#bad buddy episode 4

[passinhosdetartaruga]

I feel like the injuries inflicted upon my soul by episode 4 of Bad Buddy were healed by episode 4 of Last Twilight. IYKYK T.T

[dribs-and-drabbles]

Flirting in the form of veiled insults when the attraction is unrequited/unrealised versus realised/unhinged.

BAD BUDDY ep 4 | MY SCHOOL PRESIDENT ep 7

[social-media-shy]

Bad Buddy Rewatch - Episode 4 - Pat's and Pran's POV

Pran's POV

Pat's POV

[telomeke-bbs]

BAD BUDDY RERUN SEASON – EP.4 (NOTES ON THE REWATCH)

I've fallen behind Channel GMM25's rerun of BBS and I don't think it will ever be possible to catch up. Nonetheless, still continuing with my notes on the rewatch, even though GMM25's well past Ep.4 by now! 🤷‍♂️ (Links to my notes for Episodes 1 to 3 are at the bottom of this write-up if you're interested to read more.)

Episode 4 opens with the discussion between the Archi and Engine teams on how to co-ordinate while rebuilding the bus-stop. The shot is quite formally framed, with Archi on one side and Engine on the other. We are being given a smack of visual foreshadowing here – the conflict of Ep.9 (when Wai comes in between Pran and Pat) is quite literally echoed in the physical blocking:

So when the talks break down, we see Pat and Pran having several discussions in a staircase on how to get the best out of their workteams:

It's meant to suggest the staircase of their apartment building (because they're dressed so casually in tank-tops/t-shirts, shorts and flip-flops) but it actually isn't the same staircase – the railings, treads and risers don't match what we see when they race up to their apartments at Ep.3 [1I4] 9.58.

In the Behind-the-Scenes video for the rooftop filming (linked here: [Behind The Scenes] จนกว่าจะพบกันใหม่ครับเพื่อน! | แค่เพื่อนครับเพื่อน | BAD BUDDY SERIES, timestamp 1.29) Ohm and Nanon confirm that key scenes planned for the rooftop were rained out and had to be relocated indoors.

I think these were discussions at the rooftop, that then became these staircase discussions (Ep.4 [1I4] 2.58 and 4.22), since they show Pat and Pran at an intermediate stage of their relationship, between the first contact of their blind-date-gone-wrong and their Epic Rooftop Kiss – drawing closer but not yet (overtly) romantic in any way.

If these discussions had indeed been planned for the staircase of their apartment building, they would have been filmed in the same staircase at the Tinidee Hotel Bangkok Golf Club (where their student apartments are located); the fact that they weren't suggests that they may have been a last-minute switch-out from the rain-soaked roof.

So when Pat and Pran are startled by a bump in the night and proceed to investigate fearfully, it's not because our two brave boys have suddenly turned into total scaredy-cats out of character from their usual courageous selves:

In Thailand, and all across Southeast Asia, there is a strong belief in the supernatural as a very real, unseen part of everyday life. People grow up believing that malevolent spirits and beings are all around, which are to be given respectful distance, feared as uncontrollable forces, and appeased where necessary.

This is why there are shrines, offerings and talismans everywhere in Thailand – the supernatural world is as much a part of the surrounding reality as everything else that you can see and touch (and it is dealt with differently according to the different rules by which it operates).

Pat and Pran are simply doing the prudent thing here – you can't control the supernatural and you are at its mercy for the most part, which is why they're being so terribly cautious. If it was just a normal human intruder that they were worried about we know they would have been a lot bolder.

When Ink turns up characteristically flustered (BBS plays with this idea a bit) to photograph the Archi-Engine teams at the new bus-stop, Pran's expressions reacting to her appearance out-of-the-blue land quite differently on the rewatch:

What must have been going through Pran's mind is his mantra of “Things don’t end well whenever I’m close to you”, repeated at Ep.1 [4/4] 3.28 and Ep.2 [3I4] 9.01. Every time he'd allowed himself to get closer to Pat, something bad would happen (see this link here for more explanation).

Against the received wisdom of a hard lesson learnt time and again, Pran was all ready at the end of Ep.3 to stop pushing Pat away (when they talked in the corridor of their apartment building). But here at the bus-stop the universe is responding negatively just as before, and this time it is with the most epic smashdown possible.

