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The 2024 VIIB Awards
11 Plays27 days ago
It’s our 3rd Annual Very Important Internet BL Awards and we’ve changed up our whole shit! Ben and NiNi talk the best things we watched all year.
Episode transcript available here.
00:00 Welcome
00:55 Introduction: It's Awards Season Once More
02:09 Acting!
08:00 Ships Ahoy!
16:31 Immortal Technique
29:05 Top Tings
41:43 Special Class Awards
43:11 Special Class: Honourable Mentions
47:36 Special Class: Mark Pakin 6th Man Awards
51:13 Special Class: Standout Queer Narratives
01:06:00 Outro
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
00:00:21
Speaker
Welcome to The Conversation, the queer media and brown liquor podcast. I'm Ben, the media critic. I'm Nini, the vibes queen. And we're your drunk Caribbean uncle Ananti who is sitting on the porch in the rocking chairs. We're here to talk queer film and dramas with a special focus on Asian QL.
00:00:38
Speaker
so If you like deep dives into queer stories. If you like cracked out takes on art and commerce and queer media. If you just enjoy simping for attractive people. We believe in simping. Tune in!
Introducing the Vibe Awards
00:01:03
Speaker
And we're back. It's time for our favorite annual tradition. It's time for the Vibe Awards. We are here to discuss all the best things that we saw in 2024 and that you should watch as well. We've got five main categories in the Vibe Awards, Acting, Ships, Immorsal Technique, Top Things, and our Special Class Awards.
00:01:31
Speaker
For those of you who are new to us, this is the very important Internet BL Awards. Nina and I started our show on this, and we will be handing out plates once again to our favorite boys, girls, and otherwise stellar performers. Nina got deep into her cups before we started, and she was late. So unfortunately, I am also deep into my cups.
00:01:53
Speaker
yeah
00:01:56
Speaker
it's So we're just gonna have some fun and try to get through these as quickly as possible before we get Blotto.
Award Highlights and Winners
00:02:09
Speaker
Let's start with our acting awards. The great thing about being an actor is that you're invited into people's worlds that you normally would never be invited into. People want to tell their stories. They want to be seen and they want to be understood. As an actor, you just get to go on these incredible
00:02:38
Speaker
And the first award is Rising Star. Our awardee for a rising star this year is Ongpao Ochira Siwanachi, who played Dynamite in Cooking Crush and Kaupan in My Love Mix-Up. We love Ongpao on this podcast. We loved Dynamite. It was the first thing we ever saw him do, and we fell immediately in love with the character.
00:03:05
Speaker
And every time I've seen Ong Po since then this year, he has delivered. So I'm really looking forward to seeing what he does next. Very excited about him. I'm so excited for him. I thought he did a great job in both of his roles, despite feelings I have about both shows. Congratulations, sir. We'll be sending you a plate. Did we ever decide what we're putting on these plates? We're going into the third year of the Vibe Awards, and we don't know what's going on these plates. It is clearly going to be like two Caribbean mason jars full of, like, a fruity drink. It's going to be brown liquor. Hell yeah.
00:03:45
Speaker
amazing!
00:03:49
Speaker
Our next award is going to the best cast of the year and this award is for the best ensemble performance including individual performances, chemistry, and interplay.
00:04:03
Speaker
This is going to go to the cast of Unknown and Modi, also known as k Chris Chiu, Kurt Huang, Tammy Lin, and Kim J. Hoon. This was really a special cast playing off a really complicated dynamic, which takes place in world over the course of years. So we had to watch them play maturing characters in ever-changing dynamics the whole time.
00:04:29
Speaker
Really stellar group performance from them and it resulted in some really standout individual scenes that are easy, highlight, real footage. They were the best cast that we saw this year in terms of just the way that they gelled together and the individual performances. So congratulations, plate for you guys.
00:04:52
Speaker
What's our next award, Ben? Best pair! Best pair goes to the best couple performance, including individual performances, chemistry, and interplay between them. This is basically going to, because this is a romance show award, the best couple that we saw from the acting pair this year. Our best pair for 2024 is Tae Tae Won, Vyokratana, and new Tae Tae Poon, Teja Apaikun, playing Karan and Achi in Cherry Magic Thailand. Cherry Magic Thailand was one of the best things that we saw last year, and Tae Tae Won and new Tae Tae Poon have been around for a really long time.
00:05:31
Speaker
have been working together for about eight years. And every time they come back, they're better and better and better. And I think that Cherry Magic Thailand was probably the best that I've ever seen them. I have not always been a new fan, but he has shut my mouth lately. And I love Tatum 1. Best pair of the year. I was really impressed by them because taking over a work that is so beloved and having to perform characters that already have very strong, memorable performances is a really difficult task to do. I think these two did a good job balancing viewer expectations of their dynamic with meeting the demands of the work that they were adapting. That was an incredibly well done execution by both of them.
00:06:23
Speaker
Our final award in the acting category is our best actor. And that's for the best performance of the year. Ben, who is our best actor for 2024. It's Lee Tae Vin for his role as Tae Myung Ha from Love for Love's sake.
00:06:43
Speaker
Leite then really wanted to take on a role like this and he did such a great job playing the complex layers so of darkness and difficulty that his character is carrying in this. It is hard to get too deep into the nuances of his performance without spoiling it for those who have not listened to our previous episode or watched the show.
00:07:07
Speaker
But in a year with some really, really strong performances within BO, the top performance goes to Lee Tae-Vin. He really stood out this year. Tae Myung-ha is such a visceral character. I felt everything they want in the character to have us feel. All the confusion, all the despair. I really, really felt the depth of his work.
