#i feel you linger in the air meta

[waitmyturtles]

BLUBBERING SPOILERS BELOW FOR I FEEL YOU LINGER IN THE AIR, EPISODE 12/FINALE:

YEAH. SO. YEAH. SO!

This can't be meta. I don't think I can conjure it. Just blather. I'll try to be sensible. First, a little housekeeping before we start the meeting:

We know there will be a special episode (the preview looks..... LIKE A GODDAMN HOLIDAY GIFT, GAAAAHHH).

Peeps are going back and forth on a second season, and while it seems that Nonkul Chanon blurted it out during the final episode fan meeting (lol you cute, Nonkul), Tee Bundit is rolling back a bit, *likely* due to funding. But seeing social media going absolutely INSANE over this ending, I can't imagine that Dee Hup will have any issue with finding the moolah for a second season -- especially after that after-credits scene, WITH HORSES, WITH MUSTACHES, WITH TATTOOS, WITH ARMOR, the whole thang. Tee let that shit hang all out like that. Warrior-era Thailand, let's m'fing go. That was a hell of a lead into a second season that may not happen, come awn.

Alright, with that out of the way:

I didn't think a show would top Moonlight Chicken for me this year, but IFYLITA is my top new drama of the year (with the HEAVY CAVEAT that I have not seen La Pluie yet -- that's for either after my Old GMMTV Challenge, or just making sure I watch it before year's end).

Part of the reason why I lost my gatdamn mind last week on episode 11 is that Tee Bundit did not interfere with any damn nonsense last week -- he let the episode's story unwind without any noise. He let the emotion roll.

The same light touch (or rather, a lack of interference) happened here, BUT: there was a LOT more happening firstly by way of closing some loops that were open, moving to new loops, and shedding more depth into Jom and Yai's final moments together

We got closure on Yai's dad, who was grumpily like, uhhh, I dunno what happened in my life, but yeah, daughter Eaung Peang, you go have a good life with Maey, crotchety crotch. I think that's the best we could get from politically involved dads of 1928 Chiang Mai. (EP AND MAEY SWINGING THEIR HANDS WHILE WALKING AWAY -- SAAAHHSHAY FROM ALL THAT, LADIES, SASHAY.) It looks like EP's herbal abortion left her safe -- thank goodness. We didn't see James or Ming this episode.

For loops that weren't closed, I'm not complaining, because we got an explanation for how Jom's beloved ones will repeat in his reincarnated futures and pasts, through the explanation of the northern Thai ceremony of having 32 blessings reinstated to you after illness or misfortune (THREE CHEERS for @blmpff for capturing screenshots of this explanation!). (AND THE WHITE THREAD, PEEPS, THE WHITE THREAD, I'm coming back to this in a second.) If we do get a season 2, then I will not be colored surprised if we see Ming and James in different roles. (And, yes. Your bitch here has relaxed on Pat's shooter, finally. My nose was trained on James being a colonialist interferer, but he did good last episode.)

But this episode belonged, of course, to Yai and Jom, their final moments together in 1928 Chiang Mai, saying the slow farewell as Jom slowly disappeared in front of Yai's eyes.

LORD. WHEWWWWWWWWWWWWW. The lacy fabric with which Yai used to cover the mirrors so that Jom wouldn't see himself fade away. The empathy of that. The scene where we heard their lovemaking over the flashbacks montage. WHEW. WHOA. (I did say, to my friend @shortpplfedup, something something Jom started really fading away after that intimate scene and something something had the ontology cough cough outta him, ANYWAY.)

The way that Yai pitched forward when Jom finally disappeared.

AND I MOTHERFUCKING SCREAMED WHEN JOM AND MUSTACHIOED YAI WERE ABOUT TO TOUCH INTO THE WATER AGAIN, AND THEN THE DIVER EMT WAS LIKE, BLOOP I'M HERE AND OH, JOM, YOU'RE ALIVE IN 2023. I yelped in the deli, shit. The way Jom was silently screaming in the water for Yai.

And, so. In the "present" day (present dimension, really), Jom survived that CRAAAAZY car accident (LIKE! WHAT?! He flew out of the car into the water, bros! The magic of fiction, anyway.)

He.......he holds space for Ohm?! Looking BACK on that scene, AFTER we get the explanation of the 32 blessings, we realize: despite Ohm's infidelity and his promise to a new woman, Ohm is still important in Jom's life -- he's still a beloved presence, as he did mean something, for a long time, to Jom. Of course, modern Jom did NOT let a moment to shade Ohm pass him by, oh no. But wasn't that interesting to note? That Jom's dimensions would allow Ohm to be in those dimensions -- that Ohm would be reincarnated through Jom's 32 blessings (at least in the past direction).

You know what I also loved about seeing Jom in his present-day apartment, with the present-day Jeed, Ohm, and Khaimuk (aka Fong Kaew). I LOVED WHAT THAT CASTING, THE SHIFTING OF THE CHARACTERS AND CHARACTERIZATIONS, SAID ABOUT JOM'S PERSPECTIVE OF EQUITY IN 1928 AND 2023.

Jeed is NOT Khun Eaung Peang. Jeed is ALL SASS. But Jeed is YOUNGER than Jom. Jom, in 2023, is P'Jom, with the honorific. Present-day Jom can smack his little sister's head in jest. Jeed can be OUT and SAFE and have a crush on her girl friend, safely, and can ask for her brother's support, OPENLY.

Jom never stopped being Jom, whether it was 2023 pre-accident, 1928, or 2023 post-accident. Jom is comfortable in his own skin, and wants happiness AND EQUITY for the people he loves around him. I love that the casting and characterizations of the incarnations of the characters reflect Jom's state of mind that all people are equal and the same, no matter a fancy honorific or a royally appointed residence.

I screamed at @shortpplfedup when I saw Jom wearing the white thread in bed during the thunderstorm. I stopped, rewound, and saw he was wearing the white thread in the water scene with Warrior Yai. The white thread never left his wrist -- he still has his blessings intact.

And, and, and, back to the house of Palanthip in 2023. Who's the lady of the house? This lady knows Jom's the only one who can open that chest. The chest opens, the drawings are there, THE PICTURE OF THEIR PARTY, AND THE LETTER FROM YAI TO JOM, THE LETTER, THE TEARS, AKSLKDF, AND, AND, AND --

Oh my god, I was crying, y'all. Shit. Just our confident dude, striding in, asking Jom, sweetheart, why are you crying. And Jom jumping into Yai's arms.

I was shaking my head. I mean. I love that we learned that Yai actually HAD HIS OWN BLESSINGS CEREMONY because he was so lost after Jom's departure. WE LEARNED ABOUT THE REST OF YAI'S LIFE. We know, now, that the Yai of 1928 yearned for Jom for the rest of his life. So much so that, at the twilight of the life of 20th-century Yai, that he had the good mind to leave Jom a letter, to let Jom know that his life was a good life, because Jom had been in it. To let Jom know that Yai's love had never faded away.

AND THEN THAT YAI CAME BACK TO JOM.

Jom, dude, you're a good dude, for these good people to be coming back to you, in dimension after dimension. That monk was right.

I told you this was just blathering; I can try to put some sensible thoughts together in a few days, but the structure of this story, the empathy of this story, the way this story was leveraged by drama and romance and HOPE. I mean. This series was utterly fantastic.

I know there's the lifelong debate of whether or not BLs "count" as queer media, and in many, many instances, they do. But since I've had the disappointment of Only Friends and GMMTV on my mind lately, I had to note, mentally, particularly during the lovemaking scene, and during the closure of this episode, that Tee really fucking handed it to anyone who criticizes BL as a not-as-sophisticated drama genre.

And you know what? I also wanna say that Tee fucking handed it to GMMTV as well. I am so DAMN glad this series was airing when Only Friends was airing. While Only Friends sat on the opportunity to present progressive ideas on queer love and queer community, IFYLITA ROLLED right into it.

(I'll ask @lurkingshan to fact-check me on the following:) Because this series was a historical drama with a queer romance centering it, I think Tee Bundit could feel free from the chains of BL tropes and expectations to do something truly singular. I felt that what I was watching was cinematic, it was moving, it was strikingly emotional, particularly because I felt that this show was showing me something that transcended any viewer's expectations of what we should be watching, as opposed to, say, a BL set in an office like Tee's Step By Step. Where that show fumbled was in the show itself not knowing if it was a workplace drama or a BL-centric romance.

IFYLITA knew what it was: a historical drama, certainly centering romance, but also balancing conversations about equity and wealth disparities across eras. With that uncomplicated centering, I think Tee Bundit made an absolutely BRILLIANT show, and it fucking WORKED.

I will scream to anyone who'll hear me. If you haven't watched I Feel You Linger In The Air yet, do it, PLEASE PLEASE. Y'all know I am an Aof Noppharnach girlie for life, and I LIVE FOR MOONLIGHT CHICKEN, I DO, I DO, all of my Asian references in MLC and the food and everything, god I loved that show, but --

IFYLITA was a cinematic masterpiece. Full stop. All hail @neuroticbookworm and @lurkingshan for telling me to keep with it after my Step By Step-PTSD. This show was worth every last minute I spent watching and writing on it.

Season 2, Warrior Yai, let's get him a better mustache -- let's FUCKING GO, BABIES.

P.S. BRIGHT AND NONKUL FOR LIFE, FOR LIFE!!!!!!! THE ACTING!!!!!! MY GOD!!!!!

[lurkingteapot]

Romanisation woes aside (that "u" is supposed to denote a different vowel sound in the first instance than in the second and I do not understand what led to that choice), I wonder whether this was left untranslated intentionally.

ปัตยุบัน (IPA approx.: /pàt júʔ ban/, Paiboon: bpàt-yú-ban; Puttyuban in the English subs) is not a word I'm familiar with, but looking it up I got ปรัตยุบัน (IPA approx.: /pràt júʔ ban/, Paiboon: bpràt-yú-ban), which lists Sanskrit प्रत्युत्पन्न (IPA: /pɾɐt̪.jut̪ˈpɐn̪.n̪ɐ/) as the word's etymological origin … and ปัจจุบัน as a modern form.

