3
5
jpny01
This is a trainwreck.
I keep seeing the phrase "there's zero toxicity!" Sure, if you don't think kidnapping and torturing your love interest counts as toxicity, or infantilizing him or discussing him with his father without his knowledge, or being overarchingly controlling, or being enraged with jealousy everytime your boyfriend talks to another person. Question - toxic or not toxic: "I want to lock you up, preventing you from seeing anyone" and "there's a demon in my heart that could harm you at any time." Was I the only one shouting "Run, Fiat! Run!"It's fine to have a D/s couple, but then you need to say it's a D/s couple and you need to see the couple agree to it. Otherwise, it looks like a psycopath and someone with Stockholm syndrome. Here Mame tried to have it both ways, and the result is not successful.
First and Ja have almost no physical chemistry at all. They have some cuddling chemistry, but that's about it. The actors are so obviously uncomfortable in the love scenes that it makes me squirm. There's always at least a foot of space between their bodies, which is quite an achievement in a sex scene. Leo always looks like he's planking over Fiat instead of f#@$ing him. And their love scenes are all exactly the same. You can count on several things: Leo will grab one or both of Fiat's hands and pin them by his head. His necklace will fall into Fiat's mouth and they'll kiss anyway, despite how that would feel on your teeth. I cringe just thinking about it. Also, metal doesn't taste good. That's why we don't eat it. And the planking.
There is no plot. I mean zero plot. Not even a teeny bit. Every week there's some sort of crisis manufactured that depends on an implausible failure of communication that will inevitably make Fiat cry, in exactly the same way he's cried in all the previous episodes, to the point that I wonder if they just shot it once and replay it every time anything at all happens, because anything at all will made him cry. Like sobbing, not adult crying. Then the crisis will be resolved with a handwave off-screen, but will be given in flashback later.
There's an ep where someone withholds from Leo info on a cartoonishly evil villain's plot to hurt Fiat unless he kisses her. So, does Leo discuss this with Fiat and come up with a course of action, or does he just tell Fiat to be on his guard (Fiat says OK and has no further questions, and Leo offers no context for what one might presume is a somewhat unusual thing to say) and kiss the girl? And if you were a betting person, what are the chances that Fiat will just happen to be on hand to witness something that took one second? This is the quality of the writing. It's so bad I sit staring with my mouth open, even though my expectations weren't really very high.
Fiat is a star athlete, and captain of the basketball team, yet he can't descend three stairs (to be fair, there might have been four stairs) without tripping, he can't tie his shoes without Leo, if he's been sobbing, which is 90% of the time, he has to be carried to bed by Leo, and he can't talk to his insane escaped-from-the-asylum mother without Leo's supervision. Leo doesn't even let Fiat battle his own evil twin by himself. (That last was made up, but if it happened it would surprise no one.) What happened to his kick-ass bad-boy character? I have a theory: In TT2, Fiat was pursuing Type, who is an uke, so he could be more aggressive and manly. Now he's with Leo, who's a huge seme Dom, so Fiat has been transmuted into the Über-uke - the most useless and fragile person ever to exist in a BL.
On to the positives: The secondary couple is so well-written that I suspect Mame has an assistant that wrote their story while her boss was off having virgin cat lady D/s fantasies about Ja, because it's really cute and healthy. Leon is aggressive, but always respectful and gentlemanly. I've seen people accuse him of being a rapey stalker, but he asked for permission to pursue Pob which Pob granted. At one point, he starts to lean in for a kiss, immediately and correctly reads Pob's body language, and aborts & apologizes for his behavior. Smart is not the world's best actor, but he's committed to the role, he's very charming, and he has a shockingly beautiful body which I wasn't expecting to see and was unprepared for. And a sweet smile, and he's not afraid of playing intimacy with another man - you really feel Leon's attraction for Pob, both physically and as a person. It's really sweet and cute.
What's more, although there's still a seme/uke dynamic at play, because Mame is incapable of imagining anything else, it's not typical Mame - Leon (the seme) is younger (although still taller, a barrier that will likely never be breached), and Pob is emotionally more mature and stronger, and is always in control, which I like - he's even the only person who will stand up to Leo & Leon's mother. He wants Leon, but he plays it cool and makes very sure Leon is serious before he's willing to let it happen. And when he's sure, he LETS IT HAPPEN, no "I'm a 19th c. 12-year old virgin, you can kiss me on the cheek once per week."