00:07:34
Speaker
Lee Taivin is the veteran actor amongst the cast here and he's the type of actor who clearly elevates other actors around them. That's a pretty important skill for him to have developed at his relatively young age. Congratulations, sir. Hope to see more of you next year.
00:08:01
Speaker
moving on to our ships category it's time for our sippy awards let's go girls love is awful it's awful it's painful it's frightening it makes you doubt yourself judge yourself distance yourself from the other people in your life makes you selfish makes you creepy makes you obsessed with your hair makes you cruel, makes you say in two things you never thought you would do. There's something wrong with your priest. It's all any of us want, and it's hell when we get there. under and So something we don't want to do on our own. I was told if we're born with love, then life is about choosing the right place to put it. People talk about that a lot. It feeling right. When it feels right, it's easy. But I'm not sure that's true. It takes strength to know what's right.
00:08:58
Speaker
ah love isn't something that we people do
00:09:03
Speaker
feel romantic takes a hell of a lot of hope think what they mean is when you find somebody that you love
00:09:14
Speaker
but feels like hope
00:09:18
Speaker
I'm gonna let Ben take it away with our first award in the ship category, which is the best ghost ship. It should have happened and we should have seen it. So who is our best ghost ship of 2024? It's Ma Wen and Than from 23.5. This is how Euro can still win. We're going to give him an award. but They should have let him kiss one of the twins in the last goddamn year or so.
00:09:52
Speaker
to let him kiss both of the twins. He had the chance. We went with this one because there was an interesting narrative reason for them to have leaned into the tension that his character, Mauen, was developing with Than, particularly because of his crush on a different character. In this case, more than any of them, they should have let them kiss just a little bit. Yura, we love you on this podcast. One of these days, they will let you kiss a boy. I'm swift.
00:10:25
Speaker
Moving on to the greatest of the ship's best friendship. This goes to our best besties of the year. This is not an award for the people who are the best at supporting the romantic outcomes for a couple. It is about the characters whose friendship itself is so critical to the function of these characters' lives that it in some ways challenges or even supersedes any of the romances that occur in the work.
00:10:57
Speaker
Our winners for best friendship go to the three must eat ears, Prem, Dynamite and Sam C from Cooking Crush because without their friendship, Cooking Crush does not work at all. It is probably more central to the story than the relationships between Prem and Ten and between Dynamite and Fire.
00:11:22
Speaker
the focus on each other and they care about each other and they're allowed to get angry at each other and when they're angry at each other they apologize for the stupid shit that they did.
00:11:36
Speaker
We had two veteran actors who I love a lot playing Sam C and Prem with a newcomer in Dynamite. I think it was really impressive to see the two veterans support the newcomer and create a beloved character as a result. This group has a real fight and breakdown.
00:11:55
Speaker
in this show that challenges the core friendship itself. I found myself more moved by the resolution of the fight this friend group was having than I was any of the romantic challenges. This was a really special group. Congratulations to the three Mustard Tiers. We will be sending you a plate. On to Best Side Ship, Nini's favorite award every goddamn year.
00:12:25
Speaker
yeah We decided this year that we were not going to fight over this award. The best sideship goes to the secondary couple who best reinforced the themes of the primary couple's story. Then you tell the people who has won. It's going to fire in dynamite. You thought I was done awarding on the out. We're never done a awarding on both. You had this really interesting dynamic with 10 fighting his dad.
00:12:52
Speaker
and Prem dealing with his own anxieties where on the opposite side you had Dynamite presenting himself as really forthright and open about what he is and fired avoiding his mom.
00:13:04
Speaker
These two balanced out very well with their main couple of their show. And it's not a surprise that the best sideship went to also the show with the best friendship because the character and relationship writing on this show was really stand out. This was one of Neo's not best known performances, but truly one of my favorites that he's done. I really liked what he did with Fire, especially coming off of playing Boston.
00:13:31
Speaker
That man is an incredibly talented actor, and we are very lucky that he shows up so often for us. Congratulations, Fire and Dynamite. We will be sending you a plate. I just want everybody out there who thinks I hate GMM TV to know that. While I do have beef with them, I am not incapable of applauding good work when I see it.
00:13:58
Speaker
LA! Best main ship! We are in a romance genre. We're here for couples that we believe can make it. This always goes to the couple whose love story we actually buy into and believe. These are the people you return to. These are the ones you show people and they're like, what should I watch? These boys, sit down.
00:14:21
Speaker
Nene, who is our best maneship of the year? Our best maneship of the year is Shiba and Haruto from Love is a Poison, Japanese title.
00:14:34
Speaker
ducoy da suri ra ho to
00:14:39
Speaker
The show was hilarious and had so much heart and Shiba and Haruto's relationship at the center of it all is really what pulled me in. The acting is amazing. The writing is amazing. This is a true battle couple. They got together and decided that they were going to stand shoulder to shoulder, back to back and fight off everybody who tried to comfort them.
00:15:07
Speaker
believe in them, I believe that they lost. This show has a fist bump involving rings that legit made me understand what it means to swoon. This show whipped ass. It may have seem like an oddity show. Ignore that part. Just go fucking watch it. The show understood all of the reservations the audience might have from their initial reaction to them and went out of their way to demolish them. This show was fucking fun and I really loved these two so much. I will be thinking about that man's fake posing during
00:15:43
Speaker
their photo of the two of these. I'll be thinking about that towel sequence where he threw it on him in the onsen. Don't think I forgot. These guys were great. They even got to have a Yucatan moment. They sure did. yeah it it They fell in love so hard and it was delightful to watch. I just love when a couple fights for each other, especially when one of them can't.