Now ปัจจุบัน (IPA approx.: /pàt  t͡ɕùʔ  ban/ Paiboon: bpàt-jù-ban) I know – it means present day, modern day, current time (as a noun) or present, current, modern, up-to-date, or acute (medical) as an adjective.

On the English Wiktionary entry for the word ปัจจุบัน, ปัตยุบัน is listed as an obsolete form.

So. The Modern Day Bar? I love that as a name for this establishment that seems set somewhere between a gentlemen's club and a secret gay bar, but it might've seemed to on the nose in English. otoh I may just be completely off track and it's just a name, or a Northern word I'm failing to interpret. Hopefully the next few weeks will let us know.

[twig-tea]

Top 5 moments of yearning in 2023 bl (no cheating you can only pick 5)

WOW. wowowowowowow. Wow. It's almost as though you saw my other answers before asking this (which I know you didn't because this came in first and I am Slow). Rude.

First, I need to establish a very important distinction: Pining (my beloved) is when you think or are determined that it will never happen; yearning (also my beloved) is when you think it could and are really struggling to hold yourself back from just going for it right now for Reasons. The possibility of fulfillment is the main difference.

Second distinction: Yearning is not necessarily sexual tension. It can be an element of it, but yearning is about wanting something, whether that's sex, closeness, acceptance, or something else. It's about wanting existing barriers to drop that are preventing you from having the thing you want most in that moment, whether they're internal or external, physical or metaphysical.

Finally, as much as I would love to talk about only my favourite shows exclusively forever, you did ask for my top five moments rather than top 5 shows that contain yearning, so I stuck to the rules. All that is to say, there are a couple of series on this list that I don't actually recommend lol

With that out of the way:

Top [For Real Only] 5 Moments of Yearning in 2023 BLs Because Shan Hates Me

1. Jae Won yanking and then patting down Ji Hyun before putting him in a cab, The Eighth Sense

Basically this whole show is yearning (except for the brief interlude for pining). I chose this moment because this was the first moment I was certain they both actually knew what was going on and it was clear to them both that they could have this, at least in theory; the tension felt palpable, and I really wasn't sure whether they were going to hold back or not. Jae Won is supposed to be saying goodbye, but he can't keep it in to the point where he just can't stop touching Ji Hyun (that backpack pull that happens immediately before this, guh), and Ji Hyun is also so clearly soaking it up. When the cab pulls up and they just keep staring, there was a real question in my mind about whether they were going to break and just go for it or not. For these two it's not just about sex; they yearn for version of one another they are when they're together, and they don't want the spell to end.

2. Khun Lu and Ken almost kiss while naked in bed, Chains of Heart

I'm still not entirely sure I know what happened in that show, but the yearning between these two was palpable the whole time. In this particular scene, Ken has just seen a hint the previous night that Lu is in fact Din, his missing-presumed-dead lover, and he's already previously rejected Lu on the premise that Din is still alive and is the only man he'll ever love, even though he feels drawn to Lu. Up until then, his yearning was for Din, though he also felt something for Lu. Now suddenly he's presented with the possibility that he's already reunited with his lover, which is all he wants, though he's unsure that's what's happening. On the other side of this equation, Lu has been wanting as much of Ken as he can charm, trick, or beg for. He just wants him now, here, under the pretense of this new body, because he knows Ken will never be safe if Din is thought to still be alive. At the same time, he is torn between wanting to be near Ken to keep him safe and wanting to stay away to keep him safe. Yearning barely covers it.

3. The post-sex breakdown of Yai and Jom in I Feel You Linger In The Air

This scene was particularly painful because the yearning only hits harder after his orgasm, rather than the catharsis Jom was probably expecting. In this scene they weren't just yearning for one another physically like in earlier parts of the show; they are yearning for a future they can't have together but both want and in this moment feels like it should be possible. Yai really looks like he wants to meld into Jom's skin. The way that sex does not break the yearning is quietly devastating. Is there anything worse than having everything you want in your arms but knowing you can't keep it?

4. Patts desperate to get through to Saengai on the other side of the door, La Pluie

@liyazaki the tumblr gif search is not crediting you properly so adding a tag to you here!

Listen, Patts has been yearning for reciprocation from his soulmate for years before he meets Saengtai, and it did not at all stop once they met, it just changed in quality. He's always yearned rather than pined because with soulmates comes the expectation that it will work, because of 'destiny'. We saw him say in a flashback that he thought his soulmate could be platonic, and I do believe him when he says to Nara that he'd be fine with that, because what he really yearns for is to be understood and wanted for himself (hence the heartbreaking line "is it that hard to choose me?" that comes before this). The fact that someone had a "destined" connection to him and rejected him for years took a real toll on this man. The way he claws at the door in this scene will stay with me into 2024.

5. Minato and Shin at the Onsen, Minato's Laundromat s2

As much as I dislike where this season went, a yearning list would not be complete without Shin and Minato. We spend a lot of time with Shin's yearning in this show, but we get glimpses that Minato is actually yearning too throughout the season and especially at the onsen. In this scene, he tries to get drunk to get past his own insecurities, but it doesn't work as well as he wanted. This scene was all about Minato articulating all the ways he also yearns, and how it's overwhelming for him--and how that overwhelm is frustrating. I love this outpouring of Minato's frustration around his own internal blockers to what he wants. Also Shin swallowing in this gif makes it perfectly clear he is also Suffering. Perfection.

Bonus and it doesn't count as cheating because it's not a BL SO THERE:

Sam and Mon comforting one another after Sam's grandmother found out about their relationship, GAP

This show was such a mess but my god these two women wanted one another so badly, and I appreciated the hell out of that. It felt like yearning rather than pining until near the end, because all through their getting together phase they insisted on such an intense level of denial that they didn't even seem to worry about what they wanted being impossible, they just knew they didn't have it yet. So they did things like bite one another and pretend it was platonic and wonder why they weren't satisfied. I was thinking about going with an early scene where they barely resist the urge to make out, but instead I went with this one because I think it's a double-whammy. in this scene, Sam is trying to get Mon to tell her what's wrong, and Mon confesses that Sam's grandmother saw her at her house and asked her to leave Sam. Instead of pulling away, Mon clings to Sam, and Sam apologizes to her for not being there for her. Sam thinks she can talk her around to accepting Mon. "Don't worry; I'll talk to her. We'll get through this". The yearning here is for them to be together and safe; accepted by their families and happy, and not feeling this pain. I don't recommend this show, but there is something to be said for the way it showed the impact of intergenerational trauma and the very real yearning so many of us feel to just be accepted as we are.

[pharawee]

I've seen a lot of interfans (and I in no way consider myself *not* an interfan - I'm definitely part of that audience) being confused and dissatisfied with the last episode of I Feel You Linger in the Air and - fair enough - that's a completely valid opinion to have and in no way wrong.

But I also keep seeing how that (completely valid) confusion and dissatisfaction is blamed on the show's storytelling and direction, and I honestly think that's a little unfair.

Leaving things open and unexplained doesn't make a story bad - especially if said story hasn't ended yet. It doesn't even make it unfinished.

And telling things in a way that many (international) fans aren't used to doesn't mean that the narrative is lacking. Because stories aren't really universal (even though, yes, the most beloved and successful stories are often built on motifs and themes that are fundamentally valued and understood across cultures). They rely on culturally shared norms and narrative cues that are inherently understood by the intended audience. Even the narrative flow and structure of a story varies wildly, with some cultures preferring meandering or circular narratives and lots of repetition and backtracking (case in point: the many, many flashbacks in Thai dramas).

I'm in no way an expert on Thai literature, but as someone with a degree in Cultural Sciences and (Socio-)Linguistics I'm very curious about examining cultural differences and how they shape who we are and why we do what we do (it's not a very exact science; we mostly just listen, record and bullshit talk a lot lmao). So when I read/watch a story and something doesn't add up for me (in an otherwise reasonably constructed narrative) I always assume that there's something I'm missing - not because the director/writer was sloppy or I'm too stupid to understand, but because I'm simply not picking up on the cultural breadcrumbs the narrative left for the audience to find and build upon.

And it's the same with IFYLITA's themes of reincarnation and karma and forgiveness, its lingering on certain themes and moments.

And, to be honest, sometimes it's best to take things at face-value and just accept what the narrative has given you. Maybe some things are meant to be puzzling and surprising. Maybe you're not supposed to be 100% sure about where the past and present versions of Yai come from; about who they are. Jom accepts them, isn't that enough?

That being said, it's an absolute outrage that Ming wasn't in the finale. I am devastated!!

[bengiyo]

I Feel You Linger in the Air Ep 11 Stray Thoughts

Last time, Jom, his friends, and their allies teamed up to expose Dech and Robert and their cruelest abuses. We then spent most of the episode wrapping up a lot of plot threads. Most everyone has either moved on or is okay for now. Maey is back with Euangphueng, Ming is fine, the mom is rebelling in her own way, etc. Yai is going to France and expects Jom to stay here and wait for him, which made me immediately dissociate. Also, Jom's starting to disappear in images and mirrors and we don't know why.

I like that Yai is skeptical, but can comprehend some of what Jom is saying about himself. Yai may not be good at practical things, but he's a thinker.

Nonkul is really good, and you can feel the complex emotions coming off of Jom as he can finally talk about what he's been experiencing openly.

Okay, Bright has cake.

This is the same team that had a woman give birth, with her jeans on, in the back of a truck earlier this year. I hope they handle this pregnancy plot better.

Why does the subber keep adding Khun to Euangphueng's name when Maey doesn't say it, but doesn't add it to Yai's name when Jom usually says it?

Okay, I really like them articulating the long-term pain and suffering Euangphueng is dreading.

That Fong Kaew scene with Khamsaen was so good. She's worrying about EP and he's convinced himself that Robert didn't touch her, but we know the implications of him making her bleed when he does himself on her.

Bright and Nonkul are so good together. There was no dialogue in this soft montage of Jom redoing the drawings, but you could feel the wistfulness that Jom might disappear at any moment. It's not easy for some pairs to do the 'being together' part really well, but these two are hitting that beautifully. Now that the stresses have been removed, they are clearly in love and a team.

