#bl romcom | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

twig-tea · 2 months ago

Text

TOL Romcom Rewatch Week 7: Flipped

It is so nice to be writing this post on time! This week we watched Flipped, which is a film I had forgotten I’d watched, because I had memory shelved it so hard (for good reason–see @lurkingshan’s post). While the film itself was not good, thinking about the parallels with Theory of Love was really fun, and it felt like the most plot parallels we’ve had to date.

@solitaryandwandering asked me whether my thesis from last week's 1-6 round-up post--that there were actually good messages in these films for Third to learn from, if Third watched them more closely--continued into this week, and I think the answer is yes! The biggest thing Third missed, to me, is that when Juli realizes that Bryce sucks, she tells him outright and to his face what he did and why she was no longer interested in him, not even as a friend. This, then, emboldens Bryce, first to change his behaviour and then to make amends. In contrast, Third has only at best hinted that he knew ("you played with my emotions!"), but he didn't outright confront him on anything except how frequently he changes partners. Khai doesn’t actually know that Third knows that Khai intentionally tried to bait him into confessing. At this point in the story, Khai thinks Third is done with him because he kissed Third and said Praew’s name, and that him expressing sincerity with someone had the intended effect of making Third get over him (which is also partially true). This means that, unlike Bryce, Khai doesn’t yet know what he’s up against in terms of making Third trust any of his behaviour, which explains some of his stumbles in this episode (in addition to the insights Shan already talked about in her post re: Khai having no experience with dating a man, or dating a friend, or wanting to date Third, or particularly caring about any of his previous partners).

One of the things I love about this perspective flip is how effectively it is used in the series; it’s something I especially love thinking about in the context of having watched this film, which did not use this device effectively. Having seen Khai’s behaviour from Third’s perspective, when we didn’t know what he was thinking, was really effective in hiding how much Khai knew, whether his behaviour was intentionally romantic, and whether it was sincere. It meant we felt the heartbreak with Third when we realized with him what Khai was actually doing. Now that Khai is genuinely being sincere about having romantic interest in Third, the most effective way for us as an audience to trust that is to hear Khai think it so that (unlike Third) we can feel certain in his intentions (even if we don’t trust that his feelings are going to last, or that he deserves reciprocation yet), and instead sit with Khai on his uncertainty about how Third is going to take his advances, whether he still has any feelings for Khai, and whether his sincerity will be believed. And in case we don't just trust Khai's thoughts (which is so fair after the first six episodes), we get to see him reject a girl, and have a physical reaction to Third, all of which is important in reinforcing that he is sincere.

I also just love seeing Third be distant, competent, cold, and difficult to read from Khai's perspective, after having seen inside Third's head for weeks and knowing that he is an angsty mess on the inside.

And on the flipside, we see that Khai does not realize that he comes across to the entire campus as such a douche, which is very fun after having sat with Third and knowing exactly what people see on the outside. The scene where he improvises on Third's script (based on himself, unbeknownst to him) and perfectly portrays the character is not something he understands as a bad thing, but the director is quick to point out that yes, this is perfect because it's exactly what a player would say.

I also speculated in last week’s post that we might be moving into more Khai-coded films with the change in perspective, but we know that Flipped is Third’s favourite movie, so I don’t think that’s the case (at least not yet). But I will be thinking about the plot of this film, knowing that Khai knows how much Third loves this movie, in the weeks to come.

#tol romcom rewatch #theory of love #flipped (2010)#bl meta #typed so that i can stop thinking it

23 notes · View notes

tankhunmybeloved · 7 months ago

Text

@poetry-protest-pornography made a fun bingo template for 2025, so here's my wishlist

#gmmtv series #thai gl #thai bl #gmmtv 2025 #I beg you please give butches cute romcoms #i'm a simple woman

50 notes · View notes

neuroticbookworm · 3 months ago

Text

Theory of Love Romcom Rewatch Episode 5 and 6

If we peep at the list of movies on this project, a gradual increase in narrative quality is very noticeable. Which is why I was so excited when we finally arrived at last week’s pick, 10 Things I Hate About You. My brilliant rewatch project buddies have thoroughly meta’d the movie and the corresponding episode, while my tired ass procrastinated a lil too close to the sun and missed posting last week. So I figured I’ll combine my thoughts on the movies and episodes of week 5 and 6 into one post filled with few observations and lots of incoherent screaming. Let’s go!