00:16:11
Speaker
ah and then got his ass beat and it was incredible no notes
00:16:32
Speaker
It's time to do some more traditional awards. We're moving on to Immortal Technique where we talk about technical and production related awards. This is one of my favorite sections every year because this is the one that rewards you for paying attention to details.
00:16:49
Speaker
This is also the one where we basically talk about the people behind the scenes, the people whose names are in the credits, but who don't get a lot of credit. And we always love to give that credit out on our show.
00:17:05
Speaker
As a director, i kind of i I have quite a good ability, at at the very beginning when we're first starting to write the screenplay, I have quite a good ability to imagine the film in my head. like you know Even the very first page of of the script, as we do it, I can start to imagine the camera angles, the music.
00:17:24
Speaker
I can start to feel how the film's coming together and I sort of have this imaginary film starting to be put together and that's right back at the beginning and I mean in this case we started this process about five or six years ago and then what happens during the course of the movie is that this this film that's playing in my head always gets modified because as you design the sets, you know, then the sets that we've designed replace the ones that I originally sort of imagined and then as the actors come on board their faces put fit into the characters I imagined and so my little internal movie is always changing and being updated so that
00:18:02
Speaker
it's It's, you know, it always ends up better. Everything, every time my film in my head gets changed, it it's improving all the time. Because all all these other people are coming on board and giving their input and into it.
00:18:14
Speaker
We're starting with Best OST Song, and this is for the song as recorded, the style or genre does the song fit the mood of the show, composition and arrangement, production and performance, usage and listenability. Basically, is it a bop and do you think about it a lot? So Ben, what is our Best OST Song of the Year?
00:18:39
Speaker
This was actually a pretty extensive discussion we had in the background about this one. But in the end, we are excited to award Kamino from Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo, performed by Gogang, music and lyrics by Gogang and Jung Mi Jin.
00:18:56
Speaker
And I love this song. Every time it came on at the beginning of an episode, you just felt yourself sinking into the place that the show wanted you to be. It starts off with this acapella harmonizing that just really got you into your feelings. And then a little bit of piano, a little bit of strings. It was very not flashy.
00:19:22
Speaker
but really effective if you have not watched let's read this attack window i don't know what you're waiting for listen to the song in context then go listen to it out of context it's a great song i'm re-watching it right now with emily we just started the first episode and legit the intro starts and she's like oh it's one of those ships exactly it puts you straight into the right place that you need to be in
00:19:54
Speaker
Our next award is for the best music. This is the use of music overall. Scoring, music supervision, music editing. It's all about where and how music is used throughout the entire production. As usual, we had a lot of feelings about this one. But in the end, Nene, we decided to award four minutes. The... Composer is Toi Turdsak Janpan. Music supervisor, Pimata Pattibul, and Yurpat Jungkol Songkro, done by Banana Sound Studio. For minutes, one thing that it did do well was everything around the production, and the music in particular was very evocative and very effective in setting mood.
00:20:40
Speaker
The show worked very effectively through the soundscape. It was well done. Kudos to them.
00:20:49
Speaker
On to Best Production! This is kind of a catch-all award. It goes into production design and art direction, set design and dressing, location choice, costuming and hair, makeup, and a little bit of sound design, color grading and editing. This is about shows that do a good job with their world building, their aesthetic, and basically, do they really capture the vibe? Best Production this year goes to Love for Love's sake.
00:21:18
Speaker
art director hi you hear ri You've got a person who is essentially isekai into another world. like He passes out in our world, wakes up inside of what feels like a video game, and they have to convey a lot of details about what's going on with the mechanics of the video game and all the ways that the world is behaving around him. None of this is very easy to do, particularly on a very short runtime. And they managed to give us all of the information and details we need without huge exposition dumps. There are some key details, the work they do with Tae Myung-ha's eyes and his hair in particular
00:22:05
Speaker
This is one of those shows that really rewarded us as viewers for paying attention to more details than just what was happening in the subtitles or when the boys were at their prettiest smiling at each other. Paying attention to was such an important part of really being able to embrace and understand this experience. It was incredibly impressive the way that they built up the video game world and all the ways that the video game starts to glitch.
00:22:35
Speaker
It starts so subtly you almost can't tell and then by the time it builds up you start thinking back to all the little things that showed up in the background that told you that the game was glitching. It is really serious attention to detail that they put into this show and for that we award them a plate.
00:23:00
Speaker
We're going to move on now to the Writing Awards and the first one is Best Original Story. So that is for premise, story, screenplay, stage directions, dialogue, character voice, all the things that go into writing an original story.
00:23:19
Speaker
This year's award goes to Fong Da Suu for Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo. Welcome back ma'am and well deserved. My goodness gracious me. Good job ma'am. This was one of the most stunning experiences we got to have this year. Once again you were determined to make us love some boys and then break them up for a ridiculous amount of time and make us really root for them to get back together in.
00:23:48
Speaker
Holy shit, you did a great job this time. This was honestly such an unexpected and really special experience. and The reason why we award original story is a significant amount of BL is adapted. A lot of productions for a lot of valid reasons rely on adapting existing work that already has a fan base that's ready to support it again and advocate for it. It's always really impressive when someone does something original that manages to cut through the noise and become one of the most memorable things we may have ever watched in genre. The writing of that confessional scene where Shin Joo Young takes his cross off and puts his forehead on the wall and confesses through the wall. I mean I don't know how somebody comes up with that but I got goosebumps.
00:24:39
Speaker
There's the bit where Hyung-ho is going to Do-ho's house to get something and Shin Ji-young shows up and we just see the three of them staring at each other in a hallway. There is not much dialogue in this sequence, but that is such a charged moment. and and Incredible stuff.
