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Mixed Nuts, Part 2: Thoughts On Yaoi
156 Plays2 years ago
Japan is churning them out almost faster than we can keep up, so we dedicated a whole grab bag episode to give them the attention they're asking for. Ben, NiNi, Ginny and Shan talk what's working and what's not in Japanese BL as we discuss Sahara-sensei to Toki-kun, One Room Angel, Perfect Propose, Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yaro Ka, I Want To See Only You and I Became the Star of a BL Drama.
Episode transcript available here.
00:00:00 Welcome
00:01:15 Grab Bag Part 2: J-BL
00:02:22 Sahara-sensei to Toki-kun
00:11:29 One Room Angel
00:18:54 A Note on MBS Tunku Shower
00:26:01 Perfect Propose
00:49:27 Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yaro Ka
01:04:44 I Want To See Only You
01:10:55 I Became the Star of a BL Drama
01:26:16 Outro
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction of Hosts and Podcast Theme
00:00:20
Speaker
Welcome to the conversation about BL, aka the Brown Licker Podcast.
00:00:27
Speaker
And there it is.
00:00:29
Speaker
I'm Ben.
00:00:30
Speaker
I'm Nini.
00:00:30
Speaker
And we're your drunk Caribbean uncle and auntie who are sitting on the porch in the rocking chairs.
00:00:36
Speaker
Four times a year, we pop in to talk about what's going on in the BL world.
00:00:42
Speaker
We shoot the shit about stories, all the drama going into them.
00:00:46
Speaker
I review from a queer media lens.
00:00:49
Speaker
And I review from a romance and drama lens.
00:00:51
Speaker
So if you like cracked out takes and really intense emotional analysis.
00:00:56
Speaker
If you like talking about artistry, industry, and the discourse.
00:01:02
Speaker
If you generally just love simping.
00:01:04
Speaker
There is a lot of simping on this podcast.
00:01:07
Speaker
We are the show for you.
Focus on Japanese BL Projects
00:01:16
Speaker
And we're back.
00:01:18
Speaker
Continuing into Grab Bag Episode 2.
00:01:21
Speaker
This time we're going to talk about all the Japanese projects.
00:01:25
Speaker
We are still with pod team members, Ginny and Shan.
00:01:29
Speaker
Say hi, Ginny.
00:01:30
Speaker
Hello.
00:01:31
Speaker
Say hi, Shan.
00:01:32
Speaker
Hi again.
00:01:34
Speaker
We are here to talk about Japanese BL, Japanese drama, all things Japanese, a.k.a.
00:01:40
Speaker
Ben's favorite thing, a.k.a.
00:01:42
Speaker
Ginny's starting to become favorite thing, a.k.a.
00:01:45
Speaker
Shan's actual favorite thing, a.k.a.
00:01:47
Speaker
my I'm getting there thing.
00:01:50
Speaker
We will be talking about six shows
Overview of Japanese Shows to Discuss
00:01:53
Speaker
this week.
00:01:53
Speaker
We're talking about Tsuhara Sensei to Toki-kan, One Room Angel, Perfect Pose, Although I Love You and You, a.k.a.
00:02:03
Speaker
Tsukiyon and Kero Dayaraka, I Want to See Only You, and I Became the Main Role of a BL Drama.
00:02:12
Speaker
Nini, take us in.
Critique of Tsuhara Sensei to Toki-kan
00:02:22
Speaker
Let's start with Sahara Sensei, which I did not watch, so Ben or Shan, who wants to complain about this more?
00:02:28
Speaker
Well, there's no need for you to watch it, Bestie, because it was horrible.
00:02:32
Speaker
Horrible!
00:02:33
Speaker
Sahara Sensei to Toki-Kan is a Japanese BL from MBS through Drama Shower about a juvenile delinquent who falls for a new teacher who seems to pay attention to him and starts to reform his behaviors as a result of this relationship.
00:02:48
Speaker
But the teacher's got his own baggage, and then the show makes a goddamn mess of all of this.
00:02:55
Speaker
We have very many gripes to voice.
00:03:00
Speaker
It was not good.
00:03:02
Speaker
Jenny, did you watch this show?
00:03:04
Speaker
I did.
00:03:04
Speaker
I feel like you were less pissed than me and Shan.
00:03:10
Speaker
Is that true?
00:03:11
Speaker
I'm usually less pissed than you and Shan.
00:03:14
Speaker
I think that's just a natural sound.
00:03:16
Speaker
I don't think anybody could be as pissed as Shan.
00:03:19
Speaker
Right.
00:03:21
Speaker
Scaling for our norms.
00:03:22
Speaker
I think I was about as pissed.
00:03:25
Speaker
I really did not like this show.
00:03:27
Speaker
Oh, yes.
00:03:27
Speaker
Go for it, Jenny.
00:03:28
Speaker
Tell him.
00:03:29
Speaker
Kill him.
00:03:30
Speaker
Kill him, bestie.
00:03:32
Speaker
I don't know anything about the source material, but it felt like it was trying to set up two taboo relationships, one teacher-student and one sideship that was sort of step-siblings.
00:03:43
Speaker
And then it completely whiffed both of those and decided bizarrely to deal with the taboo nature, particularly of the main relationship, as if it simply isn't a taboo.
00:03:55
Speaker
No one cared.
00:03:56
Speaker
No one cared that this teacher and student were having a romance.
00:04:00
Speaker
it was simply not addressed or didn't seem to be a concern to anybody.
00:04:06
Speaker
It made the show baffling to follow because it was like they lived in this alternate universe where that doesn't matter, but other things like homophobia do matter, but only sometimes it was not coherent.
00:04:21
Speaker
I really enjoyed Toki, the juvenile delinquent.
00:04:24
Speaker
He was delightful.
00:04:25
Speaker
His actor was really fun.
00:04:27
Speaker
And that's really what kept me watching the show for however many episodes it was.
00:04:33
Speaker
Six, eight, ten, eight.
00:04:36
Speaker
That's what kept me watching the show for eight episodes, even though by about the midpoint, it really felt like it was not doing or saying anything interesting.
00:04:47
Speaker
Shan, go in and let half.
00:04:50
Speaker
Okay, I will.
00:04:52
Speaker
This show is fucking infuriating.
00:04:56
Speaker
I am still so mad every time I think about it.
00:04:59
Speaker
I can hear it in her voice.
00:05:02
Speaker
Here's the thing with the teacher-student trope.
00:05:05
Speaker
It can be done well.
00:05:06
Speaker
It has been done well.
00:05:08
Speaker
The way that you do this trope well is that you take that relationship seriously.
00:05:14
Speaker
You have to care in the story that there's a power dynamic here, that a teacher has a role to play and a job to do with regard to their students, that they are an adult who is meant to be trusted, to guide their students to good life choices, to their own social, emotional wellbeing, to care about their futures, to care about their education.
00:05:42
Speaker
This show just utterly, utterly failed on that front.
00:05:47
Speaker
And it makes the teacher character here completely irredeemable and unbelievable as an education professional.
00:05:58
Speaker
At no point did this show take its own concept seriously.
00:06:04
Speaker
It wanted us to engage with this romance as if this was just a normal teen love story between a teenage boy and a slightly older boy.
00:06:14
Speaker
There was no reckoning with the fact that this was his teacher.
00:06:18
Speaker
the biggest sin among many was that we were shown through the story that Toki was not actually helped by this relationship with Sahara Sensei.
00:06:30
Speaker
We were shown that Toki, because of his feelings for his teacher and because of his desire for
00:06:36
Speaker
to impress this prospective love interest, that he made choices that were harmful to him, that he did not seek help when he was being bullied, that he did not take his education and his assignments seriously because he was too focused on this crush.
00:06:56
Speaker
We began the show with the notion that he was a juvenile delinquent who needed support and mentorship.
00:07:04
Speaker
He's a good kid, a nice kid, a kind kid, and he just needed some guidance.
00:07:09
Speaker
But he didn't get any fucking guidance from his teacher.
00:07:11
Speaker
Instead, what he got was a distraction and an extraordinarily self-centered adult who
00:07:19
Speaker
really only cared about what he was getting, the confidence boost that he was getting out of this relationship with his student, did not look out for this kid, did not help him focus on his studies, did not help him prepare for his future, and did not help him in any meaningful way with the problems that he was experiencing at school.
00:07:38
Speaker
This show literally ended with Toki graduating, walking out of the school building, spotting Sahara,
00:07:47
Speaker
and chucking his diploma into the fucking bushes so that he could run and kiss his boyfriend because school's over now and he doesn't have to care about appearances anymore.
00:08:00
Speaker
I actually could not fucking believe that.
00:08:03
Speaker
And the wildest part of all of this is that the show doesn't seem to have any awareness about it.
00:08:09
Speaker
This is not a narrative about a student getting so obsessed with a teacher that he loses his way.
00:08:17
Speaker
This is just being presented as a straightforward, happy and positive romance that we're supposed to root for.
00:08:23
Speaker
It is one of the most baffling things I have ever fucking seen.
00:08:27
Speaker
Tell him why you mad, son.
00:08:29
Speaker
Tell him why you mad.
00:08:31
Speaker
Bestie, everything you said was true and correct.
00:08:36
Speaker
I will add further that this show does not get the benefit of the doubt of being BL to cop out about a lot of this because of the backstory they give on Sahara and Nekato, his junior in high school, now fellow teacher.
00:08:54
Speaker
The failure of their relationship
00:08:57
Speaker
is grounded in the realities of homophobia and taboo.
00:09:02
Speaker
So there's no way to approach the Sahara-Toki relationship under the guise of any MM attraction is fine because BL, because the show draws attention to the social and political realities.
00:09:19
Speaker
And it's especially frustrating because Sahara actually gives decent guidance to another student, the Toto character, who is playing injured as a basketball player.
00:09:32
Speaker
Sahara talks him down from going into a match that he shouldn't.
00:09:36
Speaker
Because he's hurt in a way that I thought was really excellent from an educator.
00:09:41
Speaker
Because he doesn't tell the kid, you shouldn't play.
00:09:44
Speaker
He asks the kid pointed questions, making the kid self-introspect and recognize for himself that he should not play.
00:09:55
Speaker
which only exacerbates the issues that Shan eloquently highlighted just now about how fucked up this whole thing is because he does not bring that same awareness to the relationship he has with Toki.
00:10:10
Speaker
It is such a weird experience with this show and I really hated it.
00:10:17
Speaker
I think that about covers it.
00:10:18
Speaker
It just feels like it didn't know what it was trying to do and it did everything badly.
00:10:25
Speaker
I think that's an excellent tagline.
00:10:27
Speaker
So those of you who watched it, it's time to rate.
00:10:31
Speaker
Shan, you first.
00:10:32
Speaker
I gave it a three.
00:10:33
Speaker
And I think reflecting in this moment, I want to lower it to a two.
00:10:36
Speaker
I'm giving it a two.
00:10:38
Speaker
I agree.
00:10:38
Speaker
Go ahead.
00:10:39
Speaker
Jenny?
00:10:40
Speaker
Oh, man.
00:10:41
Speaker
So I give it a six and a half.
00:10:43
Speaker
I simply don't finish shows that I'm going to rate lower than a four or a five.
00:10:49
Speaker
On the surface level, there were moments that I really enjoyed about this.
00:10:53
Speaker
As I said, I did like the performance of the Toki character in particular.
00:10:58
Speaker
So I gave it some credit for that.