Just as Pran and Pat are jibing and joshing at each other (Ooh your shoes are shiny! Ooh you smell nice!), in a demonstration of closeness visible only to them (a kind of mock-antagonism that masks their true relationship) – by some cosmic coincidence, the one individual whom Pran had seen Pat actively showing romantic interest in (and who beat him to Pat's affections in high school) suddenly bursts onto the scene.

So the expression on Pran's face (kudos to Nanon here) is not (just) because he's concerned that Ink is going to expose their deception (that they're not the enemy-strangers whom their uni friends think they are). What we're seeing is the realization sinking in for Pran that his old rival for Pat's love is suddenly back in their lives, and he knows (or rather believes) from experience that he has no chance against her.

Plus Pat whisks her away at first sight – to Pran it looks like Pat is grabbing the first chance to be with Ink again (even if it's really just action-man Pat stopping her from spilling the beans about their friendship in front of their friend groups).

Pran's expression at Ep.4 [1I4] 8.46 is also a parallel with his expression at Ep.4 [1I4] 8.25 during the high school flashback. That was the first time Ink appeared in their lives, and at timestamp 8.25 he showed he had already noticed way back in high school that Pat felt some kind of attraction for Ink.

Perhaps it was Ink's reappearance at the bus-stop that fully convinced him, but later we do get to see that Pran really does believe “Things don’t end well whenever I’m close to you” is some kind of sacred text to live by, when he repeats a version of it at Ep.4 [1I4] 12.09, after Pat steps on his lost earbud – "See? The two of us shouldn’t get close to each other."

So when Pran realizes that Pat had rushed out of class just to meet with Ink at the nearby café, shortly after he'd sent him a friendly little text message, this life lesson (“Things don’t end well whenever I’m close to you”) is cruelly nailed into his consciousness yet again – he is reminded of the time when he reached out to Pat (with some iced milk tea) back in high school, only to be knocked back by the sight of Pat flirting openly with Ink, in the flashback at Ep.4 [2/4] 0.35.

And then we see Pran getting hammered with reminder after reminder of Pat and Ink seemingly as a couple – when he finds out Pat's abandoned the bus-stop construction (their joint project, that he even sent a text reminder about) to be Ink's photoshoot model (Ep.4 [2/4] 5.27), when he sees them sharing a meal together (Ep.4 [3I4] 2.51), and when he sees Pat wearing the friendship bracelet Ink gave to him in high school (Ep.4 [3I4] 4.40).

The photoshoot was to thank Ink for keeping PatPran's friendship a secret, the dinner wasn't planned as a romantic date (nor did it turn out like one), and the bracelet was simply a platonic gift for Pat (and Pran would get his own too later). But I guess from Pran's POV it did look like InkPat was becoming a thing, whether or not he was overthinking it.

So now, a few observations about Pat's photoshoot with Ink (which as a scene is as important for InkPa as it is for Pat):

At Ep.4 [2/4] 4.37 we see that it was Ink's idea that Pa should enroll in the Faculty of Communication Arts – which she does.

There's a tiny continuity error between Ep.4 [2/4] 2.59 and 5.07 – Pran's white sleeves miraculously grow longer, and he's also lost his collar.

At Ep.4 [2/4] 3.49 we see that the seeds of Pat's romantic confusion are sown when Ink tenderly re-adjusts his stray locks, and he feels the stirrings of something. He misinterprets what he feels for something else (when she gently brushes some debris away from his hair), and perhaps misdirects the incipient feelings he has for Pran toward Ink instead. And of course BBS tells us that he and Ink are not to be, when this moment of tenderness is broken up by – who else? – Pa, physically coming between them with contact lenses for Pat.

The reference to Pat's contact lenses is a set-up for Pat's reference to Lasik in Ep.7 [1I4], which is a set-up for Pa's reference to her own contact lenses as part of her new look, which is in turn a set-up for her losing her contact lenses at the faculty and needing to be rescued by Ink in Ep.7 [1I4] as well.

At the photoshoot, the contact lenses (or lack thereof) are also a metaphor for Pat's shortsightedness vis-à-vis his feelings for Ink. He thinks he's seeing something, but he's not really (kind of like the way he was trying to model for the camera but unable to see exactly where it was). And it's Pa who holds the key to where his (and Ink's) true feelings lie, when she turns up with the remedy for his blurred vision, while at the same time personifying the answer to the question of who actually has dibs on Ink's heart.

This little scene also foreshadows Pat's ill-fated date with Ink at the dessert café in Ep.5 – there just as here, he leaves Pa with Ink after being presented with the gift of clear-sightedness (contact lenses at the photoshoot, while at the dessert café it's the results of Pa's love guru test).

