Welcome to my weekly blog post where I give thoughts on dramas I’m watching, whether I’m at the beginning, middle, or end. Whatever I’m feeling.
This week I finished recapping two shows with nothing in common. First, with episodes 11-12 Japanese romance anime A Sign of Affection, which is based on an ongoing manga and picked a good place to end. Second, with episode 17 of Until We Meet Again, which brings the show full circle with a lot of crying and death but don’t worry, it ends on a much more positive note.
Today’s reviews will be series reviews of each show starting with:
A Sign of Affection – ゆびさきと恋々 – Anime – Japan 2024
Recently aired Japanese Anime with 12 episodes.
A sheltered young deaf woman meets a handsome, interesting, world-traveling guy. Romance ensues.
Do you want a show with conflict and plot?
Because there isn’t much here, even when there could be more. The show follows our main character, a young deaf woman named Yuki, as she meets and gets to know a handsome classmate named Itsuomi. The episodes revolve around their encounters, getting to know each other, learning about each other, and growing closer.
There’s no major obstacle for them to overcome to be together. Yuki encounters obstacles in her everyday life because of her deafness, but there’s not much she can do about being deaf and she never lets it give her a pause. I get upset on her behalf, but if you want a show more about the unfairness of a world that casually assumes everyone can hear, Silent would be a better pick.
Her deafness isn’t an issue in her relationship with Itsuomi, it’s what first gets his attention. He’s eager to learn sign language (in a way other people around her really should be), so that’s not an issue.
Both Yuki and Itsuomi have “friends” who’d like to be more, but they’re more annoying than threatening to the relationship.
The manga the show is based on is still ongoing and the anime ends somewhere in book 6 (there are 10 books in Japanese and 8 of them are currently available in English). Considering the manga has no ending and the show has no plot, I think it picked a good spot and a good way to end it.
For me, no plot or conflict is often a feature, and this was a relaxing watch. I’m good for a season 2 if they make it.
The show also touches on one of my favorite themes, communication
Itsuomi is a multilingual world traveler who grew up in Germany. He’s interested in languages and it’s part of his interest in Yuki. Yuki is also multilingual, as she can read lips and sign. Part of their learning about each other and part of the show is seeing various JSL signs.
The show doesn’t go too heavily into the topic, but I liked how Itsuomi and Yuki worked on communication. (For example, a special sign so Itsuomi can make it clear he wants to kiss Yuki.) I also liked the show’s general tone of encouragement towards learning languages.
I really enjoyed this show, and would recommend it as long as you aren’t looking for serious social commentary or angst.
And now for something completely different
Until We Meet Again – ด้ายแดง – 2019
A 2019 Thai BL with 17 episodes.
A college freshman and an upperclassman who feel inexplicably drawn to each other.
You can watch the trailer here.
You can read my initial thoughts and my recaps here.
What we have here are three shows in one
A past-life romance, a college romance, and a Thai dessert show. It an interesting combination. I’ll start with the past-life romance since that’s the heart of the show.
Pharm is a college freshman who meets Dean, an older student. From the start, they have a connection and an unspoken understanding. Both are haunted by feelings of searching for someone and meeting each other ends that search.
Because both are connected to a pair of lovers who tragically died by suicide not that long ago. I think it’s the “not that long ago” part that makes this show most interesting for me. I’m used to past lives being at least a hundred years ago. In this case, it was recent enough that people who knew their past selves are still around. Because of this, we get to see how families can be affected by traumatic events and that even time can’t make that disappear.
But all this sounds heavy, so don’t worry, there’s a cute college show here too. Pharm has an adorable friend group. There’s drinking. There’s clubs. There’s classes with seemingly no teachers. There’s vacations at waterfalls. Sometimes the xylophone comedy music can be maddening, but it is nice that the entire show isn’t the dark angst of their past lives.
Pharm has an interest in cooking, and we get to see him make a variety of traditional Thai desserts. The show revived an interest in them in general, and if you look them up online you’ll see comments relating to this show.
If you only want to learn about the Thai desserts in the show you can check out Thai-Australian actor Perth (who isn’t in the show) talking about them here.
I’m all about love and food being tied together and really enjoyed learning about these unique desserts.
The shows strengths and weaknesses
Not that I don’t enjoy a good, light-hearted school romance, but it’s nice to see a story with more going on. The shallow side characters like “nice grandma” or “mean dad” got to do more than usual, some of them getting dramatic scenes and small character arcs. Our leads, one of them in particular, gets to show some impressive acting as he goes through a range of complicated feelings and experiences. How do you depict someone overwhelmed at meeting the love of their past life? I think he does it well.
And if you watch and fall in love with side characters Win and Team, they have their own show you can check out.
I also love that our main characters are both quiet, which is a rare pairing. They are an introvert/extrovert pairing but it’s a little more complicated. Pharm is an extrovert who likes being around people but is shy and reserved. Dean is an introvert who isn’t shy, he just isn’t interested in people. I like this more complicated take on a typically trope-y pairing.
On the downside, the show could lose an episode or two without hurting the plot. At one point most of an episode is devoted to advertising Thailand’s public transportation system and a nice-looking aquarium.
This show may be less than ten years old, but I would consider it a classic in the relatively young Thai BL genre. If it’s a genre you enjoy, I would suggest at least trying it.