#Vietnamese BL

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - The Industry is Having Issues But the Spice Spicy Must Flow

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

March 2024 Wk 4

Ongoing Series - Thai

Two Worlds (Thurs IQIYI) eps 1-2 of 10 - One of those "he's dead Jim so time travel" thingames starring MaxNat. I'm over this concept but I do enjoy MaxNat. Phupha (Gun) and Khram (Nat) love each other but Phupha is murdered. Then Khram is pulled to a parallel world where, years ago, Khram and Tai (Max) were in love. However, Khram was killed by Tai’s dad. Now Tai finds alter-Khram. But then there is ALSO an alter-Phupha to deal with. (Phupha is played by Gun Thanawat who was Khom, the repressed butler bodyguard from Unforgotten Night. We like this, but we scared of the love triangle aspect.) Did that make sense? Yeah, okay, see what I mean?

Initial thoughts?

The subs are troubling but I’m enjoying this show a lot. It’s nice to see MaxNat get something meaty to sink their teeth into - that’s not just each other. Also it’s so smart of them to give us a fully fleshed out entire episode developing the alter romance rather than just a separation + death. It makes Khram’s grief and motivation that much more believable. Also it’s really nice to see Nat have good chemistry with other actors. 

Deep Night (Thurs iQiyi) ep 3 of 8 (10?) - I'm still enjoying it. But Two Worlds is objectively better. So this one has lost ranking. Also, unexpectedly chili (the name of my heavy metal Thai cover band).

Lovey switchy and verse main couple too.

This is all quite pleasing.

The bit where the hosts pretend to be a BL couple actor ship was epic on so many levels.

Also unsettling.

All sex work is performative, and in a way there is something more honest about this depiction, in this setting, than what BL actors are made to do on the promo circuit. Which then begs the question, how different is BL from sex work? That's the unsettling bit, for me anyway. Not to slam on sex work AT ALL, we pro-the-true-pros on this damn blog, but actors have been shaded by association with True Professionals for a very long time and BL has already had one epic shut down in this regard. (See the PerthSaint scandal around Love By Chance, no I will not explain.) Where was I? Oh yes, so anyway, see the Gossip section for the part where they better be paid either way!

Also, since I'm a warped fucker, I found this scene funny.

And then hilarious when all of those BL tropes were just trotted out. Like a greatest hits reel.

Truly beyond meta. (How Absolute BL of them.)

Note he’s even standing in yaoi's patented "hands in pocket with the shoulders back"? 

Meanwhile, the gayest bridge in Thailand made its quarterly appearance:

And lip serviced was paid to the most touristy romantic things you can do in Bangkok.

And I mean lip service literally. 

To Be Continued (Thai C3 Thailand grey) ep 5 of 8 - I’m still enjoying it but getting more and more nervous. We getting too close to Promise territory for comfort. EXPLAIN Ji’s reticence well and do it now or risk audience mistrust. We have to be given a GOOD reason for Ji's behavior, or he'll be irredeemable.

City of Stars (Fri iQIYI) ep 8 of 12 - NO SINGING. Yes smiley kisses and good communication and a nice healthy relationship. But no singing!

1000 Years Old ep 6 of 12 - Dropping in the ranks. I’m sorry it’s just gotten boring. It has, however, inspired me to invest in my own ridiculous cream fuzzy sweater. Which I plan to wear with leather trousers and huge stumpy boots, like the Kpop queer I truly am. Or do I mean vampire? 

Kiseki Chapter 2 (Sun iQIYI) ep 1 of 6 - Seems to be an excuse for a small posse of Thai actors to wander around Tokyo playing tourist and sing in public . Someone stop them?

“Most people think this kind of thing is bad manners .”

Anyway, it’s v boring. I’ll give it one more ep but I suspect I’ll DNF.

Close Friend Season 3: Soju Bomb! (Weds iQIYI) eps 1-2 of 6 - Meh. This is also looking suspiciously DNF-a-licious.  

