary slightly according to regional licensing, but both platforms currently list the drama for international release.
Episode schedule Episode International release Japanese calendar date Episode 1 August 5, 2026 August 6 Episode 2 August 12, 2026 August 13 Episode 3 August 19, 2026 August 20 Episode 4 August 26, 2026 August 27 Episode 5 September 2, 2026 September 3 Episode 6 September 9, 2026 September 10 Episode 7 September 16, 2026 September 17 Episode 8 September 23, 2026 September 24
Summer Fever (2026) Original title: 썸머 피버 Also known as: Winter Fever Season 2
Synopsis
Winter was the season in which Yeonho and Yujun almost destroyed a relationship that had taken fifteen years to build. They had grown up together, moving so naturally from childhood friendship into love that neither of them had ever learned how to imagine a life without the other. Yet familiarity did not protect them from fear. Yujun became convinced that Yeonho remained beside him out of responsibility rather than love, while Yeonho’s terror of losing him gradually turned devotion into something more desperate and possessive. What should have been a simple conversation became a breakup, and what should have been temporary distance nearly erased everything they had shared.
Summer Fever begins after they have survived that emotional winter and chosen to return to each other. The coldness between them has been replaced by a much warmer season, but reconciliation does not immediately remove the wounds that caused their separation. Yeonho and Yujun may be together again, yet both must learn how to love without allowing insecurity, guilt or fear of abandonment to make their decisions for them. The official description presents the sequel as the beginning of a new season for the couple, following them as they finally enter the passionate summer they were previously too frightened to enjoy.
For Yeonho, loving Yujun has never been the difficult part. His struggle is accepting that love cannot be preserved through force, control or the refusal to let someone leave. He has to understand that choosing Yujun every day is not the same as making Yujun responsible for his entire happiness. Yujun faces the opposite problem. He has spent so long believing that he is a burden that even sincere affection can feel like pity. Returning to Yeonho therefore means more than accepting that he is loved. It requires him to believe that he deserves that love without constantly searching for reasons why it must eventually disappear.
Summer gives them the opportunity to experience the side of their relationship that winter repeatedly interrupted. They can finally enjoy ordinary intimacy, playful affection and the physical warmth of being together without treating every happy moment as something temporary. However, the history between them remains present. A relationship formed over fifteen years cannot simply begin again as though nothing painful happened. Their love is no longer about discovering their feelings. They already know how deeply they are connected. The real question is whether they can build a healthier relationship from something that once became dangerously dependent—and whether two people who have spent most of their lives together can remain individuals while continuing to share the same future.
The sequel also introduces Sooeon, played by Kim Joo-young, while Lee Hajin returns as Kang Jiseok, a character previously seen in Laundry Romance. Their presence connects Summer Fever to True Film’s wider shared universe, although the production has not yet explained exactly how their story will affect Yeonho and Yujun. Summer Fever is therefore not simply a happier continuation of Winter Fever. It follows two men after reconciliation, when saying “I still love you” is no longer enough. Yeonho and Yujun must now prove that their relationship can survive outside the fear that once held it together.
After enduring the season that nearly separated them, summer becomes their chance to stop loving as though every day might be the last—and finally learn how to remain together without losing themselves.
Series information
Summer Fever is a South Korean short-form BL produced by True Film and the direct sequel to Winter Fever. Seo Jeong Hyeon returns as Seo Yujun, while Kwak Geon Hee returns as Kim Yeonho. The supporting cast includes Kim Joo Young as Sooeon and Lee Hajin as Kang Jiseok.
Airing information
Public premiere: Thursday, August 6, 2026 Public release time: 6:00 p.m. KST, corresponding to 11:00 a.m. in metropolitan France Membership early release: Tuesday, August 4, 2026, at the same time Platform: True Film’s official YouTube channel Expected episode count: 4 episodes Estimated runtime: Approximately 10 minutes per episode Total estimated duration: Approximately 40 minutes
True Film has officially confirmed the membership and public premiere dates. The four-episode count is listed by DramaBL and is consistent with Winter Fever and True Film’s usual short-form format, although True Film’s initial promotional announcements did not explicitly state the total number of episodes.
Expected release schedule Episode Members Free public release Episode 1 August 4 August 6 Episode 2 August 11 August 13 Episode 3 August 18 August 20 Episode 4 August 25 August 27
The projected membership finale is August 25, 2026, while the final episode should become publicly available on August 27, 2026, assuming True Film maintains its usual weekly schedule without interruption.
Mr. Fanboy (2026) Original title: รักสุดใจนายแฟนบอย Adapted from: Mr. Fanboy #รักสุดใจนายแฟนบอย by littlebbear96
Synopsis
Wan is a fourth-year university student whose greatest passion has very little to do with his studies. Away from university, he becomes a devoted fan photographer, following the public appearances of Nine, a rising actor whom he has supported for years. To Wan, Nine appears talented, hardworking and kind—the sort of celebrity whose public image makes every hour spent waiting behind a camera feel worthwhile. His academic life unexpectedly brings him closer to that seemingly perfect world. While preparing a thesis about the Thai BL industry, Wan struggles to find information about what really happens behind the scenes. A friend jokingly suggests that the easiest way to understand the industry would be to enter it himself, especially when a production starring Nine is searching for a supporting actor. Wan attends the audition without seriously expecting anything from it, only to receive the role.
For a fan who has always loved Nine from a safe distance, being selected should feel like a dream. Instead, Wan quickly discovers that becoming his idol’s colleague is very different from watching him through a camera lens. The first person to make that difference clear is Third, the sharp-tongued leading actor cast opposite Nine. Third immediately assumes that Wan is only there because he is an overexcited fan who wants access to his favourite celebrity. He sees him as inexperienced, unserious and potentially disruptive to a production in which everyone else has worked hard to earn their place.
Wan refuses to accept that judgement. What began as a strange opportunity to gather material for his thesis becomes a personal challenge. He wants to prove that enthusiasm does not make him incompetent and that being a fan does not prevent him from behaving professionally. His determination gradually forces Third to reconsider the harmless university student he dismissed so easily. Their initial hostility does not disappear immediately. Third is proud, demanding and often unnecessarily harsh, while Wan has little patience for an actor who seems to believe arrogance is the same thing as professionalism. Yet the more time they spend rehearsing and filming together, the more their conflict begins to resemble attraction.
Third becomes the person who notices how seriously Wan takes his work. Wan, meanwhile, starts seeing the man hidden behind Third’s difficult personality: an actor who genuinely cares about his profession and who may be far more sincere than the celebrities who know how to appear pleasant whenever a camera is nearby. At the same time, Wan’s admiration for Nine begins to change. The closer he gets to his idol, the harder it becomes to preserve the flawless image he once believed in. Behind carefully managed interviews, manufactured pairings and affectionate moments created for fans, the entertainment industry operates through competition, rumours and decisions that can destroy someone’s reputation before the truth has any chance to emerge. Even Nine may be hiding a side of himself that Wan was never supposed to see.
Wan therefore finds himself caught between two completely different forms of attraction. Nine represents the ideal he created from a distance, while Third is the complicated reality standing directly in front of him. One taught him how powerful admiration can feel; the other forces him to recognise the difference between loving an image and knowing a person. As Wan attracts more attention from viewers, his unexpected popularity also begins to disturb the balance surrounding the production. In an industry where fictional couples, fan reactions and public narratives can be turned into commercial weapons, becoming visible may be far more dangerous than remaining an anonymous fan photographer.
Mr. Fanboy is therefore not simply a romance between an actor and one of his former fans. It explores the strange relationship between celebrities and the people who support them, the distance between a public persona and private behaviour, and the emotional violence that can occur when an industry depends on selling intimacy while controlling every genuine relationship behind the scenes. Wan entered the production hoping to get closer to the man he admired. Instead, he may fall for the actor he initially disliked—and discover that meeting an idol is sometimes the fastest way to stop idealising him.
Series information
The drama is produced by Mandee Work and DoMunDi TV and directed by Kla Nathawat Piyanonpong. Save Worapong Walor plays Wan, Auau Thanaphum Sestasittikul plays Third, and James Supamongkon Wongwisut plays Nine. The main romantic pairing is Auau and Save.
The production began principal photography on February 20, 2026. Recent official production updates show that filming was still progressing through its later shooting queues at the end of July and beginning of August.
The source novel was published in Thai by DEEP Publishing/Satapornbooks. A separate special volume continuing Third and Wan’s relationship and their careers was released in July 2026, although the television production has only been announced as an adaptation of the original novel.
Airing information Planned premiere: August 2026 International platform: iQIYI and iQ.com Version: The uncut version has been announced as exclusive to iQIYI/iQ.com
The official teaser and current Thai promotional material confirm an August 2026 release, but as of August 1, 2026, neither DoMunDi nor iQIYI has published a specific day, weekly schedule or episode total. DramaBL therefore correctly lists the precise release date as still to be announced.
NOUR (2026) Original title: นูร์ Also known as: Nour the Series
Synopsis
For more than two hundred years, Ken has remained alive in a world where everything around him eventually disappears. He is not simply the calm and mysterious officer he appears to be. Ken is Nour, a supernatural being cursed with immortality. Remaining in one place for too long would expose what he is, so he has survived by repeatedly changing his name, identity and occupation. After living through countless versions of himself, immortality no longer resembles a gift. It is an existence built from secrecy, isolation and the certainty that anyone he allows himself to love will grow old without him. Official promotional material describes Ken as having lived through approximately one hundred different professions while hiding his true nature.
