#no denials

That the show is more interested in specific class commentary than in the commentary that the characters themselves offer about their situations.

Which is to say...

Joke's trauma is being underwritten and turned into something funny because Jack's trauma is the serious part of the show, because Jack's trauma from poverty overrules Jack's trauma from his struggles with school and with feeling like a constant scapegoat and unworthy of being loved.

Jack is allowed every trauma, he is allowed to say that he has never dreamed and that being poor means you don't dream even when he's the one who dreamed where Joke never had a thought of his own future in his mind but that wasn't important because he wasn't poor and he wasn't trapped in that way and so it doesn't matter as much ans his lack of dreams is never commented on.

Jack leaves Joke standing in front of a class full of children with a problem he can't solve and it's played as funny, as lighthearted, as if Joke on the verge of a panic attack is something that everyone should be laughing at because his trauma isn't treated as deep or serious. His father, who is the reason for most of this trauma, is sent in to rescue him and then they resolve their relationship. And... that's that! He's invited home. It's over. None of that trauma matters anymore and it was all meant to be funny, to be a joke, to be something Jack did for him... you know, humiliate him because he's bad at school. Funny.

The show is more interested in making class commentary than it is on character commentary and that's why I'm worried that Jack won't be the one to go after Joke but that Joke will have to come back again, that Joke will have to fight for them again, that it will always be Joke fighting because the show doesn't care about Joke's trauma except to solve it as quickly and unimportantly as possible so they can focus on Jack and his neighborhood.

And I'm not saying Jack doesn't have trauma or that commenting about that is wrong or that class commentary is wrong but what I am saying is that Moonlight Chicken did it better and deeper and faced down the fact that trauma happens no matter how much money you have and that trauma might be different depending on class but it's all still trauma all the way down.

Jack has his trauma but so does Joke but the show doesn't care about Joke's trauma because they want to make a commentary on classism and class issues and that means that Joke's issues can never be as bad or as important as Jack's because he's not part of the commentary or at least he wasn't. Now he is and so his new trauma is allowed but the old things? They have to just... stop.

I am struggling with this a lot so I'm making this post to get words and thoughts out. This doesn't mean I hate the show or the characters or the creators or even that I'm not enjoying it! This is just a specific aspect of the show itself and an ongoing issue in Thai B: that has frustrated me for a while tbh because it's so often that they can only honor the trauma of one of the characters in a relationship so the other gets brushed aside (see also: Mhok of Last Twilight).

Mob is willing to accept that the entire world is gay as long as it's not anyone in his family. And he'd prefer not to be his friends either but he can accept that.

But you can see his growth in the second season. Not just for himself but also for his brother. He helps his brother make up with his boyfriend and is even happy for them until he reminds himself that he's not supposed to be.

And his feeling for Kikuchi have spent the entire season trying to grow and being ignored because Mob doesn't want to accept that side of himself.

He even considers faking amnesia just to escape from his own heart. There's no escape from yourself, though, as hard as you try. And the instant the voice in his head suggests he might care about someone else besides Kikuchi? All those feelings have nowhere to go and all that denial goes out the window.

Because Kikushi is the only person that truly respects Mob's boundaries and the only person who truly gives Mob space and time and doesn't constantly pressure him. And Mob knows that.

Oh, Macau and Chay dating would the messiest thing in the world, it's true. Between them both being teenagers and inexperienced and in very different ways traumatized in a multitude of ways that aren't visible to the eye...

They also have Porsche and Vegas as big brothers.

Porsche and Vegas would just be... fascinating. And having Kinn in that circle as well? Oh, it'd be messy AF.

Between Vegas and Kinn and Porsche... Chay and Macau would practically be Romeo and Juliet half the time. They'd have to fight for any time together, they're both have to sneak away to get together...

That was absolutely one of the best scenes I've seen in a long time. To watch Porsche just tear Big into pieces over his assumptions about him despite genuinely being surprised and even shocked that Kinn was gay. Because it mattered more to him to be able to show him that he couldn't be flustered and to mean it.

Porsche handled it perfectly and it was the most confident we've seen him since the became a bodyguard. That was the most comfortable we've seen him since he left the bar, frankly.

But, yeah, for Kinn to watch that was also powerful because it was both showing him what his traditional bodyguards are willing to do and assume about other people versus how Porsche reacts to the revelation and the way he holds himself and the way he talks about himself.

Loom/Unloom/Loom/Unloom/Loom/Loom/Loom/Unloom