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Unknown (Taiwan Tues Youku YouTube & Viki) ep 5 of 11 - It's brilliant. I love it. I'm ready to hurt. Let’s do this thing. 

Distribution note: This one has been picked up and is also airing on Viki now, so it may lose YT distribution in soem territories. I like Youku's hard subs better than Viki's subs, but that's a matter of preference not information since I don't speak Mandarin.

Love is Better the Second Time Around AKA Koi wo Suru nara Nidome ga Joto (Japan Weds Gaga) ep 3 of 6 - It is good. Every week I like this show a little more. I'm enjoying a reunion romance explored in Japan's quintessentially contemplative yet slightly surreal way. The juxtaposition of the tenderness of the sex scene with this Japanese brand of authenticity was oddly elegant - for lack of a better way of putting it. All in all, this is a good show. Thought provoking. Stylish.

AntiReset (Taiwan Fri Viki/Gaga) ep 9 of 10 - It remains lovely but they sure are reusing a lot of footage. Also, this was a classic penultimate doom episode. I do wonder how they are going to resolve this show ethically.

My Strawberry Film (Japan Thurs Gaga) ep 6 of 8 - It is what it is, and it isn’t my style of show no matter what country of origin. Oddly that's one of the reasons I don't like it. Anyone could have made this, it's not as Japanese as I want it to be, it's just indie film club high school angst. Yawn.

I watched it, finally

The Servant and the Young Master (Vietnam YouTube) 7 eps - I dislike vertical filming, but I kind of enjoyed this show as a BL. I like class conflict romances. For me the rich kid is a bit too dictatorial (edges into bulling), but it’s kinda works. It’s sparse and underdeveloped and a bit plotless, but mildly entertaining. If you're missing Vietnamese BL you might give it a try. 6/10 

Began Beginning (Myanmar YouTube) 8eps - A Burmese BL that I had thoughts about but actually ended up recommending. Read the saga here:

It's done, ready to binge, but I suck

What Did You Eat Yesterday Season 2 AKA Kinou Nani Tabeta? Season 2 (Japan Gaga) 10 eps

It's airing but...

Graduation Countdown (Taiwan YouTube) ep 1 of ? - on one hand it's micro-installment vertical, on the other it's adorable and from Taiwan. I blame @heretherebedork entirely for my conundrum. As indeed, I did for My Type back in the day. (That was Nat Chen's first BL, yes of Kiseki: Dear To Me fame.) So I think I will also simply lean on Here to let me know when it's done and binge all at once. It's just too much to ask me to keep up with 2 minute pieces, I don't have that kind of endurance training, not even for BL.

Time the series (Tue Gaga/YT) 10 eps - it's finished now, I dropped it at ep 4. Should I bother?

A Secretly Love (Thai Sat WeTV grey) 10 eps - I watched the first ep but grey is too much work for this inferior of a show. I may pick up and binge if it gets distribution but for now, it gets a DNF from me. KimCop might have held this crap together but Kim without Cop? No thank you.

Lady Boy Friends (Thai WeTV grey) 16 eps - reminds me a bit too much of Diary of Tootsies only high school. Not my thing. DNF unless it turns a corner and is truly amazing for some reason.

Man Suang that MileApo vehicle from last year is coming to Netflix in the USA. I haven't heard much about it and since the KP stans would have lost their tiny minds if it was any good at all, I'm assuming it's not good at all.

Gossip

Thai BL actor Yoon breaks with his former company and talks about some very very VERY shady goings on in the Thai BL industry. Including not being paid.

And whacha know, same thing happening in Korean BL.

Have I mentioned recently how much I hate the film industry?

Next Week Looks Like This:

Starting Soon

3/31 Only Boo! (Thai GMMTV YouTube) 12 eps - New main couple for GMMTV in an idol romance about a boy who dances good and a food stand vendor. Other side of the tracks grumpy/sunshine pair who fall deeply in love but, of course, baby boy idol can't date. Boyband but from GMMTV? Control your singing and I'm game.