EDIT: The secondary couple are well-written from Ep 1-11. Ep 12 will make you want to go burn something down. Like Mame's house. But if you do, try to let all the cats out first. Also, have you ever tried to travel to a third-world country with a week's notice? Neither has Mame. Clearly.
I really can't recommend this. If you like the main couple and are liking the series, that feeling is not going to survive Ep 11 and you'll feel you wasted your time. I'd wait for a Leon/Pob cut and watch that.
1 for the writing. It's bad. 8 for Leon/Pob in Ep 1-11, negative 20,000 for Fiat/Leo, so I was generous and gave it a 1. Although I should subtract a point for the Leon/Pob ending, but nobody promised us a fairytale. Except they did because this was marketed as a BL. But there's nothing lower than a 1. So pretend it's a zero.
6 for the acting. If feels worse than a 6, but the material the boys had to work with was so inferior that I felt I should give them the benefit of the doubt.
5 for the music. I don't really notice it, so it's not great and not bad, and kudos for not having too many flashback scenes to sappy and overpowering ballads.
3 rewatch value. You'd have to hold a gun to my head to make me watch this again, but I will probably watch the naked Leon scene several hundred more times, so a 3. (Seriously, I would watch a Leon/Pob cut of ep 1-11, or maybe even FF through the series for their scenes).
4 overall. Probably an 8 for Leon/Pob (ep 1-11, pretending 12 didn't happen), but unfortunately they're not in it very much.
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Is everone watching the same show I'm watching?
How does anyone find this funny? The level of homophobia and misogyny is unacceptable. In the first episode, feminity in gay men is equated with predatory behavior, and the second episode involves a brothel and one character bullying another into having sex against his will.This is terrible! Not in terms of production values or acting - it's solid there. But the writing is so backward, unfunny, and offensive that I'm truly shocked anyone likes it.
And the evil ex-GF trope again? Can we move past this?
It's a shame - I love everyone in the cast, and I was excited to see Pod in a lead role. Ep 3 was better and funny, but it's hard to get past the previous 2 episodes But even in 3, you have a gay couple paying a call-girl to pose as their romantic interest because they're afraid of Ton. What kind of message is THAT?
And the lack of originality... yikes:
Trip-and-fall-on-each-other-and-stare-at-each-other-with-faces-too-close-together routine? Check.
Engineers? Check.
Pathetic ladyboy? Check.
Silly fujoshi? Check.
One thing it does have going for it is Pod (Ton) is shirtless all the time (or wearing a skin-tight compression tank top which is pretty much the same thing) and I'm shallow.
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I'm not sure why Asian series all have to have sappy easy listening soundtracks - does anyone actually voluntarily listen to music like that? I'd rather have Classical Chinese opera than this dreck. Fortunately it's only mildly annoying because the story and characters were so engrossing.
I wish it had maybe two more episodes to have a smoother transition for Xia Yu Hao from bad boy to sweet and sensitive - it was a little too quick. It would have been better if it had taken longer for Qiu Zi Xuan to make all the discoveries that uncovered what kind of person Yu Hao is. But for four hours, it was superbly written, a tight narrative without a lot of extraneous activity or repetition.
You won't be sorry you watched this.
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Fatally Dull
I have to be honest, this is one of the worst BLs I've ever seen. It's not offensively bad, it's just relenetlessly dull and bloodless. I don't want to waste your time with too much detail, so bullet points:- The story was a good idea, but it was just a setting and did nothing to explore behind the scenes of the BL genre, at least not in any realistic and meaningful way. That would be OK, if not for:
- The lack of chemistry between the leads. I'm not sure if that's the actors' fault - the script was weak and the directing especially bad. That's the first time I've gotten bored and ff a love scene.
- The acting is lackluster. It's not embarassingly bad, it's just lifeless. I've seen Gameplay and Best in other things and they were both really good. But all the positioning was so awkward and unnatural - again, I think the directing.
- The editing is rushed, but I understand the production was such a wreck that the actors had to do a lot of the editing, so kudos for that, but it didn't really save the drama. Or I should say "drama', because:
- I get product placement, but this whole series was just a vehicle for marketing supermarket products like makeup and cheap icecream.