James is a determined young police officer assigned to investigate a disturbing sequence of murders connected to deliberate fires. The cases do not follow any ordinary criminal logic. Victims, evidence and repeated patterns suggest that something older and far more dangerous is hiding behind the flames. His investigation brings him into contact with Ken. James initially sees him as another officer connected to the case, but Ken seems to know more than he is willing to explain. His experience extends far beyond what should be possible for a man of his apparent age, and his relationship with the crimes may reach back long before James was born. From the moment they meet, the investigation stops belonging entirely to either of them.
James is searching for the person responsible for the fires, while Ken is trying to prevent the past he buried from returning. Yet every new death draws them closer to the truth about Nour’s curse. Their growing attraction makes that truth even more dangerous. Ken has survived by refusing permanence, while James is becoming someone he may no longer be capable of leaving behind. Their relationship therefore develops around a difficult contradiction. James cannot completely trust a man who conceals almost everything about himself, but Ken cannot reveal the truth without risking both his freedom and James’s life. Loving an immortal man means accepting that his history may contain identities, loyalties and crimes that no ordinary relationship would ever have to confront.
A second part of the mystery unfolds through Jirat, a reserved forensic doctor and one of Ken’s closest friends. Accustomed to examining death through evidence and reason, Jirat has built his life around what can be observed, tested and explained. The arrival of Chita, his new assistant, begins to challenge that certainty. Chita gradually becomes far more important to him than an ordinary colleague. His warmth enters a life Jirat had kept emotionally controlled, but their connection also brings him closer to the supernatural truth surrounding the cases. In a story where death may not represent a final boundary, Jirat must reconsider whether his medical knowledge has taught him what death is—or merely what happens to the body afterward.
As James and Ken pursue the arsonist, Jirat and Chita search for answers among the victims and the traces left behind. The two investigations slowly become one, revealing that the fires are not isolated murders but part of a secret connected to Nour’s long existence. Each man approaches that secret differently. James wants justice, Ken wants protection from a past that refuses to remain buried, Jirat demands a rational explanation, and Chita appears capable of seeing a world the others have spent their lives ignoring.
NOUR places two love stories inside the same supernatural crime investigation, but its central question is larger than identifying a murderer. It asks what immortality does to a person after everyone he once knew has disappeared, whether love can survive a truth hidden for centuries, and whether death is genuinely the end—or simply another boundary that these four men are about to cross.
The current version is an original production rather than a confirmed novel adaptation. It reworks the fantasy concept previously developed under the project title AKINA, but NOUR is now presented as the official WeTV and Tailai Entertainment version, with a revised cast and story.
Series information
The series is written and directed by Boss Wasakorn Khumklaowiriya and produced by Tailai Entertainment as a WeTV Original. The two main pairings are Boss Patthakarn as James with Tongtong Kitsakorn Kanogtorn as Ken, and Toey Pongsakorn Mettarikanon as Jirat with Phoom Chawonwat Thongyoo as Chita. It is the first leading BL role for both Tongtong and Toey.
Premiere date: Tuesday, August 25, 2026 Airing day: Every Tuesday Release time: 8:00 p.m. in Thailand Platform: WeTV Version: The uncut version is advertised as exclusive to WeTV.
The DramaBL page still lists the release date as unannounced, but this is now outdated. WeTV’s second official teaser confirmed the August 25 premiere and Tuesday release schedule on July 21, 2026.
LOVEx3 (2026) Original title: Love ยกกำลัง 3 หลักสูตร (รัก) ภาคบังคับ Also known as: Love³ / Love x 3
Synopsis
Love does not come with one universal formula. For six young men whose lives are already connected by friendship, family and school, it arrives through three very different relationships—each forcing them to understand feelings they would rather avoid.
Fuen has been best friends with Physics, usually called Sik, since their first year of secondary school. Sik is impulsive, outspoken and often acts before thinking, while Fuen has always been the calmer one, quietly keeping both of them out of trouble. Their friendship feels so natural that neither seems willing to question what it has become. The person Fuen believes he wants is Star, a popular student from another class whom he has admired from a distance. When Sik discovers his secret, he decides to become Fuen’s personal love coach, writing down suggestions and helping him find ways to approach Star. Fuen finally gathers the courage to speak to his crush, only to learn that Star’s heart is already focused on someone else: Sik.
Fuen is therefore placed in an almost impossible position. The boy he likes wants his help pursuing his best friend, while that same best friend begins reacting strangely whenever Fuen and Star grow closer. Advice that was supposed to bring Fuen nearer to Star instead exposes emotions hidden inside a friendship that both boys had taken for granted. Before Fuen can decide whom he truly loves, he must first understand whether the person he has been searching for was beside him all along. Star’s story does not end with that triangle.
Din, an admired final-year student, hears an absurd rumour claiming that every character of Star’s LINE ID costs 3,000 baht. Star may be attractive and extremely popular, but he is not someone Din initially considers his type. However, once Star’s friends challenge him to obtain the ID without paying, Din’s pride refuses to let him walk away. What begins as little more than a game becomes a slow pursuit built through repeated encounters and increasingly personal challenges. Din believes he is trying to win Star’s contact details, but the closer he gets, the less important the original competition becomes. Star is accustomed to being admired for his appearance, while Din gradually becomes interested in the person hidden behind that popularity.
The real question is no longer whether Din can obtain the complete ID. It is whether Star can trust the feelings of someone who originally approached him because of a dare—and whether Din is prepared to admit that the boy who supposedly was not his type has quietly become the centre of his attention.
The third relationship begins earlier but reaches its most difficult stage at university. Chem is Physics’s younger brother. While still in lower secondary school, he falls for Off, one of his brother’s closest friends and a boy three years older than him. Off does not dismiss his feelings completely. Instead, he asks Chem to wait, promising that when Chem reaches his final year of school and the timing is more appropriate, he will return and court him properly. Chem takes that promise seriously. Off, however, changes after entering university. He begins skipping classes, withdrawing from his friends and eventually transfers elsewhere. Chem continues hearing fragments of information through his brother until something he witnesses convinces him that Off has forgotten both him and the future he once promised.
By the time Chem enters university to study sports science and work with its football team, he has finally decided that waiting has cost him enough. Then Off appears again as one of the university’s athletes. Off treats him with the same protective familiarity as before, but Chem is no longer the trusting child who accepted a promise without demanding an explanation. Their relationship carries more emotional weight than the other two stories because affection was never their only problem. Chem needs to know why Off abandoned him, while Off must prove that caring for someone is meaningless without honesty, consistency and the courage to remain present.
Together, these three romances follow the same group from the confusion of high school into the more complicated reality of university. One begins with a crush directed toward the wrong person, another with a challenge that unexpectedly becomes sincere, and the last with a promise that may have arrived too early to survive unchanged. LOVEx3 treats love as a compulsory subject no one can avoid, but also one that each person must learn differently. Some feelings are communicated through handwritten notes, some through a LINE ID obtained one character at a time, and others through years of waiting for an explanation. There may be three stories, but they form one connected journey about recognising whom we love, proving why we love them and deciding whether that love is mature enough to last. The author described the first two novels as lighter high-school romances, while Pha Rak Sueksa moves into university and carries a more serious emotional conflict.
Series information
The drama adapts three connected novels by Chiffon_cake: Rak Rai Khong Phu Chai Cool Cool (รักร้ายของผู้ชายคูลๆ), Khao Mun Rop Khwam Rak (เขาหมุนรอบความรัก) and Pha Rak Sueksa (พารักศึกษา). They are not unrelated anthology stories: the characters belong to the same social and family circle, and the third novel continues relationships established in the previous books.
The series is produced by TIA 51, directed by Bum Pariyakon Chayaninparamet and written for television by Poomjai Sundaeleila.
Airing information
Premiere date: Sunday, August 16, 2026 Airing day: Every Sunday Thai broadcast time: 10:30 p.m. Television channel: Channel 9 MCOT HD International platform: iQIYI, with the uncut version released at 10:30 p.m. Thailand time
TIA 51 is also organising the LOVEx3 1st Homeroom event at Siam Pavalai in Bangkok on August 16, including an exclusive screening of the first episode.
Unlucky Bae (2026) Thai title: จุดจีบสายมู Adapted from: Chut Chop Sai Mu (จุดจบสายมู) by LuaAimei
Synopsis
Rin has spent most of his life trying to distance himself from the superstitions and occult practices surrounding his family. Being born into a lineage associated with spiritual rituals does not mean he wants magic controlling his life. Unfortunately, heartbreak makes people do exactly the things they normally know better than to do. Krit suddenly ends their relationship, claiming that he wants to be alone. Yet that same evening, Rin discovers a post celebrating Krit’s first month with his new boyfriend, Moji. The breakup is painful enough, but learning that he was probably being deceived makes the humiliation much harder to accept. After drinking too much, Rin gives in to anger and performs a ritual intended to curse his ex.