10 Things I Hate About You

ICYMI, 10 Things I Hate About You is a modern day adaptation of the Shakespeare play, The Taming of the Shrew. And coincidentally, Taming is the only Shakespeare play I have read so far, thanks to my 10th grade English curriculum. My memory of the opinions I had on this play as a teenager are not pleasant, so I was a little skeptical going into this movie (I have watched the movie before, but it was so long ago that I barely remembered a thing about it). This movie was surprisingly a treat to watch, for multiple reasons. Heath Ledger was charming as always, the writing was smart, witty, and snappy (hey this Shakespeare guy is pretty good I should check out his works sometime), and the supporting cast was so stacked and so delightful to watch on screen.

As a young and budding shrew, I remember my teenage self being pretty miffed at the idea of a dude “taming” one of my brethren. But as I watched the movie, I quickly realized that the story is aware that it really doesn’t take much for a girl to be termed a shrew; all you need to do is not comply with the stupid social mores of the time and the job is done. The story also doesn’t just let Kat be a prickly and annoyed teen who is Not Like Other Girls. As @bengiyo mentioned in his post, I loved that Kat was called out by Mr. Morgan for her derision and performative white feminism. I also liked how Kat was a pretty easy project (ugh) for Patrick, even though she thinks she is anything but. Her mental walls built entirely with hardcover copies of The Bell Jar (lol) were not high enough to hide her hopeful naivete on the matters of the heart. I loved the idea of social misfits finding romance with each other.

This film was not without its flaws: I agree with @lurkingshan that the narrative forgave Patrick so quickly for getting paid to date Kat, then deliberately hiding the truth from her, and gaslighting her when she questioned his motivations. Knowing how the rest of Theory of Love plays out, it’s easy to see how the show’s approach to Khai’s retribution differs from the way the movie treated its stupid and flawed boys.

Speaking of the show, I think I struggled to write about this episode last week because I was frustrated by all the conflict avoidance that was going on in the episode. Third felt hurt, betrayed, and angry after overhearing Khai and Bone talking about their stupid scheme, and he lashed out at Khai (which is great) without ever telling him exactly why he is so mad at him (not so great). Instead of direct confrontation, Third chose the passive aggressive route. He told Khai that he hadn't wanted to call Khai a friend for a while (which is so loaded with hidden meaning that Khai has no way of parsing), and he moved out without an explanation. When Khai brings a girl to their group project meeting, both Third and Khai escalate the passive aggressive comments to a point that almost culminates in an explosive fight between friends, before Third stepped in to stop them. And he walks away once again without resolving a thing.

And Khai was no better! He was fuming when Third finally returned home late at night, and he let his anger and frustration override his brain, and did not connect the dots on what could’ve possibly made Third say “You played with my emotions.” *insert eyeroll* He never gave a good think on what could’ve possibly made Third so mad and prickly towards him, and he never allowed himself to read Third’s emotions beyond his hurtful words. One of the things that is really standing out to me in rewatch is how Third and Khai are so different in their approach to conflict resolution. Third enjoys being in pain, so he never works towards addressing the problem in a constructive way. He brushes things under the rug without a resolution, so that he can glare and scoff and be perpetually mad. Khai, on the other hand, seems to prefer direct confrontation. He wants people to spell their ire out for him, which is not bad in itself, but it looks like he also uses it as an excuse to never pay attention to non-verbal communication. These two approaches are totally incompatible with each other, and it is clear that if Third and Khai want to end up together, they have to learn how to constructively work through and resolve a conflict between them.

The episode ends with Khai reaching out and making amends with Third out of nowhere, and I was so glad that @solitaryandwandering picked up on Chekhov's laptop that had mysteriously changed Khai’s behavior. Next up on the romcom list was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and I’ve been looking forward to this week’s movie and the episode right from the beginning of this rewatch project. And yes, it was everything I'd ever wanted and more.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

I watched this movie in my late teens as a young and curious cinephile in undergrad whose favorite weekend activity was hunting down and watching 16 straight hours of media from around the world. I remember being so moved by the story and the fight to preserve the memories of a loved one, and I was looking forward to revisiting it. I really did not anticipate the effect it would have on me this time around, as I spent most of the runtime screaming at my screen, feeling so many emotions all at once.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is the story of Joel, an unassuming everyman who comes across as passive, internal and someone who would rather prefer to be left out of even the tiniest whiff of conflict. He meets Clementine, a quirky girl with loud hair who has no problem chatting up a stranger on the train and picking a fight with him when he says something she disagrees with. The movie then throws us into a confusing montage, suggesting the passage of time, and picks back up with Joel reaching out to Clem, his girlfriend, after a vicious fight. Which leads to him learning that she had undergone a procedure to wipe her memories of them, so she can move on from him. Joel, feeling crushed, betrayed, and cast aside, makes an impulsive decision that is very out of character for him and decides to undergo the same procedure to wipe Clementine from his memory. We are introduced to Dr. Howard, the lead doctor and the brains behind the technology, Stan and Patrick, the technicians working under him, and Mary, the receptionist at the practice. What follows is Joel’s emotional journey as the procedure takes him through the memories he shared with Clementine one by one, the good, the bad, and the ugly, before permanently erasing it from his brain.