00:24:59
Speaker
From original story, we're moving to the best adapted story. This is for adaptation of a source work from another medium or another culture. Ben, who wrote our best adapted story?
00:25:14
Speaker
Toyama Erika, for I Became the Star of a BL Drama, adapted from BL Drama no Shuini, Narimashita by Suzuri Machi. This was the first thing we watched on New Year's Eve into New Year's. This was the show that set the standard of the year for me.
00:25:36
Speaker
This show was legitimately funny. In a really short runtime, they captured the total essence of the story. What a solid experience to start the year. And good news, gays, theys, and them. We're getting the sequel.
00:25:56
Speaker
Oh, yeah i we are. I'm so excited about that. Congratulations to Toyama Erika, who wrote, it I'm sorry, the best line of the year when the writer of the drama within the drama says, we will drown the audience in the BL goodness. That line stands alongside every fujo she has a dick in her heart.
00:26:22
Speaker
like i Congratulations to our original story and adopted story writers, Wanda and Toyama Erika. We will be sending you plates.
00:26:38
Speaker
Our final technical award goes to Best Direction. This award is for overall vision, filmmaking style and visual impact, photography, cinematography, shot selection and direction of actor movement and expression.
00:26:57
Speaker
This is usually awarded to the directing team, which usually consists of the director, the director of photography or the cinematographer, and the editor. Ben, which show had the best direction of 2024? It's going to 25G Akasaka Day, aka at 2500 in Akasaka.
00:27:18
Speaker
directed by Hori Takahiro and Kawasaki Ryo, DP Hanamura Yasushi, and edited by Kitani Mizuki. We just avoided, I think, in the main role of BL Drama. And then this show released and I was like, are we doing this again but moody?
00:27:37
Speaker
and they say we sure are and we loved it. I cannot believe we got similar premises in the same year and both were standout productions of the year. I'm a sucker for actors playing actors and I really love the work that went into this particular show.
00:27:56
Speaker
The way that the show plays with the camera inside the show, inside the show, the camera zooms in to sort of immerse you in the moment and then pulls you back out to show you how fake the moment is. It really make an effort to blur that line between real and fake, which is a big theme in the show. So very well done.
00:28:20
Speaker
My favorite section every year. BL is really silly sometimes, and there's a wide range of quality. And I don't think it's always for a lack of effort on people's part, but damn, is it really good to have some things that are good enough that you are willing to show it to some of your bougie friends, make them sit down and watch some fucking BL.
00:28:42
Speaker
ah Thank you to everyone. Thank you to all of our immortal technique winners. You will be getting your plates in the mail if we ever get around to sending out these magical plates. But y'all did good and we love you.
00:29:06
Speaker
Let's move on to our top things, all the best things that we saw this year. Historically, we've rewarded these on some genre lines, but primarily country lines.
00:29:23
Speaker
With the greater diversification of the genre and also the absence of certain countries for economic and political reasons, we have opted to not award based on countries anymore. We are going to be awarding on genre-oriented categories only. With that being said, Nene, take us in.
00:29:59
Speaker
I thank you gentlemen. The year has been a good one for the society. and This year our members have put more things on top of other things than ever before.
00:30:14
Speaker
but I should warn you this is no time for complacency no there are still many things that I cannot emphasize this too strongly not on top of other things I myself on my way here this evening saw a thing that was not on top of another thing in any way anyway shame indeed but we must not allow ourselves to become too despondent for You must never forget that if there was not one thing that was not on top of another thing, our society would be nothing more than the meaningless body of men that gathered together for no good purpose. um
00:30:57
Speaker
We're going to start with the best GL. Well, there's no competition really in 2024. It is Sakura Tai Onna to Tabatai Onna aka She Loves to Cook and She Loves to Eat from NHK in Japan. NHK really delivered for us. so I was so relieved when they actually came back to continue the She Loves to Cook and She Loves to Eat story because after the first 10 episodes, we were not finished.
00:31:31
Speaker
The ongoing expiration of queerness and relationships between women in the modern era was just so excellent in this show. We had adult women of various ages interacting with each other across those age lines and trying to support each other in meaningful ways. And we got really great development on the core relationship. There was a lot of new GL this year. I'm looking forward to some more projects and I hope.
00:31:59
Speaker
We have a wider field to choose from next year, but this is unequivocally our winner of the year. Nobody can compete with the chosen family scene. It's over for everyone else, I'm sorry.
00:32:14
Speaker
I love the way that they expanded the show, expanded the cast to bring in somebody new moving into the apartment building to bring in Nomoto's internet friend that she turned into a real friend, and really expanding the world and getting more into the relationships between all of these characters, all of these amazing women. I love it so much. It's the best GL that we watched this year.
00:32:46
Speaker
Our next award goes to the best pulp. It's for shows with a small budget that have a big impact. It's very hard sometimes when you're working on tiny budgets to say big things. And it's really impressive when that show clearly has a strong creative handle on what it wants to do and what it wants to accomplish. It's easy to award the studios that have a lot of money and a big actor pool and can produce a lot of stuff. Something's probably going to be good.
00:33:15
Speaker
If you try often enough, it's always really cool when a small team comes out of nowhere and delivers one of the best things you saw this year. With that in mind, NeNe, who is our best pulp of the year? Surprising absolutely no one, our best pulp of the year is Knock Knock Boys by Counter Production and VTV from Thailand. Knock Knock Boys was an amazing pulp that used its small budget incredibly well. Some great acting, some sharp writing.
