#hctm

All the junk (buttons and stamps) I made for my Strawpage that I couldn't find elsewhere..! much love!

I used this site to make all the buttons : )

Finally someone tagged me! Thank you @williamrikers I've been dying to participate in this one.

You'll notice I'm long-winded as ever, and for some of these, I've spliced in some of my previous writing. But hope's a perennial interest for me as a viewer. I hope you don't mind.

Boys In Love

Hope...that I'm understood and supported

I've made it no secret that I share many similarities with Shane, and I'm lucky to have had partners like Kit twice in my life. Kit and the writing in the series treated Shane's autistic behaviors with delicacy, accuracy, and kindness far beyond what I've seen for a gifted autistic-styled character most anywhere else (coded or explicit). The characterization even opened my eyes to some overgeneralized social logics I had instilled. Mick played it's nuances beautifully, too. A spiky profile, as they say.

It balanced the support for his character with demonstrations of Shane supporting others' challenges. The ending made no promises for his future or the other boys, except that they could cherish being truly cared about for now as they took one step at a time forward. People like me and Shane are just people who exist in the world and make our way through life, and it fills me with hope to see creators and characters who understand and appreciate that.

The Trainee

Hope...that the world doesn't ask or require perfection from us

This was my first BL introduction to plot de-escalation. I'm trained to expect a mounting of conflict in my stories (fiction, like this, as well as nonfiction like the one's told on the news or by friends). They culminate in an explosion of sorts, with a cause or person to blame and a few heroes who overcome that mess. Shows like The Trainee, with their alternative structure, revealed how cynical and stress-inducing that line of thought was.

There was no 'gotcha!' moment here. The series brought us so many situations that could've sparked drama or set off a firing process for one of the employees. Maybe you felt some of the problems should've been dealt with that way. The point of the series wasn't the consequences of actions, though. Each week, instead, the episodes restored the dignity of its characters so they could learn and grow and let others inspire them to move forward.

The director's speech to the interns at their farewell party highlighted the central theme perfectly. "I remember the first day we met. I heard none of you were any good. I couldn't tell if three months later, you'd be any better. I just wanted you to find your own path and see your own worth." What kinds of grace and patience are we willing to give ourselves in order to seek out and work toward meaningful lives? And once we can offer this to ourselves how do we offer it to others? if you're feeling lost on your path in life and need a kind hand to comfort and guide you, I can't recommend a better internship than the one offered at Good Pick in The Trainee.

The On1y One

Hope...in hope, itself

While it was airing, I gushed about how The On1y One's open ending was all about the ability of us and the characters to hope. For me, with its thorough investment in the themes of ephemeral pain and beauty, The On1y One is a rare instance where the intangible hope for a future story we can't see lies at the very foundation of the series itself. It chooses the moon instead of the tangible coin. We have to believe in potentials and futures that didn't necessarily arrive for these characters. Author Marilynne Robinson writes in What Are We Doing Here, "We may all live in anticipation more than in present time, worry and dread pulling us out of the moment, too, but hope giving us better purpose, the imagination of what might fall into place, to our benefit or satisfaction. Hope shapes intention. It leaves improbable possibilities open." This series did not seal itself with a kiss the way many viewers seemed to want, but for me it artfully opened a door of possibility.

The last image we get in the series is that ellipsis of belief, moving us toward something we cannot see. After Jiang Tian symbolically reties the circle of his bracelet, committing to a bond with someone after his years of abandonment, we return to the dreamlike image of the glass pitcher filled with mint lemon tea--the one we've watched break again and again in flashbacks--now whole again. So it is with these two. We hear a nondiegetic promise from Sheng Wang that he'll come back. It's ostensibly a promise to return to Class A for Jiang Tian but it's also a promise of a greater reunification for them and all things. What's broken is rendered whole again, not exactly as it was, maybe not even in reality, but in hope.

Only Friends

Hope...that you're not alone in this mess

Said a drag queen, "We're selfish and vain creatures of beauty, and isn't it bizarre how we make the best friends in the world?" That queen, Sharon Needles, has since been widely disowned by fans for her offensive comments and other queens for her rude behavior and disruptive drug habits. Ah, sweet irony! The ugly, honest truth of queer friendship was at the heart of Only Friends, which more than any other BL attempted to capture queers in all their petty contradictions--it's not a coincidence that many of the emerging gay male BL podcast pairs start with this series. It hits close to home.