I really love the relationship that has formed between Fong Kaew and Euangphueng. EP is making a very difficult decision and I like the way Fong Kaew's supporting her. It's also interesting to see Maey worry about the karma of getting an abortion as a reason to raise the child.

Yai is reading The Time Machine by H.G. Wells!!!

Not that the monk is wrong about them having no control over this phenomenon, but they could also maybe keep track of the rate at which Jom's reflection is vanishing and see if they could predict the number of days.

There is a melancholy hanging over this that works so well, because Jom basically has a terminal condition that will strike at any moment and permanently end this relationship.

Poor Ming. He's losing all of his friends.

Wow, this farewell party reminds me of the stories shared with me about someone getting an AIDS diagnosis before we had anything resembling effective treatment. Throwing a party before their health plummets to say goodbye.

And now they're dancing as everyone reminisces. I'm just gonna cry thanks.

Jom isn't going to be in this photo and we're all gonna be sad.

Okay, the letter broke me. How many queer lives have been lost to time because we couldn't preserve their stories. I am so invested in this letter now.

If Jom vanishes after he reads this letter I will be crushed.

They ended the episode on the almost faded photo!!!!!

I feel so heavy after that episode. Nonkul and Bright really did the damn thing this week. You can feel the ache the entire time. That party was one of the most beautiful things I've experienced in genre in a while. This show is really special.

[lurkingshan]

I’ve been thinking about what makes the relationship between Jom and Yai in I Feel You Linger in the Air work so well despite the lead up to the romance being somewhat underwritten (which it plainly has been, especially on Jom’s side). I’ve discussed with some of my watch buddies that Tee Bundit gets bored of his own romance narratives and prefers to focus more of his attention on everything else happening around the romance (see: Step by Step), and he has plainly been doing the same in IFYL. So why is this romance working so well despite that?

First, I must give Tee credit for landing the big moments, even if he’s gliding over some of the building blocks to get there. Yai reciting that love poem, his series of increasingly obvious confessions and Jom finally opening up to receive them, their escalating physical desire, that olive oil scene, their dance both in reality and fantasy, their first sex scene, the intimate talk in the tub, Yai taking Jom to see the fireflies—this is all peak swoony romance. And crucially, he is grounding all of these moments quite intentionally in a sense of foreboding and impending doom, so even as we find joy in these two falling in love, we never forget what they have to lose and the danger that is lurking all around them. This works to tether the romance fantasy elements to something that feels more real, making the entire relationship feel both more vital and more fraught.

Second, I think the characterization for Jom is strong enough for us to fill in the gaps around his feelings for Yai. Jom met Yai after the worst day of his life and on the heels of realizing his lover had betrayed and strung him along for years. Yai’s earnestness and sincerity, his straightforward way of communicating, and his confident assurance that he wants to be with Jom no matter what must all be a balm to Jom’s hurt after what Ohm did to him. Jom has become more calm and centered as his relationship with Yai has progressed; he no longer seems anxious and scared at all times despite his continued awareness that he’s in a dangerous situation. You can read that as Jom simply allowing himself a pleasant distraction amidst his confusion and turmoil, but to me he just seems more centered and secure with Yai. His feelings for Yai seem genuine and his desire to be with him grows stronger each episode. I’ve noticed how much more Jom is smiling in these last couple episodes, and it doesn’t even feel conscious on his part. He just likes Yai and it’s coming through loud and clear.

Third, I must give it up for the actors. Nonkul and Bright are killing it in these roles, and they have created a very natural chemistry that can quickly ignite into intensity. Their depiction of physical desire is tangible; I can feel it in my own body when the tension between them ratchets up. They play beautifully off each other, and not just in the way they physically touch; everything from their body language to their facial expressions to their eye shine when they look at each other to their vocal intonations is just loaded with feeling and palpable chemistry. This is a story based in a fated connection and likely some form of reincarnation and inter-dimensional time travel, and so the pull between them needs to feel strong enough that you believe they would come together over and over again through time in all their various forms. We need to believe this relationship is something they will fight for and that Jom will mourn when he inevitably gets forced back to his own time, and they are absolutely selling it.

IFYL is delivering some of the best Big Romance we’ve seen in bl this year, despite having a story that is playing with a lot of big themes and is interested in a lot more than the romance. It’s a really remarkable show and another sign of how the genre is evolving.

[neuroticbookworm]

Social Class Commentary in I Feel You Linger In The Air, episode 5

I Feel You Linger In The Air continues to blow my mind week after week (I love you, Yai and his pink pants), but today's episode was especially brilliant with its commentary on oppression across social class, and how people react and adapt to it.

Prik has been a potential problem lurking in the plot's background, as she seemed to enjoy the privilege of being a senior servant in the household. Combined with her old school opinions, she could've posed a serious threat to Yai and Jom's romance in the future. But this episode gave her a wake up call and showed her exactly where her place is and how much power she actually has -- absolutely none. She had to rely on the kindness of a man who was willing to stick his neck out for her so she can visit her dying mother, the same man on whom she had placed zero trust in the past.

And on the other end of this social class spectrum, we have FongKaew and her place in the house, and how she chose to remedy that. When I saw her dyeing the dress blood red and decking it with black lace, I was sure that she was in her Black Widow era and that Robert is gonna meet the Reaper in his bed tonight. But no, she is, at least for the time being, choosing to work with the situation she's currently in, and seduces Robert in the hopes that it'll lift her place in the hierarchy of the household. And it does.

But the absolutely stunning revelation in all this was the implication that Eueng Phueng and Maey were actively involved in making FongKaew Robert's second wife, so that Eueng Pheung can be free of his sadist ways. What an absolutely brilliant way to highlight how even the most seemingly well meaning upperclass folks are only capable of seeing their servants as a means to their ends, people whose lives can be played with, to make their own lives easier. And no, the cruelty doesn't stop there. They then have the audacity to judge the methods people like Fongkaew have to use to survive the wretched situations that were forced on them.

It is also noteworthy that these themes of power and obedience were explored exclusively with the women in the show, who, irrespective of the social class they're in, will always be placed beneath the men of their group. These women can claim faux superiority, try to climb social ranks, and scheme against each other, but in the end, they would all be considered lesser, inferior and submissive to the men of the time. I only hope that they soon realise this truth and stand with each other, instead of playing short lived games that every women would eventually lose.

In clown collaboration with @lurkingshan

[hoppipolla]

As early as episode 1, the drama has established that most characters rely on their sense of touch, especially Jom and Yai. Beyond the simple aesthetic of it all, the emphasis on hands is inherent to the way the characterisation is structured. 

The close intimacy between Jom and Yai during their sex scene is made possible thanks to the way their hands convey what they are feeling. 

Yai desires Jom and the way he reaches for Jom’s face as Jom is getting him undressed shows both his impatience and his overwhelming yearning. During this scene, Yai is battling between his physical desire and the fascination he feels towards Jom. His kisses are ardent but also gentle, like when he kisses the hollow of Jom’s shoulder or his neck. His eyes linger on every inch of Jom’s body, his hands slowly slide down Jom’s arms: he is mesmerised. And so is Jom whose expression is quite indescribable: a mix of quiet desire and deep love. 

Although the sexual tension is high, there’s a slowness to the scene that I feel grateful for. The directing lets the characters discover each other’s bodies and it’s so beautiful. 

Jom closing his eyes as he lets Yai’s kisses take him whole emphasises how he gives priority to his sense of touch, making him feel so tangibly Yai’s love for him. 

The two of them drawing each other near in a tight embrace before Yai guides Jom to the bed, doing so without ever breaking their kiss, seems to show how their bodies mirror their feelings. 

Just like @lurkingshan beautifully said in this post, Bright and Nonkul’s seemingly natural chemistry contributes to building such a real feeling of intimacy which is at the core of the story for the two of them (their characters) feel as if they’ve known each other forever. As the monk said, they are destined to meet each other and who knows how many times they’ve already met before? 

When Jom goes back to the past and sees Yai for the “first time”, their world collides and their hearts recognise each other although their minds are at a loss. Memories come flooding back but they can’t quite understand where they come from. 

This irresistible attraction they feel towards each other cannot be expressed in other ways than knowing glances and subtle touches and the directing of this series does both amazingly.

[purposelynana]

If you ever fall in love, it comes slowly. The revelation does not come in days or weeks or months. Some love could take years only to finally realize of what we're losing.

So for those people who eager for story to be told faster or perhaps wondering by the episode 4 they didn't have kiss scene, fucking hell. You're so pampered. Apathetic. Raised by bunch of motherfuckers who does not understand the concept of time. How time does move slowly for some of us. How time prevent us to be the best of us. How time separates us. How time also unite us.

Love that comes from rushed feelings tends to died out faster.

So thank you for the slow pace. From the old soul who resides in the depth of my heart, I am gratefully thank you. For your kind undestanding towards time and its slow nature.

Watching I Feel You Linger in the Air does make me a little bit nostalgic. Reminds me of an old lover of mine. And how it could do wonder if our story become much closer to fiction. But in reality, no one has the effort to keep waiting. Or even remember old promises. In reality, time does suck.

That person got married today.

[waitmyturtles]

A little bit more on I Feel You Linger In The Air (reincarnation, the novel version, and more)...

I am back home and recovering from a somewhat INSANELY stressful work trip (WHEW! TIRED!), and I've missed writing meta oh so very much, BUT! A couple of things will be happening in my meta life soon: The Old GMMTV Challenge Bad Buddy Meta Month starts next week (FINALLY, EEE!), Last Twilight starts tomorrow, the Den-Panuwat-penned-and-Only-Friends-adjacent series Playboyy starts next week -- we got a lot going on.

AND, AND! AND! I did myself something good while I was away. I HOUSED the novel version of I Feel You Linger in the Air, because, BECAUSE! I still can't help screaming mentally about that finale -- even though reading the novel actually made me realize that episode 12 of IFYLITA was a touch redundant.