00:11:01
Speaker
I agree with Shan.
00:11:02
Speaker
I originally gave this show a four.
00:11:03
Speaker
I'm lowering it to a three.
00:11:08
Speaker
Let's talk about it again in a couple months, see where we land.
00:11:11
Speaker
I'm giving the show a 3.5 from the conversation.
00:11:17
Speaker
That is not how the math works, but that's what I'm giving it.
00:11:20
Speaker
Feels right.
Exploring One Room Angel Themes
00:11:29
Speaker
Moving on to our next show, let's talk One Room Angel.
00:11:33
Speaker
And what is One Room Angel about?
00:11:36
Speaker
One Room Angel is a story about a depressed man who ends up hanging out with an angel for a few weeks, it feels like, and starts to maybe come out of his depressive spiral as a result.
00:11:55
Speaker
which ends up with some really sad over- and undertones from what we learn about the Angel character.
00:12:02
Speaker
This is a kind of difficult show to talk about from a BL perspective because I don't really think it's a BL.
00:12:07
Speaker
This wasn't really a romance.
00:12:09
Speaker
From my understanding, the Angel character is significantly younger in the source material, and I get why they maybe chose not to go that direction.
00:12:21
Speaker
Shannon had more complex thoughts, I think, than I did about the genre assignment of this show.
00:12:28
Speaker
I like this show.
00:12:29
Speaker
I just want to say that up front.
00:12:30
Speaker
I think it's a really beautiful show, a really thought-provoking show.
00:12:34
Speaker
I think it has some really interesting things to say about depression and self-worth and finding meaning in life and the will to live.
00:12:44
Speaker
I liked all of its themes.
00:12:45
Speaker
I liked the characters.
00:12:48
Speaker
I do think that it feels incomplete as a narrative and it feels like there was supposed to be a romance arc here that got removed.
00:12:59
Speaker
I don't know if that's true.
00:13:00
Speaker
I haven't read the source material, but that's kind of how it felt upon watching it.
00:13:04
Speaker
I don't think it's a BL.
00:13:05
Speaker
There's no romance here.
00:13:07
Speaker
There's what feels more like a platonic friendship to me between Cokie and the angel.
00:13:14
Speaker
The show has some of the most beautiful cinematography that we've seen in Drama Shower.
00:13:19
Speaker
Some of the visual imagery is really striking and I still think about it off and on.
00:13:25
Speaker
I like the way that they constructed Cokie as this character who is kind of downtrodden, but kind at his core.
00:13:33
Speaker
He's just been through some shit.
00:13:34
Speaker
He's had a hard life.
00:13:36
Speaker
And I like that.
00:13:36
Speaker
I like that he was someone who was very easy to sympathize with.
00:13:40
Speaker
The angel was a good foil for him.
00:13:42
Speaker
He would come at him in ways that would provoke him and give him some spark, make him feel a little bit alive again, which was what was missing and what was so important.
00:13:51
Speaker
I think the show wasn't that strong on unpacking the mystery of the angel and who he had been in his life and connecting that back to Koki.
00:14:01
Speaker
I think there were a few different threads here and they didn't all come together seamlessly, but I did really like the core story of healing.
00:14:08
Speaker
I do have feelings about this tendency we're seeing recently in the MBS drama shower shows of sprinkling in some non-BLs in the lineup.
00:14:19
Speaker
This is a dedicated time slot that is explicitly meant to be for BL shows.
00:14:24
Speaker
And there have been a couple now in the lineup that don't really fit that bill.
00:14:29
Speaker
And so I do kind of regret that we got this show as part of the drama shower lineup instead of another BL.
00:14:36
Speaker
But I'm glad we got the show.
00:14:38
Speaker
I like it a lot.
00:14:39
Speaker
I think it has some good things to offer.
00:14:42
Speaker
Jenny, were you able to watch this show?
00:14:44
Speaker
I was in the interest of precision, because we're talking about it not being a romance, which I do kind of agree with.
00:14:50
Speaker
They do have a conversation about being boyfriends and they have this cute little beach date and stuff, but it feels like something that's sort of tacked on to make it fit in the BL space.
00:15:03
Speaker
It doesn't feel like it's actually part of their story.
00:15:08
Speaker
The connection that grows between them is, but the romance was not really played out.
00:15:13
Speaker
So even though they kind of give it lip service, it doesn't feel like it's there, which is why we're all saying it's not a romance.
00:15:20
Speaker
I think my favorite thing about the show was the Koki character.
00:15:24
Speaker
This is Jenny's favorite character type, the hot mess.
00:15:28
Speaker
I love a hot mess.
00:15:29
Speaker
I do.
00:15:30
Speaker
He's older, which I also like.
00:15:32
Speaker
He's not especially pretty, which is a nice change of pace.
00:15:37
Speaker
And he's just so down in it and can't seem to get himself out.
00:15:42
Speaker
I do like the story of him sort of getting forced roommate angel therapy, basically.
00:15:49
Speaker
So yeah, I enjoyed it.
00:15:50
Speaker
I didn't deeply love it.
00:15:53
Speaker
For the themes that it was getting into, it could have gone deeper.
00:15:57
Speaker
It's got some really dark material in both of the characters' backstories.
00:16:02
Speaker
And it didn't feel to me like it really followed through strongly enough on the resolutions to those things.
00:16:10
Speaker
But it also wasn't a total miss.
00:16:14
Speaker
I ended up feeling really complicated about this show.
00:16:17
Speaker
I feel like I was very unfairly comparing it to Eternal Yesterday a lot.
00:16:21
Speaker
And because it wasn't BL, I was a little bit frustrated that this time slot was going into non-BL content.
00:16:30
Speaker
Like, it feels like the original thing was BL, and they decided in their adaptation not to lean into the potential romance between an adult and a high school student.
00:16:43
Speaker
a totally fine adaptation choice but it's like why adapt this work then it doesn't exactly work for me as a result i really liked the angel character i like how sassy he was and pushy he was about stuff nishi murataki loved the way he played the angel character
00:17:01
Speaker
I really liked the aesthetic with his all-white outfit the whole time.
00:17:05
Speaker
I really liked the effort that the costuming department put into his wings.
00:17:11
Speaker
That was not easy, particularly on the budget that Drama Show is clearly working on.
00:17:16
Speaker
I thought they got a lot of good work out of the animatronics of his wings.
00:17:22
Speaker
I really wish we had gotten more about Toki's Yakuza-based trauma.
00:17:27
Speaker
There's an allusion to this with the brother that feels a bit incomplete for me.
00:17:32
Speaker
Or the stuff with his mom, Arisa.
00:17:36
Speaker
There's like a weird ambiguity with the end of this too, where some of the viewers thought that Koki also died at the end, tragically.
00:17:45
Speaker
What?
00:17:46
Speaker
Wait a minute, what?
00:17:47
Speaker
I don't think he didn't die.
00:17:50
Speaker
I didn't think he died, but apparently that was one of the reads.
00:17:53
Speaker
Fascinating.
00:17:54
Speaker
Huh.
00:17:56
Speaker
It didn't occur to me, but you can't really argue with it in a show that leaves things this unfinished.
00:18:00
Speaker
Exactly.
00:18:00
Speaker
And that's why I was a little unsettled by it towards the end.
00:18:04
Speaker
Cause I'm like, well, I can't refute that, but also damn y'all killed this man so they could fuck shit.
00:18:13
Speaker
Okay.
00:18:14
Speaker
Okay.
00:18:18
Speaker
Oh boy, we better wrap it up there.
00:18:20
Speaker
So let's rate this experience.
00:18:23
Speaker
Jenny.
00:18:24
Speaker
I gave it a seven.
00:18:26
Speaker
Not bad for what it was.
00:18:27
Speaker
Not great.
00:18:28
Speaker
Shan.
00:18:30
Speaker
I gave it an eight.
00:18:31
Speaker
I liked some of what it was trying to do, but I don't think it fully got there on all of its storylines or really on its themes.
00:18:39
Speaker
Gave it an eight originally.
00:18:41
Speaker
I think I'm going to downgrade it to a seven, five.
00:18:44
Speaker
So we'll give it a seven, five from the conversation.
00:18:54
Speaker
Let's discuss Drama Shower before we move to the other projects.
00:18:59
Speaker
As of this recording, we are almost at the end of my strawberry film, The Last Outing from Drama Shower Season 2.
00:19:08
Speaker
Currently, MBS has not renewed the Drama Shower time slot for additional projects.
00:19:15
Speaker
They may renew this in the future, but let's talk on the podcast how we feel about Drama Shower after almost 11 projects, the role this time slot has fulfilled, and our complex reactions to all of the projects.
00:19:32
Speaker
I like that they did so many different kinds of things.
00:19:37
Speaker
Almost none of the drama shower shows are favorites of mine.
00:19:42
Speaker
There are a lot that I quite liked and a few that I could see rewatching, but I do appreciate the commitment to do and try a bunch of different things.
00:19:55
Speaker
I hope that something like it gets renewed or gets put in place because as we discussed a little bit last time talking about genre, I want to see experimental BL.
00:20:08
Speaker
I want to see different ideas and frameworks being explored, even ones that we hated like
00:20:15
Speaker
Sahara, Sensei, and Toki-kun.
00:20:17
Speaker
I would rather they make a bag of shows that includes a terrible one than just crank out the same reliable favorites.
00:20:25
Speaker
So while I don't love most of the individual shows, I feel positively about the project.
00:20:33
Speaker
Shan, how are you feeling?
00:20:35
Speaker
I'm sad at the prospect that Drama Shower might not continue.
00:20:41
Speaker
It did produce one of my all-time favorite BLs, Eternal Yesterday.
00:20:45
Speaker
And while I don't always love the shows, I love that we can rely on a steady progression of shows being released.
00:20:53
Speaker
When one show ends, we know the next is coming very soon.
00:20:58
Speaker
Japanese media can feel uncertain.
00:21:00
Speaker
We often don't find out about shows until right before they air.
00:21:04
Speaker
We often find out about a show, but then find out that it's not accessible to us and we can't watch it.
00:21:10
Speaker
It's been nice to have kind of a steady, reliable place where we know we could go to find a Japanese BL.
00:21:16
Speaker
And I like how, you know, like Ginny said, how experimental it's been.
00:21:20
Speaker
They're doing a lot of different types of shows, a lot of different tones and styles.
00:21:25
Speaker
A lot of them have been not my favorites, maybe like mid to bad, but there have been a few real gems in this lineup.
00:21:34
Speaker
Not only Eternal Yesterday, but also shows like Jack O'Frost and Tokyo in April Is.
00:21:40
Speaker
These are shows that stuck with me that I really enjoyed the watch experience for.
00:21:45
Speaker
And I hope that even if Drama Shower as a dedicated time slot doesn't come back, that MBS will keep...
00:21:52
Speaker
churning out these shows and releasing them at a steady clip because I think that they are pretty solid.
00:21:58
Speaker
I really like this format for Japan where they do these six to eight episode shows.
00:22:02
Speaker
These tight contained stories have a pretty clear sense of what they want to do most of the time with some exceptions.
00:22:10
Speaker
And I'd like to see that continue.
00:22:12
Speaker
We've had this kind of recent boom of Japanese BL.
00:22:15
Speaker
And I don't want that to go away.
00:22:16
Speaker
I want them to keep producing shows.
00:22:18
Speaker
And I want to always have a Japanese BL airing, ideally.
