Welcome to my weekly blog post where I give thoughts on dramas I’m watching but not recapping.
I’m still recapping Love Between Fairy and Devil and Time and Him are Just Right.
I’ve started recapping Utsukushii Kare Season 2. The Utsukushii Kare couple is one of my favorite pairings (BL or otherwise) and I’ve read two out of three of the novels the dramas are based on so I can bring them into the discussion. I plan to go back to the first season and cover it as soon as I can.
This week I finished:
Meet Yourself – 去有风的地方 – China 2023
A recently aired Chinese modern drama with 40 episodes.
The first 30 episodes of this series had my full attention but the last 10 wore on me a bit.
Since my overall feelings are positive, I’ll start with the negative. For that last quarter, it felt like the usual tropes showed up to get in the way of the lovely, slice-of-life characters and plot. Some of the realism got lost. There were still some nice moments in those last episodes, but there were also times when I felt very “oh this again.”
But most of the show was lovely. Our main character, Xu Hong Dou, had a personality and background that felt unique amidst the modern cdramas I’ve watched. She was a smooth, cool, confident businesswoman who could laugh and smile but also kept things to herself. I believed her as a woman who’d worked in the service industry for a long time and knew how to work with people. Watching her and A’Yao grow closer together felt real and exciting in a slow-burn way.
While other characters annoyed me at times, they all redeemed themselves at other times. There was a great variety of ages, situations, and backgrounds interacting and having interesting conversations that felt true to life. The scenery and town were gorgeous, well shot, and successfully sold me on going to China to sit and drink tea while looking out the window at the stone streets. I wanted to meet these people and hope that the characters go on to live their best lives.
It’s a good show if you want to escape your life and have your mood lifted in a calm, slow, gentle way.
Since I needed to get over the painful loss of both Thi/Noey and Win/Team in the same week, I started another Thai BL:
Moonlight Chicken – Midnight Series : Moonlight Chicken พระจันทร์มันไก่ – Thailand 2023
A currently airing Thai BL, I’ve watched 2 of 8 episodes.
Uncle Jim runs a chicken rice diner while struggling financially with the times and helping those around him. One night he takes care of a drunk customer, Wen, and the two end up having what should be a one-night stand. But Wen is eager for more. Also, Uncle Jim’s nephew ends up working for a rich family with a son his age who lost his hearing a few years ago.
The main premise didn’t pull me in as much as learning there one of the second couple is deaf. So far the show feels different from other Thai shows I’ve watched as both Jim and Wen are average guys, almost like a Taiwanese BL. Both characters are gay and they know it and it’s been a part of their lives. There’s a fleshed-out, realistic feeling to the characters and the way they are introduced. There’s also a heavy emphasis on money and poverty and very day-to-day concerns that most people living anywhere deal with.
I enjoy the over-the-top feeling of Thai BLs, but it’s nice to see something different. No students at engineering school! The series is short, it’s only going to be 8 episodes (somewhere else I even saw 6) but I’m looking forward to seeing more of all these characters together.