Related to the IFYLITA novel and series: I got an ask in my inbox that somehow disappeared (@porjomkwan, if you're still out there -- thank you for the ask!) that asked about my thoughts on the theme of reincarnation in IFYLITA, and cited this fabulous post and reblog by @tipsyjaehyun and @clairedaring about this theme. Tipsy and Claire covered the majority of the ground that the drama series captures regarding reincarnation -- in particular, the GORGEOUS focus on the northern Thai blessing ceremony that calls back to a human host the 32 spirits that a host carries with them throughout their life/lives. Those spirits can be incarnated and/or reincarnated within repeated and/or beloved figures of the host's memories and reincarnated lives. (That explains why people like Ohm and Kaimook, in Jom's present life, are reincarnated as Khamsean and Fong Kaew in Jom's life of 1928 Chiang Mai. And it explains how Jom can continue to be called to different eras involving Yai, from Commander/Warrior/Mustache Yai of ancient Thailand, to 1928 Chiang Mai Khun Yai, to present-day Chiang Mai Yai Kanthorn.)

@clairedaring notes in their reblog that in the novel, the foundational theme of reincarnation AND of Jom and Yai being forever bound to each other is confirmed, directly and heavily, by Commander Yai. Claire quotes from the novel Commander/Warrior Yai speaking to Jom :

"Jom-Jao, listen, though you are fated to be apart from me, my love will never fade, and it will follow you like a holy spirit, protecting you in my place. No matter where fate brings you, no matter the danger you encounter, may those misfortunes fall upon my spirit instead of yours."

I want to confirm that this is my understanding and experience of the centering and grounding of reincarnation in the series as well (@porjomkwan, this answers your question to me!). And, this very much speaks to what I understand was a gentle criticism by Thai audiences towards the show as this season of the show ended -- because the Commander Yai period really sets in stone what Jom can expect for the rest of his live(s) regarding having Yai in his life again in another time period. In which case, I agree HEAVILY with @clairedaring that IFYLITA absolutely needs a season 2, because that Commander Yai period is so definitive of how this first season gets contextualized in the end of the entire piece.

A couple of other quick notes on the novel before I move to a comparative final point:

1) JOM. JOM IS A SASSY B IN THE NOVEL. DAMN! I honestly think Nonkul Chanon could DEF handle being a touch more sassy. "I'm a grown-ass man," Jom says at one point. Yes, you ARE, HONEY! Sassy B Jom courting and standing up to Commander Yai? It was a WONDERFUL story line. (BTW, the quality of the writing of the IFYLITA Y novel was, as expected, wanting, especially by way of a fan translation. But I have to agree with fans of the novel from Thailand and elsewhere, that the story itself was SOLID.)

2) The history behind the Commander Yai period is FABULOUS to learn about. (@tipsyjaehyun has some context about the various eras of Yai here, if you don't mind a few novel spoilers.) In particular, I spent a LOT of minutes reading about the lengthy reign of the Ayutthaya Kingdom in Thailand, and just -- as an Asian and an Asian-American watching Thai shows, getting deep into this reminds me of my own accountability and responsibility for trying to grasp what an average Thai viewer will bring by way of education-based historical awareness into shows like IFYLITA. This long Wikipedia article is a must read if you want to go deeper into IFYLITA context!

3) My third point on the novel leads into what I quickly want to note by way of at least one comparison to another show that did reincarnation themes differently, but also beautifully, by way of an original Y novel.

Until We Meet Again is a permanent FAVE of mine -- and it captures reincarnation, at least a different style of it, within its drama context. In UWMA's context, a red thread tied between the passed bodies of the lovers Korn and Intouch ensures that their spirits will find each other again in the future.

As noted within UWMA, different Asian cultures have different reads on the meaning of the red thread, from China, to Thailand, to elsewhere. This article notes northwestern and Vietnamese beliefs regarding the red thread, and this Wikipedia article notes the Chinese origins of the myths of the red thread. (Remember than in IFYLITA, the blessing ceremony of calling 32 spirits back to a host is cited as being from northern Thailand -- meaning, many of these myths, legends, and practices are utterly regional, and very tied to specific regional cultures that we can learn more about as viewers. Super cool.)

In UMWA, Korn's and Intouch's spirits inhabit other bodies -- namely, Dean's and Pharm's personages. And Dean and Pharm take on some characteristics of the spirits they provide a home to, and, even more interestingly -- Dean's and Pharm's OWN behaviors reflect the regrets and/or resistances that Korn and Intouch bear to each other, with Korn's spirit being far more forward with love than he was when he was alive; and Intouch's spirit being far more fearful of that love, knowing in the end where his love led to -- their deaths.

In IFYLITA, we see Yai's spirit being reborn essentially into different version of Yai, and all of them called Yai. In the novel, Jom treats all of these Yais as Yais that he can fall in love with -- he is in love with all of them, because the spirit of Yai is essentially a singular spirit being reborn into various different versions of the body of Yai (quick spoiler: the modern-day Yai is only half-Thai).

I happen to REALLY love these various interpretations of reincarnation between these shows, and certainly many, many more shows and movies across Asia that touch upon reincarnation as an essential theme of HOPE, of love, of joy. The various ways in which these practices are regarded, from Buddhism, to Hinduism, to Shintoism, and other Asian spiritual practices, are fascinating to learn about, including their regional variances. And they speak very much to me as an Asian, as to how I learn about cultural practices, nuances, and mores. (A comparative cultural example is how food -- like, say, a dish like Hainanese chicken rice -- differs among Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore.)

But also, as an Asian watching shows like UWMA and IFYLITA -- I *know* that when I'm watching a show that's based on spirit reincarnation, that I'm not necessarily watching a "sad" show. I remember, of the day dramas of Japan and Korea that I watched when I was younger, that I absorbed better understandings of ancestor worship and elder respect. If a house had an altar with a picture of a passed-on elderly relative -- surely it was understood that that relative had passed away and one could be sad about it. But their spirit is meant to be honored at the altar, and especially in Japanese and Korean family dramas with these kinds of scenes, you can see characters speaking to the pictures of those who have passed on, having conversations, and being the subject of annual ceremonies of honoring the dead.

In other words, what I utterly LOVED about the IFYLITA novel -- and what I truly hope a season 2 will capture -- is that the Yais of the various eras were not despondent when Jom left them. Those Yais knew that a future Yai would experience Jom again. Korn and Intouch knew their spirits would meet again one day: it was Dean and Pharm that needed to come together to make that happen.

I wrote quite a bit about the Asian cinematic tradition of sad and/or open-ended endings in my review of The Love of Siam, and I think one reason why I absolutely cannot shake IFYLITA from my system -- and even UWMA, too, although UWMA has a confirmed happy ending -- is that IFYLITA is utterly reflective of this practice of the open-ended ending, at least for the show's first season, because we KNOW, through reincarnation, that Jom WILL encounter Yai again. If you read the novel, you know that Commander Yai promises this. But even if you don't read the novel, and we never get a season 2 -- to see Yai Kanthorn strolling right into Jom's arms, without very much other context, is enough, at least for an Asian audience, to know that the spirits did their thing again. Dramatically, I do think the finale could use more finessing (cc @lurkingshan and @neuroticbookworm, to whom I said this when I finished the novel), but now that I have the novel's context, I know HOW the finale could have been improved.

I took this ask as a major excuse to just unwind more and more on a piece that I totally loved in IFYLITA, and I hope to heck that we get a second season. I am thrilled that I made IFYLITA my debut into Y series reading, because the story is just so solid, and as I often say about my really beloved shows -- IFYLITA does not shy away from being rooted in assumed knowledge about cultural practices that an Asian audience can automatically check into. It really felt familiar and homey to watch this incredibly made and well-told story about an enduring romance, and I'm so appreciative that IFYLITA will be a show I'll be holding close as this year closes out -- a year that started off on the strongest Asian note with the fabulous Moonlight Chicken. MLC and IFYLITA encapsulating 2023 for Asian audiences? We were fed really, really well.

[lurkingteapot]

The poem Khun Yai recites to Jom at the end of ep 4 is from นิราศภูเขาทอง Golden Mountain Niraat, which has been called the best niraat ever written, by สุนทรภู่ Sunthorn Phu (or Phra Sunthonwohan, as Jom calls him respectfully), THE niraat poet.

ไม่เมาเหล้าแล้วแต่เรายังเมารัก สุดจะหักห้ามจิตคิดไฉน ถึงเมาเหล้าเช้าสายก็หายไป แต่เมาใจนี้ประจำทุกค่ำคืนฯ

translated in the show as

Not a drop of liquor to interfere, drunk on love's celestial bliss I've tried to resist this sweet intoxication no matter how drunk I am, sobriety comes with the morning light Drunk on love, my heart undone every night.

From what I gather, niraat are a type of lyrical poetry that deal with topics of journeying/travelling and separation from loved ones.

I'm not a literary scholar and still speak and read only very little Thai, so take this definition with a huge grain of salt, but I have a feeling that, in localisation terms, boy was basically quoting a Shakespearean sonnet at Jom. He's down bad.

And Jom gets the reference and lets Khun Yai know. I'm guessing that if he was trying to not appear cultured, he failed again.

[twig-tea]

I am absolutely obsessed with how I Feel You Linger in the Air has managed to convey the critical and fulfilling nature of found family and queer community woven amongst this love story. The two dance sequences are so powerful; first they showed the Fantasy, in which everyone in high society including Yai's family would clap and cheer their romance as they dance in structured ballroom steps and perfect tuxes, and then in today's episode we got the Reality, which is so much cozier, in which they are surrounded only by the people they love and trust, regardless of class, and they aren't putting on a show, they're just being themselves in cozy sweaters, swaying in one another's arms, while the people who care about their happiness watch them and are glad that they are happy.

When you've experienced exclusion, it makes you purposeful about who and what you include and what you work towards. And it doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt that we are excluded from some of those spaces, but focusing on what we can have and have built for ourselves is important. The spaces we build for ourselves are better than the spaces society tells us we should aspire to be in.

[pharawee]

As it turns out, I unfortunately don't have the time to both gif I Feel You Linger in the Air and write commentary (also, it kind of feels like cheating since I've read the novel and know what's going to happen. I've read some of my mutuals' theories but joining in on the conversation kind of feels like ruining people's fun 😔).

That being said, I love the novel not just as a BL novel but as a beautifully written and crafted (and translated - it comes with so many footnotes!) story in general. Definitely check out the official translation if you like IFYLITA and want to support its writer. It's well worth the money.