4/1 Love is like a Cat (Korea ????) 12 eps - This completed filming Aug 2022(!) which means there have been serious problems with post-production. This is another of Silkwood's Korean+Thai colab projects. Mew Suppasit plays a rookie film star, called the Cat Prince (for his cold arrogance) who goes up against a charismatic puppyish animal daycare director (JM of JUST B). There is also a side romance (love triangle?) with a veterinarian. Geonu of JUST B is also in the cast.

I wonder if this was part of the hold up, with Geonu on Build Up right now, they might have tried to muffle this one. Or maybe it's just that bad...

4/3 We Are (Thai GMMTV YouTube) 12 eps - University ensemble BL featuring PondPhuwin, WinnySatang, AouBoom, MarcPawinPoon - basically the good kind of messy gay friendship group (so more My Engineer and less Only Friends). Looks a bit like the Kiss series but everyone is queer. I'm IN!

Knock-Knock Boys (Thai WeTV?) - 4 college friends conspire to help their friend lose his virginity. Familiar faces like Seng (yes, Billy's previous partner), Best and frest face, news here.

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

NOTE: It looks like one of my personal favorites of last year Unintentional Love Story is getting a spin off!

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

Without ghost girl.

With ghost girl.

I think she may be my favorite part of 1000 Years.

CLASSIC tsundere seme description of a sunshine uke. Like classic'est of classic. (Two Worlds)

Is there such a thing as a tired trope in a BL? Since it is a genre that is made up entirely of tropes quilted together? Your philosophical question for today brought to you by Deep Night's kabedon (Japanese trope) + punishment threat (Thai trope).

Love me a lap sit moment. (City of Stars)

(Last week)

Streaming services are listed by how I (usually) watch, which is with a USA based IP, and often offset by a day because time zones are too much work.

The tag BLigade: @doorajar @solitaryandwandering @my-rose-tinted-glasses @babymbbatinygirl @babymbbatinygirl @isisanna-blog @mmastertheone

If ya wanna be tagged each week leave a comment and I will add you to the template. Easy peesy.

[wanderlust-in-my-soul]

Forehead touches - an indication of not only the emotional or physical connection, but also a mental one. (Part 1/?)

Goodbye mother

Ghost Host, Ghost House

My Tooth Your Love

War of Y

Love in the air

My only 12 %

Wish You: Your melody in my heart

Don't say no

My favorite bl-tropes collection, as always in no perticular order.

[squeakygeeky]

Just when I was losing faith in Vietnamese BL they somehow pulled off a historical BL with a happy ending. Mind you, I'm not saying it was good on an objective scale--this was clearly a labor of love by a tiny team with an iPhone and access to an old building. They did the absolute most with what they had, though.

It's called The Dandy and His Servant and I watched it based on the title along, because not gonna lie I've probably read a romance novel with that same title. This show speedruns its way through all the tropes you could want it to hit in a very cute way. There's caretaking and learning to read and the servant is shirtless gathering wood and of course there's the 'call me anh' conversation. Actual kissing too.

The attempted arraigned marriage crisis worried me, because this was the point where it could have shifted dramatic and tragic, but that was resolved pretty quickly and happily for (almost) all parties involved. The subtitles are good but hard-coded.

@heretherebedork I feel like this was made for you specifically.

[heretherebedork]

Have you ever woken up to discover that the house you thought was haunted turned out to just have a cat... only for that cat to turn into a very, very handsome man who still acts like a cat but is, did I mention, very handsome?

... Welcome to Vian! Vietnamese BL doing what it does best... domesticity and family and being light and fluffy and cute and just a little weird. @absolutebl Thrilled. I don't even care that it's vertical. They're adorable.

[iguessitsjustme]

I made this for me but I’ll share

[save-the-data]

Be Your Star | S01E01

Vietnamese Drama - 2024

[gabrielokun]

[gillianthecat]

Probably most people already know about this, but I’m still pretty new to BL so I only just learned about this amazing resource:

world-of-bl.com

It lists seemingly every single BL ever! It shows what’s currently playing and when and what platform(s)! It lists upcoming shows and release dates if known! It provides links to each episode! It doesn’t seem to give descriptions, but that’s ok, that’s easy enough to look up elsewhere. I just love having everything in one place.