Ink's heart is also symbolized by her camera (which lends extra significance to their Magic of Zero episode). She had her camera trained on Pat while he was modeling, but there was an awkwardness to him (Ep.4 [2/4] 3.07) and he couldn't see exactly where she was at (before Pa arrived and made things clear for him). This parallels how Ink's kind and friendly heart is open to Pat platonically, but is unavailable to him for a deeper (romantic) connection. And when Pat steps away, Ink then trains her camera on Pa, who has no problem posing for her, taking to it easily and naturally – for Pa is the real romantic focus of Ink's heart, and with whom it belongs.

One tiny detail later at the Flagpole Bar though – we see that Pat pulls up a chair for Pran (Ep.4 [3I4] 3.40), whereas he didn't do that for Ink when they first sat down:

Pran rebuffs the gesture, but what this seems to say is that Pat always unconsciously finds some way to tend to Pran.

Despite what Pat might have been thinking about Ink, when we see him performing acts of caring – the object for his bubbling emotions is Pran, not Ink. I think Pat can't help himself, and Pran is unconsciously the center of his world and the focus of his feelings. At Ep.4 [3I4] 5.51 he starts out delivering fried chicken (Ep.4 [3I4] 5.55), and then moves on to tendering kindness and ointment for Pran's injured shoulder. But actually, if you look at the preceding scene in the Flagpole Bar, Pran leaves before ordering any food and that means that Pat and/or Ink must have ordered extra fried chicken for him. I like to think this is Pat going out of his way to think of Pran, and also perhaps giving him an excuse to knock on Pran's door.

So when Pat asks Pran to show him his rugby injury, he's solicitous and insistent, but the one thing he doesn't do is touch Pran in any way until Pran himself has rolled up his sleeve.

I think this is BBS doing a tip of the hat to the idea of consent before intimacy, that has shown itself to be one of the problematic areas in BLs that have come before.

But remembering that Pran is in love with Pat – what a fine-bladed torture it must have been for him to have Pat tending to his injured shoulder like that.

Pat is ministering to Pran's outward hurts, but in blithe ignorance he's leaving Pran's inner, emotional pain (his unrequited love) still unalleviated, raw and bleeding – a hurt that he had unknowingly caused, and to which only he holds the cure.

And Pat is possibly making Pran's heartache worse here, since from Pran's POV he's undergoing a demonstration of love in action without any affirmation or possibility of love behind it (especially in the light of his belief about InkPat as a couple). To Pran it's an absolutely brutal reminder of a love that can never be.

I didn't notice it before, but Pran's t-shirt in this scene is about the only time that we see him with a smiley on his person.

Pat has several t-shirts that either depict or suggest smileys (see this write-up here), but Pran (at least in the earlier episodes) is always all buttoned-up in colorless long-sleeved shirts that are a metaphor for his repressed nature. Usually the smileys are around Pran (on his lamp, his mobile phone, his doorhanger, his posters), and I think they are a reminder to him of his sunshine boy Pat.

But Pat now seems to be spiraling further and further away from Pran, ever since Ink – an undefeatable love rival in Pran's mind – reappeared in their lives.

After the trauma of being pulled into thirdwheeling their intimate dinner, and being reminded of Ink and Pat's (supposed) couplehood several times elsewhere in this episode, Pran in this scene is going beyond just surrounding himself with reminders of Pat. He's consoling himself by positioning the symbol for his beloved Pat right at the center of his chest, where his broken heart is. 💔

Yes, the sequence with the Nivea Micellar make-up remover beginning at Ep.4 [3I4] 8.00 is more cringey cringe product placement, but BBS takes this necessary evil and makes something more of it.

It's impossible not to feel something when someone is tending to you with kindness in their physical touch – we saw Pat experience a twinge of that when Ink was adjusting his hair at Ep.4 [2/4] 3.49. So poor Pran must have been shredded to bits inside when Pat was applying ointment to his shoulder. But then we see that Pat – after proffering intimacy (with the ointment) – now offers himself up for the same from Pran, with the make-up removal.

The ointment application and make-up removal are really the two of them trading kindness and intimacy because they do care about each other, despite their outward jabbing and prodding. And Pat demonstrates he's happy to be on the receiving end of Pran's ministrations too. 