00:22:24
Speaker
So yeah, I'm hopeful that if not this exact project, that something will come back, that we will continue to get shows that are interesting and a fun watch.
00:22:34
Speaker
I am also a bit sad that we might be losing Drama Shower because I really like what Asimakaru has talked about with it from the little bits of translation we've gotten.
00:22:43
Speaker
They have a real commitment to BL as a genre and showcasing what BL can be.
00:22:49
Speaker
I like that Drama Shower has had two original projects.
00:22:53
Speaker
both times it's run.
00:22:54
Speaker
Jack O'Frost was original and My Strawberry Film is original.
00:22:58
Speaker
And whether or not we end up deciding that these projects were especially good or not, I actually think it's really healthy for BL as a genre to not be as tied to the developmental format where we basically just raid the closet and see what indie writers have been up to and then quickly adapt their shows.
00:23:21
Speaker
I'm really curious what knowing that you're developing for television right away enables with the storytelling.
00:23:33
Speaker
So I'm a little bit bumped that we don't know for sure if Drama Shower is coming back right now.
00:23:39
Speaker
But I really enjoyed this entire project.
00:23:42
Speaker
My average rating for Drama Shower was just under eight, which feels correct.
00:23:48
Speaker
If you like BL...
00:23:50
Speaker
Drama Shower has been a really fascinating project because it's been so varied.
00:23:55
Speaker
We had some cool stuff that came out of it.
00:23:57
Speaker
I thought Mr. Unlucky had some cool ideas.
00:24:00
Speaker
I loved Eternal Yesterday.
00:24:02
Speaker
Takara-kun, Amagi-kun let me down slightly, but I liked it.
00:24:06
Speaker
Like, I liked almost every single one of these outings, except for fucking Sahara Sensei.
00:24:11
Speaker
They really had to come in and ruin it right at the end, didn't they?
00:24:14
Speaker
For fuck's sake.
00:24:16
Speaker
I will miss this if we don't get it back, but I really like what we got from it.
00:24:22
Speaker
Nene, any thoughts on Drama Shower from sort of only getting our reactions to it and then being prodded about some of the shows?
00:24:30
Speaker
When you were talking to me about some of the drama shower shows, you basically were saying these are Japanese pulps.
00:24:38
Speaker
So I've tried to place them in the BL firmament for me, according to them being mostly pulps.
00:24:45
Speaker
I've only watched three of the drama shower shows.
00:24:48
Speaker
I've watched Jack O'Frost, I watched Tokyo in April, and I watched My Personal Weatherman.
00:24:53
Speaker
Of those three, Jocko Frost was easily my favorite, but the shows that I've watched coming out of Japan that weren't Drama Shower in the last year or two were actually the ones that I enjoyed overall more.
00:25:04
Speaker
So while I appreciate the role of Drama Shower, what it has done in giving a dedicated time slot,
00:25:10
Speaker
Much like in Thailand, GMMTV, Frygay, was a dedicated time slot that helped build some bits of the genre.
00:25:19
Speaker
This is kind of similar.
00:25:21
Speaker
It's a lab, and I think that the genre needs its labs.
00:25:27
Speaker
I think Drama Shower is a good lab, and I'm sure we're going to get another good lab out of Japan again soon.
00:25:34
Speaker
So yeah, I think that the project was worthy.
00:25:37
Speaker
I wouldn't have really watched a little bit of it, but I think I can also see how some of the things that it was working through have already started to percolate a little bit through some of the other stuff that we're getting out of Japan, specifically out of MBS, but also out of some of the other places.
00:26:01
Speaker
On to our next show, Perfect Proposed.
Discussion on Perfect Propose and Workplace Dynamics
00:26:04
Speaker
Yes, bring it on.
00:26:05
Speaker
I love this show.
00:26:07
Speaker
Shan, would you like to describe Perfect Propose for us?
00:26:10
Speaker
Sure.
00:26:11
Speaker
Our protagonist, Hero, who is extremely overworked, exhausted, very stressed out by his soul-sucking corporate job, is found, passed out on the sidewalk by his childhood friend, sweetheart, question mark.
00:26:27
Speaker
I think they see that slightly differently, but a childhood friend named Kai, who has also just come into some personal hardship,
00:26:35
Speaker
Kai decides to move in with Hiro to take care of him.
00:26:40
Speaker
And also, so he has a place to stay.
00:26:43
Speaker
And the story is primarily about Hiro seeing his way out of this really horrible burnout situation that he finds himself in with Kai's support.
00:26:56
Speaker
Second chance romance is my favorite thing in BL.
00:27:00
Speaker
I had a great time with this show.
00:27:02
Speaker
One of the things the show really focused on was how fucking horrible Hiro's fucking job was.
00:27:11
Speaker
Listen, oh my god, it was too real.
00:27:15
Speaker
I want to talk about that part first because while I think we all have mostly positive things to say about Hiro and Kai's relationship, I don't want to downplay that particular portion because the show cared a lot about it.
00:27:29
Speaker
I know, Jenny, you landed on the uncomfortable to slightly put off side of that presentation.
00:27:37
Speaker
It's rare that I see you repulsed when we're watching something.
00:27:42
Speaker
And it was interesting seeing you have a difficult time with that.
00:27:47
Speaker
My issue really was that as the second half of the show came into play, it became clear that this wasn't primarily a romance.
00:27:55
Speaker
This was a story about Hiro escaping his soul-sucking corporate job and also being more attentive to his body in the most fundamental sense of like his needs as a human being.
00:28:09
Speaker
I felt like I'd been a little bit bait and switched.
00:28:13
Speaker
The setup of the first couple episodes is very much about Kai offering him this physical nurturance, including sexual attention that he was in need of, and possibly their relationship growing, and then it let that be nothing more than a catalyst for Hiro to leave his situation.
00:28:33
Speaker
There was like an episode and a half that were really just fully dedicated to the misery of his job and how and why he was so stuck in it.
00:28:42
Speaker
I was just like, they're doing this well, but I didn't sign up for it and I'm not enjoying it.
00:28:50
Speaker
So that was my experience.
00:28:52
Speaker
I respect that.
00:28:55
Speaker
While we're talking about the job stuff, I want to go to Nini because I think of all of us, you had the strongest response to the corporate culture stuff.
00:29:07
Speaker
Oh my god.
00:29:08
Speaker
It was like I was seeing myself.
00:29:12
Speaker
So if you listen to us, you will know that I'm doing this thing where I restarted my life in my 40s.
00:29:19
Speaker
And the reason that I'm doing it is because I left a job like this.
00:29:24
Speaker
I left a soul sucking job where I was being gaslit and basically burnt out and destroyed.
00:29:33
Speaker
And so this was almost like a healing drama for me.
00:29:36
Speaker
I would just settle in like, oh, I'm going to stab the boss.
00:29:39
Speaker
Oh, he's making him food.
00:29:40
Speaker
I want somebody to make me food.
00:29:42
Speaker
This is so awesome.
00:29:44
Speaker
I'm so glad.
00:29:45
Speaker
Is he going to get out?
00:29:46
Speaker
I need him to get out.
00:29:47
Speaker
Hell, I need all of them to get out.
00:29:49
Speaker
Why don't they all quit?
00:29:50
Speaker
Like, I was having that running commentary in my head while I was watching the show.
00:29:54
Speaker
It was very cathartic for me.
00:29:56
Speaker
I enjoyed everything about it.
00:29:58
Speaker
It was too real.
00:30:01
Speaker
The gaslighting from their boss, especially.
00:30:06
Speaker
was the part that sort of sent me a little bit into a crouch.
00:30:09
Speaker
I was just like, oh, I'm having flashbacks.
00:30:12
Speaker
But I needed it.
00:30:14
Speaker
I needed to see Perfect Propose.
00:30:17
Speaker
It wasn't just an enjoyment for me.
00:30:19
Speaker
It was something I needed to excise from my life.
00:30:23
Speaker
And I was able to do it through Perfect Propose.
00:30:28
Speaker
So it was great for me.
00:30:29
Speaker
The experience was so cathartic.
00:30:31
Speaker
Can't complain about it at all.
00:30:33
Speaker
Fantastic.
00:30:35
Speaker
Shan, I remember you having some thoughts because I don't know that you lived through this sort of stuff directly, but you know colleagues who did.
00:30:44
Speaker
Yeah, I'm, I think, more on Nini's side of the line with this in that I experienced it as more cathartic and healing.
00:30:52
Speaker
I have been in some toxic workplaces.
00:30:54
Speaker
I've never been in quite the kind of place that Hiro was in in this story like Nini has.
00:31:01
Speaker
But I
00:31:02
Speaker
I thought it was just a really authentic presentation of that kind of work experience.
00:31:08
Speaker
I thought it was a really genuine representation of the dynamics that can come up in a workplace like that.
00:31:14
Speaker
One of my favorite things that happened in the show is that Hero's supervisor left and Hero became the supervisor.
00:31:20
Speaker
And then he was put in the position of having to drive his team to do the kind of things that he had been driven to do.
00:31:28
Speaker
And he was realizing how limited his options were for breaking that cycle.
00:31:33
Speaker
And I thought that that was just such an important note to include here.
00:31:39
Speaker
the people within the system that are the problem.
00:31:44
Speaker
It's the system itself and it's all reinforcing.
00:31:48
Speaker
I was also a hero in my last job and my team and I, we quit on my birthday, no less.
00:31:56
Speaker
What an incredible experience.
00:31:58
Speaker
So I started the age of 32.
00:32:04
Speaker
Unemployed, which was fun.
00:32:09
Speaker
I really liked that the show leaned into the work culture aspect of it, that Hero's previous supervisor was like, you need to quit too.
00:32:19
Speaker
Like, I'm leaving.
00:32:19
Speaker
I got a better offer.
00:32:21
Speaker
You are way better than these people allow you to think of yourself as you should quit too.
00:32:25
Speaker
I loved Hero staying because he thought he needed to insulate his team from that kind of hell.
00:32:31
Speaker
And I love that he failed spectacularly.
00:32:33
Speaker
Like he tried to save a junior dev from that and he couldn't.
00:32:38
Speaker
I really appreciate it that they show that there's no amount of effort that overcomes that sort of nonsense.
00:32:48
Speaker
A lot of the times when they do the adult BL, the work part of being an adult feels kind of missing or nebulous.
00:32:59
Speaker
They're mostly using work to recreate things.
00:33:02
Speaker
the cliquish dynamics of high school to tell those sort of stories.
00:33:08
Speaker
And I really appreciate it that this show and the next show we're going to talk about actually don't do that.
00:33:15
Speaker
I want to refocus now that we've talked about the really fucked up, sad work part of this on the relationship between Kai and hero part of what locked me in on this show right away was Kai literally picks passed out hero up off of the street,
00:33:32
Speaker
takes him back to his house, feeds him some proper food, and then jerks him off so he can go to sleep.
00:33:41
Speaker
Hiro was more than a little overwhelmed by all of this, but that man's skin cleared up the next day.
00:33:52
Speaker
He's looking refreshed, restored, rejuvenated.
00:33:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:33:58
Speaker
We had some complex reactions in our own circle and online about that particular encounter.
00:34:05
Speaker
Jenny, I want to get your commentary on this part because I think you often have the most nuanced appreciation of sexual moments that carry a level of dubious consent.
00:34:17
Speaker
And I wonder if you have any thoughts about that.
00:34:20
Speaker
One thing that you and I have talked about, Ben, is people often put male-female frameworks onto these shows and
00:34:31
Speaker
Which is not to say that consent isn't a problem between men, because it for sure is.