And the website is so easy to navigate! It’s an old school website.💙 Everything laid out on one page in neatly organized lists. No pop-up ads! No ads at all!! No endless wasted white space that means you have to scroll forever; it’s purpose is providing information in a clear, accessible manner.💙 I hadn’t realized just how much I missed these straightforward, functional websites until I saw this one.

Anyway, enough nostalgia. It’s not gorgeous - the colors aren’t to my taste - but it seems very useful and easy to navigate. It’s great on a computer or tablet, and small but useable on a phone. It seems to be accurate and get updated promptly, as far as I could tell.

I don’t know who manages it, but many thank yous to them, it looks like a huge undertaking.

Mostly I’m sharing because I’m excited to find it, but also in case there are other new watchers who didn’t know about it either.

[pickletrip]

The man he is, the boy he was.

Oh dear, what went wrong? How did it all go wrong?

[chrispychanniem]

My Honest Opinion:

Man, I really wanted the side couple to work. Like seriously, they had so much chemistry and potential expect our wishes didn't come true.

Of course I am happy that we got a happy ending but this feels like it has been dragged out. Also the entire series is kinda haphazard for me.

All in all, the series is not bad, it's just not my cup of tea.

[fellharder]

When ViAn was announced I was hoping for a catboy romance with at least a hint of steam to make up for all the ways in which Choco Milk Shake failed (I love CMS so much, but it should have been poly and there should have been some sweet snogging). I mean, look at the pretty (in ridiculous outfits):

So I've suffered through the vertical made for fucking TikTok format, I've actually cheered at how they did a neat bed scene angle for that specific format, I've suffered through so much contrived arguing, I've yelled at the screen to make catboy more cat ffs (CMS did that beautifully, ViAn seemed to give up on his cat-ness around episode 3) and still cooed whenever there's been a touch of cat behaviour, and every single week I've wondered if there's gonna be any plot.

I suppose the answer to that last bit is a firm no.

And there's so much plot they could fit in, even with short little episodes in a horrible format.

How did An turn human? How did he learn to act more or less like a human? Lots of potential there. They keep dropping little bits of Vic struggling with his family and his sexuality, how about using that for Vic's character development? What's with all the silly jealousy nuggets that don't go anywhere, with the neighbour and the ex there's meat for actual jealousy drama? How about expanding on the loneliness theme that's also sprinkled over some episodes?

I get the feeling they brainstormed plot bunnies for fifteen minutes, wrote some scenes for each, shuffled the notes and called it a day script-wise.

Maybe that's on purpose, to just drop cute catboy-and-human scenes into the never ending hellscape of vertical video for consumers to gobble up and forget about, but it makes for really dissatisfying watching when you're expecting a show. Maybe it's me approaching it the wrong way. That's a rhetorical question, naturally, because I'd get very indignant if watching a series as an actual series is the wrong way.

I'm very curious about what a new watcher will make out of ViAn when binging all 12 episodes.

[absolutebl]

7 Wonders of BL

1 Colossus of Rhodes MaxTul

2 Great Pyramid of Giza Thailand

3 Hanging Gardens of Babylon BL

(what, like I’d let that one slide, whatcha take me for?) 

4 Statue of Zeus at Olympia Bangkok 

5 Temple of Artemis at Ephesus Taipei 

6 Mausoleum at Halicarnassus GMMTV

7 Lighthouse of Alexandria Vietnam

Some of you will get the jokes... some of you will only get the thirst.

That’s okay too. 

Before you ask, here’s the pulls:

Together with Me

Manner of Death

KinnPorsche

Step by Step 

Love is Science? 

He’s Coming To Me

Mr Cinderella  

(source)

[doestheqlcharacterkeeptheglasses]

THUY - FOOLs

Does this character keep their glasses?

YES.