At the beginning of the scene Pran was all spiky and withdrawn, but Pat and his persistence keep chipping away at his walls, and by timestamp 8.20 we see that it's worked again and the genuine closeness (and heartfelt tenderness) between the two boys resurfaces once more.

In a sense this foreshadows almost all of Ep.6's story arc, when Pran withdraws yet again after the Epic Rooftop Kiss, and Pat is persistent in trying to draw him back out again.

So after the gentle closeness of the shoulder ointment/Micellar Water scene, the action moves on to the rough-and-tumble rugby game between Architecture and Engineering at SouthTechnology University.

Perhaps Pat is still high off the previous scene's intimacy and all charged-up from the close physical contact of the game, but we see that something has definitely changed for him, because he really lays the innuendo on thick with this line: "Are you afraid people would think I’m flirting with you?" (Ep.4 [4/4] 0.48) – before reaching out to touch Pran (having been given the message in the previous scene how closeness and physical touch between them was consensual and felt good, maybe).

Pat stomps off in a huff when Ink arrives and Pran sends him away; it looks a bit like he's hurt that Pran's chosen her over him.

And when he glances back with a smile at Ep.4 [4/4] 1.40, that look of longing is clearly for Pran. But I think Pran misinterprets this as Pat looking at Ink though (Ep.4 [4/4] 1.48).

Knowing how important competition is for Pat and Pran and how it represents emotions that are deeper between the two of them, it's hard not to see the rugby game as a stand-in for their repressed (romantic) passions.

Pat even goes "If you hug me this tight, you might as well take me as your boyfriend" (Ep.4 [4/4] 3.47). All of that sweaty huffing and rough body contact reads quite like a surrogate for something else – and both Pat and Pran are giving it all they've got:

(above) Pran gets atop Pat and they linger in the moment a bit too long

So on the rewatch, I think there are definitely signs that Pat feels the stirrings of butterflies for Pran in Ep.4, from his suggestive comments, his unexplained desire to spend the night (because he conveniently "forgot" his keys, twice), the tenderness and caring he displays, and the careful steps he takes to enter Pran's personal space after having learnt that consent was important (when Pran threw him out of his apartment the first time).

But our gold-hearted dumbass isn't used to looking inward or trying to process his emotions, possibly because he'd spent so much of his life directing his energies outward, living a life based on values and norms imposed from the outside (the definitions and dictates of his father), rather than as directed by his own internal compass.

I also think Pat may have shut down a lot of his inner emotional life after Pran was sent away in high school, hence the ineptitude that we see in Episodes 4 and 5 when it comes to him trying to make sense of the feelings that Pran's reappearance in his life has stirred up – he'd been out of practice for years!

So Pat's frown at Ep.4 [4/4] 8.31 is because he's jealous of Pran (apparently) flirting with Ink, and getting a friendship bracelet from her too.

But he's quite likely frowning because deep down his still unknowable heart is concerned at losing Pran to Ink, not the other way around. (This is echoed later in Pat's sigh of relief at Ep.4 [4/4] 14.57 – after Pran confirms he isn't into Ink romantically – it's less to do with Ink being available to him, than it is for Pran being taken.)

So the episode ends with Pat finally getting to bunk over at Pran's place, and this is when BBS really starts to roll out its big guns.

OhmNanon worked wonders here, shifting deftly from light comedy to heartwrenching emotional gutpunch and back again, and I was certainly left reeling (wasn't everyone?) from every actorly twist. Nanon exercised his dramatic subtleties to their finest, but in terms of impact Ohm's playful earnestness was not far behind.

To me this was the scene in BBS when you could actually sense a shift in the center of gravity, that the proceedings had begun to take on a certain emotional weightiness, without fully shedding their outward air of breezy nonchalance.

For the most part, this scene was played raw and real without the clever screenwriting winks and nods seen elsewhere in BBS – Director Backaof was relying on an uncomplicated recounting of the narrative with the actors delivering their lines shot through with honest emotions, and I think it paid off.

OK so there is one clear writerly flourish – Pat doesn't ask Pran why he thinks Ink should like him. He hypothetically asks whether Pran himself would like him (if Pran were in Ink's place), ignorant about what could be driving him to frame his question so oddly.

And then he lists out the reasons why Pran should like him (at Ep.4 [4/4] 15.45) simultaneously giving lie to his purported interest in Ink, while unknowingly twisting the dagger wrought of his innocent words even deeper into Pran's already wounded heart.