The problem is not that the curse fails. It reaches the wrong man. The pen Rin uses during the ritual does not actually belong to Krit. It belongs to Khobfah, Krit’s quiet and distant friend. Once Khobfah gets it back, his already difficult life becomes an almost uninterrupted succession of accidents, injuries and impossible bad luck. Rin quickly understands what happened, but discovering his mistake is much easier than correcting it. The curse cannot simply be removed, and none of the remedies he finds seems strong enough to reverse what he has done.
Unable to confess the truth, Rin begins following Khobfah and secretly testing every possible solution. Lucky stones must somehow be placed beneath his pillow, holy water has to be disguised as an ordinary drink, and visits to temples suddenly become strangely necessary. From Khobfah’s perspective, the colourful art student who never paid much attention to him before now seems determined to remain constantly at his side.
What Rin does not initially understand is that Khobfah has felt cursed long before any ritual entered his life. After losing his parents, he grew up surrounded by relatives who treated his misfortune as something contagious. Other people learned to keep their distance, and Khobfah eventually did the same, convincing himself that being alone was safer for everyone. Rin may have approached him because of guilt, but his persistence becomes the first real warmth Khobfah has experienced in a long time.
When removing the curse proves impossible, Rin decides to use the one advantage he still has: his own unusually good fortune. He stays close to Khobfah, hoping that his luck can compensate for the damage caused by the spell. But protecting someone every day creates a form of intimacy that neither superstition nor coincidence can fully explain. Rin’s original intention was to punish the person who betrayed him. Instead, his mistake draws him toward someone who has spent his entire life expecting to be abandoned. The closer they become, the more difficult it is for Rin to separate responsibility from affection—or to admit that a relationship born from a lie may have developed into something sincere.
The curse may have placed Khobfah in Rin’s path, but it cannot decide what happens afterward. Rin must eventually choose between continuing to hide the truth and risking the loss of the man he has come to love, while Khobfah must decide whether Rin’s presence is only another temporary piece of good luck or someone who genuinely intends to stay.
Series information
Unlucky Bae is a Thai university romantic comedy with supernatural elements, produced by GMMTV and Yolo Production. It stars Mac Nattapat Nimjirawat as Rin and Tham Tupthong Suwanrakanont as Khobfah. Aun Napat Patcharachavalit plays Krit, while Stamp Panachkorn Rueksiriaree plays Moji. The series is directed by Apirak “Yokee” Chaipanha and Anan Rasamee.
The original novel was published by Deep Publishing under the title Chut Chop Sai Mu (จุดจบสายมู). The television adaptation slightly changes the Thai title from จุดจบสายมู to จุดจีบสายมู, creating a wordplay that shifts the idea from the “end” of superstition toward romance and flirting through spiritual practices.
Number of episodes: 10 Premiere: Thursday, August 6, 2026 Finale: Thursday, October 8, 2026 Broadcast: Every Thursday at 8:30 p.m. in Thailand on GMM25 Netflix release: Every Thursday at 9:30 p.m. Thailand time Estimated runtime: Approximately 45 minutes per episode
Planned episode dates Episodes 1 through 10 are scheduled for August 6, August 13, August 20, August 27, September 3, September 10, September 17, September 24, October 1 and October 8, 2026. This schedule assumes there are no broadcast delays.
New Boyfriend (2026) Original title: แฟนใหม่..ใกล้ฉัน
Synopsis
Dan has reached the point where avoiding love feels safer than trying to understand it. After being deeply hurt by a previous relationship, he closes that part of himself and builds a predictable life around his job. Work, colleagues and routine are manageable. Feelings are not. That carefully controlled existence is disrupted when Pond joins his company as an intern. Pond is not simply a new employee Dan has been asked to supervise. He is someone from Dan’s past—someone Dan once loved, cared for and never completely managed to forget.
Keeping their relationship professional soon becomes almost impossible. Circumstances force Dan to spend even more time with Pond, including living under the same roof while remaining responsible for him at work. Dan continues to insist that their closeness means nothing, but his heart reacts as strongly as it did when he first fell for Pond. Pond has no intention of accepting a distant or polite reunion. He is stubborn, openly affectionate and determined to win Dan back, even when Dan keeps treating their past as something that should remain buried. For Pond, returning is not enough. He wants Dan to choose him again.
Trying to escape the confusion, Dan turns to Best, a colleague with whom he feels comfortable and understood. He sees Best as a safe person to talk to, but their growing closeness creates another misunderstanding. Pond begins to see Best as a possible rival, while Tae—who has quietly cared for Best for a long time—starts wondering whether he has already lost his chance. Best and Tae face their own emotional uncertainty. Tae understands more than he is able to express, while Best is drawn to the attention and kindness Tae gives him. Yet Best fears that Tae may not truly see him and might only be attracted to him because he resembles someone Tae loved before.
All four men believe they understand their own feelings, but each is trapped inside a different fear: Dan is afraid of being hurt again, Pond is desperate to prove that the past can still be repaired, Tae cannot clearly say what he wants, and Best does not want to become a replacement for another man.
Set within an office where professional boundaries become increasingly difficult to maintain, New Boyfriend explores what it really means to move on. Sometimes the person who changes your future is not someone completely new. He may be the man who returned, the colleague who was always nearby, or the person you were too frightened to recognise while looking in the wrong direction.
Series information New Boyfriend is a Thai workplace BL produced by OHAO Studio. The main couple is played by Shinedan Kreangsak Muangsaen as Dan and Pond Jiraphat Thanoomas as Pond. Best Noratape Nontarat and Tontae Tinnakorn Puwasakdiwong play the second central pairing. The series premieres on Wednesday, August 5, 2026, at 9:15 p.m. Thailand time. A new episode is scheduled every Wednesday on the official OHAO Studio YouTube channel, where episodes should also remain available for replay.
For most of his childhood, Jung I-hyun lived through characters written by other people. After becoming a successful child actor, performing gradually stopped being something he did and became the only identity others were willing to recognise. Even his mother seemed convinced that without acting, there would be nothing left of him.
Her sudden death forces I-hyun to abandon both the entertainment industry and the life that had been decided for him. Yet leaving acting behind does not mean that he has lost his love for the stage. Years later, he returns with a different ambition: rather than allowing himself to be directed again, he wants to become the person responsible for shaping the story.
I-hyun is finally given the opportunity to direct a small musical production called The Mermaid Prince. It is a chance to prove that he can create something of his own, but also a confrontation with the question that has followed him since childhood: who is he when he is no longer performing for someone else?
Kang Jae-on has spent those same years refusing to let go of his dream of becoming an actor. His life is far removed from the glamorous image of the entertainment industry. He survives by moving between part-time jobs, repeatedly postponing the future he wants while trying to endure the reality in front of him. What prevents him from giving up completely is the memory of a promise made during high school, when he and I-hyun once imagined that they might stand onstage together.
That promise was never fulfilled. Their first love ended beneath misunderstandings, emotional wounds and words that neither of them managed to correct before they separated.
When Jae-on auditions for the leading role in The Mermaid Prince, he does not expect the director watching him from the other side of the room to be I-hyun. The boy he never truly forgot has returned as someone colder, more guarded and determined to keep control over both the production and his own emotions.
Their positions are now very different from the ones they occupied in the past. Jae-on is still waiting for someone to give him a place beneath the spotlight, while I-hyun has chosen to remain behind it. Yet rehearsing together makes it increasingly difficult to separate the roles they are supposed to play from the feelings they once shared.
For Jae-on, returning to I-hyun’s side is also a chance to repay the person who once helped him continue when he was ready to give up. This time, he wants to become the one who stays, protects him and refuses to disappear when things become difficult.
As the musical slowly takes shape, the two men are forced to revisit the dream, promise and relationship they abandoned years earlier. Their reunion becomes more than another opportunity to perform. It is a rehearsal for the life they might have shared—and perhaps their final chance to stop treating their love as an unfinished scene.
Play Me has 8 episodes, each approximately 10 minutes long. The first two episodes premiered on Friday, July 31, 2026, at 1:00 p.m. KST. Two new episodes are scheduled every Friday. The planned finale date is August 28, 2026.
The expected schedule is: Episodes 1–2: July 31, 2026 Episodes 3–4: August 7, 2026 Episodes 5–6: August 14, 2026 Episodes 7–8: August 21, 2026
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However, her story should at least have ended this childish idea that fame means unlimited money, permanent employment and the ability to recover millions whenever the public decides the loss does not matter. Cha Eun-woo has now paid about ₩13 billion—more than 50 times that amount, or approximately €7.8 million/US$9 million. So no, this is not money that even a successful Korean actor can casually lose and “make back in a few months,” especially when one wrong decision involving family, agencies or financial advisers can damage both a career and everything earned over many years.
https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20250217005000315
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/entertainment/others/20250609/actress-kim-sae-ron-was-listed-as-creditor-in-fathers-bankruptcy-lost-over-180000
https://news.sbs.co.kr/news/endPage.do?news_id=N1008130556
Cha Eun-woo’s situation is not Kim Sae-ron’s, and I am not pretending that the circumstances are identical. The relevant point is much narrower: the celebrity may be the person earning the money while relatives, agencies, accountants and other professionals are involved in managing the structures around that income. When something goes wrong, however, the public usually places every decision directly into the celebrity’s hands because that is the only face they recognise. In this case, the disputed company was established by Cha Eun-woo’s mother, and its former registered address was linked in Korean reporting to an eel restaurant operated by his parents. That does not automatically prove that the company was legitimate, but it also does not prove that Cha Eun-woo personally designed a criminal scheme. https://www.chosun.com/english/national-en/2026/01/22/7CXNJF6XCFG2XHJBZ4IAPCFZI4/ https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/korea/nts-alleges-actor-cha-eun-woos-mother-runs-shell-company-for-tax-reduction-purposes/12001366
What matters is that Cha Eun-woo did not respond by hiding behind his parents, his agency or his advisers. In his April statement, he said that he had not examined the process carefully enough and that the responsibility belonged to him, not to his family or company. That was the responsible position for an adult whose income and name were involved, regardless of who handled the practical arrangements. It was an acceptance of responsibility for his lack of oversight, not an admission that he had knowingly designed a criminal tax scheme.