I've written before that I was very curious about how the series would approach the way the novel almost treats the past as its own character. Descriptions of history and culture and architecture (and language but unfortunately some of that gets lost in translation by necessity) are so vivid and colourful, and it's such a big part of why I love the novel so much.

You'd need a huge budget (and lots of cgi) to translate this attention to detail into visual form - to the point where it would probably detract from the story itself - but IFYLITA found such an amazing workaround that adds so much depth and colour to the narrative: instead of relying on the environment to tell a story about the past it concentrates on the characters itself.

And tbh at first I was a bit irritated by the large cast of secondary characters (most of which exist only at the very fringes of the story in the novel) because I thought it would take away from Jom and Yai's story. There's an episode early on where 20+ minutes pass without either of them appearing or being talked about.

Only, the story as it exists in the series would simply not have the same impact without Ming and his aging mother, or Fongkaew's tragic backstory, or Prik's family background, or Ueangphhueng and Mei's quiet love story, or the sympathy the series extends towards characters like Khamsaen and James (Robert can get f'ed in both the novel and the series though). It's the intricacy of their relationships and social standing that paints a picture that's just as vivid and vital as Jom's observations of the past in the novel - and I love that. It's such a natural, visual way of storytelling and it complements the novel incredibly well. It's like the novel offers an inside look through Jom's perspective, and the series provides an outside look through showing the characters and their lives.

There's so many other things I'd love to write about eventually (like how the series portraits Yai when in the book we almost always view him through Jom's eyes, or how the series visualises the mystery and horror of Jom's time travel, or how both novel and series treat karma) but giffing comes first because silly moving images is what I'm here for. 🙏

[bengiyo]

I Feel You Linger in the Air Ep 7 Stray Thoughts

Last week, Jom and Yai began their romance officially, and we saw further evidence that Jom's drawings are connected to the time travel or dimension hopping experience. Yai took Jom to a gay speakeasy, where James came out and expressed his attraction to Jom. Yai got jealous and turned a bit petty with Jom for a bit. However, the two had a beautiful moment where they agreed to try this. I really hope James doesn't betray us, because I liked him encouraging Yai to step up for Jom. We also confirmed that Euangphueng and Maey intentionally brought Fong Kaew to the house to distract Robert, and that Robert may be involved in the fire that killed Fong Kaew's dad and scarred her mother.

I am glad I saw a post earlier giving context that the poor women being murdered here are based on real people. Tee always has something to say about the real dangers queer people face in their lives, and it's a tense warning at the beginning of this relationship between Jom and Yai.

Unsurprisingly, the parents are anti-gay as their two queer kids suffer in front of them.

I already know this party is going to involve pairing Yai with a girl as a way to further secure the dad's power.

At least Jom has some sense.

Yai basically described what Fong Kaew is going through with this short story.

There goes Lamyai clocking them, and she's a gossip.

I have thoughts about them introducing Nuey last week, who cannot hide themselves, and Yai now being unable to do so now that he's connected with someone.

It's a good thing that Jom stood up for Prik. He has an ally who also cares about Yai to tell Lamyai to hush.

I find myself worrying about windows and sightlines a lot this episode. Euangphueng and Maey are having a moment and I'm worried that someone will see or hear.

I suspected that Maey has survived some horrible things, and this is as horrible as some of the things I imagined.

One of the things this show is getting right about existing under homophobic is the constant sense of surveillance hovering over you. Robert represents that so clearly.

Oh, sensual oils. This is promising.

This use of both mirrors with Jom out of focus is driving me insane.

Big fan of the little bit of stubble they keep showing on Yai.

Jom was loyal to Ohm. It's probably been a while since he was intimate with someone.

Intercutting the massage with Jom masturbating is one of the most erotic things I've seen that wasn't overly sex since ITSAY episode 3. The way this was shot and scored clearly indicates that they both came, or at least Yai was close.

As much as I like seeing Nonkul and Bright do sensual things as their characters, we gotta get Jom out of here. He comes from an era where he isn't a slave.

Guide is absolutely crushing this role as Ming. He has built incredible chemistry with Nonkul.

There's something private about the way Nonkul smiles that draws me in every time. Bright has a similar thing with his brows.

Yai is running around making mistakes while Lamyai is running around righteous.

And now Uncle Dech caught them, and immediately went to Yai's dad.

Even Ming, the fan favorite, is struggling with his friend being queer.

Oh, Ming, don't confess when you're drunk.

And there's the pairing Yai with a girl part of the party I expected.

Now why the hell are Euangphueng and Maey running off now? I'm gonna need all of the gays to get it together.

Absolutely obsessed with the possibility that there is a picture of Jom that survived to the modern era.

Yai, my dude, you cannot abandon the heteronormative rituals so publicly like this if you want to protect Jom.

Thinking about O'Shae Sibley, who was killed for voguing as these two dance outside.

I am not immune to BL fantasy sequences involving dances.

Why...are we rapping?? What in the Marty McFly is happening?

I am not immune to boys making out in the rain.

Okay, that horny want in Yai's face, and Jom nodding yes? They are about to fuck for sure. This is about to go south so quickly.

Yep, gay turmoil begins next week, but we may get some nice love scenes first.

That was a fantastic episode. They really balanced the danger of being outed with the inherent need to connect that bubbles over in all of us. I felt the fear for everyone's safety, but I actually really like how badly everyone was hiding this week. That's basically the point. You can't win. The only way to be safe in the closet is to be perfectly quiet and alone. You cannot have anyone if you want to be undiscovered. Two people can keep a secret if one of them is dead. Like Nuey last week, Yai and Jom cannot hide. There's no amount of careful that can hide the warm feelings between two people. This was perfectly executed.

[purple-obsidian]

I loved your post about sleepy sex with dick. I'd love to see more soft moments with him in bed, pretty plz I need him to smother me 😪

nonsense (18+, dick grayson x gn reader) wc 900

⭓ this post contains sexual content and is not suitable for minors.

"I have a theory."

"A theory?"

"Yeah."

You can't see the grin on his face, but you feel the upturn of his lips against your neck and the soft shaking of his body as Dick chuckles at your sleepy musings.

"Well, lets hear it, babe. Don't keep me in suspense."

Your fingertips graze his scalp, toying with his thick, dark hair that tempts you every time you're together. Its just begging to be pulled at and played with, really. It isn't your fault.

"You and Bruce, your whole gig is that you don't have powers, right? You're just ordinary people, regular humans."

"Well, I wouldn't say ordinary." He chides back with playful defensiveness. His voice is muffled from his proximity, but you can understand him just fine.

"Exactly." You mumble back, staring up at the ceiling of your bedroom. You can just barely make out the outline of the ceiling fan, dimly lit with the meager light emanating from your digital alarm clock on your bedside table, accompanied by an inconspicuous bottle of lube and a half-empty water bottle. "I think it's bullshit. You're meta, one hundred percent. I think you've been fooling everyone all along."

"Huh. Is that right?" He mutters against your warm neck, his soft breath fanning over your skin and sending a sharp tingle down your spine.

"You're telling me I'm wrong?" You whisper breathlessly, struggling to take in a full breath with how his body is crushing you, keeping you pinned between him and the mattress. Dick senses your discomfort and shifts his weight around to take some pressure of of your diaphragm. You cling to him reflexively when he moves, scared that he might try and get up.

"Aww, baby, someone feeling needy?"

You ignore the teasing in his tone, but allow your fingers to grip his raven strands that much tighter, keeping his head in place next to yours. "Don't change the subject."

Dick shifts his bodyweight again, wiggling his hips and grinding them against yours not-so-subtly. There is nothing separating your bodies, all clothes were forgotten hours ago when the two of you first came to bed. The evidence of your time together dampens the bedding below you and lingers in the still air of the bedroom. And still, his arousal that's pressed against your stomach stiffens once again while he slowly moves against you, teasing you, toying with you like he was made to do so, as if the gods sent him here specifically to be your undoing. He's good enough at it that you wouldn't be surprised.

"What superpowers do I have, then? Since you got me all figured out."

You grin, releasing your firm hold on his hair and nuzzling his cheek to get him to look at you. Dick reluctantly removes his face from your neck and blinks the sleep away from his eyes to focus on your face in the dark.

"Isn't it obvious?" The tip of your nose brushes against his, lips almost touching. Your breath is synced up to where you're inhaling as he's exhaling, your chest deflating slightly while his expands, back and fourth, slow and steady.

"Indulge me." Barely a whisper, his gravely voice tickling your eardrum.

Sapphirine eyes slowly come in to focus in the dim light. You snake your hand down between your bodies to grasp his hardening length, which is still sensitive from his earlier performance. The broken moan that chokes him upon contact is like a shot of dopamine to your brain. To you, there is no greater ego boost than being the source of this man's pleasure. With a gentle touch, you stroke his cock languidly, letting out a soft exhale that lacks enough air to fuel a full laugh.

"Stamina." You tell him, letting your mouth brush against his chin as you speak, his stubble feeling harsh against your lips, which are chapped from the endless kisses and fervent promises exchanged in this very bed hours earlier.

He ruts into your hand with another pained groan. "Sh-shit." A tremble shakes his large frame before he braces his forearms on either side of your body, baring more of his weight so he can lift himself off of you and give you more room to stimulate him where he needs you most. "Just like that… dammit, babe, you have no idea what you do t'me."

You lick your lips, chasing him as he pulls away, the few inches of space he put between you far too much for you to tolerate.

"Tell me I'm right." You demand, but you capture his lips in a heated kiss before he can answer you. The sound of his moans mingle with your own as the two of you make out, slow and sloppy, his cock now painfully hard and heavy in your palm.

"Right about what?" He mutters between urgent, feverish pecks to your lips.

"Y-your super-human stamina." You stutter after a beat, almost losing your train of thought. It's so easy to get lost in him. His taste, his smell, his warmth, his love. Its nothing short of addicting.

"Dunno what you mean…mmmm… You're talking nonsense, baby."