- The character of Penelope is truly awful. She spends the whole series sexually harassing the acting coach - relentlessly and without mercy, to the point I would have taken legal action in his place. It was very uncomfortable and yet another miserable portrayal of a trans character as a ridiculous and pathetic man-starved predator.
I can't recommend this, even for Gameplay fans. I came out of this wondering if he was as good as a thought he was, and he's always been one of my favorite actors.
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Surprising - LGBTQ+ rather than BL, but very good.
BL audiences probably won't like this too much - but it's such a refreshing change from the formula. Usually BL characters behave like Jane Austin characters instead of actual people - but here we have what feel like real people. The story doesn't shy away from the superficiality in gay life, or how stupid we are when young, and it touches on the nature of love and the different kinds there are.I think this could have been more special if the position of Rich and his son were reversed - the way it ended up leaned perhaps too heavily on superficiality.
The acting was pretty good - there were a couple of scenes that might have been too ambitious, but kudos for stretching limits. The directing is excellent, as is the cinematography.
It could have used one more episode so that the wrap-up was a bit more full, but it was well-written enough to work at the given length - the final conversation between Richard and Tupe was a highlight.
The music is good, but maybe it could have used a bit more so that the theme song got a chance to rest. There are several things that one would want to rewatch, especially in the director's cut.
I'm so sorry about the loss of the director - it will be hard to find someone of that caliber for S2.
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Great fluff, but forgetable.
This is not a bad series. But I also don't feel it's as good as most other people do. I would recommend it, but here's my honest review:The first half of this is spectacular - it roughly follows Romeo & Juliet, so it's hard to go wrong. The director does a fantastic job of ratcheting up the dramatic tension until the end of Ep 5. But then nothing happens. The major conflict with Pran's best friend Wai just evaporates without real resolution due to an external circumstance - there's no conversation about what happened - one moment he's homicidal, the next he's totally OK with everything.
The central conflict between the families also never goes anywhere - there's a brief reveal of the origin of the conflict, and then it's never addressed again - it just goes away... after a time jump.
Speaking of which, time jumps are lazy. The director opted, instead of confrontation and resolution of the central conflict, to just leaping over it. That makes it incomprehensible why they would endure the enormous sacrifice of keeping their relationship secret for five years.
I love that we got to see the main couple interacting as a couple throughout most of the series rather than a hug in the last 10 seconds of the series, but the entire second half of the series is basically just cute moments between them, with no further development of their relationship from the climax on the rooftop in Ep 5, and so it gets repetitive and dull - I've never before in my life ff'd though romantic scenes in BLs, but I was just bored and in the later episodes, relied on 2x to get through them. They seem more like friends with benefits than a real couple. In the last ep, they interact exactly like they did at the beginning - not like people who have been building a life together for 5 years.
Ep 5 was the peak because it contained a very skillful buildup of tension with an extremely satisfying resolution. Because all the conflict after that just disappeared, we were cheated of a satisfying resolution. The couple never had to fight for anything to be together - they just were. For 7 more episodes with very little happening plot-wise. If there are no stakes, there's no tension, and nothing to invest in, so all you have left is cute boys being cute to each other, which is great, but disappointing if it's all there is.
The acting in this is very good. Ohm and Nanon obviously really like each other, so their relationship is comfortable, and Jimmy is a standout as Wai - he was downright scary in Ep 5 and he has a strong presence.
So if you want a fluffy feel-good series to watch, you can't beat this. But instead of being what it could have been, one of the best BL series of all time, the director just didn't know how to resolve the dramatic tensions he'd build up, so he just punted, and as a result, other than Ep 5, this series is eminently forgetable. I doubt anyone feels that way just after watching the finale, but I suspect many will, in fact, forget it fairly soon.
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Beautiful Story and Beautifully Shot
First, this is not for everyone. If you're expecting a BL, you can stop expecting a BL - it's not one. There is an LGBT aspect of the story, and the male gaze is present as Atom wears very little thorughout which is a goldmine for shallow people like me, and when he is dressed up, he looks amazing.Reading the comments section, there is a bit of overstatement of the theatricality of the series. It is intentionally play-like, but the purely visual elements are of equal importance to the dialogue, and I think that because this was deceptively marketed a BL, the audience was looking for BL and not seeing what was really there, and you can't blame the audience for that.
