FOUR THEMED THAI BL SERIES RECOMMENDATIONS
by me (key)
INTRO
I've done top-ten lists before, but I think a better approach than a numbered list is to order them by why I'm recommending them. Some of my favorites are well-known, but a few gems definitely went overlooked in international fandom for various reasons (accessibility, aired during an over-saturated season, etc.), so I wanted to give them a li'l well-deserved boost. Anyway, here are four of my top fifteen selected at random:
¶ IF YOU LIKE A SOLID PLOT
Triage (2022)
Synopsis: Third-year emergency medicine resident Tin has to cope with a deluge of different patients every day. Up until the eighteenth, that is. Tin's life is transformed when university student Tol's car is overturned and he's rushed to the emergency room in serious condition. That night doesn't end when Tin fails to save Tol's life, though. When Tin next wakes, he finds himself in a time loop, a loop he won't be able to leave until he's altered Tol's fate.
Review: This was TaeTee's comeback series after years apart, and it was a massive hit domestically. Due to geoblocking and paywalls (AISPLAY is a notoriously challenge for international viewers), it didn't really take off as a fandom among overseas fans. But oh, is this worth it. Whatever way you choose to watch, I highly, highly recommend this one. The time-loop premise is genuinely fascinating, and so is the actual story structure.
And there are cats!!!
Plot-wise, I'd say Triage has the best writing of any BL series I've seen. More than once, I was texting a friend who'd already seen it, "This is like a show-show!" And what I mean by that is that a lot of BL series still seem to lean on genre-specific tropes to please audiences. They don't really bother themselves with things like character arcs or basic storytelling elements. And those series have value too! Sometimes mindless entertainment is all we want. But if you're in the mood for a series with a plot, some mystery, one of my favorite female characters, one of my favorite side couples, and some brilliant character arcs, definitely give Triage a watch.
Tin is brilliant and analytical but a very broken lightbulb when it comes to most social situations.
Important Note: If you've seen Cutie Pie and/or Love in the Air, you need to see Triage just to witness the incredible duality of Tonnam's acting skills. Sing easily is one of my top five favorite BL characters. He's the grumpy parent friend who will call you stupid for working when you're sick and then bring you soup and an electric blanket. I love him so much, so please love him also and help me write more SingGap fics please there are only like three of us out here and we need more please we're very hungry.
¶ IF YOU LIKE CHARACTER-DRIVEN STORIES
Between Us (2022)
Synopsis: Team is a talented swimmer who just entered university. However, when it comes to swim competitions, he's never able to perform to the best of his abilities. When swim team upperclassman Win comes to know that the problem doesn't lie in Team's abilities or dedication, but rather his trauma and the sleeping difficulties it causes, he offers up his own room for Team to stay in. With the comfort of company, Team's performance starts to improve and feelings start to grow between the two young men. But Team isn't the only one with issues from his past preventing him from moving forward. Win struggles with how to handle receiving love and how to give special treatment to those closest to him. Occurring parallel to the events of "Until We Meet Again," this story focuses on how Win and Team come to know and inspire growth in each other.
We're in The House of WinTeam, you knew it'd be here.
Review: Between Us was first announced in May 2020 (on Win's birthday no less!). WinTeam got me into Thai BL through two gif sets here on Tumblr that I randomly stumbled across in February 2020. I marathoned what was available of Until We Meet Again, and it became and continued to be my favorite BL series until Between Us started airing last month.
Between Us is essentially a series about character studies. Like its parallel series Until We Meet Again, most of the conflicts in Between Us are internal and stem from various sources of trauma (survivor's guilt, parental neglect, parental abuse, etc.). These internal conflicts prevent characters from reaching for love and personal attachments because they don't feel like they deserve them.
This is basically Self-Sabotage: The Series.
The Production's Pandemic Problem: Depictions of trauma, friendship, and queer experiences in Until We Meet Again and Between Us are all handled and framed with profound respect and understanding, and I think a lot of that comes from its director and screenwriter. Both LazySheep and New Siwaj have shared their personal experiences with depression, and throughout the pandemic, they supported each other through their respective struggles. New was running a small agency/studio and supporting actors and staff while legally unable to film any series, and Sheep faced additional ongoing medical conditions along with a demanding full-time job that prevented her from working on Hemp Rope's script adaptation.