How could that ugliness fill me with hope? Well, I've known these people, experienced these kinds of broken friendships, watched self-righteous discourse roll across my screen about who should be canceled, excluded, punished, and barred from our concern. Even a doctor's diagnosis that offers no cure can still be a comfort. You're not imagining it! A diet of narratives about everything only getting better has the side-effect of making the world a disappointment compared to the ideal insisted upon.

For a more literary perspective than drag race, writer Wendy Smith wrote about Chekhov that he "invites us to be tolerant and accepting, to see the inevitability of change, but to understand that it brings loss as well as gain. His characters can be foolish, selfish, oblivious, wrongheaded, even hurtful, but their longings and loneliness are so evident." The Realism of Only Friends comforts me. I am not a lone perpetrator of or witness to the mess of life. 'Shit happens' is a compassionate, hopeful message for a series to offer if you've felt alone amongst the shit while everyone said you ought to be smelling roses. In fact, demands for ideal subjects can cause severe political damage. Gays, like any other group, don't deserve civil rights because they're morally pure--no one is. It's because they're human.

Cherry Magic Thailand

Hope...that people want to care for others

Achi is not unkind or inconsiderate, but Cherry Magic's gently-offered observation that his insecurity (like our own) derives and reproduces itself through negative assumptions about others' thoughts is profound. He doesn't realize it and would never do it intentionally. In fact, he admires most everyone and their capability. He just has a hard time seeing his own worth, and projects that blind spot onto others instead of seeking out their actual perspectives as an alternative. When we truly engage with others face-to-face, Cherry Magic believes we'll start to see how others admire the light we bring to the world, too.

Cherry Magic Thailand is overflowing with kindness and love. And it matters so much that it's a queer narrative at the center. Presuming others won't see your worth is so much more ingrained when there's such a prevalent history of it. This series insisted upon pushing past that history to create a new present in which we can appreciate that most people are genuinely seeking ways to care for other people. Maybe not to the sparkly-eyed level of Karan, but people will be thankful you see them as a person to trust and ask for support.

Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo

Hope...that the cycles of abuse and neglect can be broken

For all the hope that people genuinely want to care, I'm no stranger to the crueler realities of the world. Without diving into my personal history, I'll just say I'm fast to spot a dangerous glint in someone's eyes, and for a portion of my life, like Do Hoe, lived in fear and restraint at the thought of enacting some things I'd experienced.

LFTCOT in its Realism is an intense watch, but every moment depicts the two leads attempting to break out from the cruelty. The leads stumble and, without realizing it, stubbornly mirror the psychology of their families as they grow older but always in a drive to move beyond those painful pasts. Particularly, I felt understood by the draw they both have to work with children, overseeing their growth, care, and protection in contrast to how they experienced adolescence. To watch them in the last episode soft and free from the entanglement of their shame and past miseries changed me.

Peaceful Property

Hope...that the current state of the world is not permanent

I won't even claim to be a strict Marxist, or anything, but hear me out. Marx wrote (and has been widely misunderstood for writing), "The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property." In Peaceful Property, we watch a landlord release his properties to tenants one by one, until he finally smashes a model of his own family's first home, releasing all their accumulated savings. It's one of many political threads sewn into a series that at the heart of the issue is more concerned about the spiritual alienation and loneliness everyone is made to feel from their work, from themselves, and from each other under this system.

It's not that I think a QL series or a whole slew of them will end capitalism, but I'm moved by the depth and the emotional sensitivity with which screenwriter P'Dome showed these theories (meta incoming on that front). There is a celebration of explicit and subtextual political density in the writing of Thai QLs that thrills me. American writers especially have as of late leaned into irony and tragedy to convey political messaging, but in Thailand, despite a more restrictive regime, they have found a means to transform their frustrations and knowledge into heartwarming broad-appealing entertainment brimming with commentary and hope.

What Did You Eat Yesterday?

Hope...that even the smallest gestures matter

The signing of a paper in someone's kitchen, a grocery errand for a bag of onions, flexibility in the household budget for a cuter cafe: these are some of the reasons I sobbed--often for more than half an hour--while watching this series. WDYEY is a slice-of-life comedy in nearly the purest sense. It focuses on such intimately mundane aspects of an older gay couple's life together. I could've included this for the hope it brought me as simply a rare model of older gay men, but it's more than that.