[squeakygeeky]

I watched Mr Cinderella S2 so you don't have to

I'm probably World's #1 Mr. Cinderella Enjoyer, but I knew I would hate S2 from the trailer alone and I was correct. Let's actually start with the ending, because the ending was a full two minutes of Dung and Khoa slow dancing on pier. I clipped it so you can watch some of that and not the actual show.

The rest was baaaaad bad. I've watched Truong Minh Thao in weirder things, but this was the least fun. IDK why anyone thought fans of a mostly fluffy show about two people from different worlds falling in love would want to watch a show about extremely tedious villain characters attempt to break up an established couple in the most soap opera angsty way possible. But like bad soap opera, you know I love me some good melodrama. Like, even if it had been well done and the villain characters had been vaguely charismatic about it, it would not have been an enjoyable watch for me. Plus without the post-credits scenes it seems like the villains had succeeded and suffered no consequences, which confused me a lot, but by then I was very confused by the basics of what was going on and not just the characters. Nobody even got the hose this time, disappointing!

You can tell Ba Vinh and Truong Minh Thao were enjoying returning to these characters and they're so comfortable playing off each other that the part so of Episode 1 before the plot starting happening were fun. But that made it worse when the rest of the show was just Everyone Suffers. I did not want to watch my favorite characters suffer.

At least we got a proposal flashback before everyone suffered.

There was Khoa's adoptive brother returning to reveal they had been previously in love, a shady doctor, framing for medical malpractice, sex pollen perfume, and possibly black magic. IDEK man. It had a happy ending technically, as long as you watch past the credits, unless that dancing scene was supposed to be a flashback, in which case it was an open ending from the previous post-credit scene.

I guess between seasons they decided Ba Vinh's character was the bottom and I mean literally not just linguistically. My only other linguistic note is that the proposal and a later scene both used what translates as 'life partner' or maybe 'soulmate' and it's cropped up in at least two other BLs. Feels weird to be listening to Vietnamese again, maybe someday I'll have a go at properly learning it, not just learning about it if you know what I mean.

[heretherebedork]

Thinking And Healing is, so far, a very cute miniseries by O2 that's got lots of mental health talk about healing and communicating but is also quite disjointed and I haven't quite figured out if it's two stories or one... but they're so cute. @absolutebl look, the best kissers out of Vietnam!

[iguessitsjustme]

Okay okay. I feel a little bad about my cruel poll. So I’m going to take requests for 3 video edits. First come first serve. I will take requests from asks, DMs, or replies. This is my second time taking requests and I loved all of the requests last time, y’all gave me such good ideas and inspiration BUT this time the rules are a bit different.

I will be taking 3 requests for video edits. Here are the rules:

·The first 3 people to request a video edit, will get one. If I get more than 3, I cannot guarantee I will make it, but I will try my best. But the first 3 are guaranteed.

·The request needs to be from a show 2022 or prior. The earlier the show, the better. We’ve had so many beautiful and gorgeous shows lately, but let’s so the older shows some love. (I know I know 2022 shows aren’t the old but I didn’t want to limit it that much.)

·The requests need to include a song and a pairing that you would like. If you only pick one or the other, I will pick for you and you might not like the combo you get.

Please keep in mind:

·Please be patient. I work a full-time job and I now somehow have stumbled into a social life. So I don’t have a lot of spare time. And these edits take me a long time to make. It might be a few months before it gets done, but it will get done.

·Only one request per person please. If you do have multiple things you want and can’t choose, tell me all of them and I can either choose or tell you what I think I can do the best on.

·Pairings need to be from shows that I can easily download, or I will request links/videos from you (I am not good with technology at all. I’m just kinda winging it tbh).

·Please keep in mind that I am self-taught and not very experienced, so the finished products might be rough around the edges, but they will all be made with love.

·I will post your request and tag you in it, so if you make a request on anon, you’ll just have to check the tag “rae takes requests” on my tumblr periodically to see if your request has been made.

·I retain the right to veto any song/pairing, but if I do, I will let you pick another one.

If you’re interested in having someone make a video edit for you, please let me know! I do have a lot of fun making them and a lot of the time I discover awesome music this way too!