This movie has two distinct yet intertwined narrative threads:

The dissection, research, and understanding of Joel and Clem’s relationship

The movie’s cognizant lens on the ethics and morality of the memory-wipe technology, and its commentary on the people willingly working in the industry

The first thread is the core of the story, and the one that hurts the most with its commentary on romantic relationships, and the beauty in the imperfectness of it all. Watching Joel realize halfway through the procedure that he does not want to forget Clementine, and his futile fight to save at least some of his memories of her was heartbreaking. The procedure erasing Joel’s memories of Clem starting from the most recent ones means that we (and Joel) go from watching them fighting, cursing, screaming, and making each other miserable, to the soft moments of quiet intimacy, and to those few precious moments where simply existing in the world with the person he loves makes Joel feel larger than life, and the happiest he’d ever been. The story is so skilfully constructed and edited to slowly immerse Joel and the audience into the realization that relationships are rarely perfect, and communicating and working through problems is always a better path for long-term happiness than going nuclear and wiping every trace of the other person from memory.

I remembered little to nothing about the side characters from my first watch of this movie, and I was absolutely floored by the vile and unethical behavior of every single person involved in this practice. Patrick steals Clem and Joel’s medical files from the clinic and used them to pursue Clem exactly as Joel did, sending her spiralling into a mental breakdown that she couldn’t fully understand, as the memories that’s causing her pain are gone, leaving only a discombobulated echo that is now made stronger by Patrick’s actions. We also see this confusion paralleled in Mary, who is openly infatuated with Howard, despite her relationship with Stan. Each reveal in this thread hit me like a ton of bricks, and every time I thought I was through the worst of it, the story hit me with another, more horrifying one.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a film that will both devastate and heal you with its romance, while simultaneously scrambling your brain with its brilliant writing and commentary. I recommend it to everyone, and especially to narrative gremlins and angst monsters like me.

And finally, episode 6 of Theory of Love, my beloved! My experience of watching episode 6 was pretty similar to @lurkingshan’s, I remember jumping up from the chair and screaming when I watched Khai narrate his marvellous plan that destroyed his friendship with Third. The POV switch is a great narrative tool in any well-constructed story, but it hits especially hard in Theory of Love, because both the audience and Khai lose our access to Third and his thoughts at the same time, just when we need it the most.

Lemme do a quick rundown of episode 6:

After making amends for his part in their fight in episode 5, Khai takes Third shopping and buys him a gift that is personalized and meaningful.

Then they go to a party where Khai gets drunk, holds Third down against a wall, and forcefully makes out with him, while calling him a girl’s name, which further devastates Third.

The next day, Khai chases down an already dejected Third, and thanks him for talking sense into him, and tells him that he’s gonna pursue his current girlfriend seriously with the intent of long-term commitment.

Third, finally reaching his limits, decides to move on from Khai, and starts involving himself in university projects that will keep him occupied and away from Khai.

Khai notices Third pulling away from him and their friend group, and gets increasingly sad about it. Finally he goes away to visit his brother.

Sitting on the beach with him, he reveals that he found out about Third’s feelings when he stumbled upon the private video Third made confessing his feelings for Khai and struggling with the idea of moving on. So Khai hatched a plan to make Third thoroughly hate him, to help him move on from Khai. And finally, after orchestrating the clusterfuck to end all clusterfucks, he reveals that he might like Third back.

Just putting all of his actions in writing is making me wanna scream into a pillow. The sheer stupidity of it all makes my mind boggle every single time. Third has been making dumb choices consistently for five episodes, but my boy Khai outdid it all in just one episode. This week was the one where I felt the strongest thematic parallels between the episode and the corresponding romcom, which is funny because the parallels also cannot be fully attributed to either Khai or Third. It almost felt like a bridge between the two POVs, with Joel’s passiveness clearly mirroring Third, while Joel’s struggle of coming to terms with an impulsive decision that fundamentally changed his relationship with a person that he realizes a little too late as too important for him to lose, perfectly mirrors Khai’s position at the end of episode 6.