The business context also needs to be described accurately. The eel restaurant connected to his family was a genuine operating restaurant, not a fictitious storefront or a paper company. It had operated for years, was publicly profiled in 2023 as a 150-seat restaurant on a large site, and had real customers, staff and restaurant activity. The separate company involved in the tax dispute was registered at the same address for a period, but it was also a legally incorporated entity whose representative obtained official registration as a popular-culture and entertainment-planning business in 2022. Fantagio has stated that the company had a management-services agreement with the agency, performed management and support work for Cha Eun-woo’s activities, and submitted evidence of those services during the tax proceedings. The unresolved question is therefore not whether the restaurant existed—it clearly did—but whether the separate management company performed enough genuine, independent services to justify the income allocated to it and the way that income was taxed. That is precisely the issue now being reviewed, and it is very different from claiming that the restaurant was fake or that Cha Eun-woo personally created a proven criminal scheme.
https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260408181051005
https://jstart.co.kr/bbs/board.php?bo_table=school_news&wr_id=1059
https://www.mt.co.kr/society/2026/01/28/2026012819361285820
https://www.dispatch.co.kr/2338101
https://imnews.imbc.com/replay/straight/6805784_28993.html
With that human context understood, the legal context still needs to be reported correctly. Lily Alice’s article is very short, and the expression “legal proceedings” may make readers think that Cha Eun-woo has sued the National Tax Service in court. That is not what has happened at this stage. Fantagio confirmed on August 2 that he filed a petition with the Korean Tax Tribunal in July, asking it to review whether the National Tax Service’s income-tax assessment was legally justified. The Tax Tribunal is an administrative tax adjudication body. This is therefore an administrative appeal against a tax assessment, not currently a criminal trial or a court lawsuit. No Tax Tribunal decision has yet been announced. https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260802017000005 and https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20260802002400315
The amount also needs to be explained more clearly. The figure originally reported in January was more than ₩20 billion (roughly €12.2 million or US$14 million), but that was not Cha Eun-woo’s final financial burden. Fantagio later confirmed that previously paid corporate tax and VAT had to be adjusted or refunded because part of the calculation overlapped. The effective amount paid was therefore approximately ₩13 billion (roughly €7.8 million or US$9 million). He paid the assessed taxes in April after receiving the official payment notice. https://www.chosun.com/english/kpop-culture-en/2026/04/09/B3FFZURX6BAA7LFDEEHMEO7AFQ/ and https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10713205
Reports now state that his earlier pre-assessment review did not overturn the National Tax Service’s central position. After the final assessment and the tax adjustments, he paid approximately ₩13 billion (roughly €7.8 million or US$9 million) and later filed the Tax Tribunal petition. This means that the current stage is different from the pre-assessment review discussed in January. It is now a formal challenge to an assessment that has already been issued and paid. https://v.daum.net/v/9mGwginQw9?f=p and https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/korea/cha-eunwoo-files-appeal-over-13-billion-won-tax-bill/12803532
Paying the assessment did not legally remove his right to challenge it. Under Article 57 of South Korea’s Framework Act on National Taxes, filing an objection, review request or Tax Tribunal petition does not normally suspend enforcement of the tax disposition. Article 68 gives the taxpayer 90 days from learning of or receiving notice of the disposition to file a Tax Tribunal petition. Fantagio’s statement indicates that Cha Eun-woo used this procedure within the legal period. https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsInfoP.do?joNo=004704&lsId=001586 and https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsSideInfoP.do?docCls=jo&joBrNo=00&joNo=0068&lsiSeq=286425&urlMode=lsScJoRltInfoR
The underlying dispute has not changed. According to the reports, the National Tax Service concluded that the company established by his mother did not provide sufficient independent services and treated the income attributed to it as Cha Eun-woo’s personal income. Fantagio’s position is that the central question is whether the company was a legitimate entity with sufficient economic substance and whether the relevant tax rules were applied correctly. The Tax Tribunal will now review that issue, but the parties have not released the evidence submitted in the case. https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/entertainment/shows-dramas/20260122/cha-eun-woo-faces-allegations-of-20-billion-won-tax-evasion and https://news.tvchosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2026/08/02/2026080290038.html
Cha Eun-woo’s April 8 statement confirmed that the taxes had been paid, accepted personal responsibility for not examining the company’s establishment and operation carefully enough, and stated that the remaining procedures would continue. His later appeal is therefore not proof that the April statement was withdrawn. He complied with the assessment while preserving his right to request a legal review of it. The result could uphold, reduce or cancel the assessment, but no decision is public at this time.
Finally, I found no public court case, criminal indictment, prosecution announcement or Tax Tribunal ruling concerning this dispute as of August 5, 2026. The only newly confirmed proceeding is the pending Tax Tribunal petition. Calling it an “appeal” is accurate, but describing it simply as “legal proceedings” without explaining that it is an administrative tax appeal may create the false impression that a criminal or court case is already underway.
The agency said it had found numerous posts involving alleged false information, defamation, insults, malicious attacks, sexual harassment and privacy violations, and that civil and criminal proceedings were already underway. It did not say which artists were targeted by which posts, nor did it announce a new incident involving Kyungsoo. As Usual Lily Alice simply took an agency-wide notice and placed its most recognisable name at the centre of the story, creating confusion that was not present in the original statement.
So yes, this kind of protection should be normal rather than exceptional. But accurate reporting should also be the norm. Kyungsoo should not be made to look as though he personally demanded legal protection over a new controversy when the announcement concerned Blitzway Entertainment’s artists collectively.
Blitzway is also not “abusing the legal system.” It collected evidence and submitted it to the appropriate authorities. The police, prosecutors and courts will decide whether the reported material violates Korean law. Apparently, allowing judges to evaluate evidence becomes an abuse of justice only when the person seeking protection is someone you have already decided to ridicule. That is a remarkably selective understanding of the legal system. As for the courts having “more important issues,” courts do not operate by choosing one single important case and abandoning every other offence. Different courts, departments and investigators handle different matters. Reputation, privacy, threats and sexual harassment are also legal rights, even when the victim is famous. Being successful does not turn a human being into public property.
And quoting “sticks and stones” as though a children’s rhyme settles questions of law, harassment and reputational damage is probably the weakest part of an already very weak performance. Words can destroy careers, spread false accusations, damage families and encourage thousands of strangers to target one person. Children are taught that rhyme to help them cope with teasing. Adults are generally expected to develop a more sophisticated understanding of consequences. You presented four “takes” as though their number somehow compensated for their lack of substance. In reality, you gave us one childish insult, one argument against a claim nobody made, one misunderstanding of how courts function, and one nursery rhyme. That is not intellectual provocation. It is confidence arriving several pages before comprehension.
The Korean title of the notice is “Legal Response Regarding Infringement of the Rights of Our Artists.” Throughout the statement, Blitzway refers to its artists in the plural. It says the company found numerous posts and comments involving alleged false information, defamation, insults, malicious attacks, sexual harassment and privacy violations against artists represented by the agency. Doh Kyung-soo is one of those artists, but he is never individually named in the notice. The same statement also concerns the rest of Blitzway’s roster, which includes Ju Ji-hoon, Jung Ryeo-won, Chun Woo-hee, Woo Do-hwan, Moon Chae-won, Chae Jong-hyeop, Park Ha-sun and many others. The complete statement was also reproduced by Star News. Unlike this article, the Korean report clearly explains that this is an agency-wide announcement and lists several of the artists represented by Blitzway: https://v.daum.net/v/20260805210143900
There is another difference in the wording. The article says that the agency “will pursue” legal action, but Blitzway actually said that civil and criminal legal procedures are already being carried out. The agency also warned that deleting a post or making an account private does not necessarily remove responsibility when the evidence has already been collected, and that anonymous writers may still be identified through legal procedures. Fans can submit the URL, author information and screenshots of relevant posts to [email protected]. Most importantly, Blitzway did not reveal any particular rumour, post, suspect or new incident involving Kyungsoo. Therefore, the answer to people asking “What happened?” is that no new personal scandal or case concerning him has been announced. MyDramaList has taken a general notice protecting all Blitzway artists and presented it as a story specifically about Doh Kyung-soo, probably because his name attracts more attention. Even Soompi made the same misleading choice by claiming that the content was directed at him when the original Korean notice does not say that.
There was a separate case involving Kyungsoo under his former agency, Company Soosoo. Complaints were filed against malicious posters in 2024, and on February 25, 2025, the agency announced that investigators had identified a suspect accused of repeatedly spreading false and defamatory material. Further legal proceedings were expected, with no settlement or leniency. That information is real, but it is an older and separate case. Blitzway did not say that its current agency-wide notice was an update on that investigation.