Shiro and Kenji's ages place them in a position to appreciate how the small gestures we perform make up our life, offering a balm when the world is chaotic or harsh and a blessing to existence when we could so easily take it's gifts for granted. Childhood's are spent, and parents' pass. Our own lives and those of the people closest to us are so much more precarious than we can bear to always acknowledge. In the face of these existential facts, the cooking instructions slipped into each episode become a ritual. We boil the water, mince the garlic, sear the salmon (it was on sale!), and someone will be home from work soon who will see the daily efforts we've done our best performing to be alive in this world.

He's Coming to Me

Hope...that the people we've lost still matter

Remembering those we've lost in our art, in ceremony, and in even just in our hearts, HCTM insists, helps us to carry a part of them with us. Much of my adolescent awareness of gay men was shaded by the HIV/AIDS pandemic and its unfairness. It's a painful moment in history to recall, but how cruel it would be to move beyond the people who's lives were stigmatized and cut short by it.

HCTM found a profoundly uplifting queer metaphor to commemorate the passing of the torch from a lost generation to those who grew up unconsciously grieving their mentors' absence. Some felt cheated by the ending's refusal to fully bring P'Med back to life, but for me it affirmed that hope is never extinguished, not even by death.

A Tale of Thousand Stars

Hope...that I matter

There's a fine edge to deep-seated shame, which for many of us doesn't ever quite touch suicidality. Without breaking the skin, it merely presses down on our hearts with a sharp doubt about our worthiness, whether someone else might live our lives better than we are living them. With no way to restrain the blade, we put our effort into living our lives as an apology for who we are and what we can't forgive ourselves for. We live for others, and even if we can't find solace at least we try to be kind. The slow build-up of the depths of Tian's shame over the course of the series culminating in the cathartic star-counting scene, where Phupha grabs him by the shoulders on the mountain urging him, "No one should use their their whole life to repay someone else's," freed me from a weight years of therapy couldn't manage alone.

It was paired by a theme and a performance by Mix that highlighted the complex internal sense of femininity for many gay men that, due to social persecution and ridicule, can make them feel wrong and unworthy of life even under the most privileged circumstances. By the end, A Tale of Thousand Stars offered hope that I could accept myself--the dreams I have, the intuitions I feel, the paths I choose, the ways I express myself, even the mistakes I make--and at least a few people who mattered to me could love me compassionately without feeling affronted or abandoned when I choose to follow my heart where it needs to go. They'll still be there for me no matter what I do.

My School President

Hope...that it's getting better

Not in a utopic fashion, mind you, but watching MSP had me reflecting on how different my life might've been if a show like this been on The Disney Channel or ABC Family growing up. If it had been allowed there, it would've meant the broader culture was accepting of boys falling in love. I would've had feelings far less compartmentalized, conversations far more celebratory, crushes I could've fully realized, for which I'd roll off my bed in giggles and pouts like Tinn.

This series seems to be the most accurate reflection of what the (chaster-side of) adolescent beginnings for gay attraction can look like in the current culture. It's not entirely devoid of homophobia, but it's no longer so beholden to it. There is joy--in the experiences and the media--where struggle and tragedy once predominated. For all the awful things happening in the world, it's because of series like this I can see ways it's getting better. At least I hope so, and that's the point.

For anyone who read through all of this self-indulgence, bless you! Consider yourself tagged just for that feat.

Let's close our eyes and make a wish.

Mummy song for the week 👅

Here they come

He's Coming to Me (2019)

[What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far. Today, I’ll cover He’s Coming To Me, how this show centers Thai-Chinese/Asian culture, shipper culture, and the brilliance of Ohm Pawat and Singto Prachaya. THIS IS A LONG POST.]

I’m gonna have to hold myself down for this one. He’s Coming To Me. This kind of show. HCTM is ABSOLUTELY the reason why I created this project watchlist in the first place -- to watch this kind of show. This show cements my utter respect and passion for the work of Aof Noppharnach. This guy’s work needs to be taught in schools. 

I’m like -- after days of finishing HCTM, and furiously and hungrily rewatching episodes, I am still shaking my damn head at this show. I knew it was great, but y’all didn’t prepare me for ITS GREATNESS. (And to be watching it the same week as Our Skyy 2 x Bad Buddy x A Tale of Thousand Stars -- it’s been an Aof-themed moment, and I’m a touch overwhelmed by EVERYTHING I’ve absorbed.)