00:33:53
Speaker
just incredible all around. They took what they had and ran with it. I still think about Amand and Latte not having sex at the beach. I think that's one of the best scenes that I've seen this year. This show absolutely fucks. Go watch it. Nothing more needs to be said. Girl, I'm halfway through this bottle. I need to slow down. I'm still leaving that in.
00:34:24
Speaker
Our next award goes to the best romantic comedy, Live, Love, Laugh. I'm leaving that in as well. Ben, what's the funniest and most warmed we felt all year? This year's winner is Dokkukoi Dokkumo Sugareba Koitonaru, aka Love is a Poison. This show was just that funny. Consistently for 12 weeks.
00:34:52
Speaker
It's hard to be funny for 12 weeks. This show earned every single laugh it got. And they used their laughs to tell some really dirty jokes. I just keep thinking about the succulents.
00:35:06
Speaker
but that ah The succulents making all those sighing noises. The succulents were one of the best things about this show.
00:35:17
Speaker
And if you want to know what that means, you should go watch it. It's an incredible show. Incredibly funny. I laughed out loud multiple times. It's a delightful romantic at comedy. Our next award goes to the best romantic drama.
00:35:34
Speaker
Nini who is our awardee for this year. Once again from Japan the best romantic drama is 25G Akasaka Day at 2500 in Akasaka by TV Tokyo. I am stuck on this show.
00:35:54
Speaker
in a way that I did not expect to be when I watched it. Just the emotions involved between Hayama and Shirasaki and how long they've been going on and how tangled up they are because they are working together playing lovers and can't really disentangle real from fate I really think about the way Nihara delivers Asami-san across the entire show. I really feel like this show kicked an overdrive. I think it's around the end of episode four when Shirasaki is struggling with delivering the big confession scene and the drama they're recording within the show. The way we arrive at the endpoint of that is really one of the most effective episodes of television we got in BL this year.
00:36:48
Speaker
I'm not gonna stop thinking about it ever. Congratulations to 25G Akasaka B. You get a plate.
00:37:00
Speaker
Moving on to the best genre romance. This is for romance blended with sci-fi fantasy horror, action, and or mystery elements. This year's winner is Love for Love Stakes.
00:37:17
Speaker
from Wave Studios. It's really hard to do sci-fi well. and give the audience an interesting relationship to sit with. Without spoilers, I really like that the audience has had a wide field of complex reactions to the end of this particular story. I think that that is a really wrong indicator of how well the show explored the various things it wanted to do.
00:37:55
Speaker
It's really, really hard in sci-fi to do relationships that are meaningful because in sci-fi it's more about the human condition and exploring complex ideas. The characters are more stand-ins for like societal ideas that the story wants to pick at. This was an incredible job with a newcomer no less.
00:38:20
Speaker
delivering on a really compelling and complex relationship. Man, I'm still thinking about that shoes moment. Oh home my God. Hold on, I'm in my feelings. The vibe awards when Ben gets in his feelings. He shouted that man's name and he said, run. And then his shoes let off sparks and I screamed in my house. The scream I scrubbed.
00:38:44
Speaker
yeah This is really a great one. One of the things about genre romances, it is really important for the genre elements to matter, for them to be integrally integrated into the story and the themes. That's one of the things that we look for in a good genre romance. When Tae Myung-ha got the ability to see who Cha Ye-woon dislikes the most and he's going around and surveying the field, that hurt my feelings.
00:39:13
Speaker
My lord, that was a moment to end moment. This really was an excellent show. This was not an easy decision for us, but this is why this show pushed ahead. Congratulations to Lopper Loopsie. You get a plate.
00:39:32
Speaker
All right then. It's time, baby! Show of the year! Here we are at the end of the Standard Class Awards. We are ready to award the best fucking thing we watched this year in QL. If you ain't watched, fuck all this shit because you're too busy, you got too much else going on. If you only have time for one BL, please go watch our awardee, Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo from Studio Hymn Energetic Company.
00:40:09
Speaker
It wasn't even close. It was not even close. Look, last year I almost fucking murdered Nina over Love Flooey. I do remember. We met in person and I almost fucking killed her over the show.
00:40:28
Speaker
With this year, it wasn't even a discussion, really. Obviously we enjoyed some other things, but one show really stood out, and this was it. Gwangdasil is back. She's ill in the fucking game.
00:40:43
Speaker
We already spoke extensively about this show in an earlier episode, but we barely scratched the surface of everything we could have talked about in that show. That was a complete viewing experience. Not a moment of our time was wasted on extra bullshit. This was a stellar show and it is, hands down, head and shoulders above other things we watched this year.
00:41:12
Speaker
I just keep thinking about Dougal asking Chuyang if he dressed up for him while he starts undressing it. It's a show! It's a show! We can talk about it forever! Congratulations, Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo! You will get a plate! That's gonna wrap up our standard class awards.
00:41:43
Speaker
Now we move into where Ben really gets to enjoy himself. Ben would not do the vital awards if we did not do special awards. Here's the background for the new people. When Nini first approached me about doing a podcast together, she's like, let's start with an award show. Like it's the end of the year. Let's award the shows we really liked this year. And it was all like super queer cinema type stuff. And Nini's like, okay, but I want to give the else shows awards.
00:42:14
Speaker
it's So we compromised and we put all of the queer shit whose primary goal was not to tell romantic stories overall into their own special class so we could highlight them.
00:42:30
Speaker
We thought this was a good compromise because BL is a romance genre and the shows that I typically like to award here are not romances. But these are the shows that I support BL for. The market that enjoys BL has enough crossover with some of these types of queer dramas that it enables them to get made.
00:42:56
Speaker
so It's time to hand out our special class awards so I can once again talk about all of my favorite things.
