Not the best, not the worst

This is ok, but not great. It’s definitely good for passing an entertaining couple of hours, but it lacks real consistency of storyline or well-developed characters.

What I liked:
- The production quality: Korean series (including their BLs) tend to be top tier for cinematography, and this one is no exception. I really loved some of the camera angles. They gave it the full Korean drama treatment, and it was excellent.
- The acting: I think the actors did well with what they had to work with, and I was as emotionally invested in the characters as I could be given all the flaws in the writing.
- The overall plot concept: The basic concept of the story is quite interesting, although I don’t know if I can give the drama credit for this one, since it’s based on a web comic. I’ve actually read some of the comic and was wondering whether it would translate all that well into a drama. But turns out that the plot concept fit really well in drama format.

What I didn’t like:
- Character Development: The characters on a whole have very ambiguous motivations. It’s very clear that they’ve been written to follow the source material (webcomic), but without any real depth. This get worse as the series progresses, and I found myself getting whiplash from Youtan’s sudden personality shifts and the completely unexplained back story and motivation of the third character (I forgot his name).
- Plot progression and pacing: This is an instance where they really could have used a script doctor. Or maybe they had one who just wasn’t paying that close of attention. To be fair, it’s extremely difficult to reduce a full webcomic down into a mini-series of only ten 16- to 20-minute episodes. But man, this series got choppy at time. A good example of this was a flashback sequence, which I only realized in the following episode was supposed to show the character getting their memory back. I hadn’t even known that they didn’t have their memory in the first place.
- Plot holes: There are several plot points that are just never explored or are left dangling at the end. Like Dongbeak in one scene seems to get possessed by…someone? Something? We don’t know because it never gets explained. I’m sure this and other plot holes were parts of the comic that they felt were important to include. But if that’s the case, they needed to have done a better job of wrapping them up and weaving them into the story.

All that being said, I think most of its flaws really just stem from trying to shoehorn a webcomic-length story into a mini-series. Despite my criticism, it is a decent drama to watch if you just want some entertainment. The actors are good-looking. The plot makes sense if you turn your head and squint. And you get some cute fluffy moments. It’s certainly not the next Semantic Error, but it’s not an unpleasant way to pass a couple hours.

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BL Fast Food

My thoughts halfway through the series (just finished ep 4):

Concept:
This drama is what it looks like when you try to turn red flags into cutesy fluff. One side is stating a clear and persistent “no” and the other completely disrespects his boundaries by constantly touching him and making passes at him. It gives me SA vibes.

Characters:
The character construction is pretty shallow and generic, but the actors are managing to pull it off. I think I actually like them, which is impressive because how turned off I am by the overly aggressive flirting. I think this is a testament more to the skill of the actors than the quality of the writing.

Writing/plot:
The plot progression is probably the weakest aspect of the drama so far. Several plot points have just popped up out of nowhere without the kind of lead-up or framing needed to not give the audience whiplash. It’s clear that not a lot of thought was put into realistic character development or story building. That being said, the general concept of the story is decent and even cute.

Production:
It’s a Korean BL, so it definitely meets a basic threshold of production quality. There’s nothing particularly exciting or artistic in the camerawork, lighting or editing, but it does the job and it looks good.

Overall:
This is what I like to call a “fast food drama”. It’s easy and filling, although with very little substance or originality. It satisfies a lazy afternoon, but I probably won’t be able to remember anything of the story a month from now.

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