If you approach this as a straightforward story, you may hate it - it's an allegory, so it's important to think about what everyting symbolizes and what is metaphor, and what the message is.
There are many related themes, a couple of the more surfacy ones being the futility of second-guessing past decisions - and the utility of atonement in order to move on.
The structure of the story has Sunshine given the power to totally erase a person from the universe each night for 7 Days before Valentine('s - I wish these productions could get the grammar of the title correct), and the correct decision will bring love back to him. Each erasure has a lessson, but this causes the biggest problem with the series and what I think is the main reason so many people disliked it and/or dropped it:
it's too long, One of the erasures is a self-indulgent political statement by the writer, which didn't belong in here. What would have been more meaningful and universal would have been to erase the Conservative, ending up in a Stalinist far-left conformity, as without balance even the side you're on can become descend into oppression.
Another of the erasures just makes Sunshine evil and malicious and should not have been included, Some of his decisions are bad, but viewed through the lens of his heartbreak is understandable, but this one isn't - it's just awful of him.
The acting in this is fantastic - the series rests firmly on Atom's shoulders, and he carries it. His heartbreak is heartbreaking, his smile is even worse (so beautiful it hurts), and there's a scene with him on stage that's worth it in itself. Jet is good too, but he has a more limited range and I don't think he quite kept up with Atom. The small parts are all very well acted, even "annoying stock characters" that made them all compelling, like Jared the Flower Guy. who could have just been irritating, but it's hard not to fall in love with him.
I loved this series, but I did feel it bogged down in the middle. If you can put up with that, the end is worth it. But again, this is not a BL, so don't watch it expecting one.
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A surprisingly good series
The first two episodes were confusing and not too engaging, but it's well worth giving it a chance.This is one of the most attractive casts I've seen in a long time, and the acting is fairly good. There are three couples, the main pair and the two side couples - as is not uncommon, the side couples far outshone the main pair, who were the weakest in every regard - their story was odd and full of holes, they looked like they were held at gunpoint to play gay, and their kisses were among the worst I've ever seen. Fortunately, J-Min has his singing career to fall back on, and Kim Yeong Suk looks really, really good with his shirt off, and I liked that the show didn't pretend his abs had no effect on Lee Hyun.
The other two pairs have wonderful chemistry and their characters are more appealing, with MVP going to Lee Kwang Hee as Maru, who is a powerhouse of vulnerability and cuteness and yet so sexy.
I liked how this was about pairs of guys, and didn't divide them into ukes and semes - in fact it subverted expectations. You would assume Sung Min was the seme - older, taller, more muscular. and yet passive and shy, whereas Joo Hyuk is more assertive and confident. None of which means anything in real life about who does what in bed.
The last episode is a bit of a throw-away and could have been skipped, although it wasn't unpleasant.
Anyway, I'd recommend this - it's possibly my favorite BL series lately.
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Lovely short series
This is very well-written, acted, and produced - it's very visual and takes full advantage of the medium to tell the story with real economy of force.The story is non-linear, but easy to follow. The writing and acting manages to effectively convey through small details how the boys feel about each other, and the dynamic of their relationship. The ending was perfect for their story.
The acting is understated, but the tension is there when it needs to be. There is a coffee metaphor, but it's used effectively and we aren't beaten over the head with it.
I would recommend this - but if you watch it, don't try to judge it as you would a 12 hour-long episode series. It's a completely different type of story told in a much more visual way.
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It's not terrible.
There are some positives to this, including that the author clearly has enough life experience to write characters that act like people. The plot doesn't depend on tropes and accidental kisses, it's just a straightfoward attraction between two people.What the author does not have, however, is any sense of pacing or dramatic plotting. There really isn't much point to the premise as it doesn't really factor much into the story and has nothing to do with the ultimate resolution. There is a mystery at the beginning that could have been drawn out and made more terrifying, but instead the audience is let in almost immediately and it's played mostly for laughs.
The two main failings are the plot holes and the general lack of energy to everything. The end result is that I really never had much idea what was going on because nothing impressed itself on me stongly enough to remember, like in the finale when they reveal their coke-can tabs. I have absolutely no memory of anything involving those. Kevin has an ex that's important somehow, but that's never fleshed out. Also, How is it possible that Kevin wouldn't know the state of his aunt's family? Wouldn't his mother know the truth? Or if not, wouldn't he have to tell her?