Other than that though, the scene plays out as a straightforward unfolding of the storyline, that could have manifested quite flat if it had been in the hands of a director or actors whose caliber was closer to average – but luckily for us we had Director Backaof and OhmNanon instead, and they pumped up all the quieter moments with emotions roaring into our headspace.

Similar to how the shoulder ointment application had made him feel, having Pat lying right next to him must have been just crushing for deeply-pining Pran. But he gave in and went ahead with it anyway, having been unable to toughen his heart and condemn his beloved, keyless Pat to a hard night out in the corridor.

And Pran hit the absolute rock-bottom of emotional devastation when Pat responded "Yes" to the question of "Do you like Ink?" at Ep.4 [4/4] 14.48 – his throat catching, blinking back tears and a side-eye at Pat were all wordlessly speaking volumes.

Pran then parries Pat's unwitting thrusts with more characteristic contrarianism when he goes "I… hate you" at Ep.4 [4/4] 17.08. And shortly thereafter we are pulled under, into the depths of Pran's sweet, longing sorrow when he turns to gaze upon Pat in the dark (at Ep.4 [4/4] 18.27), echoing Pat's words "You always look at me" from Ep.3. When you're in love…

The rest of the scene is just silent, unverbalized emoting – but it's pulled off so powerfully it takes time to realize how well it was done. Really, it's quite a marvel that it actually worked – there were no clever lines, nothing of the sort to build on. Just longing looks and a single tear, so kudos to Nanon yet again.

Fortunately for us, Director Backaof then lets us off the burner a little bit. We see Pran – made of tough stuff – pull himself together, and defiantly challenge Pat one more time by pulling the blanket off him, to end the scene on a wry note, a welcome (if rueful) bit of comedic relief winking through the tears.

So I found this final scene of Ep.4 [4/4] (especially when it showed us Pran's single tear) so memorable because it was the one that got me emotionally invested in BBS.

Pran's PP bag during their staircase race in Ep.3 [1I4] was the first detail that made me sit up and take notice of the cleverness encoded into Bad Buddy, but that was mostly an intellectual interest (see this write-up here for more elaboration). But little did I know that after Ep.4's raw depiction of feelings, the Epic Rooftop Kiss would be lurking at the end of Ep.5 to grab my intellectual interest and emotional investment, wrestle them to the ground and wring them out into straight-up adulation and obsession.

Once BBS started dealing out the emotional punches, there was no turning back. Not that I'd really want to anymore; I'm now an addict who loves his drug – but thank goodness my drug of choice (Bad Buddy) is truly a healing one. 💖

[Afterpost Edit: for notes on the rewatch of other episodes, see these links here: Ep.1,  Ep.2, Ep.3 and Ep.5. 😊]

[filmyocean]

Maddie: I know what this is about. You're jealous of all the attention Tommy is getting. Especially from Eddie Buck: Please. You think I care if Eddie gives some other guy some attention? How insecure do you think I am? Buck: Seriously, how insecure do you think I am? I need you to tell me. Will you please tell me?

[midnightfreeway]

there's something poetic about pat walking into pran's room--into pran's heart--without permission and pran saying "i didn't let you in" before closing the door and letting him stay anyway

[aestheticsfandomsandmore]

pat holding on pran's arm/hand during their involuntary hug hunts me day and night 'cause of the way he's so comfortable with pran's touch, 'cause of the way he has craved for any kind of closeness to him since the day pran came back and he got used to the idea of having him once again in his life, 'cause he doesn't give a shit that their friends may see them in this misunderstandable position, he just wants him close close close as close as possible and he will take any chances he's got gladly and greedily hahahah i want to die

[part5of4podcast]

Have an unpopular opinion about a BL? Don't worry, we probably do too. Saying all the things you do or don’t wanna hear Part 5 (of 4) is here to engage with BL media from Japan, Thailand, China, Korea and more. We're talking film-making techniques, narrative analysis, fandom woes, while asking questions like, hey why don't the bottoms move their arms? We may not be experts, but we are loud, chaotic, and full of opinions.

Last episode was heavy on the salt so today we’re going for a comfort soup recipe. We’re talking about our Top 5 BL series; TV shows, films, novels, and comics!

Listen to this podcast on: Spotify | Soundcloud | Youtube

Check out each named series at our Series Page for official viewing/reading links.

Want to learn more about any specifics we discussed this episode? Check out our Further Reading Page!

