etoks21

Wow, this is excellent.

I know the makers are working with a small budget, but they do a great job of making the best of what they do have. The acting/direction is top-notch, especially from the male leads, and the show has a shit-ton of heart, which makes up for almost anything else.

Park Luke is a profoundly mature actor for his youth. I believed every word he spoke, every feeling he emoted, every tear in his eyes. Nothing is over or under-done. He is utterly natural and convincing. I have a new name to add to my fave BL actors list.

A few caveats:
For the hundredth time, men, especially gay men, do NOT get up and get fully dressed and get back in bed after having hot sex. And seeing as in the uncut version we see some shirts coming off, it's not as though bare chests and shoulders in the waking-up scenes are going to freak us out. What is it with so many Korean BLs featuring dudes who have presumably great sex and then rise to shower, iron their clothes, put them back on, and go back to bed?

Speaking of which, I watched the first episode of the uncut version on a site with obnoxious ads. However, the little bit of extra heat is so marginal and utterly irrelevant to the success of the story-telling, that I watched the rest of it on YT where someone stitched all the episodes together into one uninterrupted video. Thank you, someone!

I wish the director had backed off on the OST ballads over quiet, intimate, powerfully emotional moments such as before the first sex scene. A couple of other times music was used to cue us to emotions being felt when the actors were doing a great job and needed no sudden guitar strings and a pop ballad to support them. The silence otherwise used to powerful effect here would have been the better choice. Leave the cheesy music to Thai and Pinoy BLs, which need all the help they can get.

Why do BL women always want to marry gay men even after they learn they're gay?
I suppose the bit with the fiance is pretty trope-ish, which would be another caveat. But otherwise, the show is so well-done that I rolled with it. I need a sequel to witness how that bitch wreaks "hell" on our boys, and how they fight back together.

Like most of the best films and series featured on MDL, this exceptional piece is grossly underrated.

All things considered, and as a result of it succeeding at being everything it attempted to be, Bad Guy gets a 9.5/10 from me.

Buh-bye, Cassie!

lol Thank you, nama! :D

"...or based on CONTENT made in China..."
This series is based on a Chinese novel. Reading comprehension, please.
The maker of any content in China is going to produce it with their government's rabidly-homophobic policies and attitudes in mind. Thus, it seems only logical that the writer of this novel self-censored as she wrote it. To what degree? I do not know. I did not say that I do know.

Is an opinion really an opinion? I did not know that!
Everyone doesn't like the same things I like? I did not know that!
You are a font of wisdom and knowledge!
Thank you!

It's "bad" to ME. I wrote the comment. I write comments to express MY opinion.
Is your reply to me someone else's opinion?
That seems odd...

I should have stopped after "this show sucks ass," because that's the bottom line and I really did not know what the hell I was talking about regarding C-novels. Apparently, you CAN write a gay novel in China. But also apparently, good luck trying to get it made into a live-action series IN China.

I'm going to edit my original comment so I don't look like so much of a dumb-ass. :D

This show sucks.

I avoid 99% of films, or series made in, or based on content made in China because of the ban on gay live-action content. Please do the same. I gave this one a shot because a fellow MDLer I trust said it was good. She was wrong. :)

Finally, it's hilarious to read the hysterical comments left below by people who love this show for some reason. How about ignoring comments you don't like, scroll on by instead of telling everyone you disagree with to STFU?

Dropped.

It's also unhealthy to obsess over comments you don't like. Why not ignore them?

I have a question, for the first fucking time: You got a problem with negative comments about a show you love? DO. NOT. READ. THEM. Easy, right?

You'll know in the first sentence if the writer is trashing your show, so what's your excuse?

If all it takes to ruin your enjoyment of a series is a negative comment you disagree with, I suspect you're not that sold on it either. Quit trying to police other people's comments.

This is terrible.
Feels like it was made in Thailand, which is not a good thing.
The wig says it all.

Dropped.

I grew weary of that whole "now that's just my opinion, and you certainly have a right to your opinion as do we all, no matter how vile and revolting, bigoted, or prudish your opinion might be. I hope you'll forgive me for having an opinion if it is in opposition to yours, and I hope you will pardon me if I've offended you. I am sorry for having an opinion" thing.

In a comment thread it's a given that a comment a person makes is "their opinion." I see no point in stating the obvious. Segueing from what you said earlier, if someone is OUTRAGED by something I write, that's a THEM problem, not a me problem. I've been lectured here many times by the scolds. I don't care what they think, other than the degree to which it is fun to play with their outrage.

Hi Queer!
(Maybe interacting with you will help cure me of my phobia of the word "queer.") I love almost anything "dark" in my books, films, and dramas. "Fluff," such as is widely delighted in here, bores me to tears.

Good, I'm pleased that you were "disgusted" by my comment and concluded that I am a "disgusting" person. I enjoy getting feedback like that from sex-phobic, humorless scolds like you. It tells me I'm offending the right people.