The previous case can be checked here: https://sports.donga.com/ent/article/all/20250225/131104745/1
So yes, Blitzway is genuinely taking legal action, and Kyungsoo is protected by that policy as one of its artists. But no, the official announcement was not made only for him, and there is currently no confirmed new event involving him that would explain the way this article was written. That distinction matters, especially when a misleading headline immediately causes readers to assume that he is involved in another controversy.
Psychologically, burnout, emotional avoidance and unhealthy attachment can make people withdrawn, contradictory and difficult to understand. They often act before they can explain what they feel, which can resemble inconsistent writing. I do not think the series was perfect, but I believe much of that emotional distance was intentional rather than accidental.
I have now written a full review explaining why Koh, Jira and Pheem worked for me, why Dew impressed me so much, and why some viewers may understand the series differently after revisiting it. I would genuinely like to know whether the review changes anyone’s perspective, or confirms why the drama still did not work for them.
Psychologically, emotionally exhausted people often become withdrawn, contradictory and difficult to understand because they no longer explain themselves clearly. That can look like weak characterization, but I saw it as part of the series’ portrayal of burnout, avoidance and unhealthy attachment. I explained this more fully in my review, and I would genuinely like to know whether it changes your perspective at all.
However, its greatest weakness remains the extremely short format. Eight episodes lasting roughly six to eleven minutes will probably produce only about seventy minutes of finished drama. That leaves very little time to establish the friendship, develop reciprocal feelings, explain the separation and provide a satisfying present-day resolution. Lovememory’s weaker series were criticised precisely for missing important backstory and replacing emotional development with repetitive dialogue.
The first episode attracted approximately 55,000 views and 1,600 likes during its first weeks. That is respectable for an independent channel, but it does not indicate a major breakout, especially compared with Lovememory’s 131,000 subscribers. Since only four episodes have been released and reliable audience scores remain scarce, judging the finished series would be premature.
My current assessment is therefore cautiously average. The title, emotional structure and two-character focus give Love Hurts more potential than some of Lovememory’s weaker projects. However, it still visibly belongs to the low-budget Korean YouTube BL category that many viewers are beginning to ignore. Unless the second half provides a strong explanation for the separation and gives the actors enough material to make the relationship emotionally convincing, it risks becoming another pleasant but forgettable short drama rather than a series capable of rebuilding international interest in Korean BL.
Original title: 첫사랑니
Alternative titles: First Love Tooth, First Wisdom Tooth, Cheotsarangni
The production has not released a detailed official synopsis. This version is therefore based on the first four episodes, the trailer and the confirmed character information, without inventing events from the unreleased second half.
Synopsis
Kim Dojin has never been a particularly successful student. After receiving the worst grades in his class, he is placed beside Lee Jaewon, one of the school’s strongest students, and ordered to study with him. For Jaewon, helping Dojin should be nothing more than another responsibility given to him by a teacher. For Dojin, it initially feels like another humiliation. They are not friends, they have little reason to spend time together, and Dojin has no interest in being constantly reminded of how far behind everyone else he has fallen. Yet forced proximity has a way of revealing what distance keeps hidden.
Behind Jaewon’s serious and dependable appearance is someone far gentler than Dojin expected. Jaewon does not simply correct his work or lecture him about his grades. He listens, notices the details others overlook and gradually becomes the person beside whom Dojin feels most comfortable being himself. Their study sessions begin to matter for reasons that have nothing to do with school. Ordinary conversations become memories Dojin returns to long afterward. A glance lasts slightly too long, physical closeness becomes difficult to ignore, and the friendship developing between them begins to carry feelings neither boy knows how to name. For Dojin, falling for Jaewon is both exciting and frightening. Jaewon becomes his first experience of being genuinely seen, but first love also arrives with the constant fear that he may be misunderstanding everything. Kindness is not necessarily attraction, and the person who makes his heart race may never have imagined their relationship in the same way. Jaewon appears more controlled, but silence does not mean the absence of emotion. As Dojin’s feelings become increasingly visible, Jaewon must decide whether to protect the friendship they already have or admit that their closeness has changed him as well.
The story is not told only through the innocence of their school years. An older Dojin remains unable to forget Jaewon, suggesting that whatever began between them did not end cleanly. Their past survives through memories that return unexpectedly, carrying both the excitement of first love and the pain of knowing that something important was left unfinished. The Korean title gives that emotional wound a physical form. 첫사랑니 plays with the words for first love and wisdom tooth: something growing quietly beneath the surface until its presence becomes impossible to ignore. It can be removed, but the empty space remains—and even years later, touching that place may still hurt. Love Hurts therefore treats first love as more than a sweet memory. It is the person who taught Dojin what attraction felt like, but also the person whose absence continues to shape him. Meeting Jaewon changed his youth; understanding what happened between them may be the only way for him to finally move beyond it. The central question is not simply whether two former classmates loved each other. It is whether feelings left unspoken can survive the years between them—and whether returning to a first love can heal an old wound or only make it painful again.
Series information
Production company: Lovememory
Main cast: Kim Changyu as Kim Dojin and Kang Seonho as Lee Jaewon
Number of episodes: 8
Current runtime: Approximately 6–11 minutes per episode
Members’ premiere: July 8, 2026
Free public premiere: July 10, 2026
Public release: Fridays at 6:30 p.m. KST
Time in metropolitan France: Fridays at 11:30 a.m. CEST
Platform: Lovememory’s official YouTube channel
Expected members’ finale: August 26, 2026
Expected public finale: August 28, 2026
Original title: 席替えしたら、どうやら後ろの男が俺のこと好きらしい
Romanized title: Sekigae Shitara, Douyara Ushiro no Otoko ga Ore no Koto Suki Rashii
Japanese short title: Sekisuki
Synopsis
For Hare Mayama, changing seats should be one of the most insignificant moments of the school year. He is a quiet second-year student who rarely attracts attention and is comfortable remaining somewhere in the background. Being placed near the back of the classroom therefore seems like a small piece of good luck—until the first worksheet is passed forward from the desk behind him. Written across it is a confession: “I like you.” Hare assumes it cannot possibly be intended for him. The student sitting behind him is Kosei Asamiya, one of the most attractive and popular boys in their class. Kosei moves easily among the confident students at the centre of school life, while Hare has never imagined that someone like him would even notice him. When Hare finally asks whether the message was a mistake, Kosei answers without hesitation: he wrote it for Hare.
For Kosei, the confession is not the beginning of his feelings. It is the moment he finally stops hiding them. He has apparently liked Hare for much longer than Hare ever realised, and sitting directly behind him removes the distance that previously allowed Kosei to remain silent. Once the truth is spoken, he does not know how—or perhaps does not want—to restrain himself anymore. His attention becomes increasingly direct, his jealousy more visible and his affection sometimes so intense that Hare has no idea how to respond. Hare’s confusion is not simply caused by discovering that another boy likes him. He genuinely cannot understand why Kosei would choose him. Hare sees himself as ordinary and unremarkable, and the original novel gives him insecurities connected to always feeling less noticeable than the people around him. Being loved by someone as confident as Kosei therefore feels almost more frightening than being rejected. Accepting the confession would also mean accepting that Kosei sees something valuable in him that Hare has never been able to recognise in himself.
Kosei may appear fearless, but his confidence disappears whenever Hare fails to understand what he means. His feelings are obvious through everything he does, yet the two boys are inexperienced enough to misunderstand even the clearest words. Hare sometimes wonders whether Kosei’s affection is really romantic, while Kosei struggles to express his devotion without making Hare feel trapped by it. Their romance develops through the smallest parts of school life: worksheets passed between desks, conversations that would never have happened before the seat change, walks home, shared umbrellas and the constant awareness that the person they are thinking about is only a few centimetres away. What was once an ordinary classroom slowly becomes a private world built between two desks.
Kosei’s friends, Toma Sakaki and Mitsuki Tsunekawada, understand the situation far more quickly than Hare does. Toma uses humour to reduce the awkwardness and gently pushes his friends forward, while the calmer Mitsuki often sees directly through the misunderstandings neither boy can explain. Rather than creating another romantic rivalry, they appear positioned as observers and supporters of a relationship that is already obvious to almost everyone except the person being pursued. The story is therefore not really about whether Kosei will confess. He has already made his choice from the beginning. It is about how Hare gradually learns to believe him. Kosei has spent too long holding back and now loves with an intensity that can become overwhelming. Hare has spent too long assuming that no one would choose him and cannot immediately trust something that appears too good to be real. One needs to slow down enough to let the other understand, while the other must stop searching for reasons why such affection cannot possibly belong to him.
After Moving Seats, the Boy Behind Me Has a Crush on Me turns a very simple school event into the beginning of a relationship neither boy expected to experience in the same way. For Kosei, the new seating arrangement finally places him close enough to say what he has wanted to say for a long time. For Hare, it becomes the first step toward seeing himself through the eyes of someone who has apparently been looking at him all along.
