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The story is hardly original: an undercover operation, a powerful crime family, two enemies with a shared past, guns pointed at attractive faces and enough sexual tension to ignite the ammunition warehouse. Think KinnPorsche or Spare Me Your Mercy which is the bar I set for this genre.

The criminal plot occasionally feels less like a true syndicate, it doesn’t feel like a Mafia-type group and more like a nice excuse to lock two handsome men inside the same house. Fortunately, the handsome leads Orion Chen and DayDay understands their roles and one can feel their intensity. Just like our two leads in Ash.

Kiss or Kill may not have the polish and feel of a major production, but it knows exactly what it is selling, danger, deception and two men who cannot decide whether to shoot each other or remove each other’s clothes. I love strong-willed gay men duking it out to see who ends up on top(our intended). The crime story still feels fake, yet the chemistry feels surprisingly genuine. Four episodes in, I’m not completely convinced by their love but I’m sufficiently seduced to continue watching. Since this was film outside the scope of the Chinese censorate I hope the intensity of the NC scenes are worth waiting for, after all, fireworks are bound to explode.