Also, the story depends on a three-year time jump, during which the main pair don't see each other. What? Why not? Kevin has the resources to fly back & forth from the US, and Pluem's new job would certainly pay enough for him to travel. Why did Kevin even go home? All he does is live stream - it's not like he can't do that from anywhere.
But most of all, none of this has anything to do with the premise of the show, which isn't in the end a premise, it's just a "schtick". It isn't integral to the plot like in the masterful Something In My Room, and has nothing to say - it's just a shallow and unmemorable romance.
The dialog isn't vapid, but it's infected by the Thai-drama-endless-pauses-while-speaking disease which I take it is supposed to lend serious scenes gravitas, but instead makes them dull and stilted, because nobody speaks like that or we would slap them. The pacing of the series is too fast, but the pacing of every individual scene is too slow.
There are also other strange choices - in the final episode, where Pluem is being seductive (highly, highly, successfully), this could have been one of the hotter scenes in a while, except instead of being turned on, Kevin appears to be terrified, which is really a buzzkill and makes it creepy. It's odd, because when the camera shows us his perspective, he's staring straight at Pluem's pecs, which are ably outlined by the fantastic outfit he has on (speaking of which, the wardrobe in this series is first-rate), so why is he acting like a 12-year old girl facing his first time when he's a man in his late 20s? It drained all the energy out of the scene.
You can see that Boy and Tod have the potential for chemistry, but it's never really allowed to go anywhere, and this whole series feels like it was created with a hand tied behind its back - as if the creators were embarassed by feelings and felt they had to exercise unnecessary restraint.
This isn't a terrible series, but if you remember anything but Tod's short shorts a few months from now, or maybe Boy's sexy smirk, I'd be surprised.
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The North Star never moves, and neither does this story.
This story was BL Plot #3, "Boys kept apart by implausible miscommunication". If both of a pair are in love with each other, mutual friends know that, and one of them doesn't talk about anything else (and yet everyone wants him), and on top of that, one of them actually told the other that he likes him, how is it possible that nothing happened? That puts Khluen into the "you are a total idiot and deserve to die alone" category.In today's world, how is it possible NOT to know that two people broke up several years ago? Dao is obsessed with Khluen and never looked at his social media, or Gia's? Have you ever had a crush on an actor, saw him in an instagram photo with a girl, hated it, hurriedly copy/pasted what he wrote into google translate and was relieved it's his sister? Yeah, I have too. And Khluen was clearly very upset by whatever Gia said on the phone before he rushed off, so a non malignant narcissist would have said "OMG, is everything OK?" instead of making it all about him.
Everything about the plot is contrived, the characterization is inconsistent and implausible, and nobody has agency except Dao, who uses all of it to be a self-absorbed prat. And the series really boring. Try to decribe the plot. For example, Not Me would be "A guy replaces his evil twin in a marxist motorcycle gang to fight for justice and falls in love with his brother's enemy." That sounds ridiculous (and it is), but there is no world in which I would not watch that. This is "Two guys who have been in love with each other for several years continue to not communicate for seven episodes while nothing else happens."
Dunk is cute, and Joong is attractive enough, but there was just zero heat. I kept shipping Dao with Fah because there was so much more chemistry between them. Sure, they're brothers and it's wrong, but that would have been a lot more intesting than this. If not for Mek, I would have dropped this lifeless series. Honestly, the brotherly love scenes with Dao and Fah are the only thing about this that worked for me. Fah's reaction when he walks in on Dao and Khluen was actually funny, unlike all the fart and poop jokes.
The technical aspects were weak, with inconsistent lighting in scenes. The very last one where they're on a dock at night looked like someone was flashing a spot light on them on and off. And the soft-focus filter was again abused to the point that everyone looked botoxed to within an inch of their lives and their facial expressions were smoothed away.
I would skip this. If you're more interested in the follow-on series about Fah and Prince, there is absolutely nothing in this series that you need to see to understand Star In My Heart, which is clearly to a painful extent "inspired" (to be generous) by another series you may have watched that takes place in the mountains.