00:34:36
Speaker
But the way that these dynamics play out and the way that the core relational dynamics between men work is not always comparable and can't always be mapped onto a male-female dynamic.
00:34:52
Speaker
How I read this scene, and how I think it was intended to be read, is Hiro can't say, oh yes, do this, please,
00:35:01
Speaker
because he's not in a headspace to accept that this is something that he could want from another man, or really at all.
00:35:08
Speaker
And again, it's really difficult to talk about this without inviting people to map it on all kinds of other situations where it doesn't belong.
00:35:18
Speaker
So please don't do that.
00:35:20
Speaker
But the way this scene is constructed felt very clearly to me, like...
00:35:26
Speaker
This is something that Hiro is willing to let happen to him and maybe needs to let happen to him, but is not able to affirmatively say yes to because of where he is in his head.
00:35:39
Speaker
And especially with the way that intimacy develops between the characters later fulfilled the storyline that they set up in that first scene.
00:35:47
Speaker
I feel like this is a place we always land up in with Asian media because of the ways that Asian media portrays and puts forward ideas about what is acceptable sexually, what it is acceptable to want and not want, how it is acceptable to relate in a sexual manner.
00:36:09
Speaker
I feel like these always come up when we're dealing with Asian media.
00:36:12
Speaker
People talk about wanting to change the conversation in Asian media around this kind of stuff, and I fully understand that.
00:36:18
Speaker
But this story read to me pretty old school yaoi.
00:36:23
Speaker
And because of that, I got where the headspace of this story was coming from.
00:36:30
Speaker
Like you said, Jimmy, this can't be mapped onto everything else.
00:36:33
Speaker
But in this specific story, I saw where it was coming from.
00:36:38
Speaker
For me, I think I would have been more concerned about their dynamic
00:36:42
Speaker
if not for the morning after conversation in the bathroom.
00:36:46
Speaker
The energy in that scene was Kai being very attentive and almost doing like aftercare with Hiro, who was clearly into the dynamic with that whole scene with the hair gel and then him giving him the key so he could stay.
00:37:04
Speaker
And then the next episode being like, why has nothing happened since that moment?
00:37:08
Speaker
Which also, like Nene said, is very old school yaoi.
00:37:12
Speaker
Sexual encounters with dubious consent happen a lot in life.
00:37:18
Speaker
It's a thing that happens.
00:37:21
Speaker
I don't need every depiction of it in fiction to be accompanied by someone turning to the camera and saying, that was dubious consent and it's bad.
00:37:35
Speaker
Instead of just letting the context of the story and the characters' reactions
00:37:41
Speaker
let us know what their headspace was and why it happened.
00:37:43
Speaker
And I think that the show did that.
00:37:44
Speaker
I think that we understood Hiro and Kai's dynamic well as the show progressed.
00:37:50
Speaker
I think that we saw a pattern develop where Hiro would hope for or want something from Kai, but wouldn't ask for it.
00:37:59
Speaker
And Kai could read him and see what he was going for.
00:38:03
Speaker
I like that Kai got to a point of teasing him about that and pushed him to ask for the things he wants or come right out and say or do something to confirm it.
00:38:14
Speaker
I thought it was quite legible what the show was going for here, so I was not troubled by it.
00:38:19
Speaker
They did a good job of building a believable dynamic for them of Hiro coming to rely on Kai for all kinds of
00:38:29
Speaker
different comforts and as his main source of care and pleasure.
00:38:36
Speaker
I think they did a great job conveying that Kai was totally down for Hiro the whole time without it feeling like possessive.
00:38:46
Speaker
I particularly enjoyed around, was it episode five when they have that kiss on the bench where he's like, Hirokan-san, have you made your decision yet?
00:38:57
Speaker
I thought that was great.
00:38:59
Speaker
Pairing that with teasing him with the shots of the delicious dinners he was making at home that Hero wasn't making at home to eat.
00:39:05
Speaker
I think the message from Kai always consistently was, this is all here for you.
00:39:10
Speaker
You just got to take it.
00:39:11
Speaker
And I like that.
00:39:12
Speaker
That felt adult to me.
00:39:14
Speaker
I want to talk about Kai a little bit.
00:39:17
Speaker
We know that Hero is obviously at the end of his rope when we first see him passed out on the street with people walking past him.
00:39:24
Speaker
We learn fairly quickly that Kai is also kind of at the end of his rope.
00:39:28
Speaker
He's been a neglected, lonely child for a long time, and the only other person who ever seemed to give a shit about him was in the midst of a health crisis, and that guy's son was keeping him away from the dad because he didn't understand their relationship.
00:39:47
Speaker
I really liked, actually, that part of the issue that Kai was having with his boss and his son was that Kai couldn't
00:39:57
Speaker
ask for what he wanted out of the boss.
00:40:01
Speaker
He clearly saw the boss as a father figure and the boss saw him as a son figure, but he couldn't talk about it.
00:40:08
Speaker
It's very Japanese.
00:40:09
Speaker
He couldn't presume and he couldn't put himself in a position where he appeared presumptuous.
00:40:16
Speaker
So he had to take a step back, be polite, he couldn't say certain things, he couldn't behave in certain ways.
00:40:23
Speaker
This is the situation.
00:40:25
Speaker
I'm going to make myself as small as possible in this situation.
00:40:30
Speaker
And then once it got to the point where he felt like maybe he could have presumed a little more, the son started to understand, okay, this is actually sort of a father-son dynamic here.
00:40:42
Speaker
The son backed out immediately.
00:40:44
Speaker
He was just like, I'm sorry, I didn't understand what you guys were to each other.
00:40:48
Speaker
I really like that.
00:40:49
Speaker
I am often the one who complains about the Japanese non-communication or Japanese communication and how it is frustrating for me.
00:40:59
Speaker
But I thought this was a really good use of it, of Japanese cultural expectations around family and not wanting to be presumptuous about certain things.
00:41:10
Speaker
I really think that it played out really well here.
00:41:12
Speaker
I quite enjoyed that.
00:41:13
Speaker
I love the relationship between Kai and the restaurant owner.
00:41:17
Speaker
Few things are more important to a boy than bonding with an older grumpy man and connecting in the same grumpy way.
00:41:25
Speaker
It's extremely important to your development.
00:41:29
Speaker
I like what you said, Nini, about Kai's inability to communicate what Kenji meant to him and what he was seeking from the relationship.
00:41:35
Speaker
And I like that that was mirrored in Kenji, the restaurant owner, also not being able to say out loud what the deal was, like why this boy mattered to him.
00:41:46
Speaker
He also kept his mouth shut and didn't explain it to his son.
00:41:51
Speaker
I think for similar reasons.
00:41:53
Speaker
They have a very emotional bond that they both found hard to talk about or
00:41:58
Speaker
justify to other people.
00:42:00
Speaker
I did like that.
00:42:01
Speaker
I will say, though, that I do think the Kai side of this show is the weaker element, perhaps, of the story.
00:42:10
Speaker
Hero's narrative was the main narrative, but Kai had a story too.
00:42:15
Speaker
And I do think it didn't get the fullness that Heroes did.
00:42:22
Speaker
And it was one area where I wanted a little bit more from the show than what we got.
00:42:27
Speaker
This is more to my personal preferences than necessarily show doing right or wrong.
00:42:34
Speaker
I was much more interested in Kai and his situation than in Hero's situation.
00:42:39
Speaker
So I also...
00:42:41
Speaker
Would have liked to see more of it.
00:42:43
Speaker
There were a lot of layers to the ways that Kai and Hiro each struggle to take care of themselves or see themselves as deserving care.
00:42:53
Speaker
We did get that fully played through with Hiro, and we didn't really get to see Kai's own dovetailing slash mirror image issue of that fully realized, and I would have liked to see it.
00:43:10
Speaker
Getting back to some of the adult things I really liked in this, I really liked the whole missed opportunity around the festival because Hiro is unable to leave his job and tell him to fuck off.
00:43:25
Speaker
And I really liked Kai just sort of accepting that disappointment, but getting something kind of interesting out of it by growing the strawberries in the tank they were hoping to use for something else.
00:43:38
Speaker
I really liked the failure of that moment.
00:43:41
Speaker
Hiro getting mad with himself on Kai's behalf and being frustrated that Kai didn't presume more from him and voicing all of the ways that he kind of was a jerk about the whole festival thing.
00:43:58
Speaker
I think that was one of my favorite moments in the show where Hiro gets mad and
00:44:06
Speaker
but doesn't really have a great outlet for it because he knows he's the one who's at fault.
00:44:10
Speaker
And so Kai's telling him, it doesn't matter, like, you don't owe me anything, only frustrated him even more.
00:44:18
Speaker
Yeah, because he wants Kai to expect things of him by that point, and he's not even entirely sure why, but he does want Kai to feel like he has responsibilities towards him.
00:44:31
Speaker
You do see Hero consistently more upset about other people not getting what they deserve than himself with Kai in that situation and with his new underling when he becomes the team lead.
00:44:45
Speaker
I'm never getting over that man having a couch that matches the aesthetic of the chairs in his office.
00:44:50
Speaker
I talked that in the first episode and I was so depressed.
00:44:53
Speaker
I was like, no.
00:44:55
Speaker
I remember you pointed it out first.
00:44:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:59
Speaker
I was like, y'all, are you seeing this colors?
00:45:01
Speaker
I'm not usually a colors person either.
00:45:03
Speaker
I don't usually notice that shit, but that was so striking to me that the one pop of color in his entire gray sad home was that green couch that was the same green as the chairs in his office.
00:45:15
Speaker
Depressing as fuck.
00:45:18
Speaker
Before we get to ratings, we got to do a shout out for Hiyori, the...
00:45:23
Speaker
Junior Dev, who was clearly a Fujoshi, who was keyed in right away to Watari's.
00:45:32
Speaker
She was so ready.
00:45:35
Speaker
When they went on the work dinner and she was like, all right, I'm headed out.
00:45:40
Speaker
I'm going home.
00:45:41
Speaker
Y'all are getting drunk.
00:45:42
Speaker
I'm not sticking around for this.
00:45:43
Speaker
I'm going to catch the last train.
00:45:45
Speaker
And then he was drunk and somebody's like, oh, we're going to call the guy he's living with.
00:45:49
Speaker
And she slapped back down immediately like, he's coming here.
00:45:52
Speaker
I need to see this.
00:45:53
Speaker
I got her ass right back down and ordered another beer.
00:45:56
Speaker
She was like, hell no, I'm going to miss that train.
00:45:59
Speaker
I'm going to pay for this Uber ride or this taxi and I'm going to like it.
00:46:03
Speaker
I loved her.
00:46:04
Speaker
She was like, oh shit, am I going to get to see him?
00:46:07
Speaker
And she got everything she wanted.
00:46:08
Speaker
Kai showed up sweaty.
00:46:11
Speaker
Ooh, sweaty from his run.
00:46:13
Speaker
Glared at Kaneko, like, don't you ever fucking put your hands on him ever again.
00:46:16
Speaker
I'll fucking kill you.
00:46:17
Speaker
And she was like, I got everything I needed.
00:46:22
Speaker
She didn't even go home after that.
00:46:23
Speaker
She's just like, well, I need another drink because that was delightful.
00:46:30
Speaker
I do appreciate that we got to see Hiro quit that job and stop prioritizing it at the end.
