WingedBean

I cannot believe it took me 8 days short of 6 months to complete this drama. I think this happened for 2 main reasons

1. Shine aired at a time when my country was also going through political protests. Specifically, student-led, gen z led protests. The issues, especially the police and military brutality, just hit too close to home for me. Reality bled into fiction, or was it the other way around? The point is, it was too much. I use dramas as an escape from daily life. At the time, this show just magnified the reality around me

2. I accidentally got spoilers. Thank you, my carefully constructed Twitter algorithm. As soon as the show aired, I knew what happened to whom, and that quickly diminished my desire to continue with the show.

Now on to the show itself,
I believe that 'Shine' is a very important story. It gets points for tackling something outside the usual BL lens with the heaviness and seriousness that it deserves. I may not know much about Thai politics, but I know all too well the plight and fight of the people against cruel, corrupt governments.

As for the characters
✨Trin and Tanwa - I found their opposites-attract relationship interesting at first. However, as the story unfolded and as the political matters became more serious, I found them to be more than a little mismatched. I love that Tanwa's carefree attitude and playfulness helped open Trin up to a whole new world. Something less buttoned up than he was used to.

But how did Trin influence Tanwa? The politics and reform matters were important to Trin, but Tanwa never involved himself in them. Never steps foot in this world that Trin cared deeply about - even though his view of some things did come from a privileged lens. Tanwa's story is all about his daddy issues and drug use. For a show whose main theme is political revolution, it was odd that one of its main characters was so removed from it

✨Victor - Turns out that he'd become my favourite character. N not only that, but I also felt like he had been older and a tad bit more mature in his approach for revolution, he'd have made a better partner for Trin. Especially intellectually, and even more so due to the time period they lived in. His dying, particularly in the way he did, broke me. His death is an unfortunate reality of what happens when the pple decide to fight the government.

I have seen this reality on the news more times than I want to recall. I get it, I understand it, but I don't got to like it. I am disappointed in how the show added that 'Don't tell Trin' conversation btwn him and Tanwa. They used that to absolve Tanwa and give him and Trin a happy ending. Lowkey, I feel like Tanwa having to carry that burden of Victor's death would've been a better, more impactful ending for someone like him.

I hope to see more of Peter as an actor in the future

✨Krailert and Naran - I knew it was likely going to end the way it did, I just did not expect the specific route it took to land where they did. I thought that their political differences would drive them apart. Because, yes, opposites attract, but not in cases such as this one. The difference was too much.

I expected that Krailert would choose the military might over Naran and what he fought 4. You know, as he was just another cog in the militaristic machine. I just never expected him to reveal everything, hope for a happy ending, only to be stopped by the wife and her powerful family. While they both left broken-hearted, I feel the most for Krailert. I just know that he spent most of the rest of his life in that room crying, reliving their memories, and playing that song he composed over and over on that piano.

Now Son and Euro as a ship... may the BL gods give them another worthy script in the future. Their acting skills and chemistry deserve another chance. Hopefully, one with a happier ending this time

✨Dhevi (and to an extent, Veera) - To say that ep 8 shocked me would be an understatement. What do you mean that this long-suffering woman, whom I spent 7 episodes feeling bad for, was going to trap a man she knew would never love her by threatening to kill the man he loved? Her turning evil was not in the realm of possibilities in my head. And lowkey did not make sense. I hated that twist.

With all the power she had thanks to her father and brothers, she should've found a way to keep Veera alive and divorced this man who would clearly never love her. She deserved a better character ending than what we got. Speaking of Veera, that horrible hoophobic military general died 'alone' in his cell in the same way that we saw Veera's body. I wonder if the specific way of setting up his death, this was the doing of the other military guys or Dhevi coz I believe that she somewhat loved him.

✨Final Thoughts✨
While I appreciate the heavy topics explored in this drama, I think the writing, especially that of specific characters, left me disappointed. Most of the acting by the cast was exceptional, and I fell in love with the main OSTs. 'Far Side of the Moon', 'Half of Everything', and 'Am I in Love' have found their way into and a permanent place in my playlists