The narrative structure of the episode is also clearly influenced by the structure of the secondary narrative of the film, every information revealed by Khai hit me hard and fast, and the next, more brutal one was already in the chamber, ready to be fired. There’s always another rock bottom under Khai's current rock bottom. It’s not hard to see how Joel and Clem’s incompatibility parallels Khai and Third’s. And it is also notable that Joel and Clem’s second chance came after they had listened to the other say the most hurtful things about them. That was their rock bottom, and the movie’s ending made us feel hopeful that they now have the emotional tools to find their way out of it. We shall see how the show parallels it and approaches the mending of Khai and Third’s relationship in the coming weeks.

In one of their quiet moments in the movie, Clementine whispers into Joel’s cheek, “Share with me, Joel. That’s what intimacy is.” I know Joel heard her, albeit a little late. And I hope that it is one of the lessons Third internalizes eventually, in his journey of mending and rebuilding his and Khai’s relationship.

#tol romcom rewatch #10 things i hate about you #eternal sunshine of the spotless mind #theory of love #thai bl

20 notes · View notes

gunsatthaphan · 3 months ago

Text

ยาวิเศษ 🔮🪄💫

#sweet tooth good dentist #stgd #jaysant #jay x sant #markohm #mark pakin #ohm thiphakorn #gmmtv #thai bl #bl drama #music video #*vibrates at a dangerous frequency* ofc im normal about this wdym #im crying look at how adorable they are #please #this will heal me i can feel it #sometimes all it takes is a silly little romcom #pookies #:((((((

155 notes · View notes

happypotato48 · 3 months ago

Text

Theory of Love Romcom Watch Along Episode 5 : 10 Things I Hate About You (Lazy Unhinged Edition)

Well well well well well well well well well (somebody stop me) well well well. It's 10 Things i Hate About You time, i haven't watch this movie since i was a wee little lad and i can say with my whole chest that this movie mostly hold up despite me not being snarky 15 years old anymore (i'm still snarky just not 15 anymore T_T) unlike many of my friends that participate in this project i'm probably the least familiar with shakespeare's works which i like to ratify soon since i tend to enjoys shakespeare modern adaptations and references. like my biggest fictional sad old man crush is based on Prospero from the Tempest ffs. anyway one thing that stuck out to as very positive for me from this movie is how poetically it feels i never read the The Taming of the Shrew but i noticed some line that probably came from the play, the well written scripts and the dialogues feels witty and sharp this movie did came off as a very well done modern (1999) take of shakespeare work.

Now to a side segment just for this week it's time to throw shades at Mr. Jojo Tichakorn as i had promised my good friend @lurkingshan. THK, The Heart forking Killers. first let let me say some positive stuff so some of you nerds would know that i'm not just a hater (i'm a snarky slightly crazy bitch that hope one day these posts would not come back and bite me in the ass when i enter the BL industry.)

THK mostly did an ok Job as adaptations/inspired by of 10 Things i Hate About You, some emotion do works well translate from the movie and i will give credit where the credit due i think the fall out and the resolution after the lie got discovered is handled pretty good in the show unlike the movie where it feels rushed and half baked.

Ok now after i said the all nice things let get mean!! most of THK dialogues are lame AF. it's like someone took a lot of the wittiness of the movie out and replaced that with lame tired and cliche BL dialogues. most of the actors ate their roles but even that some lines feels listless and lack flair. instead of charm the show sometime came off as trying too hard or trying too little to be charming. and that is the problem Thai language as a tonal language has a lot of possibility to do and says so much more interesting stuff but because it's a GMMTV show the dialogues feels stripped of any potential and ended up being generic and sanitized.

I'm the same with @solitaryandwandering feelling about the side stories. i'm so bored with them, i love you mike with all my heart but i can't spend another minute watching you and what her face hitting on each other. that being said i'm still intrigued by our main fuckboi Khai and loser with zero braincell Third even tho they're aggravating me so much. Khai continuingly semi unpurposefully hurts Third but the crack starts to show in this ep that he seems to some degree to know what is going on with Third.

In Thai he says "When he came to sleep with me like a wife, then i'd talk nicely to him." Khai maybe is in deny or he just an absolute asshole that let his subconscious hurts Third this badly. but it's clear he is catching up and acting out on purpose. and Third in his infinitely dumbassery refused to uses his god danm words. and the end those two ended were they always do uncommunicative and stuck in the a cycle of this toxic friendships. these two needs time out and spend time apart to reevaluate themselves and grows as people before i'd buy any kind of kind romantic relationship. but this is a BL sooo let see where this goes.