At what I presume was a particularly low point for Sheep last August, New made a public announcement that he'd be giving her an unlimited amount of time to heal and rest. He explained that he didn't want to weigh her down more with a deadline, so he made it clear to fans and general public alike that she had his full support and could recover at whatever pace she needed.
Meanwhile, BounPrem had gotten an incredible boost of popularity from their roles in Until We Meet Again…right as covid cases ramped up around the world. For the next two years, they were limited in what roles they could accept because their priority has always been their roles as WinTeam in Between Us. No one had any idea when cases would subside or rise and alter production schedules, and because of that, the only roles BounPrem felt they could accept without affecting Between Us were bit roles in other series. They never complained about the wait, they never abandoned Between Us even though they easily could have moved on, and they never treated their smaller roles with anything but good-natured dedication. In October of 2021, Boun surprised Prem with a cake at an event and, after Prem clapped along with the crowd looking for the recipient, Boun explained with a smile that it was Team's birthday, and Prem laughed with utter delight. No one loves WinTeam or Between Us more than BounPrem.
Studio Wabi Sabi announced Between Us in May 2020 to the delight of fans and actors alike, but the pandemic made the production they envisioned all but impossible. For example, they needed the university as a filming location, but it had been shut down. The Thai government also threw out sporadic restrictions on series production: at one point only twelve people could be present on a film set at a time. Wabi Sabi actually did have production of one series (7 Project) canceled for six months, so they'd already experienced what might happen if they started work on Between Us during the early stages of the pandemic. As fans' complaints increased, with some pointing to the release of new series produced by larger, better-resourced studios like GMMTV, New responded honestly. He tweeted more than once that he could have produced Between Us at any time during the pandemic if all he wanted was the fans' money. He could have filmed a cheap, extremely limited series and thrown it up online to get it done and out of the way.
It's because he was devoted to Sheep's story, his actors' careers, and his own craft that New waited until he could begin filming with reasonable confidence that the government wouldn't cavalierly shut it down. It's because he waited that we have the beautifully filmed, beautifully written, beautifully acted series we have now.
The series itself is up to episode six now, and it's above and beyond what I could have imagined. Sheep clearly had the time and space to create the best possible adaptation from her unfinished novel, BounPrem have had years to build on their mutual trust and professional relationship, and New had the patience to wait until conditions were best.
This has mostly been about the production side, but that will always be a big part of why I recommend this series to people, even once it's finished and I can review it as a whole. The passion and patience is clear in every scene, and because of that I can't recommend this series more wholeheartedly.
¶ IF YOU WERE A THEATRE KID
Something in My Room (2022)
Synopsis: Phat just moved into a new rental house with his mother. There, he meets Phob, an amnesiac ghost, and has to help Phob solve the mystery of his death within forty-nine days of Phob's death. Will they succeed?
Review: I could have titled this category many things: if you like women, if you like multifaceted characters, if you like stories that explore death with unique culturally specific aspects, if you like couples who support and learn from each other, if you like beautiful use of music, if you like LOVE, then Something in My Room.
But there's just something very theatrical to SIMR. (Literally, at one point.) It feels experimental in some ways it's filmed, it lets actors take their time with some moments in ways that feel rewarding, and I just…it feels a little niche to me in that way.
There are four complex female characters in this series. FOUR. And not minor characters, either. Major, significant characters. The actor who plays their landlady is incredible and having the time of her life being enthusiastically spooky, and I ship her with Phat's mother and no one can stop me. Phat's friend Dream also has a fantastically complicated backstory that influences the story directly. Not to mention Phob's mother and just??? Four!!! In a BL?! Seriously, if you're like me and you side-eye every BL series that has nineteen guys and one vaguely woman-shaped lamppost hidden in the background, Something in My Room is the breath of fresh air you've been searching for.
Unfortunately, this series flopped domestically and internationally, but I'm not going to pretend I know why. Personally, I blame the geoblocking and the badly cut free edit they released that confused and lost viewers early on, but it's also possible that this is just a series that didn't resonate with people as strongly as it did with me, and I'll have to live with that. SOMEHOW.
However! Look at my boys. Look at my ghost boy Phob and his alive boyfriend Phat. They just got dead-engaged. :'(
This is a series that was clearly made with a lot of heart and a lot of emotion. It also has a veiled political message in one character's backstory that I'm still blown away by because they hid it so cleverly to get it past censorship. PhobPhat are easily in my top ten favorite couples, and Supanut and Plan have fantastic chemistry.