Series information
The drama is adapted from Mashiro Ito’s novel of the same name, illustrated by Ayukawa. The story won the top prize in the first Novema! BL Short Story Contest before being published by Starts Publishing under its BeLuck Bunko label. A manga adaptation has also been announced, while a second novel is scheduled for publication on August 20, 2026. The television production officially credits the first novel as its source.
Eito Konishi plays Hare Mayama, while Gennosuke plays Kosei Asamiya. Ken Hiramoto appears as Toma Sakaki and Hayate Iijima as Mitsuki Tsunekawada. The series is directed by Yoshika Nakayama and Yudai Nara, with a screenplay by Kento Goto.
The opening song is “Hakugei” by Kimino Virus, written specifically for the drama. The main theme is “NPC” by SUPER★DRAGON.
Airing information
Number of episodes: 8
Episode length: Approximately 30 minutes
Japanese streaming premiere: Wednesday, August 5, 2026, at 25:30 JST—technically Thursday, August 6 at 1:30 a.m. in Japan
International platforms: Viki, GagaOOLala and Youku
Taiwan: LINE TV
Japanese television: TV Aichi from August 5 at 25:00; BS Fuji from August 7 at 25:00
Japanese catch-up streaming: TVer after the BS Fuji broadcast
Projected finale: Wednesday, September 24 in Japan.
Viki and GagaOOLala have already created official international pages for the series. Availability can still vary slightly according to regional licensing, but both platforms currently list the drama for international release.
Episode schedule
Episode International release Japanese calendar date
Episode 1 August 5, 2026 August 6
Episode 2 August 12, 2026 August 13
Episode 3 August 19, 2026 August 20
Episode 4 August 26, 2026 August 27
Episode 5 September 2, 2026 September 3
Episode 6 September 9, 2026 September 10
Episode 7 September 16, 2026 September 17
Episode 8 September 23, 2026 September 24
Original title: 썸머 피버
Also known as: Winter Fever Season 2
Synopsis
Winter was the season in which Yeonho and Yujun almost destroyed a relationship that had taken fifteen years to build. They had grown up together, moving so naturally from childhood friendship into love that neither of them had ever learned how to imagine a life without the other. Yet familiarity did not protect them from fear. Yujun became convinced that Yeonho remained beside him out of responsibility rather than love, while Yeonho’s terror of losing him gradually turned devotion into something more desperate and possessive. What should have been a simple conversation became a breakup, and what should have been temporary distance nearly erased everything they had shared.
Summer Fever begins after they have survived that emotional winter and chosen to return to each other. The coldness between them has been replaced by a much warmer season, but reconciliation does not immediately remove the wounds that caused their separation. Yeonho and Yujun may be together again, yet both must learn how to love without allowing insecurity, guilt or fear of abandonment to make their decisions for them. The official description presents the sequel as the beginning of a new season for the couple, following them as they finally enter the passionate summer they were previously too frightened to enjoy.
For Yeonho, loving Yujun has never been the difficult part. His struggle is accepting that love cannot be preserved through force, control or the refusal to let someone leave. He has to understand that choosing Yujun every day is not the same as making Yujun responsible for his entire happiness. Yujun faces the opposite problem. He has spent so long believing that he is a burden that even sincere affection can feel like pity. Returning to Yeonho therefore means more than accepting that he is loved. It requires him to believe that he deserves that love without constantly searching for reasons why it must eventually disappear.
Summer gives them the opportunity to experience the side of their relationship that winter repeatedly interrupted. They can finally enjoy ordinary intimacy, playful affection and the physical warmth of being together without treating every happy moment as something temporary. However, the history between them remains present. A relationship formed over fifteen years cannot simply begin again as though nothing painful happened. Their love is no longer about discovering their feelings. They already know how deeply they are connected. The real question is whether they can build a healthier relationship from something that once became dangerously dependent—and whether two people who have spent most of their lives together can remain individuals while continuing to share the same future.
The sequel also introduces Sooeon, played by Kim Joo-young, while Lee Hajin returns as Kang Jiseok, a character previously seen in Laundry Romance. Their presence connects Summer Fever to True Film’s wider shared universe, although the production has not yet explained exactly how their story will affect Yeonho and Yujun. Summer Fever is therefore not simply a happier continuation of Winter Fever. It follows two men after reconciliation, when saying “I still love you” is no longer enough. Yeonho and Yujun must now prove that their relationship can survive outside the fear that once held it together.
After enduring the season that nearly separated them, summer becomes their chance to stop loving as though every day might be the last—and finally learn how to remain together without losing themselves.
Series information
Summer Fever is a South Korean short-form BL produced by True Film and the direct sequel to Winter Fever. Seo Jeong Hyeon returns as Seo Yujun, while Kwak Geon Hee returns as Kim Yeonho. The supporting cast includes Kim Joo Young as Sooeon and Lee Hajin as Kang Jiseok.
Airing information
Public premiere: Thursday, August 6, 2026
Public release time: 6:00 p.m. KST, corresponding to 11:00 a.m. in metropolitan France
Membership early release: Tuesday, August 4, 2026, at the same time
Platform: True Film’s official YouTube channel
Expected episode count: 4 episodes
Estimated runtime: Approximately 10 minutes per episode
Total estimated duration: Approximately 40 minutes
True Film has officially confirmed the membership and public premiere dates. The four-episode count is listed by DramaBL and is consistent with Winter Fever and True Film’s usual short-form format, although True Film’s initial promotional announcements did not explicitly state the total number of episodes.
Expected release schedule
Episode Members Free public release
Episode 1 August 4 August 6
Episode 2 August 11 August 13
Episode 3 August 18 August 20
Episode 4 August 25 August 27
The projected membership finale is August 25, 2026, while the final episode should become publicly available on August 27, 2026, assuming True Film maintains its usual weekly schedule without interruption.
Original title: รักสุดใจนายแฟนบอย
Adapted from: Mr. Fanboy #รักสุดใจนายแฟนบอย by littlebbear96
Synopsis
Wan is a fourth-year university student whose greatest passion has very little to do with his studies. Away from university, he becomes a devoted fan photographer, following the public appearances of Nine, a rising actor whom he has supported for years. To Wan, Nine appears talented, hardworking and kind—the sort of celebrity whose public image makes every hour spent waiting behind a camera feel worthwhile. His academic life unexpectedly brings him closer to that seemingly perfect world. While preparing a thesis about the Thai BL industry, Wan struggles to find information about what really happens behind the scenes. A friend jokingly suggests that the easiest way to understand the industry would be to enter it himself, especially when a production starring Nine is searching for a supporting actor. Wan attends the audition without seriously expecting anything from it, only to receive the role.
For a fan who has always loved Nine from a safe distance, being selected should feel like a dream. Instead, Wan quickly discovers that becoming his idol’s colleague is very different from watching him through a camera lens. The first person to make that difference clear is Third, the sharp-tongued leading actor cast opposite Nine. Third immediately assumes that Wan is only there because he is an overexcited fan who wants access to his favourite celebrity. He sees him as inexperienced, unserious and potentially disruptive to a production in which everyone else has worked hard to earn their place.
Wan refuses to accept that judgement. What began as a strange opportunity to gather material for his thesis becomes a personal challenge. He wants to prove that enthusiasm does not make him incompetent and that being a fan does not prevent him from behaving professionally. His determination gradually forces Third to reconsider the harmless university student he dismissed so easily. Their initial hostility does not disappear immediately. Third is proud, demanding and often unnecessarily harsh, while Wan has little patience for an actor who seems to believe arrogance is the same thing as professionalism. Yet the more time they spend rehearsing and filming together, the more their conflict begins to resemble attraction.
Third becomes the person who notices how seriously Wan takes his work. Wan, meanwhile, starts seeing the man hidden behind Third’s difficult personality: an actor who genuinely cares about his profession and who may be far more sincere than the celebrities who know how to appear pleasant whenever a camera is nearby. At the same time, Wan’s admiration for Nine begins to change. The closer he gets to his idol, the harder it becomes to preserve the flawless image he once believed in. Behind carefully managed interviews, manufactured pairings and affectionate moments created for fans, the entertainment industry operates through competition, rumours and decisions that can destroy someone’s reputation before the truth has any chance to emerge. Even Nine may be hiding a side of himself that Wan was never supposed to see.
Wan therefore finds himself caught between two completely different forms of attraction. Nine represents the ideal he created from a distance, while Third is the complicated reality standing directly in front of him. One taught him how powerful admiration can feel; the other forces him to recognise the difference between loving an image and knowing a person. As Wan attracts more attention from viewers, his unexpected popularity also begins to disturb the balance surrounding the production. In an industry where fictional couples, fan reactions and public narratives can be turned into commercial weapons, becoming visible may be far more dangerous than remaining an anonymous fan photographer.
Mr. Fanboy is therefore not simply a romance between an actor and one of his former fans. It explores the strange relationship between celebrities and the people who support them, the distance between a public persona and private behaviour, and the emotional violence that can occur when an industry depends on selling intimacy while controlling every genuine relationship behind the scenes. Wan entered the production hoping to get closer to the man he admired. Instead, he may fall for the actor he initially disliked—and discover that meeting an idol is sometimes the fastest way to stop idealising him.
Series information
The drama is produced by Mandee Work and DoMunDi TV and directed by Kla Nathawat Piyanonpong. Save Worapong Walor plays Wan, Auau Thanaphum Sestasittikul plays Third, and James Supamongkon Wongwisut plays Nine. The main romantic pairing is Auau and Save.