Dick swallows up any further comments from you, deepening the kiss and humping your hand with increasing desperation. It doesn't take much longer until your theory is forgotten, cast aside to make room for the love Dick pours into you with every lazy kiss and needy touch.

if you enjoyed this, please consider reblogging or leaving a comment!

please don’t steal my work. don't upload it to another site, use it to train ai, or claim it as your own.

⭓ masterlist ⭓

[twig-tea]

Gonna add 2 cents on to this because Ben's questions about "why" resonated with me, and they're ones I asked myself (because my brain works this way too lol) so here was my answer that satisfied me, for what it's worth, with no expectation that @bengiyo you hadn't already thought of this or that it'll resonate with you:

Any time this kind of supernatural event happens to a character I assume it's for their development. In this case, I saw throwing Jom into the river and through the past as a kindness rather than a cruelty, because it gave him the space he clearly needed and otherwise wouldn't have had to process and then get over the betrayal of his lover, and to find a new love. I can't speak to the book, but in the show, Jom's passivity towards his situation changing into him participating in turning the household upside-down and getting not-his-sister out from her abuser's influence was something that I think was done a little imperfectly--if you think about it, he added the dramatic aspect but not actually any of the evidence that was needed to get Robert convicted--but it did show that he was more willing to take risks and participate actively rather than passively waiting for things like he had been doing with Ohm. And we see the change in his face, too, when he's contemplating being left behind by Yai to study abroad. I got the sense from Jom that if he didn't already suspect he was disappearing, he would have not put up with that plan.

And once he gets back, he reconnects with his sister and is decisive on establishing closure with Ohm. I liked those scenes because it helped me understand what had changed for him and how he was carrying the parts of himself that had changed during his time in the past into the future.

I'll also say that one of the key pieces of Jom's development in the past is the community that builds around him. At the beginning of the show he was isolated by choice but he'd been there waiting for Ohm for 2 years. That's all part of why it was so important to me to see Jom re-establish connections in the present, because we know he didn't just lose Yai when he came to the present, and it's important to me that he's not alone in the present and able to (re)build community for himself now.

I won't defend the very ending because it's muddled. The book version, where he goes from 1928 to the further past and then to the future makes more sense with what we saw at the end, and I still kind of hope that they slightly cheat and retcon the very end of s1 by showing that happening in s2, so the ending we got at the end of s1 is actually the end of s2 (if it ever happens).

It's compelling to me to think that Jom and Yai would never have fallen in love in the present if they had not had dreams of their past lives to make them interested. Jom meets the version of Yai who he would fall in love with--the one who is young, a little naive, kind, earnest, trusting, and fascinated by him--and then once Jom has gotten more self-confident he gets sent to the past, so that Yai meets the version of Jom he could fall in love with (and Jom falls for this version of Yai all over again, but this version of Yai is much more wary and has higher personal walls, he needed someone who already had a vested interest or else there was no way Jom would have seen enough of him to fall, and no way Jom would have caught his interest). And then Jom is sent back to the present and Yai is given visions of their past lives because the present is the only time in which they have a chance at happiness. So, all that being said, it was important for me to see Jom settled in the future/present so that I could believe that Yai and Jom have a chance at making it work between them in this time period. [This paragraph is reliant on book-end order of events, which is why I'm emotionally invested in them revealing in s2 that actually in s1 he didn't go straight back to the present]

Swoon: The I Feel You Linger in the Air Episode

And we're back!

NiNi and Ben bring Ginny back to the recording booth to discuss Tee Bundit's final offering of the year. We discuss our differing responses to historical romance, the difficulties with articulating big emotions from shows, and the balancing of political messaging with romance.

Come and join us for probably the most distant NiNi and Ben have found themselves as we discuss I Feel You Linger in the Air.

Timestamps

The timestamps will now correspond with chapters on Spotify for easier navigation.

00:00:00 - Introduction 00:01:20 - I Feel You Linger in the Air: Big Damn Romance 00:21:35 - Depictions of Intimacy 00:30:21 - Head vs. Heart 00:37:37 - Beyond the Romance and Story Integration 00:49:15 - Anticipating the Special (Or Not) 00:54:08 - Final Thoughts

The Conversation Transcripts!

Thanks to the continued efforts of @ginnymoonbeam as transcriber, and @lurkingshan as an editor and proofreader, we are able to bring you transcripts of the episodes.

We will endeavor to make the transcripts available when the episodes launch, and it is our goal to make them available for past episodes (Coming soon thanks to @wen-kexing-apologist). When transcripts are available, we will attach them to the episode post (like this one) and put the transcript behind a Read More cut to cut down on scrolling.

Please send our volunteers your thanks!

00:00:00 - Introduction

NiNi

Welcome to The Conversation About BL, aka The Brown Liquor Podcast.

Ben

And there it is. I’m Ben.

NiNi

I’m NiNi.

Ben

And we’re you’re drunk Caribbean uncle and auntie here sitting on the porch in the rocking chairs.

NiNi

Four times a year we pop in to talk about what’s going on in the BL world.

Ben

We shoot the shit about stories and all the drama going into them. I review from a queer media lens.

NiNi

And I review from a romance and drama lens.

Ben

So if you like cracked-out takes and really intense emotional analysis…

NiNi

If you like talking about artistry, industry, and the discourse…

Ben

And if you generally just love simping…

NiNi

There is a lot of simping on this podcast…

Ben

We are the show for you!

00:01:20 I Feel You Linger in the Air: Big Damn Romance

NiNi

We are back. Welcome to our Swoon episode of the podcast, and on Swoon we are going to be talking about a big damn romance which is not something that we get to talk about a lot in BL. To help us do that, Ben and I have a special guest and our special guest is, duh-duh-duh-duh, Ginny! Say “hi,” Ginny. 

Ginny

Hello!

NiNi

Ginny is here with us because Ginny is also into the big damn romance. So, we’re here to talk I Feel You Linger in the Air. 

Ben, break it down for us. What is I Feel You Linger in the Air about?

Ben

I Feel You Linger in the Air is a historical romance set in 1928 Chiang Mai, where a young man from our timeframe ends up in the past, and ends up working for a very rich family that seems to have some sort of lordship over the region at the time. Our protagonist’s name is Jom. He is an interior designer who's been living in Chiang Mai waiting for his boyfriend to come back from England for a couple of years, and then his boyfriend comes back with some girl and its like, “Yeah, she's pregnant. We're over. Sorry, bro.” Jom has a no good, very bad day and then goes off a bridge into the river. And then a hot guy with a bunch of tattoos kisses him, and then he somehow wakes up in the past? Uh, didn't really wake up and past, he exits a river in the past, and then drama ensues. 

He ends up stuck, makes a couple of friends, catches the eye of the young son of the lord of this area, and ends up becoming close to him, and finds something very meaningful in this time period, which is also strange for him because of reincarnation. Lots of people that are important to him are in this time period, but as very different people who do not know him. This ends up being used for a lot of social and political commentary, some of it very subtle, some of it not so subtle, and I guess that's mostly the show.

NiNi

So, Ginny, how’d you feel about this show?

Ginny

I had a great time with this show. It was so beautiful from beginning to end. The settings were gorgeous, the music was gorgeous. Even when it was from The Nutcracker—

[NiNi laughs]

—it was one of the most—[Ginny laughs]—sorry. It was one of the most lush feeling dramas we've gotten in BL. The whole historical setting just felt very rich and detailed. Really felt like you were soaking in it. It's kind of a slow pace, but I didn't mind that and I felt like it worked with the setting and with the big romance historical story that they were trying to tell. 

In the first five or so episodes, I did feel like the romance was the weakest part, but as soon as those boys got together and we were in more of an established relationship situation, it was gorgeous. The intimacy was incredible. They got to me deep in the heart parts; really enjoyed it.

NiNi

I had a great time with it. I love a big damn romance. I've been reading big damn historical romance basically my whole life, and this captured the feeling that you get reading a big damn historical romance. There was a hint of the epic to it in certain parts. There were quiet moments in there that were really, in some ways, very romantically profound that kind of got me, like Ginny said, deep in the heart parts. I had a fabulous time. 

Ben, how about you?

Ben

So, I don't like historical romance in general. I do not romanticize the past, particularly the not-so-distant past, and it makes it often very hard for me to enjoy historical romance. I'm Black, and I'm from the US, and I grew up in the South. And so it is really difficult for me to really enjoy historical romance because these large gaps in power, often, between the characters, do not work for me. It often makes me extremely uncomfortable. I understand that the context of this caste system in Thailand are different than what Black Americans experienced in my home country, but Jom's arc to me can be blandly described as him landing in the past and being upgraded to preferred house slave, and that is something I struggle with even as there's a lot of stuff in the show that I really like. The undercurrent of that really bothers me. 

I also end up struggling with the end of this show when I reflect on Jom's journey because it's a very tragic story for me in a way that isn't cathartic. Like, I am still left with an intense melancholy coming out of this show that I have not been able to shake. And the parts of it that were really beautiful and enjoyable I don't think have unstuck me from how kind of sad for Jom and Yai I feel.

NiNi

It's interesting that the feeling that you're left with is sort of a melancholy, sort of a sadness, because that's not where I landed on it at all. Why the feeling of melancholy in particular?

Ben

Jom is yanked into the situation for reasons we don't understand, and then he is yanked out of this situation for reasons we don't understand. And so Yai has the unfortunate queer experience of deeply loving someone and having them ripped away from him. And he never really gets over that? Judging by his own letter to Jom that has passed down. And then for Jom, he's 25, he blew two years waiting on an ain’t shit motherfucker in Ohm, crashes his car, ends up in the past, has a very bad time, and then has a less bad time because of Yai. And then Yai is taken from him. And at least in the show, Jom gets back to our time frame. 

The show remembers that Ueangphueng was his sister. He gets to eat some crepes, he gets to tell Ohm, “I don't care anymore. I just spent eight months as a slave. Whatever. You can go marry that girl.” Then he gets yanked even further back to the past? 

I don't need the show to tell me why things should happen, per se…but this is a very familiar experience, having grown up in queer cinema, where a bunch of sad shit happens, and then the fucking thing is over and you're like, “Oh. Well, that was something.”

Ginny

So I did go into the show wary because I knew it was a time travel romance and the trailers looked real melancholy. They had this ode to eternal parting about them. It definitely tells you what it's gonna do from the beginning. I do feel you, especially with Yai. I'm not entirely satisfied with where they leave that Yai in the past. 