If it's not for you, that's totally fine. All I hope is that more people give the uncut version a try. Supanut (Phob) gave my favorite acting moment in any series in the last episode, and it haunts me (ha) to this day.
(Also, if you're worried about the ending being sad, I think it's as happy as it could have ended, and I'm a baby when it comes to sad endings. Your mileage may vary, of course, but I was really happy with how it ended.)
¶ IF YOU LIKE SLOW-BURN ROMANCE
SOTUS (2016) + SOTUS S (2017) + Our Skyy (2018)
Synopsis: The "Gear" is one of the engineering mechanical devices in the cogwheel system (as in a clock). Having one signifies that one is a student of the Faculty of Engineering. However, to get one, all engineering freshmen must first undergo the SOTUS (acronym for Seniority, Order, Tradition, Unity, and Spirit) system. Arthit, one of the third-year seniors, often abuses his power over the freshmen by making them do things against the rules. Freshmen students are practically powerless to complain or resist any orders given by their seniors. Arthit was seemingly unstoppable until Kongpob stood up against the abuses by the former. Continual encounters between the two developed from animosity to something much more affectionate.
Review: Whenever I see people recommend SOTUS, it's usually because it's a "classic" and one of the major cornerstones of the industry. I think it's also important to describe it as a slow-burn so people know what they're signing up for. Personally, SOTUS and its sequel have yet to be kicked from my top five (I count them together). The character-building is fantastic, there's a legitimate character arc for Arthit that spans three iterations with the same mental block that takes on different forms in each one, and Kongphob also matures and becomes more and more multifaceted. If you're not a character person, if you're more about the surrounding plot, SOTUS probably won't do it for you.
The first series is fifteen episodes, and by the time Kongphob actually talks about his feelings for Arthit, it feels earned and authentic. SOTUS remains one of the best-written series, I think, with some of the strongest pacing. When I heard that SOTUS saved GMMTV from bankruptcy, I had no trouble believing it. They gambled on giving a BL series a substantial budget in 2015 (airing in 2016), and it absolutely paid off.
Also, just on a wildly destiny-like note, Bittersweet based her novel on a viral photo of Singto acting as head hazer, Krist became a hazer because he was Singto's junior, and then they ended up playing the opposite roles. Just fun to think about, especially with loud extrovert Krist playing the older, shyer character and quiet introvert Singto playing the younger, brasher character.
I play the instrumental "Distant Signals" at least once a week (it's on Spotify under Harry Angstrom and Jonathan Buchanan). It's one of the best examples of music done right in a series, I'd say, and I'm a big fan of when a piece of media uses music well. There are songs in SOTUS S that just pierce my heart if I hear them in passing.
And SPEAKING of SOTUS S, it's like Between Us in that the conflict is almost purely internal. I'm really, really into character-driven stories, and as a queer person who felt pressured back into the closet at my first office job after being extremely open in university? A series set in an office about a queer character who feels pressured back into the closet after being extremely open in university hit a few personal buttons. I think it's still the only series that's fully represented that experience for me. The side stories at the end of every episode showing how open and confident Arthit was when he was in the safe bubble of university compared to how anxious he is in the working world absolutely ruins my heart.
And then there's KongArt themselves. I love them as characters. Episode one of SOTUS feels like a fever dream compared to the rest of the series (and it might have been a pilot to sell sponsors, tbh), because Arthit becomes one of the softest and shyest characters in all of Thai BL.
arthit: i love you kongphob: say it again arthit: no i love you
What I appreciate most about SOTUS is that it's one of the few series that's been given multiple iterations. SOTUS established the relationship between KongArt, SOTUS S explored that relationship at its low point, and Our Skyy tested that relationship by pressing down on its weak point. I think, aside from the actors' popularity, the depth that KongArt's relationship was given is one of the reasons why fans still love the pairing years and years after the source material ended. Arthit's insecurity fuels every conflict, but in ways that I feel are realistic. Every time his anxiety and self-worth issues become a conflict, it's for a different reason, and it's realistic to me that our fears can be partially dissuaded but not completely erased.
In conclusion: these boys all need therapy. I'm casting a vote for Therapy: The Series.