Topics we link to specific to this episode is the explanation of xianxia, wuxia, and cultivation.

Recommend your favorite fanworks from any of these series as well! Support fan creators!

[inventedfangirling]

What scene/dialogue in bad buddy absolutely devastated you (but in the larger context of the episode and the show got ignored cos we had bigger traumas to unpack) and why for me was it this scene when Pat asks Pran when he's going to get the documents from LogTech and then proceeding to say that he wants to go visit the musical instrument shop?

I cant believe i didnt properly process it earlier but Pat really asked him to go to the musical instrument shop.

Not because he wants to visit the shop but because he cant take one more second of being apart from Pran and whatever this awkward almost hostile distance that Pran had put between them. The fact that he was trying to say that casually, as if all was as "normal" as it was pre rooftop kiss, when he was feeling anything but casual on the inside, his heart being on the bottom of the feelings-roller-coaster he had on been ever since that moment in the instrument shop when it finally hit him, what he had been oblivious to all along, that Pran was there, and that Pat missed him even while he was standing right in front of him and that somewhere along the way he had fallen in love with him without even knowing.

Just look at him. He's so so so in love it physically hurts ME ( an independent (NOT) unbaised (NOT) observer).

And so now he tries to inject a sense of normality and familiarity into this gap in their relationship by asking Pran to accompany him to the instrument store, do what they have done a bunch of times already but this time maybe even in hopes of telling him what he had felt the last time they were there together??!? Do you realize how devastating that is??

Watching Pat ask that with trepidation, for the first time, well and truly unsure of what is or isnt allowed to him in his dynamic with Pran and knowing (in hindsight) Pran's plan of cutting him off at least temporaririly and knowing Pat's efforts wont be reciprocated (for at least a while more) just hurts so bad i almost couldnt believe it didnt strike me the first 5 times i watched the episode.

It's literally just 10 seconds and probably one of the most un-remarkable moments in the entire episode if not show and yet i am so so so deeply shattered by it.

Is that just me being unwell or did you tear up too...? Feel free to add more devastation i really do wanna know if ive missed any more small but not insignificant moments like these.

[november-rising]

Don’t you dare cut to Maddie and Buck cracking open wine, snacking on snacks while Buck tells her all about Eddie and Chris, his soon-to-be son!

Don’t you DARE have Buck worrying about funded support for Chris and Eddie!

DO NOT DARE have Buck smiling, talking about Eddie being a great dad while moving into the girlfriend owned living room.

“So does this boy crush on Eddie mean that you’re finally ready to move on from Abby?” Maddie always knew. Bi Buck or Buck’s attraction to Eddie - she always knew.

And Buck sorta knew his affection since he didn’t outright deny the crush.

[garoujo]

this is my new boyfriend btw

[passinhosdetartaruga]

I’m so glad I have not seen The Eclipse yet, because I will need to watch that to deal with First and Khao in Only Friends

[dribs-and-drabbles]

Pran 🤝🏽 Episode 4

A master of manipulation.

An episode that began with showing how Pran (and Pat to some extent) is a master manipulator, is itself an example of manipulation at its finest. And it's us the audience that is being manipulated. The irony being that whilst Pran expertly manipulates his and Pat's friends into working on the bus stop, the show manipulates us into feeling the depths of Pran's heartache. Yes, we can place some blame on Pat's actions (as oblivious as they may be) but it's also how the production design framed a lot of things.

First we're being shown that Pat is in love with Pran: Pat holding Pran's waist in the stairwell; the flirting disguised as insults at the bus stop; the "I thought you said you liked someone in architecture" from Korn that never got explained; Pat and Pran wearing almost matching colours when looking for the headphone - blue, white, and cream (with Pat the only one with black...but Pran's looking for his black headphone...plus black is opposite of white and these two are nothing if not classic opposites...). All this, and Pat's clear desire to be around Pran as much as possible in ep 3, clearly indicates Pat must love Pran...

But sike! not really because here's Ink, a love interest for Pat. He used to like her and might still like her now: Pat and Ink are in matching colours (Pat's Salome t-shirt and Ink's mustard yellow vest); romantic music is playing when Ink is fixing Pat's hair; Pat starts wearing the bracelet Ink gave him in high school; Pa leaves Pat and Ink alone because she's "clearing the way" for him; the flashbacks to show how close they were in high school; Pran feels the need to ask Ink if she likes Pat... All this going to show that Pat definitely likes Ink...