The production began principal photography on February 20, 2026. Recent official production updates show that filming was still progressing through its later shooting queues at the end of July and beginning of August.
The source novel was published in Thai by DEEP Publishing/Satapornbooks. A separate special volume continuing Third and Wan’s relationship and their careers was released in July 2026, although the television production has only been announced as an adaptation of the original novel.
Airing information
Planned premiere: August 2026
International platform: iQIYI and iQ.com
Version: The uncut version has been announced as exclusive to iQIYI/iQ.com
The official teaser and current Thai promotional material confirm an August 2026 release, but as of August 1, 2026, neither DoMunDi nor iQIYI has published a specific day, weekly schedule or episode total. DramaBL therefore correctly lists the precise release date as still to be announced.
Original title: นูร์
Also known as: Nour the Series
Synopsis
For more than two hundred years, Ken has remained alive in a world where everything around him eventually disappears. He is not simply the calm and mysterious officer he appears to be. Ken is Nour, a supernatural being cursed with immortality. Remaining in one place for too long would expose what he is, so he has survived by repeatedly changing his name, identity and occupation. After living through countless versions of himself, immortality no longer resembles a gift. It is an existence built from secrecy, isolation and the certainty that anyone he allows himself to love will grow old without him. Official promotional material describes Ken as having lived through approximately one hundred different professions while hiding his true nature.
James is a determined young police officer assigned to investigate a disturbing sequence of murders connected to deliberate fires. The cases do not follow any ordinary criminal logic. Victims, evidence and repeated patterns suggest that something older and far more dangerous is hiding behind the flames. His investigation brings him into contact with Ken. James initially sees him as another officer connected to the case, but Ken seems to know more than he is willing to explain. His experience extends far beyond what should be possible for a man of his apparent age, and his relationship with the crimes may reach back long before James was born. From the moment they meet, the investigation stops belonging entirely to either of them.
James is searching for the person responsible for the fires, while Ken is trying to prevent the past he buried from returning. Yet every new death draws them closer to the truth about Nour’s curse. Their growing attraction makes that truth even more dangerous. Ken has survived by refusing permanence, while James is becoming someone he may no longer be capable of leaving behind. Their relationship therefore develops around a difficult contradiction. James cannot completely trust a man who conceals almost everything about himself, but Ken cannot reveal the truth without risking both his freedom and James’s life. Loving an immortal man means accepting that his history may contain identities, loyalties and crimes that no ordinary relationship would ever have to confront.
A second part of the mystery unfolds through Jirat, a reserved forensic doctor and one of Ken’s closest friends. Accustomed to examining death through evidence and reason, Jirat has built his life around what can be observed, tested and explained. The arrival of Chita, his new assistant, begins to challenge that certainty. Chita gradually becomes far more important to him than an ordinary colleague. His warmth enters a life Jirat had kept emotionally controlled, but their connection also brings him closer to the supernatural truth surrounding the cases. In a story where death may not represent a final boundary, Jirat must reconsider whether his medical knowledge has taught him what death is—or merely what happens to the body afterward.
As James and Ken pursue the arsonist, Jirat and Chita search for answers among the victims and the traces left behind. The two investigations slowly become one, revealing that the fires are not isolated murders but part of a secret connected to Nour’s long existence. Each man approaches that secret differently. James wants justice, Ken wants protection from a past that refuses to remain buried, Jirat demands a rational explanation, and Chita appears capable of seeing a world the others have spent their lives ignoring.
NOUR places two love stories inside the same supernatural crime investigation, but its central question is larger than identifying a murderer. It asks what immortality does to a person after everyone he once knew has disappeared, whether love can survive a truth hidden for centuries, and whether death is genuinely the end—or simply another boundary that these four men are about to cross.
The current version is an original production rather than a confirmed novel adaptation. It reworks the fantasy concept previously developed under the project title AKINA, but NOUR is now presented as the official WeTV and Tailai Entertainment version, with a revised cast and story.
Series information
The series is written and directed by Boss Wasakorn Khumklaowiriya and produced by Tailai Entertainment as a WeTV Original. The two main pairings are Boss Patthakarn as James with Tongtong Kitsakorn Kanogtorn as Ken, and Toey Pongsakorn Mettarikanon as Jirat with Phoom Chawonwat Thongyoo as Chita. It is the first leading BL role for both Tongtong and Toey.
Premiere date: Tuesday, August 25, 2026
Airing day: Every Tuesday
Release time: 8:00 p.m. in Thailand
Platform: WeTV
Version: The uncut version is advertised as exclusive to WeTV.
The DramaBL page still lists the release date as unannounced, but this is now outdated. WeTV’s second official teaser confirmed the August 25 premiere and Tuesday release schedule on July 21, 2026.
Original title: Love ยกกำลัง 3 หลักสูตร (รัก) ภาคบังคับ
Also known as: Love³ / Love x 3
Synopsis
Love does not come with one universal formula. For six young men whose lives are already connected by friendship, family and school, it arrives through three very different relationships—each forcing them to understand feelings they would rather avoid.
Fuen has been best friends with Physics, usually called Sik, since their first year of secondary school. Sik is impulsive, outspoken and often acts before thinking, while Fuen has always been the calmer one, quietly keeping both of them out of trouble. Their friendship feels so natural that neither seems willing to question what it has become. The person Fuen believes he wants is Star, a popular student from another class whom he has admired from a distance. When Sik discovers his secret, he decides to become Fuen’s personal love coach, writing down suggestions and helping him find ways to approach Star. Fuen finally gathers the courage to speak to his crush, only to learn that Star’s heart is already focused on someone else: Sik.
Fuen is therefore placed in an almost impossible position. The boy he likes wants his help pursuing his best friend, while that same best friend begins reacting strangely whenever Fuen and Star grow closer. Advice that was supposed to bring Fuen nearer to Star instead exposes emotions hidden inside a friendship that both boys had taken for granted. Before Fuen can decide whom he truly loves, he must first understand whether the person he has been searching for was beside him all along. Star’s story does not end with that triangle.
Din, an admired final-year student, hears an absurd rumour claiming that every character of Star’s LINE ID costs 3,000 baht. Star may be attractive and extremely popular, but he is not someone Din initially considers his type. However, once Star’s friends challenge him to obtain the ID without paying, Din’s pride refuses to let him walk away. What begins as little more than a game becomes a slow pursuit built through repeated encounters and increasingly personal challenges. Din believes he is trying to win Star’s contact details, but the closer he gets, the less important the original competition becomes. Star is accustomed to being admired for his appearance, while Din gradually becomes interested in the person hidden behind that popularity.
The real question is no longer whether Din can obtain the complete ID. It is whether Star can trust the feelings of someone who originally approached him because of a dare—and whether Din is prepared to admit that the boy who supposedly was not his type has quietly become the centre of his attention.
The third relationship begins earlier but reaches its most difficult stage at university. Chem is Physics’s younger brother. While still in lower secondary school, he falls for Off, one of his brother’s closest friends and a boy three years older than him. Off does not dismiss his feelings completely. Instead, he asks Chem to wait, promising that when Chem reaches his final year of school and the timing is more appropriate, he will return and court him properly. Chem takes that promise seriously. Off, however, changes after entering university. He begins skipping classes, withdrawing from his friends and eventually transfers elsewhere. Chem continues hearing fragments of information through his brother until something he witnesses convinces him that Off has forgotten both him and the future he once promised.
By the time Chem enters university to study sports science and work with its football team, he has finally decided that waiting has cost him enough. Then Off appears again as one of the university’s athletes. Off treats him with the same protective familiarity as before, but Chem is no longer the trusting child who accepted a promise without demanding an explanation. Their relationship carries more emotional weight than the other two stories because affection was never their only problem. Chem needs to know why Off abandoned him, while Off must prove that caring for someone is meaningless without honesty, consistency and the courage to remain present.
Together, these three romances follow the same group from the confusion of high school into the more complicated reality of university. One begins with a crush directed toward the wrong person, another with a challenge that unexpectedly becomes sincere, and the last with a promise that may have arrived too early to survive unchanged. LOVEx3 treats love as a compulsory subject no one can avoid, but also one that each person must learn differently. Some feelings are communicated through handwritten notes, some through a LINE ID obtained one character at a time, and others through years of waiting for an explanation. There may be three stories, but they form one connected journey about recognising whom we love, proving why we love them and deciding whether that love is mature enough to last. The author described the first two novels as lighter high-school romances, while Pha Rak Sueksa moves into university and carries a more serious emotional conflict.
Series information
The drama adapts three connected novels by Chiffon_cake: Rak Rai Khong Phu Chai Cool Cool (รักร้ายของผู้ชายคูลๆ), Khao Mun Rop Khwam Rak (เขาหมุนรอบความรัก) and Pha Rak Sueksa (พารักศึกษา). They are not unrelated anthology stories: the characters belong to the same social and family circle, and the third novel continues relationships established in the previous books.
The series is produced by TIA 51, directed by Bum Pariyakon Chayaninparamet and written for television by Poomjai Sundaeleila.
Airing information
Premiere date: Sunday, August 16, 2026
Airing day: Every Sunday
Thai broadcast time: 10:30 p.m.