00:46:37
Speaker
Like he woke up clearly from him having a good session the night before.
00:46:40
Speaker
Like I ain't answering that fucking phone.
00:46:43
Speaker
And we saw that the other employees have seemingly maybe left their job because they all look like they were happy in the park and they ran into Kaneko as well.
00:46:52
Speaker
So I feel very relieved by the end of this drama.
00:46:57
Speaker
I definitely interpret that group picnic at the end as confirmation that they have all left that awful job.
00:47:02
Speaker
Particularly because Sakamoto was also there.
00:47:04
Speaker
And I'm really glad that he looked okay.
00:47:07
Speaker
Listen, I was so worried about that kid.
00:47:09
Speaker
I was so worried that I stopped in the middle of my binge to ask, listen, y'all need to tell me if this kid is okay.
00:47:15
Speaker
Because the last time I saw him, he was having a meltdown and then they sent him home and then I have not seen him.
00:47:22
Speaker
So y'all need to tell me that he's fine.
00:47:25
Speaker
And they were like, yeah, he's fine.
00:47:26
Speaker
And then I was able to continue the show.
00:47:29
Speaker
So ratings, Nene.
00:47:32
Speaker
I gave the show a nine and a half.
00:47:34
Speaker
I agree with Sean and Jenny that I wanted to see a little bit more of Kai's side of the story because I think it was actually quite intriguing.
00:47:42
Speaker
I understand that they didn't have a ton of time and they did use their time well, but I would have liked to see a bit more of the Kai's side of things.
00:47:51
Speaker
Jenny?
00:47:53
Speaker
I gave it an eight and a half.
00:47:55
Speaker
I think execution wise, it probably merits a nine, but I did dock it for my own personal enjoyment because it's my rating and I'm allowed.
00:48:04
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:48:05
Speaker
Shan?
00:48:06
Speaker
I gave it a nine.
00:48:07
Speaker
I agree with basically what Nini said.
00:48:09
Speaker
I think if they had managed to drive home Kai's side of the story a little firmer, it would have been a higher score for me, but it's a good show.
00:48:17
Speaker
I really liked it.
00:48:19
Speaker
It's not an obvious recommend right away.
00:48:22
Speaker
So then they have to get involved in the discourse.
00:48:25
Speaker
And so it's hard for me to just be like, it's a 10, go watch it right now.
00:48:28
Speaker
But I like the show a lot.
00:48:30
Speaker
So I gave it a nine because there are reasonable knocks on some threads not being fully completed and yaoi considerations around male sex that made me a little bit grumpy to deal with while we were watching this.
00:48:49
Speaker
It gets a nine from the conversation.
00:48:51
Speaker
I liked it a lot.
00:48:52
Speaker
I think it's worth your time.
00:48:54
Speaker
I have to add, whenever I saw Kai's hands, I kept thinking about the discussion I had with Ben about yaoi hands.
00:49:04
Speaker
He did have yaoi hands.
00:49:05
Speaker
He had massive hands.
00:49:07
Speaker
I have started following that actor.
00:49:10
Speaker
His real smile is so fun.
00:49:12
Speaker
He is worth following on IG.
00:49:14
Speaker
Bestie, you know I don't do the socials, but for those of you who do.
00:49:17
Speaker
I do.
00:49:18
Speaker
That's what I'm here for.
Osaka Romance and Cultural Differences
00:49:27
Speaker
Moving on to Although I Love You and You, Japanese title, Tsukiyan and Kiro Doyara Ka.
00:49:36
Speaker
Oh my god, I can't believe I got that right the first time around.
00:49:38
Speaker
Good job, Bestie.
00:49:39
Speaker
Good job, Mimi.
00:49:41
Speaker
I'm not going to get it right again.
00:49:42
Speaker
So Ben, what is Tsukiyan and Kiro Doyara Ka?
00:49:44
Speaker
Tokidoya is a story about a burgeoning romance between a restaurant owner and a corporate salaryman who has recently moved to Osaka from Tokyo.
00:49:56
Speaker
Both of these guys are coming out of failed relationships and find friendship and connection in each other.
00:50:04
Speaker
The restaurant owner already is very aware of his own queerness, meets this guy and has an instant attraction to him and is determined to follow up on it, but decides that he should probably be a bit more cautious this time, particularly because of some of the cultural differences between Osaka and Tokyo.
00:50:24
Speaker
We get to see them try to sort through what their new potential relationship will look like with the complications that ensue.
00:50:32
Speaker
This was another show that we had a lot of complicated discussions about while we were watching it.
00:50:38
Speaker
Because you have more consternation than others, Shan.
00:50:41
Speaker
We'll let you go first and then we'll follow up.
00:50:44
Speaker
This is a show that I wanted to like more than I ended up liking.
00:50:50
Speaker
I really loved the main characters in this show.
00:50:53
Speaker
I liked that there was what felt like a very adult setup for the romance.
00:50:59
Speaker
These were two adult men with pasts, with romantic histories, who had exes that were present in the story and actually had roles to play.
00:51:09
Speaker
They were coming together across differences, both cultural differences and differences in how they had experienced romance in the past, differences in how they relate, differences in their hobbies and personalities.
00:51:20
Speaker
I was very interested in all of that.
00:51:22
Speaker
And I was really excited to get what I thought was going to be a pretty adult narrative about figuring out how to be in a relationship together across those differences.
00:51:33
Speaker
That's not really what the show ended up being about.
00:51:37
Speaker
There was a lot going on in the narrative here, and some of it in the end didn't feel like it justified the amount of story time that it got.
00:51:45
Speaker
Some of it felt like it really derailed the story.
00:51:48
Speaker
There I'm speaking primarily about the insertion of a love triangle into the plot that I don't think ultimately served the story or the characters very well.
00:52:00
Speaker
Sakai's ex, Mizuki, came into the story around the midpoint.
00:52:06
Speaker
And I liked his inclusion initially because I liked seeing this mature ex that was in the mix.
00:52:12
Speaker
It's very common for people to still have exes in their lives and we don't see it depicted very often in drama.
00:52:18
Speaker
And so I liked that he was around, that he was coming back into Sakai's orbit, that he was bringing up some issues for him that were maybe throwing a little bit of a wrench in this burgeoning romance that he had with Soga.
00:52:28
Speaker
But then the show really took that much further, turned it into a full-blown love triangle, had Mizuki pursuing Sakai again, had him intervening in the romance, getting in the way, dating Sakai again briefly.
00:52:42
Speaker
It was a lot.
00:52:43
Speaker
Ultimately, I think too much.
00:52:45
Speaker
It took up a lot of story time.
00:52:47
Speaker
It threw off the trajectory of Sakai and Soga's relationship development.
00:52:51
Speaker
The pacing of the story felt pretty rushed.
00:52:54
Speaker
It felt like we hadn't really gotten to settle into any kind of relationship with them.
00:52:59
Speaker
Candidly, I am not generally a fan of love triangles.
00:53:03
Speaker
They can be done well and they have been, but this is a romance narrative in which a love triangle was kind of awkwardly inserted to create drama.
00:53:11
Speaker
And that's the kind I really don't like.
00:53:14
Speaker
That was a big negative for me on this show and threw off my investment in the romance.
00:53:20
Speaker
But it's not a show that I want to be too negative about.
00:53:22
Speaker
I like a lot of what it did.
00:53:24
Speaker
I did like these characters, this smaller town restaurant owner who's really genuine and straightforward, but maybe not the most socially graceful guy.
00:53:34
Speaker
Being into this nerdy, quiet guy who has nothing in common with him, trying to figure out how to relate to each other, trying to figure out how to communicate across their differences.
00:53:43
Speaker
I really liked those aspects of it.
00:53:45
Speaker
I left the drama wishing that we had gotten a story more focused on that and less on all this random stuff that they were throwing in to create conflict.
00:53:53
Speaker
In the end, I was a bit frustrated with the show, but I like a lot of what it was doing and I hope that we'll get more shows like this that focus on adult characters.
00:54:02
Speaker
I just learned some fun trivia while doing some research.
00:54:06
Speaker
Oh?
00:54:07
Speaker
Nini, the screenwriter of Tsukiyan and Ketodoyaraka is also the screenwriter on Three Star Bar in Nishioki Kuba.
00:54:16
Speaker
The DNA is there.
00:54:17
Speaker
I can see it.
00:54:17
Speaker
This is also one of the same directors who was on Sahara Sensei to Toki-kan.
00:54:22
Speaker
We shall not speak of it, bestie.
00:54:24
Speaker
Don't bring that back into this.
00:54:27
Speaker
Jenny, of all the shows that we're going to talk about tonight, you had, I think, the strongest connection to these particular characters, and I really want to hear your thoughts on them.
00:54:37
Speaker
While I agree that narratively the show did not hold together as strongly as it could, in every scene they were written well, they were acted well, they were consistent, they were who they were.
00:54:49
Speaker
And that I think was why I loved the show so much, is it played so well on a scene by scene level.
00:54:54
Speaker
Both of these are in almost completely opposite superficial ways that
00:55:01
Speaker
men who struggle to advocate for what they want in life.
00:55:09
Speaker
Sake is extremely a pushover.
00:55:12
Speaker
You see, as soon as his ex walks back into the scene,
00:55:15
Speaker
how difficult it is for him to say no.
00:55:18
Speaker
And even earlier, as he and Soga are getting to know each other, it's very easy for him to fall into a rhythm of just doing whatever Soga wants and enjoys and simply not advocating for himself or his interests at all.
00:55:33
Speaker
So he's this very kind of impulsively outspoken character.
00:55:36
Speaker
He keeps saying things that he doesn't mean to say, but when it comes to actually saying what he wants, he's slow to do that.
00:55:45
Speaker
On Soga's side, he's very reserved and kind of doesn't feel confident enough, I think, in his own desires to advocate for them.
00:55:56
Speaker
Even though he clearly likes and feels very drawn to sake, he takes so much of the show trying to figure out exactly what that means and waffling on what to do with that.
00:56:08
Speaker
I really liked seeing two characters with the same fundamental issue that expresses itself in such different ways come together and try to build a relationship.
00:56:19
Speaker
My favorite part in the whole show is after they've started dating, they try to work out this conflict resolution system in such a characteristic way.
00:56:29
Speaker
Sake knows Soga has been married before.
00:56:32
Speaker
So he says, what was your ex-wife like?
00:56:34
Speaker
What was your relationship like?
00:56:35
Speaker
thinking in his head, I'm going to become exactly like her because clearly Soga liked her.
00:56:40
Speaker
So that will work out great.
00:56:42
Speaker
And I foresee no problems with this.
00:56:45
Speaker
And so Soga tells him about their conflict resolution style, which is not Sake's style at all, but they try it.
00:56:52
Speaker
They both kind of yes and each other into doing something that's not going to work for either of them.
00:56:57
Speaker
And they try it for a while and then it falls apart and then they talk it out.
00:57:03
Speaker
It all felt so real to me as the person who struggles to express and sometimes even to know what I want.
00:57:10
Speaker
I've been in relationships on both sides where that's a major factor and they played it out so beautifully, realistically, while still feeling very fun.
00:57:22
Speaker
The show always felt light, even when it was headed into kind of a difficult moment between them.
00:57:29
Speaker
It never let the mood sink too much.
00:57:32
Speaker
I loved seeing that dynamic play out between them and the ways that they tried to work
00:57:38
Speaker
towards each other and often worked harder at making the other person happy than making themselves happy and had to kind of figure out how to do both at the same time.