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Largely tedious with lazy writing
I'll start with negatives and end on positives.This is poorly written. There are way too many extraneous scenes and endless blocks of dialog that accomplish nothing. If a scene doesn't advance the plot or develop a character, it should be cut. If a scene repeats the same idea over and over, it should be edited down. For example, in the last episode Lom is flirty with Nuea, Nuea rejects him with a comment like "you're getting sneaky". But they did it three times in one (loonnnnnggg) scene. The dialog in general is weak and repetitive, and too much of it is pointless.
The entire plot rests on a completely ridiculous understanding that is so simple to clear up that you want to light things on fire by Ep 5. Then when it's finally cleared up, the main character behaves like it's not cleared up for no apparent reason. It just makes no sense.
The directing is lackluster with a lot of scenes lacking the energy they should have, both comedic and dramatic, although there were some good moments. It also needed a much more disciplined editor.
The acting is just OK. Sunny does a solid job with an uninteresting character, and Pak is about equal playing an even less interesting character. Nuea would have made a good side character, but I just don't think Pak has the charisma for a leading role. He does have intensity, and I can see him being excellent in a villain role. The chemistry was so-so. The actors weren't afraid of inimacy, but their love scenes still had that distance between their bodies that makes most BL sex scenes weird.
A lot of people were greatly put off by Lom & Yiwa's plan, but it's easy to object if you haven't lived in a conservative and unaccepting society with huge familial and social pressures crushing you. What they did made perfect sense, and everyone involved knew the score and consented to it, so why all the judgment? If you're gay a great portion of your life is keeping things secret to avoid minor inconveniences like getting fired, beaten to death, or disowned by your family. There are safe spaces, like your friends, and there are places where you hide who you are, or at least don't volunteer it. People at work mention their wives and children all the time - I can't do that, because even if 90% of people are OK with gay, 10% is still enough to ruin you.
There are some strong points, too. The lakorn mothers were hysterical and the editing around them was brilliant, like the ominous music whenever they appeared. Their fight scene at the wedding was funny, although like so much of this series, it went on too long.
Whoever was in charge of wardrobe should be given a raise, because it was all perfect. Both Lom and Nuea have a personal style and their outfits were beautiful.
The camerawork was good and dynamic - the visuals were beautiful and helped make the series bearable.
Sunny (Lom) has his shirt of a LOT, and has clearly been hitting the gym hard, and that never got tiresome.
I wouldn't recommend either watching this or not watching it. If you enjoy a pile of fluff and are not bothered by ridiculous and frustrating plots, you'll enjoy it. I'm not one of those people, but I still watched it to the end for the positives I mentioned above.
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Great until the ending
If you were to see this score and then watch the ep, you'd think, "what's wrong with this guy? This show is great!" Well, wait until the last minute. There's a line that is the most tired thing that exists in BL, and they had to go and throw it in.I can honestly recommend not watching this - just watch the excellent first part and use your imagination from there. You will miss almost nothing, as this ep is the same story from Film's perspective, so the only additions are a few insights into what he was thinking in the previous episode. The continuation of the story is only in the last minute, when IMO it's ruined.
I'm actually angry. In a "typical" BL, it would just make me roll my eyes, but here it feels like throwing cargo pants on Michaelangelo's David. The acting and dialogue (with that exception) are excellent, as is the editing, which respects the audience and is efficient from a storytelling perspective. But that stupid line.
It was refreshing to watch a BL that's not crippled by adherence to the seme/uke model - here you could have two guys acting like guys, instead of one of them having to faint whenever touched by sunlight or tripping every time he tries to walk.
But then they had to ruin it. I hope they pair these two in a better project.
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Yikes.
I'm not going to sugar-coat it. This was terrible.I'll get it out of the way - the makeup artist is either a sadist or hates both actors. Han Gi Chan looks 10 years older than he is (which means he's going to be a hot daddy in 10 years) and Holland looks deceased. I kept thinking of Beetlejuice.