I am actually contemplating -- I’m seriously contemplating this! -- if I like this show better than either Bad Buddy or Moonlight Chicken. I know, I KNOW. I’m not talking about the story, the structure, the filming, the writing and direction. I’m literally just talking about my own damn preferences. I might just LIKE this show better, for what it held, what it told, and how the show showed so much respect for its story.

And there’s a lot I want to touch on in this piece, so as usual, a little list for myself:

1) Where this show came from vis à vis the watchlist, and what I think it meant by way of previous BLs 2) The Asianness of the show and how it transcended the usual BL tropes 3) A celebration of Aof’s favorite themes, and how cool it was to see them being born in HCTM (including the theme of young/first love that I haven’t seen before in his work) 4) A hopefully brief and not angry reflection on shipper culture, homophobia, Ohm, Singto, and how that affected HCTM in the annals of Thai BL

Without having seen his My Dear Loser work, or his screenwriting for Gay OK Bangkok 1 and 2 (which I plan to watch after the OGMMTVC is over, in preparation for Only Friends): HCTM is the first full Aof vehicle to enter my watchlist. So just quickly looking behind me: I’ve had shows like Love Sick, SOTUS, Together With Me, Love By Chance -- shows that began to toe the line, then define the line, then sharpen the line of what BL was. As I wrote in my Love By Chance review last week, I felt that LBC was the first show on my watchlist that felt like a true derivative BL, complete with tropes that had been born during Love Sick and SOTUS, and sharpened over those first few years of the Thai BL industry growing.

So it’s 2019 now, and we get He’s Coming To Me, both written and directed by P’Aof. Tropes? No tropes. What a flip from LBC.

Instead, we get an absolute head-first dive into many of the themes that we see Aof continued to play with in his later works. For me, HCTM evoked Moonlight Chicken the most, especially for what I call the Asianness of this show -- Aof’s unabashed focus on Asian cultural themes and threads that create structure and movement for his characters.

Before I get ahead of myself, I want to thank @telomeke very deeply for chatting with me about how I could learn more about Thai-Chinese culture, because themes and behaviors related to Thai-Chinese demographics are clearly common in Thai BLs, and I’ve felt that it behooved me to learn more about the culture (or as much as I can from the internet) as I continue to review these shows. But @telomeke reminded me that a lot of the assimilation of Chinese cultures and populations mirror the cultural mixing that took and takes place in Malaysia, where a part of my family hails and where I’ve spent a good portion of my life. So I’m relieved that I actually understand more about Thai-Chinese culture than I gave myself credit for, BUT -- that’s only a caveat, because I still have so much more to learn.

I say this because I’m using this word, “Asianness,” to describe in part at least one impression I have about HCTM, which is taking seriously the theme of ghosts and what role ghosts play in a human’s life. We see very often in Japanese doramas the practice of praying at an altar honoring past ancestors -- ancestor culture and worship are big in Japan, and the doramas don’t shy away from that. We see temple trips all the time in doramas and BL doramas -- especially during New Year’s. (Our Dining Table being just the most recent one.) We see Buddhist temple culture in Thai BLs often -- in KinnPorsche, in Bed Friend, in Big Dragon, and very especially in Moonlight Chicken.

I think what I want to point out here, if I can say it eloquently, is that a Western viewer might find more notable in an Asian drama, than in a Western show, the inclusion of practices of spirituality. In the West, spirituality might be indicated by a trip to a church, or prayer. But it strikes me -- and maybe this is because I’m a first-generation Asian-American, my eyes open to ALL the differences between my culture and America -- that Asian dramas incorporate the practices of spirituality more seamlessly, because practices like lighting an incense stick and giving a quick prayer before breakfast is more culturally embedded in places like Japan or Thailand. The practice is there, and you just do it, because that’s what you do for your culture. (I often see a stick of incense lit and burning next to a plate of fruits in the early mornings when I jog past Thai restaurants. It’s just -- what you do.)

It struck me, and I still wonder about it, if Western viewers may have thought that Thun was going overboard with his interest in Thai-Chinese Buddhist practices, including being so diligent about offering alms to the passing monks, going to the temple for merits, and keeping electric incense sticks on him to make sure that Med wouldn’t disappear. An auntie on Whatsapp might cock a curious eyebrow, but also regard Thun as a “good boy” who’s devoted to the temple.