00:57:48
Speaker
I liked you describing it as them yes-anding each other because that's exactly what that felt like.
00:57:53
Speaker
It felt very improv.
00:57:55
Speaker
I really enjoyed that scene a lot.
00:57:58
Speaker
I really liked that we got to see a homo jock trying to date a culture person.
00:58:03
Speaker
That was so fucking funny to me.
00:58:05
Speaker
We don't get to see fitness gays that often, and I had such a great time as a result.
00:58:10
Speaker
It was delightful.
00:58:11
Speaker
It was more of that city mouse, country mouse thing that they were trying to do.
00:58:15
Speaker
It was so fun.
00:58:17
Speaker
I wish that I had leaned more into the differences between them more than the external factors.
00:58:24
Speaker
Of the external factors, I really enjoyed the job one coming up and when it came up in the relationship and the conflict that that posed.
00:58:32
Speaker
But I think that the ex-boyfriend thing was a bridge too far.
00:58:36
Speaker
I think it was important that we saw the ex-boyfriend to understand certain things about Saki, but I don't think that they needed to drag that out into him trying to get Saki back kind of thing.
00:58:48
Speaker
I liked Mizuki as a character a lot, and I liked them showing Sake having an intimate, intense relationship with another person.
00:58:56
Speaker
I think on the pragmatic side, from talking about this as a drama, I'm more with Shan in that I don't know that this show set us up for the right expectations.
00:59:07
Speaker
And that could be a cultural competency part on our part, because of the thing they were playing with with the Osaka Tokyo thing.
00:59:14
Speaker
But I was also hoping to spend more time with these guys as a functional couple, perhaps, than I think we got.
00:59:23
Speaker
I think it's fine for the show to do what they chose to do with their time.
00:59:26
Speaker
But I think I wanted something from the show it couldn't give us.
00:59:30
Speaker
I also got a little bit frustrated that there was way less food in the back half than there was in the front half because I signed up for a food show.
00:59:40
Speaker
But they did give me a great baseball moment, so.
00:59:45
Speaker
They did have a really good baseball scene.
00:59:47
Speaker
I was just going to guess and you, Ben, about the food.
00:59:50
Speaker
The food was a strong presence in the first half of the show and then it did just kind of disappear.
00:59:55
Speaker
I wouldn't really call this a food drama in the end.
00:59:59
Speaker
I think
01:00:00
Speaker
One other piece that we kind of discussed live while we were watching that I do think is worth mentioning, not to single the show out, but to talk a little bit about a trend that exists, I think, across dramas.
01:00:09
Speaker
There was a quite a spicy sex scene between Sakai and Mizuki in this show.
01:00:15
Speaker
Far spicier than any scene we ended up getting for Sakai and Soga.
01:00:20
Speaker
Feels like a strange choice that they went to that heat level.
01:00:23
Speaker
in a scene with his ex and then kept the heat so low on the current relationship.
01:00:28
Speaker
One of the reasons I don't like it when dramas do that is because it kind of sends a message that only toxic relationships have hot sex in them and that
01:00:41
Speaker
when you find your right person, when you're truly in love, sex is not that important or it's not part of the dynamic.
01:00:47
Speaker
And I don't think that's a good message.
01:00:49
Speaker
It's not a sex positive message, certainly.
01:00:51
Speaker
And I don't know or think necessarily that the show intended to do that here, but it is kind of the effect of that choice that a lot of dramas make to only show hot sex in the context of toxic or old relationships and keep the main couple of a show kind of quote unquote pure.
01:01:10
Speaker
That stuck out to me in this show.
01:01:11
Speaker
And nothing that came after that scene hit anywhere close to that heat level.
01:01:15
Speaker
So it did kind of stand out as a weird choice to me.
01:01:19
Speaker
In terms of the general trend, I certainly agree.
01:01:22
Speaker
It is worth noting that that scene was specifically happening in Soga's imagination.
01:01:28
Speaker
So it wasn't like this was how it was.
01:01:30
Speaker
It's like this is how Soga is thinking about Sake and his ex.
01:01:36
Speaker
which in the context of the story gives it a very different meaning.
01:01:39
Speaker
But I do certainly agree with what you're saying about the overall trend in media.
01:01:45
Speaker
That's a good point, Jenny.
01:01:46
Speaker
It's a fair one to bring up.
01:01:48
Speaker
I do think though, if the show's willing to go to that heat level, why are they not willing to go there with the main couple?
01:01:52
Speaker
Yeah.
01:01:53
Speaker
And we do know that they are having a hot time because at the end when they make back up, so guys like, look, we know we're going to fuck, okay?
01:02:00
Speaker
So let's just get this relationship shit wrapped up before we do.
01:02:04
Speaker
And I thought that was delightful.
01:02:06
Speaker
So good.
01:02:07
Speaker
It was a very funny line, but it also kind of came out of nowhere because we hadn't seen any sexual relationship for them.
01:02:12
Speaker
We saw some.
01:02:14
Speaker
I get where she is coming from.
01:02:15
Speaker
Like they confirm that the guys are having sex and they deliver some of the prelude in the aftermath.
01:02:22
Speaker
But it stands out with what they showed with Mizuki.
01:02:25
Speaker
I think minus the Mizuki stuff, we probably don't feel that way.
01:02:28
Speaker
In general, I agree with Sean, yes.
01:02:31
Speaker
But I do agree with Jenny as well that this is really Soka's imagination, like really pushing up his fears and anxieties and all that stuff.
01:02:41
Speaker
I at least got to make a joke about the need for a robust public transport system because it's what allows them to be compromised.
01:02:50
Speaker
Like you see that?
01:02:52
Speaker
Robust, fast, frequent, high-speed rail is the only reason that these gays made it.
01:02:58
Speaker
Public transport is for the gays.
01:03:00
Speaker
That's the new slogan.
01:03:02
Speaker
So, ratings.
01:03:03
Speaker
How are we rating this one?
01:03:04
Speaker
Jenny, how about you?
01:03:05
Speaker
What do you think?
01:03:07
Speaker
I gave this one also an 8.5 from the opposite direction of perfect propose.
01:03:11
Speaker
I think execution wise, it deserves a bit lower, but I enjoyed it so much that I bumped us up to 8.5.
01:03:18
Speaker
Chandler.
01:03:22
Speaker
I gave it a 7.5 because the execution issues really, really bothered me.
01:03:27
Speaker
I think ultimately I really wanted to love it and I was disappointed that I didn't.
01:03:33
Speaker
Nini.
01:03:34
Speaker
I liked all the Osaka stuff.
01:03:37
Speaker
I liked how homey they made Osaka feel.
01:03:40
Speaker
I liked the female co-worker who, having been pushed back, decided to become a full-on supporter and get these two guys together.
01:03:50
Speaker
I gave it an 8.
01:03:51
Speaker
I had a good time with it.
01:03:52
Speaker
I think it was well done.
01:03:54
Speaker
I could have done without most of the Mizuki arc, but I enjoyed it.
01:03:59
Speaker
I did like Kanda a lot too.
01:04:01
Speaker
And his friend Kaneda?
01:04:03
Speaker
Oh man, I really liked the friend support group.
01:04:07
Speaker
But this show didn't come together fully for me.
01:04:10
Speaker
I struggled to really talk about it and give a clear recommendation for it.
01:04:15
Speaker
So it's a 7.5 for me.
01:04:19
Speaker
Which averages out to a 7.89-ish.
01:04:22
Speaker
We'll give it an 8.
01:04:23
Speaker
I think that's fair.
01:04:25
Speaker
I think it's fine for it to get an 8 from the conversation.
01:04:28
Speaker
We liked it, even though it was not exactly what I think any of us was wanting.
01:04:44
Speaker
Next up, we're going to talk the latest entry, actually.
01:04:50
Speaker
I want to see only
Gentle Friends-to-Lovers Storyline
01:04:52
Speaker
you.
01:04:52
Speaker
Ben, what is I want to see only you about?
01:04:57
Speaker
It is about how we all really, really loved Kurayuki in his I didn't mean to fall in love.
01:05:06
Speaker
And we needed another show with him.
01:05:08
Speaker
Oh, man.
01:05:10
Speaker
You're struggling.
01:05:11
Speaker
You can't even deliver the joke, sir.
01:05:12
Speaker
Because it's so ridiculous.
01:05:15
Speaker
Ben's just trying to score a point off me right now, but it's not working.
01:05:21
Speaker
Jimmy no Koto Dake Mita Itai, a.k.a.
01:05:25
Speaker
I Want to See Only You, is a four-episode Japanese BL partially funded by Hulu.
01:05:31
Speaker
That was kind of interesting.
01:05:33
Speaker
In which two boys in high school go through a friends-to-lovers arc.
01:05:39
Speaker
One of them has been nursing a crush for a long time on his friend and confesses to his friend.
01:05:47
Speaker
And they deal with the complications that ensue from that in a way that I thought was really gentle and wholesome.
01:05:54
Speaker
This is a very short story, but I enjoyed it a lot.
01:05:59
Speaker
Because it's not that complicated.
01:06:01
Speaker
They've been childhood friends.
01:06:04
Speaker
One of them reveals that he has stronger feelings than just friendship.
01:06:10
Speaker
And the other guy just begins to process that.
01:06:13
Speaker
And we get this really interesting dynamic where they're figuring out what the changes to their relationship are going to be.
01:06:25
Speaker
There's not any real complicating drama here.
01:06:30
Speaker
It's really just about these guys sorting their shit out.
01:06:34
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, this show is just uncomplicated.
01:06:37
Speaker
It is heartwarming.
01:06:39
Speaker
It is cute as fuck.
01:06:41
Speaker
It is two nice boys being kind to each other while they navigate a change in their relationship.
01:06:48
Speaker
It's really as simple as that.
01:06:50
Speaker
Sakura confesses to Yuma.
01:06:53
Speaker
Yuma processes the confession.
01:06:55
Speaker
They have a lovely kiss around the fire pit.
01:06:59
Speaker
It's so straightforward and I loved it.
01:07:01
Speaker
It was just nice to watch something that is gentle and kind and lovely.
01:07:08
Speaker
And that's what it is.
01:07:09
Speaker
I really liked this show.
01:07:10
Speaker
I think it's a great serotonin hit, a quick one and definitely recommend folks watch it.
01:07:16
Speaker
Jenny and Nene, did you have time to watch this show?
01:07:20
Speaker
I did not even know it existed until I saw it on the show notes.
01:07:23
Speaker
And I was like, what's that?
01:07:24
Speaker
Oh, well, I'm already doing another show as my homework.
01:07:28
Speaker
I watched it.
01:07:29
Speaker
It was very short, very sweet.
01:07:33
Speaker
I came away just with the feeling of having really enjoyed watching something, like being wrapped in a nice warm blanket, watching these two soft boys have a soft time, and then all the kooky characters around them.
01:07:47
Speaker
This is one of the things about this kind of Japanese drama that I enjoy, which is all the kooky side characters.
01:07:54
Speaker
So you've got the two teachers, you've got the girl who has the crush on... I can't remember which boy she has the crush on, and then the boy who has the crush on her.
01:08:05
Speaker
It's so fun.
01:08:06
Speaker
It's so delightful.
01:08:07
Speaker
Teachers are the second best part of the show.
01:08:11
Speaker
I love the teachers so much.
01:08:13
Speaker
It's just fun.