00:43:12
Speaker
Let's begin with our honorable mentions. These go to shows that we think contributed to the genre in the number of various ways. And I want to say to you all of you out there nervously waiting, remember one thing, no matter what happens tonight, you're all winners, because as you know, it is an honor just to be number nine!
00:43:46
Speaker
I wanted to highlight in the honorable mentions seven days before Valentine. We talked about this one a little bit in one of our grab bags. This is a highly experimental piece.
00:44:01
Speaker
that I really enjoyed and has surprisingly stuck with me. I still keep thinking about it. It's not BL exactly. It's kind of BL-ish. It's not queer. It's not queer. It's very genre. It's also not genre. It's a little bit of everything.
00:44:23
Speaker
When I described it in the grab bag, I described it as something that made me feel like I was sitting in a theater watching actors do an experimental play. It is from the same screenwriter, playwright, director, who also gave us 180-degree longitude passes through us. so We wanted to highlight that Punisak Suki is still working with It's very different kind of work, but I think really worth watching. Our other honorable mentions come from Japan. It's time for the Anime Awards! Brother and the Booth play the sound! There were about 10 odd anime projects that were BL or BL adjacent that came out last year. Only some of which were reasonably accessible to Westerners.
00:45:17
Speaker
I want to highlight Tadaima Okairi and Twilight Out of Focus. Tadaima Okairi is the best Omegaverse project that came out in this year. Wild time to be in BL. But Tadaima Okairi He uses the convention of that genre to tell a story about a married gay couple with kids who are still growing their family and it's really heartfelt. So many stories we watch are about guys getting together and the uphill challenges they fight to do that and whether or not we believe in them. This story was 100% about that belief we had in them. These guys are together. They've already gone through
00:46:03
Speaker
Their BL drama. We're watching them build a home. We're watching them raise their son and and then their daughter. This was a really unexpected and really incredible viewing experience. Omegaverse is not for everyone, but truly this was one of the standout narratives that I got to experience this year. I still think about this family at least once a week.
00:46:29
Speaker
On the other end of the spectrum, Twilight Out of Focus was about a film club at a high school that allows us to explore three different relationships, where in two of them someone is already unknown gay. This was a really special show that was unpacking a lot of BL presumptions.
00:46:48
Speaker
Studio Dean came back this year with Twilight of Focus and is continuing to ask the question, in a context where a lot of people's first experiences with queer storytelling and queer identity is coming through BL, what responsibility does BL have to the boys and girls and other kids who are discovering themselves and BL is informing how they're going to interact with their potential partners?
00:47:16
Speaker
This show does this in a really elegant way without dunking on BL in the process. Also, the animation is gorgeous, truly. Both of these are available on Crunchyroll. Please give them a chance.
00:47:37
Speaker
We are moving on in our special class to the Six Man Awards, or what we like to call the Mark Kakiyan Awards. because we originally awarded this award too. What was your preparation in Six Man? You have to warm up different. I got my body going. I knew I'd be cooling down. So while I'm over there, I didn't go to the bike, but I would go hallway. I was stretched while I was on the bench. I was stretched off. And I would mentally, more than anything, I would mentally put myself in the game before I got in the game. Oh, they're playing like this. theyre play that pinking role all he's sitting back right there okay he's growing four hands up while He's going for the left hand. So I'm putting myself in. So I'm playing the game before I actually play the game. And reading the flow of the game. I see. Every time I'm like, you got to know what you see. I'm like, oh, they're playing you like this. OK, you got to just think through it right here because they're trying to send you left, get back to your right. mother This guy, that one guy's blitzing because he can get up the other guy. So I'm just watching different things. do And so I'm putting myself in the game, but I'm making my own adjustments yeah before the play even happened with me, actually.
00:48:37
Speaker
This award acknowledges the most valuable and versatile supporting actors of the year for on-screen and off-screen contribution. Our sixth man is somebody who can come on to a project and just fire away, go right in. Basically, it's a gunslinger. It's coming off the bench and doing everything that needs to get done.
00:49:01
Speaker
We've got two six month awards to hand out this year, and I'm going to let Ben take the first one. My award is going to Dom Geroa Chihua-Ramfer, his acting work in cooking process, Sam Seed, and to his composer work on Jack and Joker.
00:49:19
Speaker
Dome has been around BL for a very long time. I still listen to the song he sang for Until We Meet Again. This man has been in the streets with us for a long time and I think he did a really fantastic job with the Sam C character. This man is always working. He is in the background somewhere doing something to entertain people and we really wanted to acknowledge that this year.
00:49:46
Speaker
But congratulations, sir. Thank you for all the work you do. And I really hope that people continue to appreciate your presence. He is a great actor. He's a great musician. And he is one of our sixth men of the year. Our second six-man award this year is going to go to title, charity, Puong Mili.
00:50:10
Speaker
from We Are, 1D Good Day, and Kid Milk. He's been around and he continues to be around. And this year he gave us three very different performances. He's been with us as early as Love by Chance. And he started with GMM TV for us on Be My Favorite, playing a heel there. Once Gunsmile left GMM TV, he stepped into that role to be the dude we hate. Good job, sir. You're doing a great job. This year he also played people that we liked, so great.
00:50:40
Speaker
He was one of the best parts of Kidnap because his character was entirely unhinged and nobody ever called him on it. Delightful. Every time he shows up, I know I'm going to have a good time. He is a good, solid actor. He can show up and do whatever you need him to do. So congratulations to Title Kiriti on Mili for being one of 2024's sixth men.
