Media consumed in 2025
Jan. 10th, 2026 07:48 pmWell, since I just made a 2025 round-up post, might as well do one more!
( Dramas, movies, some other things. )
( Dramas, movies, some other things. )
The Way Home (2024) // part 2
Jan. 3rd, 2025 10:07 pmSiiiiiigh.
I had such high hopes for this show. And then Youku went and removed a bunch of scenes, and the whole ending was very disappointing, and here we are!
*sad jazz hands*
I opened the MDL page and saw a comment about how the creepy shippers ruined everything by practically FORCING Youku to delete everything from the show that could be remotely construed as gay, even though there was nothing gay about this touching, platonic, NORMAL relationship between brothers we got to witness in the first few episodes. Before, you know, Youku deleted all the scenes.
So then I closed the MDL page again.
I'm not gonna list all the ways in which the show very heavily leans into BL tropes and visual cues to assure us that, if you wanted to, you could read something a little non-platonic into this relationship. I trust you to believe me that it did. It also did a lot of things to assure us that this was a show for kids and these were definitely a sweet, innocent teenager and his supportive big bro. But I mean. We all contain multitudes.
Anyway, I still want to talk about this show, just for closure, so here's my final review, with spoilers for the ending. Again, this entire drama is an 8-hour commitment, you're not going to be on tenterhooks between episodes. (I still want someone other than me to watch it. 😩 Please!)
( SIGH. )
I had such high hopes for this show. And then Youku went and removed a bunch of scenes, and the whole ending was very disappointing, and here we are!
*sad jazz hands*
I opened the MDL page and saw a comment about how the creepy shippers ruined everything by practically FORCING Youku to delete everything from the show that could be remotely construed as gay, even though there was nothing gay about this touching, platonic, NORMAL relationship between brothers we got to witness in the first few episodes. Before, you know, Youku deleted all the scenes.
So then I closed the MDL page again.
I'm not gonna list all the ways in which the show very heavily leans into BL tropes and visual cues to assure us that, if you wanted to, you could read something a little non-platonic into this relationship. I trust you to believe me that it did. It also did a lot of things to assure us that this was a show for kids and these were definitely a sweet, innocent teenager and his supportive big bro. But I mean. We all contain multitudes.
Anyway, I still want to talk about this show, just for closure, so here's my final review, with spoilers for the ending. Again, this entire drama is an 8-hour commitment, you're not going to be on tenterhooks between episodes. (I still want someone other than me to watch it. 😩 Please!)
( SIGH. )
The Way Home (2024) // part 1
Jan. 1st, 2025 06:11 pmOh man, you guys.
Zhang Kangle in a high school bromance* drama, being beautiful and angsty and decidedly not in high school. It's only 16 episodes long, with the last three being released over the next few days. It looks like the first 9 might be available for free on Youku right now? They're like half an hour long. You could basically watch the whole thing in 8 hours!
(* This is being very contentiously discussed in the MDL comment section, and I would not recommend following the discussion. Personally, I wouldn't call this a BL drama. It is very queer.)
» MDL Page
» Trailer
» My Watch Thread
I want to make a "proper" post when it's over (update: semi-coherent bullet points and yelling), but I'm imploring all of you to watch this now, PLEASE DO IT FOR ME. It's clearly a show aimed at teenagers, I'm sorry, you won't find a ton of nuance in the writing or acting, but also these boys are very fucked up about each other and I will write inappropriate fanfic about them the second the show ends. Zhang Kangle breaks my heart.
A summary of my notes so far, in the form of five thesis statements:
1) This is a tender coming-of-age story about navigating complex feelings and relationships when the adults in your life won't even listen to your problems, let alone model good emotional self-regulation.
2) You know those Tumblr posts about how exercise is good for your mental health, actually, it's just not the only thing that can alleviate your depression? Anyway, an entire drama about that, but with gay incest vibes.
3) These two brothers desperately want to fuck each other.
4) If you're a gay teen and dealing with all the problems that come with that, here's a show in which Zhang Kangle can be your beautiful, kind-hearted, troubled older brother who loves you. You deserve this.
5) If you're a dirty old fujo who's into gay incest vibes, this show isn't for you, but who's gonna stop you from watching? Knock yourself out.
In conclusion: cousins.
Zhang Kangle in a high school bromance* drama, being beautiful and angsty and decidedly not in high school. It's only 16 episodes long, with the last three being released over the next few days. It looks like the first 9 might be available for free on Youku right now? They're like half an hour long. You could basically watch the whole thing in 8 hours!
(* This is being very contentiously discussed in the MDL comment section, and I would not recommend following the discussion. Personally, I wouldn't call this a BL drama. It is very queer.)
» MDL Page
» Trailer
» My Watch Thread
I want to make a "proper" post when it's over (update: semi-coherent bullet points and yelling), but I'm imploring all of you to watch this now, PLEASE DO IT FOR ME. It's clearly a show aimed at teenagers, I'm sorry, you won't find a ton of nuance in the writing or acting, but also these boys are very fucked up about each other and I will write inappropriate fanfic about them the second the show ends. Zhang Kangle breaks my heart.
A summary of my notes so far, in the form of five thesis statements:
1) This is a tender coming-of-age story about navigating complex feelings and relationships when the adults in your life won't even listen to your problems, let alone model good emotional self-regulation.
2) You know those Tumblr posts about how exercise is good for your mental health, actually, it's just not the only thing that can alleviate your depression? Anyway, an entire drama about that, but with gay incest vibes.
3) These two brothers desperately want to fuck each other.