01:08:14
Speaker
It's sweet.
01:08:15
Speaker
It doesn't require a lot of you.
01:08:18
Speaker
It's very wholesome.
01:08:19
Speaker
I enjoyed it thoroughly.
01:08:22
Speaker
I was being really goofy at the beginning of this, but I like Kuroyuki a lot, and I'm really glad we got to see him in BL again.
01:08:27
Speaker
I thought he was really good in the HIS prequel, and I really enjoyed getting to see him again.
01:08:34
Speaker
He has really sad eyes, which I actually really enjoy.
01:08:40
Speaker
Yeah, he has a really emotive face, I think.
01:08:43
Speaker
I'm excited to see him keep doing more shows.
01:08:46
Speaker
There's really not that much more to say.
01:08:48
Speaker
This is a really quick, really gentle show.
01:08:50
Speaker
If you need a really good mood boost, I recommend it.
01:08:55
Speaker
Ratings, Shan?
01:08:57
Speaker
I gave this a nine.
01:08:58
Speaker
It is straightforward.
01:09:00
Speaker
It is sweet.
01:09:01
Speaker
It's an easy watch.
01:09:02
Speaker
Highly recommended.
01:09:03
Speaker
Nene?
01:09:05
Speaker
I also gave it a 9.
01:09:07
Speaker
It's incredibly straightforward and cute.
01:09:09
Speaker
I enjoyed it.
01:09:11
Speaker
I liked that they couldn't quite figure out how to shift their relationship from friends to boyfriends.
01:09:17
Speaker
They were dating and they're like, should we be doing other stuff?
01:09:20
Speaker
But they were just doing the same stuff that they had always done.
01:09:23
Speaker
I found that delightful.
01:09:25
Speaker
I gave it a 9.5 for the terrible pasta they made.
01:09:30
Speaker
Oh my god, the pasta was so bad.
01:09:36
Speaker
zero nuts
01:09:56
Speaker
The pasta was still semi-crunchy.
01:09:58
Speaker
It was delightful.
01:09:59
Speaker
It was so high school.
01:10:00
Speaker
It was the most high school thing I've ever seen.
01:10:02
Speaker
Raw tomatoes and like unseasoned noodles.
01:10:05
Speaker
Amazing.
01:10:06
Speaker
I really loved it.
01:10:08
Speaker
For your context, Jenny, this is when the boys are trying to figure out the shift in their relationship and they make a list of things they want to do together.
01:10:16
Speaker
Making pasta with the tomatoes they were growing in the school garden was one of those things.
01:10:21
Speaker
And I thought that was a really lovely idea and super romantic.
01:10:24
Speaker
And then because they're a bunch of high school boys who barely know how to cook, they fucked it up badly.
01:10:29
Speaker
But they had a good time together.
01:10:30
Speaker
It was great.
01:10:31
Speaker
It was so good.
01:10:33
Speaker
Incredible.
01:10:34
Speaker
Seriously, Jenny, it's a short watch.
01:10:36
Speaker
It's an easy watch.
01:10:37
Speaker
If you're ever in the mood for something to just lift your mood, I suggest watching it.
01:10:42
Speaker
So as it gets a nine from the conversation, it's worth your time.
01:10:46
Speaker
Please go watch it.
Comedic BL Production Journey
01:10:55
Speaker
On to the main event, which Ben has literally been waiting to talk about since we recorded the winter series.
01:11:03
Speaker
We're finally going to talk about I Became the Main Role in a BL drama.
01:11:08
Speaker
Ben, you've been basically building up to this moment.
01:11:12
Speaker
Go right ahead.
01:11:13
Speaker
I Became the Main Role of a BL drama is about how these two boys will drown the audience in the BL goodness.
01:11:23
Speaker
Oh, God.
01:11:25
Speaker
It is a BL about making a BL, which is a lot of fun.
01:11:31
Speaker
No shade against Thailand in this, but when they do self-critical BL, it's not always the most fun experience because there's a lot of real grievances the people making it need to air, and I completely respect that.
01:11:44
Speaker
But it also can be kind of a downer.
01:11:46
Speaker
When Japan makes fun of BL, they end up seeming to have more fun poking at the nature of the genre and delivering on the comedic beats without it just feeling like a bitch session.
01:11:59
Speaker
So in this particular show, we have Aoyanagi Hajime, who is a former child actor who was struggling a bit with his career and trying to figure out how to move forward.
01:12:10
Speaker
And he gets an opportunity to be one of the leads in a BL production against a up-and-coming idol, Akifuji Uechiro.
01:12:19
Speaker
They are working on a workplace BL, and we're mostly on the set of them filming this show.
01:12:27
Speaker
We don't get to see the show itself.
01:12:28
Speaker
I really wish we would get to see the show they made.
01:12:31
Speaker
It looks great.
01:12:32
Speaker
They are starting to work on the show, and the two guys do not seem to have much chemistry.
01:12:38
Speaker
The reason we learn is because Yuichiro is actually an Aoyanagi Hajime stan who is internally freaking out the whole time because he's this close to his idol.
01:12:46
Speaker
And they suggest the two guys live together to build up their chemistry.
01:12:51
Speaker
Their relationship gets complicated as they start to develop something between each other.
01:12:57
Speaker
And this complicates their relationship on set as well.
01:13:00
Speaker
But we mostly spend that time unpacking Aginagi's confidence issues.
01:13:05
Speaker
This was my favorite show of the year.
01:13:09
Speaker
Before I just start gushing about how beautiful I find Atsuki Nuchika.
01:13:14
Speaker
Jenny, thoughts on the show?
01:13:17
Speaker
I loved this show so much.
01:13:19
Speaker
Just hearing you talk about it, I was feeling little bubbles of delight remembering all of the different scenes and moments and setups.
01:13:27
Speaker
It was just exquisite.
01:13:30
Speaker
It was so fun and so funny.
01:13:33
Speaker
Very comic, but also felt true to these people as people.
01:13:38
Speaker
Loved seeing the cheeky BL commentary.
01:13:42
Speaker
Loved seeing Abe Allen play this cool up-and-coming popular idol who is just smitten with this kind of no-name, famous-for-one ad guy and just is flailing around having to try to act BL.
01:13:59
Speaker
One of the best moments any BL drama will ever give us is him asking Hajime to record that one kind of bitchy line he says for fat material.
01:14:12
Speaker
God, best thing that's ever happened to me personally.
01:14:17
Speaker
We will not do that scene justice describing it because it's not just about the dialogue of the scenario.
01:14:23
Speaker
It is staged really well.
01:14:25
Speaker
The blocking is a huge part of the joke in that one.
01:14:29
Speaker
because of what other people know or don't know in the background.
01:14:32
Speaker
It's really a great sequence in the show.
01:14:35
Speaker
I loved all of the blocking in that show, all of the stage direction, all the stuff that's happening in the background of all the scenes when they're on set is hilarious.
01:14:45
Speaker
Japanese shows will always reward you for paying attention to what's happening in the background of a scene.
01:14:51
Speaker
And this show in particular, the background of every scene is just phenomenal.
01:14:56
Speaker
It is delightful.
01:14:59
Speaker
We cruised into the new year watching this show.
01:15:02
Speaker
It was both the last show of 2023 and the first show of 2024 for us.
01:15:06
Speaker
This show ended, I was like, we've already decided to win for 24.
01:15:10
Speaker
Everybody back it up.
01:15:12
Speaker
I love this show.
01:15:13
Speaker
It's a great example of a super high velocity comedy where it's just joke, joke, joke, joke coming at you from all sides in every moment of the show.
01:15:24
Speaker
Not just through the dialogue, but through the scenery, through the blocking, through the things that other characters are doing just out of the frame.
01:15:30
Speaker
This thing is just packed, packed, packed with jokes.
01:15:34
Speaker
And so every time you watch it, you will see new stuff that you missed last time.
01:15:38
Speaker
There are so many gags in this.
01:15:40
Speaker
It's just so well done.
01:15:42
Speaker
The command you have to have to deliver comedy in that way with this extremely zippy pacing and that super packed content to shove it all into this three hour package.
01:15:54
Speaker
It's just so impressive.
01:15:55
Speaker
It's the kind of precision that most productions can only aspire to.
01:16:00
Speaker
There was such good visual jokes in this.
01:16:03
Speaker
The reveal that Akafuji had been wearing a fan t-shirt.
01:16:08
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:08
Speaker
underneath his clothes in scenes there was a fantastic scene with a leg cabadon hold on this is fun let's go around the group with a gag that we remember until we run out Shan gave two Nene?
01:16:22
Speaker
I mean I feel like the leg cabadon was a moment because when I finally watched the show I literally said did he just do a cabadon with his leg and I was instructed in the ways of Japanese media in that moment Jenny?
01:16:38
Speaker
Him running after Hajime, carrying his Hajime standee.
01:16:44
Speaker
After he had previously used it as a shield.
01:16:47
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:49
Speaker
One of the gags I enjoyed was Aoyanagi mentioning he was called a bad kisser by his ex.
01:16:58
Speaker
And Akifuji just checks out for that moment.
01:17:00
Speaker
He's not even listening to the rest of the conversation.
01:17:03
Speaker
He just keeps repeating Motokono, referring to the ex-girlfriend over and over again because he's spiraling over it.
01:17:10
Speaker
I enjoyed that one a lot.
01:17:12
Speaker
I'm going to speak to this.
01:17:15
Speaker
He has fire leg and fighting with the shower head.
01:17:18
Speaker
Oh my god!
01:17:20
Speaker
The shower head!
01:17:21
Speaker
People don't understand what he was doing in that scene, but it was so funny.
01:17:28
Speaker
It represents his sexual desire almost being out of control.
01:17:32
Speaker
Oh, I got that part.
01:17:33
Speaker
I just don't understand what the character was doing in the shower head.
01:17:39
Speaker
Struggling.
01:17:42
Speaker
When he nearly kissed Ayanagi and then he went outside and basically hung over the balcony railing.
01:17:49
Speaker
Just had a meltdown just from being close enough to almost kiss him.
01:17:54
Speaker
The spinning scene on the steps where I was like, he's gonna kill that boy.
01:17:58
Speaker
Yes, when they were like twirling each other around on concrete stairway.
01:18:07
Speaker
There were so many good supporting characters in this too.
01:18:10
Speaker
I really liked the initial pitch scene with the producers who were describing the vision for the show.
01:18:17
Speaker
That was fucking fantastic.
01:18:19
Speaker
The level of intensity that they were bringing to their description of the super fucking basic office feel.
01:18:26
Speaker
Our follower did not understand the way I lost my shit over this show after the first episode.
01:18:32
Speaker
From the I will drown the audience in the BL goodness scene, I was like, this is it, y'all.
01:18:37
Speaker
This is the show.
01:18:38
Speaker
This is the one.
01:18:39
Speaker
Everyone else can go.
01:18:41
Speaker
I'm done.
01:18:41
Speaker
I found what I needed.
01:18:42
Speaker
So funny.
01:18:44
Speaker
Literally every time she was on screen, whether it was foregrown or background, she was killing it.
01:18:50
Speaker
I loved her.
01:18:51
Speaker
Every performer in this show was so dialed in at all times.
01:18:56
Speaker
Whether they were the focus of a scene or not, they were always doing something important and funny in the background.
01:19:02
Speaker
There was also, of course, the great runner with the managers.
01:19:06
Speaker
The managers!
01:19:07
Speaker
Who were carrying on a secret romance.