In any case, this struck me particularly deeply, because I think, if P’Aof had been a little more abashed, that he could have toned this theme down -- the theme of the everyday practice of Buddhism.

And he didn’t. He didn’t tone it down. He leveraged it as THE major theme of the drama: that ghosts exist in Thai-Chinese-Buddhist culture and practice, and that some people can communicate with ghosts, including both Thun and his mom. 

The ABSOLUTELY wonderful @telomeke​ affirmed this for me, writing so eloquently: “Underlying HCTM is an unshakeable belief in the spirit world, and it's also a given ... for a majority of people in SE Asia and Thailand in particular that the spiritual realm is as much a part of the everyday world as much as the physical reality of what we can see and touch.”

The reason why I’m hammering on this in particular is because it categorizes the show as one that is utterly representative of A SPECIFIC CULTURE -- just like Moonlight Chicken, with its commentaries on spiritual and economic practices of the particular place of Pattaya. @telomeke​, I know you have specific feelings about the ending of HCTM, which I’ll get to in a moment, but I think for me, the ending of HCTM is deeply satisfying BECAUSE of this connection to Thai-Buddhist culture, what it says about ghosts and spirits, and how they continue to be incorporated in the ongoing life of a young Thai adult like Thun. AND, I appreciated that the ending skirted, just slightly, what we might have expected about someone losing their lover (à la Eternal Yesterday). Thun only temporarily lost Med... but Med still doesn’t quite exist. And I think there’s layers there that I’ll hopefully get to teasing out, either here or in a future post.

Going back to BL tropes and structures... I mean, HCTM was just like, yo, I’m gonna play in another ball field. I’ll have more thoughts on this after I watch Dark Blue Kiss, but at least, as far as I’m aware WITHOUT having seen DBK yet, that it’s not until late 2021 that P’Aof begins playing in the BL sandbox, takes his toy dump truck, and turns the tropes upside down in Bad Buddy.

And I see, in HCTM, P’Aof laying the groundwork for the themes that he DOES love, that I happen to love, and that get repeated in his oeuvre:

- The theme of community: the need for young and old queer individuals to interact with other queer individuals (most recently depicted in OS2/BBS/ATOTS) - The theme of NOSTALGIA: Med having never left his moment 20 years prior, listening to the same music of Thun’s mom’s generation (nostalgia being most recently depicted in Moonlight Chicken) - The parable of 1,000 stars: what it means to be the last star on which to make a wish (most recently depicted in ATOTS and OS2/ATOTS) - The anguish of coming out: Thun, Uncle Jim, Li Ming, Pran coming out to Dissaya -- all heavy, all impactful, all different stories that carry heaviness and their own meaning to each of these incredible characters

And there’s so many more. But what I really want to do, to get up on the rooftops that P’Aof loves so much, and YELL TO THE AIR is:

THE GENIUS, THE SHEER GENIUS, of linking these themes -- many of these as ASIAN themes! -- to specific issues that face the queer community, such as coming out, and being invisible (like a ghost) in a majority cishet society. 

GAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH. Oh, the pain in my heart. This is exactly what I wrote in my notes while rewatching the show: “This is the first time we get Big Cultural Themes outside of issues with the queer community -- and Aof LINKS the Big Cultural Themes WITH queer issues -- the brilliance of it all.” Just like he did subsequently in Moonlight Chicken.

What was so beautiful to me about He’s Coming To Me -- and how it was channeled with GENIUS TALENT AND GRACE from Ohm and Singto -- is that, unlike Moonlight Chicken, this was the story of one young man who needed to sort out his feelings. And there was another young man, a young man who was killed, who HAD begun realizing his feelings, but was trapped by station (from a rich family) and role (the only son in a family). Med even said, it would have been impossible for him to come out as the only son of his family.

As far as we knew, Med had only come out to Kwan, Thun’s mom, before he died. Med may have very well been attracted to other men before he died -- but we see him VISCERALLY attracted to Thun, and vice versa, and that burst of first love for both young men, IN THE CONTEXT OF Thun’s spiritual practice and abilities to BRING Med to “life” in Thun’s life -- I mean. I’m shaking my head. It’s a parable for manifesting what you want in your life, and making it happen. 

And yet, what HCTM also touches on, is that many times, you DON’T get what you want in life. Med WILL disappear one day. He will be reborn. It wasn’t his time at the moment of the ending, but it will be his time one day. Thun only has Med temporarily -- we don’t see the WHEN of that. 