But wait! We then get thrown back to Pran with the "If I have these dimples will I be as cute as you?"; Pat asking to stay the night; Pat in that shirt; the "Are you afraid people would think I'm flirting with you?"; Pat being annoyed when Ink disturbs them on the bleachers; Pat's "If you hug me this tight, you might as well take me as your boyfriend"; and Korn's "what's gotten into you Pat?" as Pat gravitates to Pran after his injury. Yes, what has gotten into you Pat?

So of course we're left wondering who Pat really likes and whether even he knows it or is just oblivious to his feelings (some of us were even convinced that Pat liked Pran and was aware of it - I remember the divide of opinion and discourse about this back then). And all this manipulation culminates in the show having not only Pran but all of us on absolute tenterhooks after that little question at the end - "do you like Ink?". The countdown to the most anticipated moment of the year series...and then our collective disbelief and heartbreak when the answers came: "no" | "yes".

What do you mean, Pat?! You're quite clearly in love with Pran!

[jemmo]

“i never know what to think about, so i think about you” - the 1975

bad buddy week: day 2  favourite episode - ep 11

[fiercynn]

so @manogirl, @inventedfangirling, and @sharingfandoms all tagged me in the thai ql favorites tag game (thanks friends!), and i wasn't sure if i had enough to say about shows other than bad buddy to do it, but i figure you can't ever talk about bbs too much amirite

favorite thai ql: yeah so it's bad buddy, surprise surprise. i watched it all in the course of like 36 hours in february 2022, not long after it had ended, and it has been thoroughly stuck in my soul ever since. i've watched it so many times and in so many pieces that i couldn't even guess at a number. i've posted...uh...200k words of bad buddy fic in the past year and half? the obsession is real. it's just such a perfect mix of antagonistic and silly and tense and sweet and heartbreaking and healing that i keep going back to it over over. i love its narrative arc, and i love its little details, and i love all the ways we get to keep reinterpreting it over and over in fanworks. and i love the people i've met in the fandom, which is really hard to separate from the show! i've made really close and awesome friends here, which seems extremely fitting tbh. so yeah anyway i like that show a lot

favorite pairing: seems obvious given my previous answer, but patpran, followed closely by inkpa! idk i just think they're both neat and extremely in love

most underrated actor: JENNIE PANHAN I NEED HER IN EVERYTHING OKAY

favorite character: parakul siridechawat. he's just so in love you guys, even when (he thinks) it's hopeless. i love a character who pines. my sexuality is pining actually and pran's might be too (jk i love pran for many many many reasons but this is the one i felt like talking about today)

favorite side character: i think it has to be a tie between mae from 3wbf and longtae from a tale of thousand stars...two very different characters! i love mae in all her complexity, her efforts to be good and kind and empathetic that are interrupted by the death of the one person who was good and kind and empathetic towards her, and her search for revenge once he's gone, and then her ultimate realization that she needs to stop the cycle of violence even if it takes one more act of violence herself. meanwhile i love longtae because he is sweet and funny and adorable and such a good friend to literally everyone in pha phun dao and also it's khao, how could i not?

favorite scene in a ql: so if i type the letter "y" in my browser, the first search result is the youtube link to bad buddy episode 5 part 4/4. does that answer your question

favorite line in a ql: i thought i was going to struggle with this one but it came to me instantly: uncle tong from bad buddy saying, "you might think one man can't change the world. but i want you to know that this world can't change someone like me either." have i mentioned i am both queer and work in climate activism for a living

most anticipated ql (& why): 23.5 degrees the series!!!! i was already one million percent there for milklove but the recent confirmation of viewjune is just like the icingest of icing on the cake. i'm so fucking stoked you guys

i'm sorry i'm not going to answer the question on guilty pleasure series because like @manogirl i do not believe in the concept, nor the ones on healthiest vs. toxic relationships because i simply do not feel like it <3

most underrated series: hmm, most of the thai ql series i've seen are too well-known/watched to count for this. like would we call gap the series underrated? probably not, right? maybe...triage? but i personally felt like triage got pretty uneven in the second half...idk this is the problem with having mostly stuck to gmmtv huh

i really have not kept good track of who has done this meme already so ummmm @citystoryscapes @mahuhumaling @melto @mousieta @incandescentflower @galauvant @dancing-out-in-space

[fourthnattawat]

BAD BUDDY WEEK DAY 2: FAVOURITE EPISODE

episode 4: do you like ink? no. yes.