01:19:09
Speaker
We saw them interacting like, are they exes?
01:19:12
Speaker
Are they together?
01:19:13
Speaker
What's going on?
01:19:14
Speaker
It was clear something was going on there from the start.
01:19:16
Speaker
They know each other, that's for sure.
01:19:19
Speaker
They definitely know each other.
01:19:21
Speaker
They know each other.
01:19:22
Speaker
They do.
01:19:24
Speaker
I was very surprised by the spicy reveal we got about their relationship.
01:19:30
Speaker
It was kind of spicy, wasn't it?
01:19:32
Speaker
There was choking involved.
01:19:33
Speaker
And then also Ryoga, who was brought in to be a co-star in the show.
01:19:37
Speaker
He was like a very well-known actor influencer, I think.
01:19:41
Speaker
He was a member of a boy band and they were bringing him in for additional crossover appeal.
01:19:46
Speaker
Because his strong point was his arrogance.
01:19:52
Speaker
He walks in the room and they're like throwing fucking feathers for him.
01:19:55
Speaker
And then he starts helping them pick it up.
01:19:57
Speaker
Thanks for throwing the feathers, guys.
01:20:02
Speaker
This drama, three episodes, it had a small cast, but it did so much with what it had.
01:20:12
Speaker
We were only with this show for two hours, but boy, was that a great time.
01:20:16
Speaker
It was so much fun.
01:20:19
Speaker
The producer, the look on her face in the background when the two of them were flirting on set and she caught them.
01:20:26
Speaker
Her face is slowly lighting up.
01:20:29
Speaker
He's like, don't feel, don't let them know.
01:20:36
Speaker
I love the manager glaring at his own fucking ward.
01:20:39
Speaker
He's like, can you read that line again for me?
01:20:42
Speaker
And he glares at him.
01:20:46
Speaker
Oh, man.
01:20:48
Speaker
In terms of the BL commentary, that was fun.
01:20:50
Speaker
There's the whole ramp up of you get selected for a role.
01:20:54
Speaker
You don't really know your co-star.
01:20:56
Speaker
There's the reading of the material.
01:20:59
Speaker
One of the things I really enjoyed with this is that they delved into Ayanagi really struggling with the fact that he was unable to build rapport with his co-star right away.
01:21:11
Speaker
I like actors getting to play actors and stuff.
01:21:14
Speaker
When Ayanagi was acting as his character, he was actually really good and was really dialed in.
01:21:20
Speaker
It was really cool how quickly he could go in and out of character.
01:21:24
Speaker
I really liked them showing that he's actually good, but he's in his own head about it because he's really sensitive to commentary from fans.
01:21:36
Speaker
And they reinforce how fan behavior has really potentially negative impacts on actors and entertainers with Kuromia.
01:21:46
Speaker
He gets cornered by a really aggressive fan and has to be saved by Ayanagi in that moment.
01:21:54
Speaker
I actually liked the moment with Tendo, the female supporting character on their cast, when Ayanage is trying to talk to her about what's going on with Akafuchi and he's speaking about it hypothetically.
01:22:07
Speaker
And she's like, if your co-star is trying to make out with you, offset.
01:22:10
Speaker
That's not good.
01:22:12
Speaker
That's extremely bad.
01:22:13
Speaker
And he's like, wait, but this is a BL story.
01:22:15
Speaker
We're going to just ride it out for this.
01:22:16
Speaker
But she's like, no.
01:22:20
Speaker
Aside from how very fucking funny this is, it had some really good messages.
01:22:24
Speaker
The most important thing this show did for me was make it super clear that in order for the two of them to have a real relationship and have a romance, Aka Fuji had to let go of being Ayanagi's fan.
01:22:40
Speaker
You can't idolize and worship a person if you want a relationship with them.
01:22:45
Speaker
You have to process them as a human being, a full human being, and see them fully for who they are and not keep them on this fannish pedestal.
01:22:57
Speaker
I really like that the show was clear about that.
01:23:01
Speaker
Being a fan, being a stan of somebody is not the same thing as loving them.
01:23:07
Speaker
It was really surprising as well that the show allowed there to be the commentary about the network late in production interfering, getting cold feet about something.
01:23:19
Speaker
The guys had a lot of consternation about whether or not they'd be able to deliver...
01:23:23
Speaker
a proper kiss for the intimacy.
01:23:25
Speaker
And then the powers that be pulled the kiss and you get the sense immediately from the producers that that wasn't their choice, that people with money above them made that decision and they had to just deliver the party line and just accept it.
01:23:40
Speaker
That probably brings us to our one real criticism of this show.
01:23:43
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:44
Speaker
The reason why the show did not get a 10.
01:23:47
Speaker
Damn it.
01:23:48
Speaker
We wanted it to get a 10.
01:23:49
Speaker
So,
01:23:50
Speaker
I get what they were going for.
01:23:51
Speaker
They reserved that moment for them.
01:23:55
Speaker
But I'm looking at you, TV Asahi.
01:23:58
Speaker
Because they did not deliver a kiss.
01:24:00
Speaker
They didn't.
01:24:00
Speaker
They did not deliver a kiss in this show.
01:24:02
Speaker
It's the only knock.
01:24:04
Speaker
They teased a kiss continuously.
01:24:07
Speaker
They showed them about to kiss multiple times before cutting the camera away.
01:24:12
Speaker
We got sad kissing in episode two.
01:24:14
Speaker
They implied that they might have been kissing as practice off camera that we didn't see.
01:24:20
Speaker
And then they ended the show similarly to Cherry Magic with the camera zooming in on them about to kiss and then a cut to black.
01:24:28
Speaker
It was unsatisfying all around.
01:24:30
Speaker
It's the one real ding on the show.
01:24:32
Speaker
The first time they did the fake out, we were like, oh no show, please don't do this.
01:24:37
Speaker
We want to love you unreservedly.
01:24:40
Speaker
Please just deliver the kiss.
01:24:42
Speaker
That's the real sadness of our two grab bags.
01:24:44
Speaker
We did not get a Nini.
01:24:47
Speaker
I love this unreservedly.
01:24:49
Speaker
And we talked about like 10 shows.
01:24:54
Speaker
Everything's got a little dainted right now.
01:24:56
Speaker
We'll get there again, I believe.
01:25:00
Speaker
But genuine, I love this.
01:25:01
Speaker
I really like that for the little time we spent with them, all the characters felt really human to me in a way that was really accessible.
01:25:08
Speaker
And even though there were mostly broad strokes on all of these characters, I got a lot out of it.
01:25:14
Speaker
It was really, truly one of my favorite Beagle experiences I've had in a long time.
01:25:19
Speaker
I'm going to give it a 9.75.
01:25:22
Speaker
Oh my god, here she goes.
01:25:24
Speaker
This is cheating.
01:25:25
Speaker
This is cheating.
01:25:27
Speaker
It's not cheating.
01:25:28
Speaker
It is producer privilege.
01:25:30
Speaker
Get it right.
01:25:33
Speaker
Jenny.
01:25:35
Speaker
I gave it a 9.5.
01:25:36
Speaker
Would have been a 10 if they'd given us the kiss.
01:25:39
Speaker
But a truly delightful and worthwhile show.
01:25:43
Speaker
Same 9.5 for same reason.
01:25:47
Speaker
I gave it a 9-5 for the same thing.
01:25:50
Speaker
It's a 9-5 from the conversation.
01:25:55
Speaker
But let the record state that Amy is the most generous.
01:25:59
Speaker
Truly, we love this.
01:26:00
Speaker
This is one of our favorites.
01:26:01
Speaker
Go watch it right now.
01:26:02
Speaker
I have to re-watch it because I don't even remember my favorite gags.
01:26:05
Speaker
Exactly.
01:26:06
Speaker
You got to go watch it again and get your gags back.
01:26:16
Speaker
And with that, we have come to the end of our Japanese grab bag.
Appreciation of Japanese BL Storytelling
01:26:22
Speaker
So what are we thinking about Japanese BL?
01:26:25
Speaker
Having just run down six of them in a row.
01:26:29
Speaker
Jenny, you go first.
01:26:31
Speaker
Last time I answered this question, I was kind of feeling like Japanese BL can do no wrong.
01:26:36
Speaker
And now I feel like, well, it can and has.
01:26:39
Speaker
There have been several less than perfect shows that
01:26:43
Speaker
Still feeling very positive overall.
01:26:46
Speaker
Loving so far, knock wood, some of what's currently airing.
01:26:50
Speaker
The beautiful density of storytelling that Japanese BL tends to deliver in such a short time, it almost never feels hollow or incomplete.
01:27:01
Speaker
It feels very rich and detailed.
01:27:03
Speaker
And I continue to love and appreciate that.
01:27:06
Speaker
Sure.
01:27:10
Speaker
I am just living right now.
01:27:11
Speaker
What a time to be alive.
01:27:13
Speaker
Japanese BL coming at us all the time, consistently.
01:27:18
Speaker
It didn't used to be like this.
01:27:19
Speaker
We used to go long stretches with nothing coming out from Japan.
01:27:24
Speaker
No clue what was going to come next.
01:27:26
Speaker
And now it's like, we've got these consistently airing shows.
01:27:30
Speaker
We've got shows that are showing up as a surprise alongside that.
01:27:33
Speaker
I think at one point we had...
01:27:36
Speaker
six different Japanese QLs airing simultaneously.
01:27:42
Speaker
That's just an unheard of bounty of Japanese QL content.
01:27:46
Speaker
And I am so happy about it.
01:27:49
Speaker
I hope it continues.
01:27:50
Speaker
With volume, of course, comes some shows that are not going to hit as well as the cream of the crop.
01:27:56
Speaker
But I still love the experience of watching all of them.
Reflection on Season's Japanese Projects and Future Topics
01:27:59
Speaker
I love getting to dig into this much Japanese content.
01:28:02
Speaker
I'm just so happy and I hope it continues.
01:28:04
Speaker
I can't believe we got to talk about nine Japanese projects in a single season of this show.
01:28:09
Speaker
That's ridiculous.
01:28:10
Speaker
Wow, right?
01:28:12
Speaker
I am having a great time.
01:28:13
Speaker
And I'm actually glad some of these shows were flops or duds.
01:28:18
Speaker
As much as I really like Japanese BL, I'm glad that there was a show that I got to genuinely hate in this run so that Nini could see that I'm capable of hating a Japanese project with my whole heart.
01:28:31
Speaker
I did actually need to see that.
01:28:32
Speaker
That is true.
01:28:33
Speaker
But I'm having a great time.
01:28:35
Speaker
It's really refreshing that so many different networks were involved.
01:28:38
Speaker
We had shows from about five or six different networks.
01:28:42
Speaker
And even if it feels like we're getting a slowdown in spring, I am very glad that we have more projects on the way.
01:28:50
Speaker
There's at least two more Japanese projects on the horizon.
01:28:53
Speaker
So I'm in a really good place.
01:28:56
Speaker
There's some stuff in there I think that we're gonna talk about in the laniap about where things seem to be going next season.
01:29:02
Speaker
But for now, that's gonna be it from us.
01:29:05
Speaker
We out.
01:29:07
Speaker
Say bye to the people, everybody.
01:29:09
Speaker
This time in actual chorus.
01:29:11
Speaker
One, two, three.
01:29:14
Speaker
Peace.
01:29:16
Speaker
Bye.
01:29:17
Speaker
Oh my god, y'all are terrible at this.