4) If you're a gay teen and dealing with all the problems that come with that, here's a show in which Zhang Kangle can be your beautiful, kind-hearted, troubled older brother who loves you. You deserve this.
5) If you're a dirty old fujo who's into gay incest vibes, this show isn't for you, but who's gonna stop you from watching? Knock yourself out.
In conclusion: cousins.
War of Faith (2024)
Dec. 19th, 2024 10:59 pmThe rambling conclusion to my rambling mid-series reactions, now with even more spoilers!
Do I recommend this? Yes. If you like age-gap hoyay, and don't mind some violence* and a truly stupendous amount of CCP propaganda**, this is the drama for you. If you don't like age-gap hoyay, I don't think you want to engage with this.
Anyway, I don't think I'm overselling it when I say it's a love story.
( Spoilers, including characters deaths. This got way too long. )
Do I recommend this? Yes. If you like age-gap hoyay, and don't mind some violence* and a truly stupendous amount of CCP propaganda**, this is the drama for you. If you don't like age-gap hoyay, I don't think you want to engage with this.
* If, like me, you're worried about scenes of torture, but would like to watch Wang Yang be hot and in love with Wang Yibo, please, I will go through all the episodes and give you time stamp information on when to look away and for how long. I will do this for you! And also for Wang Yang. (I skipped the torture scenes by holding a hand up in front of the TV screen, muting the sound, and squinting at the subtitles every now and then to see if we were done. I'd estimate there are maybe a half dozen of these. Otherwise it's mostly shootouts, explosions, some war imagery, and some grossness.)
** So many speeches about the glory of communism, and such swelling trumpet music. It's bearable if you have a sense of humor about it, but my god.
** So many speeches about the glory of communism, and such swelling trumpet music. It's bearable if you have a sense of humor about it, but my god.
Anyway, I don't think I'm overselling it when I say it's a love story.
( Spoilers, including characters deaths. This got way too long. )
(Concept and title entirely stolen from ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
grayswandir, with love.)
My god, what a show. I've been live-reacting to the episodes in a Discord channel that was specifically created for me to yell about War of Faith, thank youlunarriviera, and also in a few skeets, but now I guess the time has come for a DW post as well.
( Some spoilers )
grayswandir, with love.)My god, what a show. I've been live-reacting to the episodes in a Discord channel that was specifically created for me to yell about War of Faith, thank you
lunarriviera, and also in a few skeets, but now I guess the time has come for a DW post as well.( Some spoilers )
The Ingenious One (2023)
Nov. 22nd, 2024 10:17 amI have the biggest trouble starting a new show, and I can't remember the last time I watched something that wasn't a tomb drama (or just YouTube). Might have been Parallel World?
But I had heard about The Ingenious One before (very vaguely), and I wanted to check it out for Mao Xiaotong, and then someone showed me this gif set and I was like, SOLD! A handful of episodes in, uh, The Horrors happened and I avoided YouTube and most social media, and this show became literally the only thing I turned on the TV for.
Soooooo. Some thoughts!
( Just some gushing, no spoilers. )
But I had heard about The Ingenious One before (very vaguely), and I wanted to check it out for Mao Xiaotong, and then someone showed me this gif set and I was like, SOLD! A handful of episodes in, uh, The Horrors happened and I avoided YouTube and most social media, and this show became literally the only thing I turned on the TV for.
Soooooo. Some thoughts!
( Just some gushing, no spoilers. )
Land of Broken Hearts (2024)
Oct. 29th, 2024 09:46 pmI finally watched Long-ge's manic pixie dream boy movie over the weekend, and I think I'd have to watch it again to have some more interesting things to say about it, but here's some random thoughts anyway:
( Spoilers, obv. )
( Spoilers, obv. )
I just finished watching this, so please have some very disorganized thoughts while it's all still fresh in my mind.
( Some negative stuff (mostly about casting), some positive stuff (mostly Pingxie and Xiaoge-related), some randomness. This got very long! Also, spoilers for the whole thing. )
( Some negative stuff (mostly about casting), some positive stuff (mostly Pingxie and Xiaoge-related), some randomness. This got very long! Also, spoilers for the whole thing. )
Only the River Flows (2023)
Jan. 26th, 2024 10:56 pmI have seen it! I hope it'll get released more widely soon, because it's kind of hard to talk about this movie without spoiling, like, the vibes. It's a very vibes kind of movie. 😄 And you'll want to talk about it with your friends afterwards!
The plot is basically, there are three murders and a cop trying to solve the case. That's it, that's the movie. It was shot on real film and in chronological order, which must have been a fascinating experience for movie geek Long-ge. (Also, you know, the usual disregard for his personal safety.)
( Some thoughts; vague spoilers about arthouse movie shenanigans )
Of the three movies of his I've seen so far (Lighting Up the Stars, Lost in the Stars, and this one), I would gladly watch each one again, at least once. LITS and OTRF especially would reward a second and third viewing! I think Zhu Yilong is very good at picking projects like that (outside of the obligatory propaganda stuff) and I'm looking forward to the one he's currently filming. (🤕)
The plot is basically, there are three murders and a cop trying to solve the case. That's it, that's the movie. It was shot on real film and in chronological order, which must have been a fascinating experience for movie geek Long-ge. (Also, you know, the usual disregard for his personal safety.)
( Some thoughts; vague spoilers about arthouse movie shenanigans )
Of the three movies of his I've seen so far (Lighting Up the Stars, Lost in the Stars, and this one), I would gladly watch each one again, at least once. LITS and OTRF especially would reward a second and third viewing! I think Zhu Yilong is very good at picking projects like that (outside of the obligatory propaganda stuff) and I'm looking forward to the one he's currently filming. (🤕)