BUT. I would posit (and @telomeke​ and @wen-kexing-apologist​, I wonder what you think of this), à la OS2/Bad Buddy, that P’Aof is OKAY with us not seeing this, and not necessarily considering the ending of HCTM to be a happy ending for Thun and Med. Because he knows -- and he knows that his Asian viewers know -- that Med WILL leave Thun one day. Not yet, though. Thun still has a little time to grow wiser and older and stronger. But Med WILL disappear one day. He had been hinting at it all throughout every episode of the series. He will have to leave Thun’s side. 

I think the way the show ended was graceful. It leaves that door open for Med to find his rebirth, because was a good kid and deserves to be reborn in a happy life. It allows Thun time to grow through his first love -- first love being such an important theme to this show. It’s COMPASSIONATE to Thun, very similar to me to the kind of compassion that P’Aof showed to Uncle Jim throughout Moonlight Chicken, and just now in OS2/ATOTS to Phupha. But it’s also rooted in the SPIRITUAL REALITY that Med WILL leave -- just not yet. And P’Aof is saying, I didn’t need to show y’all, because y’all Asians already know, Med’s outta here one day. 

The other thing to note about the ending is that P’Aof had already shown a tremendous amount of Thun’s pain. Thun wasn’t necessarily HAPPY in this show. He was curious, exploring, and loyal to Med. While Thun is clearly a young man who DEMONSTRATES happiness -- MY GAWD, the 19-year-old smile of Ohm Pawat!!! -- I wouldn’t say that he was a happy child. He lost his dad young. He was SCARED as hell for potentially letting his mom down. And: he had a lot of secrets to keep. The secret of being gay. The secret of being able to see and talk to ghosts.

“He’s coming to me.” Thun comes out, twice. He’s gay, and can see ghosts. 

Even though others can’t see ghosts, I can. Even though others aren’t gay, I’m gay. Mom: I’m different. 

When Thun sobs for Med while holding onto the jar of stars in his bedroom. When Thun spins around, looking for Med on the rooftop in episode five. When Thun calls for Med and Med isn’t there. Thun is alone. He is alone with his secrets, and Med is not there -- he is NOT coming to Thun in those moments -- and Thun is left alone, different and unique, as he has been his whole life.

I’d posit that that uniqueness is particularly difficult to deal with in collectivist Asian societies as in Thailand -- which led, in part, to Thun not knowing the language of his feelings as he came out to Med in episode five on the rooftop, and being SCARED, to his bones, to come out to his friends and his mom in episode six.

For 2019: I see this show as being ahead of its time, way ahead of its time. I have lots of theories as to why this show isn’t considered a more striking part of the canon of Thai BLs, and the incredible @bengiyo​ and @shortpplfedup​ have helped me to understand the magnitude of the impact that P’Aof made in breaking up the KristSingto ship to pair Singto with Ohm -- and how the fan shippers came for HCTM, and pushed GMMTV to hide this show for years before finally releasing it on YouTube with subs.

But besides that fucking bullshit, which I’ll return to in a second, I also want to note that maybe -- considering that we have more years now, after 2019, to consider the massive trove of Thai BLs that exist now -- the skirting of the still-nascent BL tropes framework was too early for many when this show came out. As I’ve demonstrated here in this piece -- this show’s complicated. There’s A LOT A LOT. I mean, I’m in love with P’Aof’s work because I LIKE HAVING A LOT in my shows. But you go a flip side and you get Together With Me and MaxTul with love bites and throaty kisses (in the words of Seinfeld, not that there’s anything wrong with that). 

HCTM is heavy. It carried a lot that wasn’t overtly sexual by nature, like many BLs at that moment in 2019 and right beforehand (randy Perth, randy MaxTul, etc.).

I understand from @bengiyo​ and @shortpplfedup​ that, because Ohm needed to move on from Make It Right and the OhmToey ship due to Toey leaving BL after MIR, and Ohm joining forces with Singto, that Ohm received massive criticism, and continues to be a subject of criticism and bullying today (some of which I’ve seen on this site). And that Singto was also the subject of online bullying as well.

With all of this in mind -- Ohm, Singto, and the unique nature of HCTM -- I’m continuing to mull over the issue of homophobia in shipper culture. If BLs are reduced down SIMPLY to the pairings that lead these shows -- and that there’s an EXPECTATION that the shows NEED to depict certain acts of queer sexuality, SPECIFICALLY among actors who identify as straight -- that seems straight up homophobic to me.