00:51:14
Speaker
We are on to our final awards, our standout queer narratives of the year. Talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show-stopping, spectacular, never the same, totally unique, completely not ever been done before, unafraid to reference or not reference, put it in a blender, shit on it, vomit on it, eat it, give birth to it.
00:51:40
Speaker
These awards acknowledge queer drama works that are not primarily romances. We're going to be talking about five different shows this year. Osando Pansu, Ganadate, Genica, a.k.a. Don't Care for an Old Man's Underwear from Japan, a family drama. We're going to be talking about Marifuyo Project from the Philippines, a community drama. We're going to be discussing Love in the Big City, a very complicated adult coming of age drama.
00:52:09
Speaker
Kimi no Sugukariwa, aka Fragrance You Inherit from Japan, a very interesting family drama, and finally, Interview with the Vampire, Season 2, a southern gothic drama from the United States of all places.
00:52:25
Speaker
We almost never talk about Western shows and stand up great narratives. That's how good that show is. That's how good it is. Let's start there then. Interview with the Vampire season 2 continues this narrative. Louis and Claudia are in Europe and we're dealing with the fallout of their attempt to kill Lestat at the end of season 1. What's so special about season 2 is honestly Jacob Anderson.
00:52:54
Speaker
I also want to give some special shout out to Delaney Hales who has to take over the rule of Claudia in this season and she does an incredible job. Asad Zaman and Eric Bogosian really step up in this season and play some really stellar stuff and Emily would kill me if I didn't mention Ben Daniels work as Santiago. This is fundamentally a gay drama about unwell divorced people.
00:53:21
Speaker
and it remains one of the most compelling watches that I get to look forward to. I have not watched this one yet. I'm working on cutting down my list this year by actually watching things. So this is on the list, definitely, of things that I'm going to watch. It's been making too much noise for me to not watch. I will say, sincerely, as someone who really swoons for really strong actor chemistry and performances, if you had watched Interview, you would not have awarded Best Payer to Delcocoie.
00:53:52
Speaker
and Stand up queer narratives. They don't go into the BL part. You all see why this award-filling works the way it does. But sincerely, that's how good the two of them are. They're not really in a proper romance because they're so fucked up.
00:54:12
Speaker
yeah t Jacob and Sam are the two men I look the most forward to playing queer characters and this show has a complex lens on queerness over the course of centuries which adds an incredible layer to the performance.
00:54:29
Speaker
It's hard to do sequels to romantic stories, but I love the second season of Interview in many ways more than I loved the first season, but I would not have been able to enjoy the second season without the first season. That is truly what makes a second season really good when it builds on what the first season did and elevates that to a whole new level, a really special experience this year.
00:54:58
Speaker
It is rare that I go out of my way to recommend Western Queer TV on this podcast, but in this particular case, I highly recommend Interview with a Vampire. It's on my list and steadily climbing. The next show on our Standout Queer Narratives list is a show that we actually haven't talked about yet, but we'll be talking about coming up soon. Fragrance You Inherit, Kimi no Sugukairiwa from Japan.
00:55:26
Speaker
a family drama. Without getting too deep into it, which we are going to do on its own episode, Ben, just give the people a little taste of what Fragrance You Inherit is about. Fragrance You Inherit is about a single mom and her son, and it's about her meeting the son's new girlfriend, who happens to be the daughter of her college crush.
00:55:53
Speaker
the son's girlfriend, is the spitting image of her mom. And this is fundamentally a show about really kind people trying to do right by each other as they navigate some unresolved feelings across two different generations. This is a show that could have gone a really ugly route, but I really liked that this was fundamentally a show about people trying to take care of each other.
00:56:20
Speaker
And it was a lot of fun watching a show where the primary stress comes from everyone being really polite about some very difficult things. We get to see an older lesbian who knows she's a lesbian but hasn't told her son navigate the unresolved feelings she had for her closest female friend in college while their children pursue a really meaningful romance between them in a way that I think honors the desires and perspective of all of the characters involved. It's a really special experience and was a real surprise for us at the end of the year.
00:57:04
Speaker
This is from Ishibashi Yuho, who also did our dining table. Tokyo in April is, I think, and a few other standout Japanese dramas. There were not enough shots of shoes. I would not have known it was her.
00:57:19
Speaker
but she does love Jews. This comes from a manga by Ogawa Maruni and it really surprised me. yeah It's about having built after disappointment, having built really good, meaningful, happy lives, and then having that rocked a little bit by unresolved things from your past and where that takes you.
00:57:48
Speaker
It's also about parents and children. It's also about being honest with the people in your life and how not being honest with them can lead to a lot of stress and anxiety. It is a great show. We will be talking about it in a lot more detail coming up in a subsequent episode, but we wanted to award it a stand-out for an arts award.
00:58:14
Speaker
We already discussed Love in the Big City in an earlier episode so we will not go on at length about it here, but we are once again stating for the official record of the Vibe Awards that this is, honestly, the show not to miss this year. There is so much that went into getting this show even made.
00:58:38
Speaker
The entire experience we get with Goyoung across his 20s in four difficult periods of his life is honestly one of the most meaningful queer experiences I got to have in communion with other people in the last couple of years.
00:58:57
Speaker
everything about reading Love in the Big City and watching Love in the Big City is one of the most memorable experiences I've had with queer media in a long time. I cannot overstate how good this show is and how significant the existence of this show is. This show, for many ways, fills the same sort of place as Moonlight in my queer cinema taste and viewing. I can't really chat with a queer cinephile who hasn't watched Moonlight, and Love in the Big City is very quickly becoming one of those things.