#theory of love #tol romcom rewatch #10 things i hate about you #thai bl #the heart killers #dumb boy unhinged thoughts

20 notes · View notes

witchzvamp · 5 months ago

Text

oh no he's just a babygirl who needs help to cross the street guys help him

#also jun appearing out of nowhere PEAK romcom let me tell you guys #but jun is stressing me out like bitch why you're so worried about MAYBE your friend wanting to suck some dick pls mind your business #thamepo #thamepo heart that skips a beat #thamepo the series #thamepo series #thame po #thame po heart that skips a beat #thame po the series #thame po series #heart that skips a beat #thame x po #po x thame #witchbz-bl #witchbz : watchz thamepo

28 notes · View notes

impala124 · 4 months ago

Text

Theory of love Episode 1: I hate myself for loving you

Well well well, what do we have here? Could it be my half-baked thoughts on Dear Dakanda, a movie I was supposed to have finished watching 3 days ago, but couldn't get through in a single sitting because I was too busy face-palming myself the whole time, and how it relates to episode 1 of Theory of love? Yes, it is.

The film is about a shy art student, who's in love with his bestfriend but is unwilling to confess because he's scared of losing their friendship.

Third in his review of the film:

I was practically cheering for Khaiyoi. I felt relieved for him.

Even though the film is told from Mhoo's perspective, we know very little about the man himself, other than his unrequited love, which made it really hard for me to root for him. So, Third was definitely projecting onto Mhoo.

As @lurkingshan has already pointed out, Third sees himself in Mhoo and has chosen to out do him in his pining for his bestfriend. It makes me wonder when Third saw Dear Dakanda for the first time, whether it was before meeting Khai or after. He and Khai had a meet-cute which is similar to that of Mhoo and Dakanda, atleast that's how Mhoo views it.

If he had watched the movie prior to meeting Khai, then he was just setting himself up for failure by comparing Khai to Dakanda. Now, if it were the latter, I wonder why he couldn't see himself in Nui rather than Mhoo. Maybe Nui was too honest about her feelings for Third to relate to her. I'm pretty sure that one of the reasons Third likes Khai is because Khai isn't afraid of confrontation, unlike him. Khai goes to the film sceening of a guy his ex chose over him, just to publicly humilate the guy. Third can't even himself to show Khai the concert tickets he bought for them to go together.

Side note about their meet-cute: It's a reference to the characters from My girl, which credits the director of Dear Dakanda as one of its screenwriters. If I'm remembering it right, My girl is also on the list.

@neuroticbookworm made a note about the romanticisation of pining in the movie and I'm pretty sure Third caught that because he was embodying it. As harsh as it might sound, the suffering of both Third and Mhoo is self-inflicted.

At no point were they given any indication that their feelings might be reciprocated and yet, they continue to resent the other person for treating them 'only' as a friend. I understand yearning, I love it, but give me some insight into the character before showing them as a pathetic loser (my favorite genre of men, if I may say so myself).

@bengiyo made an interesting note about the overtly heterosexual bubble Third lives in. This gave me a whiplash because in 2025, I'm kinda used to bls where queerness is the norm. We don't know anything about Third's past experiences and how long he's known that he's attracted to men to make any judgements here, but let me just note that Third is not some wallflower, he's part of a clique that is rather popular. Now that Two saw Third crying in the dark over Khai, maybe he'll find an ally, because Third definitely needs someone in his corner.

Something I'm interested in knowing more about is what Khai brings to his friendship with Third. Third repeatedly says that being friends with Khai is better than nothing, so he can't be a friend that flakes on him constantly, as he did in this episode. Hope you're not that much of a masochist, Third!!

Mini-rant:

Having Dakanda mention that she broke up with her boyfriend in her letter to Mhoo was definitely a choice and I wonder how much of that factored into Mhoo mailing her the postcards in return. Also, Mhoo writing I'm happy that, in the end, the thing that lasts the longest and can't easily be ruined is our friendship and ending the postcard by stating that this will be his last correspondence with her doesn't sit right with me.

Of course, one can outgrow a friendship, but, was Mhoo only friends with Dakanda in the hope that she might wake up one day and see him in a romantic light? That would be rather disingenuous now, wouldn't it?Is a female friend worth having only if she's a potential romantic partner? Is the narrative punishing Dakanda for not recognising Mhoo's quiet pining and replying with Why did you confess now?after he let her know about his feelings for her by having her break up with her boyfriend? This whole sequence reeks of valourization of Mhoo's unrequited love over Dakanda getting herself a boyfriend and Third definitely feels the same way about his pining and Khai's flings. Told y'all, I can't look at het romantic relationships objectively because biases start kicking in.

(OR)

Maybe it's about Mhoo choosing to move forward in his life instead of trying to see what can become of his relationship with Dakanda, now that she's aware of his feelings towards her.

We can't know for sure, but I feel like it's a bit of both.

#theory of love #tol romcom rewatch #dear dakanda #thai movie #thai bl

22 notes · View notes