BTW, is there anything about that statement that isn't true, about how a lot of gay men would handle the situation? I'm a gay man. I know a lot of gay men and a lot of them are pigs who would do just as I suggested Takara would do if this ridiculous plot wasn't tailored to the fantasies of plain-looking gay nerds.

I sincerely doubt you're a gay man though. You're an uptight, self-righteous fujoshi, which is a really odd combination.

"There's a reason people swarm you when you write things, have you never sat back and actually thought about that?" Your words above.

Oh dear, am I being "rude" to you, dear? Are your fee-fees hurt?" Your words again: "...or was it just the fact that you're a disgusting person????????????" Call me crazy, but that seems pretty damn rude.

Now go outside in the dark and touch your ass or something...

What YOU fail to realize is that I am not concerned with how many comments I leave. I write what and when I want to, and I don't care if you want to denigrate my doing so as attention-seeking or anything else. I enjoy watching shows, even some I hate-watch. I enjoy posting and responding to comments. It doesn't matter to me what you think of that.

And if YOU would scroll down, you'll see that I have NOT been "swarmed" here. Rather, I've had a few convos with people who agreed or discussed things with me. It's only schoolmarms like you who leap in to blast people for things such as daring to notice an actor's looks. What you're trying to do is control and police by intimidation what other people write here. Cuts zero ice with me.

By the way, here you are again, responding to me on your device instead of being outside in the sun, eating grass or something.

Oh gosh, I feel so reprimanded and corrected. I will change my behavior immediately to suit your whims.

I don't have to "justify" anything to you. I explained, because you seem to be a tad slow, the difference between live action fiction and RL, but it's clear you are not equipped to grasp the concept.

Are YOU a fictional character? I'm pretty sure not. Thus, when I spoke of YOUR openings I was indeed referring to the real world. Do you get the difference? No? Well, I can't help you.

The only sense you seem to have is a sense of indignant, self-righteous, preachy outrage. Do you feel I "baited" your rage and you can't control yourself?

As for funny, tell that to the MDLers who often message me about how much they enjoy my comments, specifically because I write things they don't out of fear of being swarmed by wet blankets like you.

And then we get to the basic "touch grass" section of your lame comment, even as you continue to respond to my every comment on YOUR device, indicating a need for YOU to do likewise. Get some self-awareness.

It's "QUEER" Studies, dammit! :D

So people call you "Queer" in the same way they might say "Joe" or "Ella?"
I'm more than twice your age, another thing that makes me cringe, lol I am far older than I ever intended to be. I'm old enough to remember when the acronym was GLBT, not the other way around. I have no idea why Lesbian and Gay have switched places. I think maybe because the sounds flow more easily across the tongue.

I'm very "immature" in several ways, or at least that's what a lot of other people would say. I'm holding on to that part of me as long as I can. Part of the fun of leaving true but snarky comments on MDL is that it is rife with self-righteous do-gooders who love to be outraged. I enjoy poking at them from time to time.

I HAVE cleaned up my use of obscenities and naughty names, though, as those used to get me in trouble here. Now, I work on implying rather that baldly stating my insults. :D

My sense of humor runs from desert-dry to glaringly obvious. I think that post contained some of all of it. I'm certainly serious about how bad the show is.

Taishin is a character, not a real-life person. I was sarcastically referring to Taishin's "moist openings," not the actor's, who is a real person. Are you capable of comprehending that my "moist opening" reasoning exists in the artificial universe of the series, not in the real-life world of the two actors, and thus I was not urging that the actor Iwasi Yoji make use of the actor Koneshi Eito's openings IRL? Or do you already understand that but leaped at the opportunity to brandish your self-righteous purity and lack of a sense of humor?

You seem to have a lot of sex-related hang-ups. It's likely you have moist openings of your own and have made use of those of other people, yes? Actually, it's more likely you're a vestal virgin in a nunnery.

What is the "hate" part? :)

My "btw, are you Queer?" was meant tongue-in-cheek, as obviously your member name makes it clear with every post that you ARE queer.

I don't use "queer" as it has gradually come to be used by young people and many institutions/organizations. I am an old fart and growing up gay myself, "queer" was the gay equivalent of the N-Word. Every time I hear or read it I feel a twinge of the pain I felt hearing it spoken by those around me back then.

I understand the aim is to claim a slur as a positive descriptor and thus rob it of its negative power, but those feelings are deeply ingrained in me and aren't going away. Every time I read "Queer Studies Department" or "Queer community" or "Queer movie," I cringe. I can't imagine a university dubbing its African-American courses as "N****r Studies."

For me, "Gay" is what unites us, or used to, as in "Gay Studies" or "gay-themed films" or "the gay community." To my ear, using "queer" in those contexts sounds political, confrontational, and trendy.

But that's me.