Why do you love episode 12 so much? Or why do you think it's the perfect ending for bb? *genuine question*
oh god i think when it came out i wrote probably thousands upon thousands of words about why i think the ending was good but i don't mind talking about it again because the bad buddy finale is still, to me, one of the best finales of all time
i will split it into two sections. one is why i think it works narratively in the world of the show, and one is why i think it works thematically in our world, the world of the viewers.
narratively:
bad buddy is sold as a romcom, and it does lean into a lot of romcom conventions, but most of the time it actually subverts romcom tropes and skews towards indie or slice-of-life territory. in most romcoms, getting together is the goal of the show, and so it is the climax. in bad buddy, pat and pran get together in episode 5, arguably 7, but either way around the halfway mark.
this is because the big conflicts of bad buddy aren't the conflicts you think you have. for example, when wai outs pran, the narrative focus isn't whether wai will be punished or how pran will forgive him. the narrative focus is how will pat and pran navigate being outed? similarly, when they have a bet, we never get a straight-forward answer for who wins the bet. finally, when it came to the family feud, the real conflict wasn't what's the real reason for their feud or how will they reconcile? the conflict is how will pat and pran find happiness?
we don't actually see a whole lot of ming and dissaya. we see a whole lot of pat and pran dealing with the way ming and dissaya have raised them. and so ming and dissaya making up doesn't matter to us, the audience. what matters is that pat and pran stay together.
in a lesser show, the easy option will be: in order for pat and pran to stay together, ming and dissaya will approve of their relationship, and we all live happily ever after.
however, bad buddy is not a straight-forward romcom. like i said, it defines itself as a romcom in order to subvert romcoms. and so pat and pran just stay together. they find their own happiness. and they say screw what our parents think, but we still love them. in a romcom, this is simply unacceptable. it's a very nuanced answer. it is actually so complicated it has defied western storytelling for decades because western storytelling prefers binary paths for narrative catharsis: happiness or tragedy, success or loss, acceptance or rejection. bad buddy chooses neither. it's very much "neither this nor that, but a secret third thing." it's also a reflection of pat and pran's ethos. they don't win or lose when they compete. they compete because they love each other and the result doesn't matter.
the reason it works narratively is because the show teases a breakup. the audience is horrified. the set up is the cliché last-minute separation, an unhappy drama ending where perhaps they meet years later and get together, and it's unequivocally a loss for pat and pran. it would mean their parents win. it's also a traditional romcom ending in many asian dramas, and so it is easy to believe.
and because the show sets this as the expectation, the neither black-nor-white reality that they lie and stay in a glass closet becomes a happy ending! the viewers are happy, and the characters are happy. narratively speaking, this was executed well and true to the storytelling of bad buddy. it played on the expectations of the viewers and subverted them just as it had been doing for the previous 12 episodes, it was tense and it was satisfying without compromising on bad buddy's dedication to neither winning nor losing. it was also a very big risk to take but choosing a simpler and happier ending wouldn't have been true to the story we'd had up until that point.
thematically:
ok so here is where it gets fun (as in here is where we cry.)
the reason bad buddy does all of this is because it is a romeo and juliet adaptation that functions as a queer allegory. ming and dissaya are stand-ins for capulets and montagues, but they also represent the external familial and societal homophobia that prevents queer people from loving one another openly.
pat and pran are fully realized characters that the audience loves and empathizes with, which means all the irrational and unfair external forces preventing their relationship strikes deeply with the realization that they are simply facing the homophobia all of us have to live with.
realistically speaking, the vast vast majority of gay people live in a glass closet. the vast majority of gay people do not have full acceptance from their parents. the vast majority of gay people have a very complicated relationship with their homophobic family. and yet this is supremely underrepresented in gay media. gay media tends to fall into either the idealism of full acceptance, or the realism of rejection. the unsatisfying reality of being somewhere-in-between is rarely there because it's not cathartic. it's not fun to see it reflected onscreen. it is also antithetical to western storytelling in many ways for many reasons, because western storytelling values a "hero's journey" above all else and a hero cannot have a journey without it ending in victory (for example: the wish-fullfilment 'apology from your parents' that millennial storytelling has been favoring lately) or tragedy (for example: bury your gays). in denying viewers this simple wish-fulfillment or traditional story arc, it instead provides a much more valuable portrayal of everyone else who lives this way, a catharsis of a different kind, of representing reality even if it isn't perfectly neat while still making it narratively satisfying for a mainstream show airing as a romcom. and the thing is, it is a truth of our world, and a very common one at that.
pat and pran are in between. they love their families, but they recognize that their families are wrong. pat and pran are also young and in traditional asian households. more than that, they share what most queer youth also experience: helplessness. pran especially has already been transferred by his mother once. he recognizes that everyone has control over his life but him. pat is more willing to fight but sees the same futility.
in episode 11, they consider rejecting their potential to finish their degrees. they consider running away. they realize in order to live openly, they will end up sacrificing more than they should sacrifice. they will end up sacrificing their own dreams and aspirations and their relationships with their loved ones. pran is willing to do it for pat, but pat doesn't want pran to lose his relationship with his family. and so they go back.
they can't change the world. most of us can't.
but they don't break up. thematically, bad buddy's whole thesis falls into place here:
they can't change the world, but they didn't let the world change them.
they just lie. it's fine. bad buddy is important because the vast majority of gay people live in a closet of some kind, out to some people but not to others, susceptible to forces they can't control with the same sense of helplessness (many, many bad buddy fans watch from countries where being gay is either illegal or extremely dangerous or both.) and that's okay. it makes sure to point out that lying was not a cowardly choice on their part, it was the smart and correct choice to make. it was even a generous choice by the end, because they were just sparing their parents' feelings. by the end of the show, it becomes clear their parents know but won't address it openly. they're not hiding. they're just not prioritizing other people and protecting their own peace. this is often framed as a loss in queer media. bad buddy points out that it isn't a loss, because there is no winning or losing with love.
bad buddy makes the statement that being in love is enough. not letting the world change you is enough. choosing love is enough. as long as they don't take away your love, you are not obligated to do more than this.
anyway thats why episode 12, more than being an epilogue to pat and pran's story, is thematically brilliant and compassionate and above all an unconventional and brave storytelling choice to make.