I feel like Jom has a whole journey ahead of him, and he did get some healing from his own trauma, but I didn't love that they left us with this heavy sadness and pining. It didn't have to be a romantic happy ending. They did give some pointers towards maybe what he did politically that also pointed to some real Thai figures that apparently were historically influential. But I would have liked to see a little more hope and uplift in Yai’s side after Jom leaves him, because we're meant to believe that Jom changed everybody's life. He inspired Yai to sit up and take notice of the world, to pay attention to some of the injustices around him. And I would have liked to see at least more of the positive side of that from where we leave him in the past. I didn't expect that they were going to get to live their lives out forever; that was kind of never in the cards. But they did leave Yai, in particular, in a pretty melancholy place, and I'm not sure how intentional that was, that that was the full impression we were left with.

NiNi

Given that it's Tee, I'm feeling like that was pretty intentional. Tee…the ending’s always bittersweet. It's never 100% one thing or another when it comes to Tee. He's always going to leave you somewhere that's just kind of like, “Yeah, there's good here, but also life is what it is.” I feel like I just generally probably have more tolerance for that when it comes to these kinds of stories. 

Like Ginny said, you know from the beginning that they're not gonna live out their whole lives together in 1928. The way the story is set up, it's just not possible that that's a thing that's gonna happen. So for me, thinking about the life that Yai lives after Jom leaves, it's not necessarily melancholy for me? He was definitely lonely and I wonder what that must have been like for him. It's more of a curiosity for me than a melancholy. 

I am a person who is very into loneliness and stories about loneliness. And so, leaving 1928 Yai alone in 1928, and having him have to deal with his loneliness for the rest of his life, that actually does not bother me. It doesn't make me feel sad necessarily, because I don't necessarily see loneliness as an inherently sad thing. I think loneliness is loneliness, and it can be sad, and it can be other things. 

The idea of Yai having had this great love and deciding that he doesn't want another one, basically because he's chosen at that point, “I don't want to do this again,” and devoting his life to other things from what we understand from what we get at the end of this story. Him having basically his memories of Jom for the rest of his life, but no other great love. This is something that my mind actually enjoys conceiving of and considering, but then I have some very different feelings about loneliness as somebody who spent a lot of time alone in romantic and non-romantic situations.

Ben

I would be probably less bothered about it if it was more like Brokeback Mountain. If the tragedy that separated them was mundane and contemporary, I would probably be less annoyed than this supernatural phenomenon, that we still have no real handle on, being the reason that they come together and are torn apart. That component of it is bothersome for me because I don't know why these things have to happen to Jom. 

It's fine to choose not to be bothered about it or not care about it, but I really hate speculative fiction stories where the supernatural component only matters in so much as it generates drama to get big moments, and doesn't feel like it's as much of a player in the story as the people there. I'm very frustrated with I Feel You Linger in the Air, because I don't know why Jom has to suffer like this. I can enjoy Jom and Yai's romance, but I don't know why this story wants Jom to suffer this way, and for the people Jom loves to suffer.

NiNi

Ginny, do you have a conception or a narrative in your head about the why, or does a conception of the why matter to you in the story? For Ben, it's incredibly important, and him not having a conception of the why is sort of a barrier between him and the story.

Ben

If you're gonna send my Black ass to the past to become a slave, there better be a goddamn fucking reason for it.

NiNi

[laughs] I hear you, I hear you.

Ginny

As far as the mechanic, I don't need that, and I don't want that, because the story was set up with this very kind of spooky vibe, which immediately put me in a place of like, bigger than human stuff happens in this story, and we're not gonna make that make sense. That's not the kind of story we're in. But the narrative that I do see is the reincarnations and the fact that this is a love happening over three versions of Yai that have loved Jom, and the Yai that we experience for almost all of this story is the second of those, so he has already some immediate instinctive connection to this strange man who's shown up, and he kind of just goes, “Oh, this person is important to me. I've already had dreams about him. I'm gonna see what this is about.” 

Why does he have to suffer like this? Because that's the story. I get what you're saying, but this is very baked into the genre and it's baked into the fundamental setup that this is gonna be a story about separation and about yearning across centuries. Those are the emotions that the story wants to deal with.

NiNi

It's fascinating for me because, as somebody who's been very steeped, as I said, in historical romance in the way that I've been steeped in historical romance and the type of historical romance that I've read across my life, you're right. It didn't even occur to me to question the why. This is the ticket for the ride. This is the price of admission. You just accept that this is the premise and you go from there. So, the idea of there being a conception of the why, it didn't even really come to my thinking on this show until Ben pointed it out. 

In a story like this, the mechanics of the time travel are by nature a McGuffin, because they're not actually important to the thematic underpinnings of the story. The thematic underpinnings of the story in this case come from the characters and who they are, and Jom being from the future is part of that. Jom being this person who has lived this life in this particular time and being thrown into another time. That's where the thematic underpinning comes from. Not because of the “Why is this happening to him?” and all that kind of stuff. Even though maybe some of that stuff may come out if they get to continue the story—maybe, maybe not—because I don't see that as being something that Tee would be particularly interested in. I don't necessarily see it as something that's, for me, critical to the telling of the story.

Ben

It's because they sent him to the future. I don't think I would have cared about it if Jom had just vanished, and then he had just woken up even further in the past, and been like, “Oh, fuck,” looks at the camera, and then they end. I would have been okay then. I would have been like, “Well, we still don't understand why Jom is hopping. Perhaps the reset in another time frame will help us see that.” 

By sending him back to the future, letting him eat crepes and hang out with Jeed, who was Ueangphueng in the past, it made me think, “Well, what the fuck was the point of all that?” You sent him to the past, he made some friends, they got the gang together and unmasked the villain, they had some great sex, they had some sad sex, and now he's back in the future. And Not!Yai walks in, confusing the absolute fuck out of us, and then they roll credits. And then they throw on a tag, because they might get a second season. 

A huge knock for the show for me was being fully-reliant on novel spoilers, which were posted by the distributor of the novel, as well as given by the cast to audiences. That's not great! A good ending makes me go back to the beginning and then I want to reflect on the whole journey. I got stuck in the ending of all of this going, “Well, what the fuck was the point of everything I just watched? Why did any of this have to happen?” I don't like getting stuck at the end. I don't know what they want to say about everything that's going on. The whole for me is not greater than the sum of its parts, and it has some really good parts. 

I think Nonkul and Bright do a great job playing the romance between Jom and Yai. I thought it was interesting to see a male gay couple and a female gay couple next to each other, and how that presents in this particular time frame. I really liked Ming and the other servants because most of them are honestly not that homophobic, which reflects a lot of historical context. Poor people did not care about what other poor people were doing. I liked the whole notion of a bunch of homos and their friends get together and they can take on fucking anybody! 

I think episode 11, where Jom realizes he's disappearing and tells Yai, and there's this somberness that grips the show as they have to grapple with Jom's functionally-terminal illness, and they go through the process of saying goodbye to the people who mattered to them reflects an AIDS experience that I am unfortunately familiar with. That was really well done. 

There's all of this great stuff all over this show that I don't feel like really spins together into something transcendent. I just have a show with a lot of pieces that I think are really spectacular. But I don't think the show itself is.

00:21:35 Depictions of Intimacy

NiNi 

Let's talk about some of those pieces. Ginny, let's talk about the intimacy—let's start there. Let's talk about the intimacy through the story, the intimacy within the relationships, and then the particular scenes that you and I have been trying to sink our teeth into. 

Ginny 

I think I said already that initially the romance between Jom and I did not grab me. I didn't feel like their courtship had a lot of juice to it, but once they reached that point of really being in each other's orbit and being close to each other, every scene was just giving so much intensity. Mutual desire, mutual interest. So much tenderness. The way that they look at each other and touch each other is beautiful—some of the best chemistry and intimacy we've seen in a long time, I think. 

Ben 

The oil scene in, what, episode 6? 

Ginny 

They've definitely not had sex yet, but the attraction is clear and understood on both sides. There's this scene where Yai is rubbing himself with oil as just, like, skin care, and Jom starts helping him. And then you cut, and you see Jom in his room looking so worked up, and then he starts to rub the oil on himself, and you see that what's happened is Jom and Yai had this moment where he's doing this massage and it was interrupted because Yai was like, “This is too much.” 

And so Jom is processing this, and very clearly implied is jerking off to this experience. And the music is so intense, and the framing is so intense, and you're intercutting between the scene with the two of them and the massage and Jom by himself. It's one of the most intensely sensual scenes that we've gotten ever, and it's done so artistically. They thought about “How are we going to frame this?” and “How do we want to tell the story of what just happened between these two men and how they both feel about it?” It's so creatively gorgeous and intense in a way that I don't see applied to intimacy scenes, and I just wanted to smooch everybody involved in it, because it was beautiful and wonderful, and I want to see more like that always. 

NiNi 

The way that this show filmed sex and intimacy. Ben always talks about being tasteful, but also being explicit enough for there to be an understanding that what is happening here is sex between men, and it is different from other kinds of sex. I was just kind of blown away by the creativity of it: the way that it was shot, the way that it was scored, the way that it is choreographed, the way that the emotion is built between the actors. 

Ginny’s right, I haven't seen anything like this. 

Ben 

The only other creator who consistently gets here when it comes to sex…probably MAME? Maybe? Like, it's kind of goofy when she does it. 

Ginny

MAME is different, and I am a bit of a MAME apologist, and I love her intimacy scenes, but there's something about the creative layers that are put on top of this that really speak to me. This show did so much without being very visually explicit; being so deeply sensual, without showing you very much at all. You're seeing skin and you're seeing touching, but that's not what's driving the emotion. It's the music and it's the filming choices that are making this experience so sensual, rather than just the sight of bodies and the way they're touching each other. And it was really striking. 

Ben 

The intimate moments themselves are not here for pure titillation. There is a strong dramatic component to each scene, which is helping the characters and the audience cope with the current struggle happening between the boys. The first scene with the oil, that was the first time that Yai was close to honest about his physical desire for Jom. 

