This review may contain spoilers
this is the best story i have seen for a chinese BL to date.
my chinese BL watchlist is limited but i know quality, decent, and bad work. i think this drama falls in between quality and decent but boy do i have things to say, lol. overall, to my shore was good.
the toxicity in this work was something of new heights for my consumption. i have yet to watch any leads have such a dysfunctional dynamic in anything, in any genre. without saying for sure, since i lack the credentials, fan xiao was a sociopath border-lining psychopathic. i say this because he just did whatever he wanted to anyone without even so much of a change of expression. his character made me hold my forehead so many times in cringe, frustration, and disappointment. the person he "loved" more than anyone in the world, he was stoic in the face of him crying, despairing, and expressing disgust toward him. xiao was fine being intimate with him as long as he had said man. his behavior was bewildering and frightening as hell. as badly as i wanted fan xiao to have redemption, he kept doing horrifying crap to manipulate you shulang. it was truly horrendous to watch. i cringed so much until he actually showed he experienced development.
i was happy that you shulang was not written to forgive xiao immediately after finding out about all of things he did. xiao deserved everything he got and more than what was expressed in the drama, to be honest. he manipulated lu zhen + shulang and ghosted him just in order to ruin their relationship. the former grievance was enough for xiao to be physically beaten, in my opinion. even his toxic display of jealously in the special episode was eye-rolling. he, however, did not stop at the relationship manipulation but commit sexual assault, coercion, blackmail, & overall abused his power as a wealthy person with connections. the man was the biggest red state i have ever seen. shulang should not have been written to forgive him nor go back to that evil.
shulang's character was genuinely a decent person until he cheated on his damn boyfriend, at the end. why was that necessary? is cheating a standard practice in chinese BL or what? what about sexual assault in BL, in general? it is so upsetting to constantly see these themes.
i did not at all care for hao yiran, at first. his face seemed way too unnatural looking. more importantly, his acting started off way too bland and straight-faced. i thought the leads had no chemistry, at first. he ended up being a better actor than i thought. i felt similarly about yunqi and he also proved me wrong. i think with fan xiao's quite clearly psychological problems, the straight-faced acting worked out. the only bad actor, in my opinion, was the actor for shulang's brother.
the intimacy was not amazing but it was good until the special episode. i do not know what happened there but the special episode was excellent until the kissing and proposal [?] the ring showcase, at the very end, was ? for me. it felt like a lazy and boring way to suggest they were going to get married. i am not for these lack of actual proposals that have been happening in BL, as of late. my favorite intimate moments were when the leads were looking at each other, talking, and touching [e.g. in xiao's car, xiao touches shulang's face with a finger and shulang grabs xiao's buddha necklace + sharing the "rouge" cigarettes].
anyway, the addressing of xiao's trauma and the reframe presented to him was a truly emotionally refreshing moment. it was beautiful and unexpected.
since i am an attention to detail kind of person, i naturally noticed lots of goofs like i often do. i noticed a microphone captured in a shot, a camera caught in a reflection, & obvious & unnatural cuts. then there were cringeworthy things like the fake volleyball game, fake kissing noises, and the way the promised fiancee ran out of the room. also, i caught a timestamp at the last frame of the special episode - that is wild AF. these kinds of things will always be unacceptable to me.
the conclusion of this was also not good. i cannot imagine that for those who watched it as it aired seeing the two reconcile through sexual intimacy. then by the next morning, it just ends with them holding hands on their way to breakfast? no.
the toxicity in this work was something of new heights for my consumption. i have yet to watch any leads have such a dysfunctional dynamic in anything, in any genre. without saying for sure, since i lack the credentials, fan xiao was a sociopath border-lining psychopathic. i say this because he just did whatever he wanted to anyone without even so much of a change of expression. his character made me hold my forehead so many times in cringe, frustration, and disappointment. the person he "loved" more than anyone in the world, he was stoic in the face of him crying, despairing, and expressing disgust toward him. xiao was fine being intimate with him as long as he had said man. his behavior was bewildering and frightening as hell. as badly as i wanted fan xiao to have redemption, he kept doing horrifying crap to manipulate you shulang. it was truly horrendous to watch. i cringed so much until he actually showed he experienced development.
i was happy that you shulang was not written to forgive xiao immediately after finding out about all of things he did. xiao deserved everything he got and more than what was expressed in the drama, to be honest. he manipulated lu zhen + shulang and ghosted him just in order to ruin their relationship. the former grievance was enough for xiao to be physically beaten, in my opinion. even his toxic display of jealously in the special episode was eye-rolling. he, however, did not stop at the relationship manipulation but commit sexual assault, coercion, blackmail, & overall abused his power as a wealthy person with connections. the man was the biggest red state i have ever seen. shulang should not have been written to forgive him nor go back to that evil.
shulang's character was genuinely a decent person until he cheated on his damn boyfriend, at the end. why was that necessary? is cheating a standard practice in chinese BL or what? what about sexual assault in BL, in general? it is so upsetting to constantly see these themes.
i did not at all care for hao yiran, at first. his face seemed way too unnatural looking. more importantly, his acting started off way too bland and straight-faced. i thought the leads had no chemistry, at first. he ended up being a better actor than i thought. i felt similarly about yunqi and he also proved me wrong. i think with fan xiao's quite clearly psychological problems, the straight-faced acting worked out. the only bad actor, in my opinion, was the actor for shulang's brother.
the intimacy was not amazing but it was good until the special episode. i do not know what happened there but the special episode was excellent until the kissing and proposal [?] the ring showcase, at the very end, was ? for me. it felt like a lazy and boring way to suggest they were going to get married. i am not for these lack of actual proposals that have been happening in BL, as of late. my favorite intimate moments were when the leads were looking at each other, talking, and touching [e.g. in xiao's car, xiao touches shulang's face with a finger and shulang grabs xiao's buddha necklace + sharing the "rouge" cigarettes].
anyway, the addressing of xiao's trauma and the reframe presented to him was a truly emotionally refreshing moment. it was beautiful and unexpected.
since i am an attention to detail kind of person, i naturally noticed lots of goofs like i often do. i noticed a microphone captured in a shot, a camera caught in a reflection, & obvious & unnatural cuts. then there were cringeworthy things like the fake volleyball game, fake kissing noises, and the way the promised fiancee ran out of the room. also, i caught a timestamp at the last frame of the special episode - that is wild AF. these kinds of things will always be unacceptable to me.
the conclusion of this was also not good. i cannot imagine that for those who watched it as it aired seeing the two reconcile through sexual intimacy. then by the next morning, it just ends with them holding hands on their way to breakfast? no.
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