I can see HCTM being too ahead of its time to begin shifting that paradigm. I’ll see what Dark Blue Kiss does next in the Aof oeuvre from this purview, but what I want to get at is:

IT IS CRIMINAL THAT HCTM ISN’T MORE WIDELY KNOWN. This show is affecting me literally at the same level as Bad Buddy and Moonlight Chicken.

What HCTM HELD by way of Asian culture and spirituality, by the RESPECT IT HAD for the experience of first young queer love, by LEVERAGING the ABSOLUTE BRILLIANCE OF ACTING OF OHM AND SINGTO (omg, AND SINE INTHIRA, are you kidding me?!?!?), and, oh shit, by BRINGING THAT ALL TOGETHER? To TELL a story of queerness and spirituality in Thailand?

Fuck. I’m just shaking my head. If it’s too much for the shipper folk, then... okay, go off. Leave the good stuff to me and the fam that GETS IT — the fam that gets that what we’re watching is ART, and not intended vessels for fantasy and fetish.

Last notes. I just want to say that in my SOTUS reviews, that I theorized that Singto would be brilliant when paired with a really good actor, and HCTM proved it to me. If it weren’t for this fucking shipper bullshit, I would have liked to see Singto and Ohm paired again.

Ohm is probably the most prevalent actor on my Thai BL list. I get that he was nicknamed “the king of BL,” and that he’s been the target of bias for that label and his predilection for being utterly brilliant in telling queer stories (thank you to @bengiyo​ and @miscellar​ for helping to fill me in on this).

Let me just say that this man is a goddamn MASTER. @shortpplfedup​ nailed it in her Ohm appreciation post.  @absolutebl summarizes why Ohm is singular in this BL space. Shippers who want to bully the mans, bring him down or whatever, spread misinformation, I want to say, angrily and rudely -- fuck off, and be afraid of talent in y’alls lives. 

With the tangle of homophobia and cyberbullying that seem to have an overstated impact on the Thai BL industry, it is a damn shame that Ohm doesn’t get more of his flowers, because he makes shows better. I mean: this guy OWNS ROOFTOPS. Episode five of HCTM?! Episode five of Bad Buddy?! Get this guy on a rooftop and he will SLAY. Pair him with people -- Singto? Nanon? Perth? OHM MAKES THESE GUYS BETTER ACTORS than they ever were previously.

I say the following, in all honesty, with a touch of disdain, of condescension, and sadness, for the people who don’t watch this show because it doesn’t have pectorals or hot make-out sessions, and because it features actors that many fans might want to bully:

HCTM does not have the reputation that it deserves. It’s not just a good show. It’s an HONORABLE show. For me, it pays homage to Asian cultures and practices that I relate to. It features a story of queer revelations and love that is written with passion and respect. It features probably the best acting I’ve seen so far on my watchlist. And it features two actors who were willing to subvert expectations, at the risk of their own careers, to tell this story, as written and directed by one of of the most brilliant, subversive, experimental, and creative filmmakers I’ve ever watched in Aof Noppharnach.

I want and need BL fans to appreciate Asian culture more in these shows. And I want and need BL fans to appreciate human behavior development as well. Because P’Aof is telling stories out here, stories that can enrich our lives. I wrote in my Bad Buddy thesis that BBS will be required viewing for my children. HCTM joins that list. HCTM makes me want to be a better Asian mother, and to make a world for my children where the experience of first love and coming out can be regarded not with pain, but with celebration and joy.

[It’s going to take me a while to get over HCTM, but I’ve already begun Dark Blue Kiss, and am having a FABULOUS time with it. That opening theme! P’Aof and JOCKS! Yum. Another frappé, please.

Here’s the updated list! Much to the chagrin of everyone-I-know-on-Tumblr (I’M SORRY @shortpplfedup​), I’m adding a VERY fast rewatch of ATOTS. Blame it on Our Skyy 2. I’ll want to watch ATOTS after the cinematic affair that is ITSAY, and after I’ve seen P’Aof do his thing on two existing series in DBK/Kiss and Still 2gether. ATOTS was my very first P’Aof series, and I want to rewatch it in chronology.

Here we go. As always, I’ll take recs, comments, etc.!