Television channel: Channel 9 MCOT HD
International platform: iQIYI, with the uncut version released at 10:30 p.m. Thailand time
TIA 51 is also organising the LOVEx3 1st Homeroom event at Siam Pavalai in Bangkok on August 16, including an exclusive screening of the first episode.
Thai title: จุดจีบสายมู
Adapted from: Chut Chop Sai Mu (จุดจบสายมู) by LuaAimei
Synopsis
Rin has spent most of his life trying to distance himself from the superstitions and occult practices surrounding his family. Being born into a lineage associated with spiritual rituals does not mean he wants magic controlling his life. Unfortunately, heartbreak makes people do exactly the things they normally know better than to do. Krit suddenly ends their relationship, claiming that he wants to be alone. Yet that same evening, Rin discovers a post celebrating Krit’s first month with his new boyfriend, Moji. The breakup is painful enough, but learning that he was probably being deceived makes the humiliation much harder to accept. After drinking too much, Rin gives in to anger and performs a ritual intended to curse his ex.
The problem is not that the curse fails. It reaches the wrong man. The pen Rin uses during the ritual does not actually belong to Krit. It belongs to Khobfah, Krit’s quiet and distant friend. Once Khobfah gets it back, his already difficult life becomes an almost uninterrupted succession of accidents, injuries and impossible bad luck. Rin quickly understands what happened, but discovering his mistake is much easier than correcting it. The curse cannot simply be removed, and none of the remedies he finds seems strong enough to reverse what he has done.
Unable to confess the truth, Rin begins following Khobfah and secretly testing every possible solution. Lucky stones must somehow be placed beneath his pillow, holy water has to be disguised as an ordinary drink, and visits to temples suddenly become strangely necessary. From Khobfah’s perspective, the colourful art student who never paid much attention to him before now seems determined to remain constantly at his side.
What Rin does not initially understand is that Khobfah has felt cursed long before any ritual entered his life. After losing his parents, he grew up surrounded by relatives who treated his misfortune as something contagious. Other people learned to keep their distance, and Khobfah eventually did the same, convincing himself that being alone was safer for everyone. Rin may have approached him because of guilt, but his persistence becomes the first real warmth Khobfah has experienced in a long time.
When removing the curse proves impossible, Rin decides to use the one advantage he still has: his own unusually good fortune. He stays close to Khobfah, hoping that his luck can compensate for the damage caused by the spell. But protecting someone every day creates a form of intimacy that neither superstition nor coincidence can fully explain. Rin’s original intention was to punish the person who betrayed him. Instead, his mistake draws him toward someone who has spent his entire life expecting to be abandoned. The closer they become, the more difficult it is for Rin to separate responsibility from affection—or to admit that a relationship born from a lie may have developed into something sincere.
The curse may have placed Khobfah in Rin’s path, but it cannot decide what happens afterward. Rin must eventually choose between continuing to hide the truth and risking the loss of the man he has come to love, while Khobfah must decide whether Rin’s presence is only another temporary piece of good luck or someone who genuinely intends to stay.
Series information
Unlucky Bae is a Thai university romantic comedy with supernatural elements, produced by GMMTV and Yolo Production. It stars Mac Nattapat Nimjirawat as Rin and Tham Tupthong Suwanrakanont as Khobfah. Aun Napat Patcharachavalit plays Krit, while Stamp Panachkorn Rueksiriaree plays Moji. The series is directed by Apirak “Yokee” Chaipanha and Anan Rasamee.
The original novel was published by Deep Publishing under the title Chut Chop Sai Mu (จุดจบสายมู). The television adaptation slightly changes the Thai title from จุดจบสายมู to จุดจีบสายมู, creating a wordplay that shifts the idea from the “end” of superstition toward romance and flirting through spiritual practices.
Number of episodes: 10
Premiere: Thursday, August 6, 2026
Finale: Thursday, October 8, 2026
Broadcast: Every Thursday at 8:30 p.m. in Thailand on GMM25
Netflix release: Every Thursday at 9:30 p.m. Thailand time
Estimated runtime: Approximately 45 minutes per episode
Planned episode dates
Episodes 1 through 10 are scheduled for August 6, August 13, August 20, August 27, September 3, September 10, September 17, September 24, October 1 and October 8, 2026. This schedule assumes there are no broadcast delays.
Original title: แฟนใหม่..ใกล้ฉัน
Synopsis
Dan has reached the point where avoiding love feels safer than trying to understand it. After being deeply hurt by a previous relationship, he closes that part of himself and builds a predictable life around his job. Work, colleagues and routine are manageable. Feelings are not. That carefully controlled existence is disrupted when Pond joins his company as an intern. Pond is not simply a new employee Dan has been asked to supervise. He is someone from Dan’s past—someone Dan once loved, cared for and never completely managed to forget.
Keeping their relationship professional soon becomes almost impossible. Circumstances force Dan to spend even more time with Pond, including living under the same roof while remaining responsible for him at work. Dan continues to insist that their closeness means nothing, but his heart reacts as strongly as it did when he first fell for Pond. Pond has no intention of accepting a distant or polite reunion. He is stubborn, openly affectionate and determined to win Dan back, even when Dan keeps treating their past as something that should remain buried. For Pond, returning is not enough. He wants Dan to choose him again.
Trying to escape the confusion, Dan turns to Best, a colleague with whom he feels comfortable and understood. He sees Best as a safe person to talk to, but their growing closeness creates another misunderstanding. Pond begins to see Best as a possible rival, while Tae—who has quietly cared for Best for a long time—starts wondering whether he has already lost his chance. Best and Tae face their own emotional uncertainty. Tae understands more than he is able to express, while Best is drawn to the attention and kindness Tae gives him. Yet Best fears that Tae may not truly see him and might only be attracted to him because he resembles someone Tae loved before.
All four men believe they understand their own feelings, but each is trapped inside a different fear: Dan is afraid of being hurt again, Pond is desperate to prove that the past can still be repaired, Tae cannot clearly say what he wants, and Best does not want to become a replacement for another man.
Set within an office where professional boundaries become increasingly difficult to maintain, New Boyfriend explores what it really means to move on. Sometimes the person who changes your future is not someone completely new. He may be the man who returned, the colleague who was always nearby, or the person you were too frightened to recognise while looking in the wrong direction.
Series information
New Boyfriend is a Thai workplace BL produced by OHAO Studio. The main couple is played by Shinedan Kreangsak Muangsaen as Dan and Pond Jiraphat Thanoomas as Pond. Best Noratape Nontarat and Tontae Tinnakorn Puwasakdiwong play the second central pairing. The series premieres on Wednesday, August 5, 2026, at 9:15 p.m. Thailand time. A new episode is scheduled every Wednesday on the official OHAO Studio YouTube channel, where episodes should also remain available for replay.
For most of his childhood, Jung I-hyun lived through characters written by other people. After becoming a successful child actor, performing gradually stopped being something he did and became the only identity others were willing to recognise. Even his mother seemed convinced that without acting, there would be nothing left of him.
Her sudden death forces I-hyun to abandon both the entertainment industry and the life that had been decided for him. Yet leaving acting behind does not mean that he has lost his love for the stage. Years later, he returns with a different ambition: rather than allowing himself to be directed again, he wants to become the person responsible for shaping the story.
I-hyun is finally given the opportunity to direct a small musical production called The Mermaid Prince. It is a chance to prove that he can create something of his own, but also a confrontation with the question that has followed him since childhood: who is he when he is no longer performing for someone else?
Kang Jae-on has spent those same years refusing to let go of his dream of becoming an actor. His life is far removed from the glamorous image of the entertainment industry. He survives by moving between part-time jobs, repeatedly postponing the future he wants while trying to endure the reality in front of him. What prevents him from giving up completely is the memory of a promise made during high school, when he and I-hyun once imagined that they might stand onstage together.
That promise was never fulfilled. Their first love ended beneath misunderstandings, emotional wounds and words that neither of them managed to correct before they separated.
When Jae-on auditions for the leading role in The Mermaid Prince, he does not expect the director watching him from the other side of the room to be I-hyun. The boy he never truly forgot has returned as someone colder, more guarded and determined to keep control over both the production and his own emotions.
Their positions are now very different from the ones they occupied in the past. Jae-on is still waiting for someone to give him a place beneath the spotlight, while I-hyun has chosen to remain behind it. Yet rehearsing together makes it increasingly difficult to separate the roles they are supposed to play from the feelings they once shared.
For Jae-on, returning to I-hyun’s side is also a chance to repay the person who once helped him continue when he was ready to give up. This time, he wants to become the one who stays, protects him and refuses to disappear when things become difficult.
As the musical slowly takes shape, the two men are forced to revisit the dream, promise and relationship they abandoned years earlier. Their reunion becomes more than another opportunity to perform. It is a rehearsal for the life they might have shared—and perhaps their final chance to stop treating their love as an unfinished scene.
Play Me has 8 episodes, each approximately 10 minutes long. The first two episodes premiered on Friday, July 31, 2026, at 1:00 p.m. KST. Two new episodes are scheduled every Friday. The planned finale date is August 28, 2026.
The expected schedule is:
Episodes 1–2: July 31, 2026
Episodes 3–4: August 7, 2026
Episodes 5–6: August 14, 2026
Episodes 7–8: August 21, 2026
The series is available through iQIYI.