The problem with this series is that the story makes no sense. Essentially, an all-star chef moves to a hut on the beach to sell udon. A homeless undead person shows up and insinuates himself into chef's life. Undead-guy is good at everything restaurant-related except protecting jugs of aged soy which are left on the floor for no apparent reason. Chef inexplicably falls in love with Beetlejuice, who abandons him in the night, leaving him heartbroken and with nobody to wash the dishes. One year later he returns and Chef takes him back without any curiosity as to why he left or any concern that he might run away again, altough tears that look like they came from a squeeze-bottle fall down his make-up plastered face. Chef seems to have been hurt by his other ex too, but at least he was wealthy and hot, and doesn't flee into the night for no apparent reason.
I'm sure Holland is a wonderful person who has had to endure harships, but we can't be good at everything, and acting is not on e of the things he's good at. I suspect he'd be able to pull off an OTT outrageous character in a comedy, but as a romantic lead in a drama, no.
Story: 2. Bad, but I gave it a point for not throwing in stock BL cliches.
Acting: 6. This is kind. Han Gi Chan is pretty good, and the two other minor characters are decent.
Music: 8. Holland sings the theme song, and it's pretty good.
Rewatch: 2. I'd say 1, but Han Gi Chan does take a shower, and I would rewatch that.
Overall: 5. It's not good. It's not embarassing (except the makeup and writing), but I did find myself hitting the +10 seconds button quite often.
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Trainwreck - but semi-redemptive Special Episode
EDIT: Post-Special Episode comments added.This series started off well. The acting for the main pair is good, they're very attractive & hot-bodied, and while there wasn't anything ground-breaking, it was nice that the main couple were both guys - fairly equal (although with a cute size difference - and It was a bit unusual for the uke to fight off a gang to rescue the seme from being beaten). Their interaction was refreshing & natural, and all-in-all it was a pleasant watch.
Until it wasn't. First, the secondary couple looked like it might be interesting at first, but it was a dreary slog, with very dull acting and an uninteresting story. Eventually I just FF'd though all their scenes.
Then, the main couple imploded. I should have known that when they got together too early. Instead of exploring the frictions caused by being friends since childhood and then becoming a couple, they opted for the most stupid and tiresome means of generating drama imaginable, the "mercilessly and cruelly break up with him so he can attain happiness with a good woman" trope. Ugh. By the time they emerge from that (by sprinting a mile toward each other wearing business suits in full sunlight without breaking the slightest sweat), you just don't give a flying f@#$ if they get together or just die horribly while crossing the street (which is usually fatal in BL). Although it turns out being run over by the White SUV of Death is survivable, apparently (you'll understand if you make it to the finale).
If I'd stopped watching after Ep 8 I'd probably rate this an 8.5, but unfortunately I continued watching. The plot turn doesn't even make sense - it's implied at first that one of their fathers was so against them being together that they couln't be, but he wasn't. At all. Other than initial surprise, which just about any parent will feel if they've never been given an inkling their kid was gay until walking in on him with a guy.
I will say that the kissing & love scenes were good. Max Lin looks about as good as one can with his shirt off, and Shi Cheng Hao is beautiful, and both commit.
The music is bad - it's like something you'd hear on an afternoon special from 40 years ago about a waitress falling in love with a prince that she doesn't know is a prince. It spoils the final love scene. There are nice cameos from three past series in this "universe" - Be Loved In House (the main couple in this series are divorce lawyers, so it's interesting to see a perfect BL couple having problems), H3 Make Our Days Count, and H4 Close to You.
I would skip this, or if you watch it, stop at the end of Ep 8. The rest is dreck. What a disappointment. Hopefully we'll see these leads in something better, because they were cute together in the first two-thirds.
EDIT for Special Episode: this was added, which really helped and got rid of the sour taste the latter part of the series left for me. Most of the episode is Ze Shou passing out after the wedding and dreaming he's back in high school but with his 28-year old memories - it's sweet, cute, and clever. The Sailor Moon outfit... Also, their English teacher is hot. Note what's written on the black board - it seems to reflect how Ze Shou feels about the girl.
They could have stuck with this idea instead of the pointless drama after Ep 8 and it would have been so much better - in fact it would have been fun for Li Gong to have his own similar dream - maybe with him being a lot more aggressive knowing Ze Shou returns his love.
There are also three new Behind the Scenes episodes that I enjoyed (still ff-ing through the secondary couple) - the actors are so comfortable with each other, and they're both so smart and funny - there's also a lot of shirtless lingering for the filming of the love scenes. It's sweet how teary-eyed they got after the wrap.
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