00:59:39
Speaker
If you haven't watched Love in the Big City, do not talk to me. Watch this one, for fuck's sake. It's that good. You owe it to yourself to get this into your psyche. We talked about this show for maybe close to an hour and a half of pre-edit time.
01:00:01
Speaker
And we barely scratched the surface. Since our episode went out, we have been continuing to talk about this show and finding new things to delve into. We are not going to talk about it forever, but we could. Watch it. It's worth everything. And it is one of our stand-up great narratives of the year.
01:00:25
Speaker
our next found out for an narrative is mar wo project from the philippines of that ah gy had like came breakfast year i was starting to lose oh I'm so glad that Anima Studios is still in it, and I'm so glad that they came back with a project like this. It felt really special to me. In a year where I found myself really struggling to connect with Youth Queer storytelling, this show said it was LGBTQIA+, and it meant that with its whole fucking heart.
01:01:00
Speaker
and they put it put its whole ass on the line to tell the stories that it wanted to tell. This was a great viewing experience. If you care about queer art, this show is available for free on YouTube. Please go give them some support. I just can't stop thinking about the back of art, Cheesene.
01:01:18
Speaker
Mm-hmm. About Adrian Lindayog and everything that he does for queer activism in the Philippines. And I'm so glad that he got to play King. Amazing show, amazing music, amazing writing, amazing direction. Oh my god, King's fourth wall breaks. um Amazing. It's just such a good show with a lot of heart, a lot of real, deep, complex feelings to delve into.
01:01:47
Speaker
The funniest thing about dealing with the Vibe Awards is each one of these shows would have decimated other categories it was in. black america yeah project what have decimmate it best to music and been It really would have, it really would have.
01:02:03
Speaker
on miss felt through i was like
01:02:07
Speaker
like and like dragging me offtage so like ah because Come on, come on, come on. No, it's time to go to bed. Come on. and We would have given Love in This Big City show of the year interview if everybody else had watched it would have definitely won genre romance flat out. Like that's how good all of these shows are. But ultimately they are not romances. But that's the point.
01:02:37
Speaker
yeah yeah Our last show is Don't Care for an Old Man's Underwear. We talked about the show at length earlier. This was so spectacular. This was a show where our primary character is a ignorant, misogynist, middle-aged man. And we were rooting for this man very early on in this show. And we loved him by the end of it. This show is so aspirational.
01:03:10
Speaker
in a way that even some of our BLs can't really stand up to. Like this show believes that misogynistic old men can do better and have meaningful, loving, supportive, and positive relationships with their families if they just listen to them a little bit more. Good job, everybody.
01:03:30
Speaker
will to really shoot for the best outcome you could possibly get. This show really modeled what relationship rebuilding and healing could look like in a way that I think is really helpful. And I really liked that a very well-known and popular Japanese comedian was in the lead role of this. Dramas like this are often really important because you have people with clout they've earned well outside of the queer narrative space doing really meaningful work in it and these are the kinds of projects that often reach a lot more people than the BL that we talk about. Like I feel like more people are going to have had a gay storytelling experience because of Interview with the Vampire more than some of these BLs we've talked about on here by a long shot.
01:04:20
Speaker
and I think for the Japanese viewing audience, I think many of them would have probably engaged with Osanopentsu far more likely than they would have engaged with. any of the BL we highlighted on this list earlier. Really important to highlight these kinds of projects because these are the projects that are useful for you to show your friends and family if you're interested in sharing BL with them. These are very good starting points to get into the rest of the genre because they are not BL, but they do open people's minds up to viewing queer media
01:04:57
Speaker
from places they might not have normally expected to get that. Well said. And I just love Makoto's turns of phrase. I think about them a lot, saying that the idol that his wife likes is the Okita family benefactor. That is right beyond my head, went too. Ah, so random is the Okita family's benefact. I understand. and but but but It's such clever writing, the way that he recasts ideas into a way that he can engage with them in an attempt to understand the things that he doesn't understand. I really enjoy that the writing puts him into the role of doing that work. All of the show is on these lists, of course, because it's our Vibe Awards. These are really the things that we loved watching, but I think I have a special place in my heart for open.
01:06:00
Speaker
We talk about a lot of shows on this podcast. We highlight a lot of things. These are the things that will be talked about well beyond this year, or at least we think they will. Please go watch them and be part of that conversation. I think the other thing that the Vipe Awards forces us to do is even in a year that we're struggling a little bit.
01:06:22
Speaker
It reminds us that, no, actually there was a lot of good stuff too. So anyway, there we are. Those are our vibe awards. We're going to put up our final awards listing as part of the transcript for this show. So look out for that when it comes out on Tumblr, but that's going to be it from us. The 2024 vibe awards are over.
01:06:50
Speaker
I'm currently showing Emily Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo and Loving the Big City at the same time. Oh my gosh, so you're giving her the exact same experience we had? I sure am! yeah it Can you believe?
01:07:06
Speaker
that we got both of these shows at the same time. Like how did they think we were supposed to process both of these shows simultaneously? get but They weren't thinking about us. that's do they were They were just like, no, we're just going to put the things out. I just love the idea that a bunch of new Korean viewers who might have become interested in QL following up on Love in the Big City.
01:07:34
Speaker
had Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo right there being advertised at them. like That is so stellar. That was a very good for me. That is going to wrap us up on the 2024 Vibe Awards. Oh my god, guys, we're done for another year. This year, let's see what's going to happen. Is Ben going to not watch him this summer so he doesn't get cranky? Stay tuned to find out.
01:08:04
Speaker
No promises. No demand. Lovers of battlefield. Oh my god, we have drunk too much brown liquor. It is time to go. We out. Say bye to the people, Ben. Peace!