Ginny 

They definitely both know at that point. I don't remember what specifically has been said, but it's been made clear between them that Yai is interested in Jom, because Jom goes into that scene kind of expecting, “Oh, is this going to lead to sex?” He thinks that's what's gonna happen, and maybe Yai did, too, but kind of got overwhelmed, or we're not sure exactly what happened that he stopped it. 

Ben 

I'm sure! Don't worry!

Ginny

[Ginny laughs]

Ben’s sure. What happened, Ben? 

Ben 

I'm just gonna get edited. [NiNi laughs] I'm glad you're here. That boy made a mess of his damn pants because he busted unexpectedly—[Ginny laughs]—and got embarrassed, and didn't know what to do, because he definitely spent too much time thinking about it because all he does is read trashy romance novels. 

[Ginny laughs]

NiNi 

I've forgotten about the romance novel that he made Jom read to him. 

Ben 

Which Jom hated!

[everyone laughs]

NiNi 

But you know what it is with the intimacy scenes? They somehow managed to be incredibly sensual, but not earthy?

Ben 

They got sensual without being as erotic as maybe they felt. I like when the actors get to give the audience what they want and need without you basically making the actors shoot porn. Bright and Nonkul are extremely professional. We don't always get too deep into the behind the scenes stuff, but we can see in the BTS we got that these two guys understood what they needed to accomplish in their scenes, which are very well choreographed ahead of time. And that's, I think, what really goes here is they're not just relying on actors being willing to just do shit. There's a specific intent that they're going for. So we get all of the effect we need, and it doesn't feel clumsy. 

NiNi 

Another thing I really loved about the intimacy in the show is how it builds from scene to scene. The other thing I like watching when I'm talking about sex in stories is tracking the emotional journey through the sexual journey. This show, I think, was really good at that, because every time we got an intimate scene between Jom and Yai, it was at a different stage of the relationship. The intimacy wanted to show us something different. It reveals something different about where the characters are, where their relationship is. When the dam finally breaks and Jom and Yai just start making out in the rain.

I talk about the show being a big damn romance. That moment is probably the most big damn romance moment in the entire show. It is epic. There's no other word to describe this moment. How it happens, how it’s shot, everything about it makes it even feel epic. There's this sense of inevitability. There's a sense of desperation. And then that carries through into the sex scene. 

You come out to that scene and you're going into other scenes where things are quieter once they become more established, you can chart the emotions that you're supposed to be feeling about both the characters and the relationship through these scenes. And there aren't that many of them. They do a great job of building the intimacy and you understanding that they have this incredibly intense physical relationship without spending a lot of time on intimate scenes. As much as I enjoy seeing those scenes and parsing those scenes through the lens of the story, the fact that they don't have that many of them to me is also an accomplishment because they're able to tell that story without necessarily making their actors take their clothes off and make out all the time. 

00:30:21 Head v. Heart 

NiNi 

The way that I feel about this show is so visceral. Ben talks a lot about rarely having heart shows, about being very analytical about the things that he watches. For me, this show…I'm not as deep into the analyzing of it as maybe Ben is. And Ginny, I don't know which side of that line that you land on. 

Ginny 

I'm probably somewhere in the middle. I try to sit wherever a show is gonna give me its best, so I'll love to analyze the show if it seems to really be inviting that. But this one, like you said, it's a big damn romance, and so much of what it's doing is just creating those moments. So I was enjoying sitting in those. 

That kissing in the rain scene that you talked about, that was incredible. What happens immediately before that is the dance that Yai has to do with this very eligible girl, and the fantasy dance that Yai and Jom have—which is just a gutting scene. I think I did cry. Everybody is surrounding them and admiring the way that they are doing in real life for Yai and this girl, and it's the agony of what they should be able to have and can't. 

This is a show that wants to dig into those pain points and I can see where for some of us who have lived that pain, it's not something that you want to sign on to. For others of us, it's like, “Yes, make me feel this thing. Take me through this in this fictional space.” We get that excruciating contrast of the publicly-affirmed love that Jom and Yai aren't allowed to have, and then we go from that right to this private, powerfully intimate moment between them. 

NiNi 

We talk a lot on this show about lenses and reads; who you are and where you sit being an integral part of how you look at the shows, how you take them in, what you get from them, and what you put back out. I think this is a show that for each of us, because we're coming at it from a different lens and with a different read, we had three kind of distinct almost experiences of it. 

I don't have a head response to this show, so Ben talking about the why of the time travel—I just wasn't thinking about it like that. My head wasn't in it to that extent in terms of analyzing. This was strictly my feels, and I had a lot of feels from the minute that Jom sat down behind the market and stress-ate that sausage. I had a lot of feels! [laughs]

Ben 

This is always going to be the struggle I have. I don't swoon. So while I do appreciate how good Bright and Nonkul are, particularly Nonkul—I had very positive responses to what he was doing. I don't ever get heart shows where I just sigh at them and like, that's it. 

The first 43 minutes of this final episode are fine. I think they accomplished that part really well. I don't have a lot of complaints about that chunk of the finale. If we end there, and then go straight to the tag, I'm probably fine with this show and having a different conversation. But Jom ending up back in the water, getting snatched by a scuba diver, and I'm like, “How the fuck did he get out there so fast?” If we're jumping right back to that moment, it's the middle of the fucking night.

[NiNi laughs]

I didn't have to care this much about the specifics until suddenly I was thrown off, and now I'm having to ask fucking questions. So Jom gets rescued and then we have all this shit in the present. And we don't spend a great deal of time there with Jom grappling with what the fuck happened to him. It's just: jumps back. “Oh, right! Jeed was Ueangphueng! We haven't talked about that in 11 episodes!” Okay, sure. Ohm is here? Why? Okay, right, right. In the actual world they're from, Ohm showed up, broke up with Jom, and within six hours he drove into the fucking river. I get it. Okay, right. That's what happened. Sure. Let's deal with that. Yeah, okay. I don't care. Go home. All right. Goodbye, Ohm. BYE!

Jom is sad because he misses Yai—valid—and then he finds the box. We have a really cool moment around the box. I really love the letter, but then there's Future!Yai and I'm like, “What the fuck is he?” [Ben sighs] I hate all of this shit at the end. It feels distracting. Why does he have to go back to the future to tie up shit from his present, to then suddenly be thrown back to the fucking past? 

NiNi 

If I am putting my head bits on, which I am very reluctant to do with this show to be quite honest with you, because I enjoyed it so much… The only thing that maybe doesn't entirely fit is the third version of Yai at the end. ‘Cause I can see why they bring Jom back to the future. There's all this stuff that happens there that for me emotionally resonates, both the stuff with Ohm and then him opening the chest and finding the letter, and getting to see his despair and his loneliness without Yai. And then a version of Yai turning up without explanation? Okay. Yeah. Okay, fine, doesn't bother me, but I was literally deep in my feelings at that point. 

I can understand also why at that moment happens and why it's not explained. Who wants to end their story on an exposition dump? Nobody. 

Ben 

You got the catharsis you needed at the 43 minute mark and you were able to just walk away with that. When they kept talking after that for another 45 minutes, it caused problems for me. When we talked about other shows we've had on this podcast, we can talk about how, like, there's a lot of good shit but for you, it didn’t hit you in the chest? 

This is where I sit with this show. It's good. I don't feel it. 

NiNi 

I got you. 

00:37:37 Beyond the Romance and Story Integration

Ben 

All right, now that we have covered the main stuff, and all of the oil scenes, and the sad sex, let's talk about the rest of the cast. According to book readers, much of the cast of characters around them was greatly expanded for this production. Since Tee and them clearly cared a lot about them, let's talk about them. 

Let's start with Ohm/Khamsaen, Fongkaew and…Preggers… [laughs] I don't remember what her name is. She got on my damn nerves. 

[Ginny laughs]

NiNi 

Did we ever get her name? 

Ben 

According to MDL, it's Khaimuk, but I don't remember it being said. 

Ginny 

Yeah, I'm not sure they ever said it, which says somethin’. 

NiNi 

Ginny said, “Whoop there it is.”

[NiNi and Ginny laugh] 

Ben 

I will say that I liked the bits with Khamsaen in the past where he doesn't actually know who Jom is. He's just pissed at Jom for having no sense of class solidarity at all, and gets in his face about this. He's like, “You're fuckin’ up my bag, bro.” And Jom, who is going through his shit, beats the fuck out of this man. But then they, like, reconcile later? I actually kind of liked this. 

Ginny 

Yeah, I mean, I was with Jom and so in favor of him beating up that man, even though that man did not know what he had done, really, to deserve this. I was just still so mad at present-day Ohm so I was very ready to have Jom take it out on the past version of him, who had done nothing basically except be a little whiny about a girl. 

Ben 

I like Khamsaen’s perspective because you've got the rich people and all their bullshit-ass games, and I like how Khamsaen is just kind of a pampered mama's boy who's losing his shit because something horrible happened to the girl he cared about, and now she's in this really shitty situation, and he's just floundering and feeling super powerless because he doesn't feel like there's much he can do about that at this point. 

Ginny 

What they set up with Robert and the way that he wields power over his whole household and his two wives and everybody who gives a shit about them really leaves everybody feeling powerless and just kind of scrabbling around the edges for what they can get. Those early episodes really set up how under the thumb of this powerful rich man most of the people in their orbit are. That's just a giant boulder in the stream that they all have to flow around and figure out how to live their lives around. 

Ben 

The way that eventually unravels was kind of interesting for me, because there's this little mystery in this show about, how does Robert even get involved with this family in the first place? Why are they so intent on Robert? ‘Cause he kind of sucks and he seems like he's also bad at his job, which is to manage the forestry shit. He would much rather spend his time whipping Ming's ass, and Mings mom’s ass, or abusing his wives, than doing his fucking job. There's this whole bit with Fongkaew where we learn that while they were trying to cover up other awful things, they brutally murder Fongkaew’s father and injured her mom permanently? And that's how Fongkaew ended up in this household in the first place. 

Ginny 

Yeah, and it seems like she kind of knows that, and just has to live with it and live with being at this man's side who did that to her family, until she teams up with the other wife for the grand comeuppance. 

Ben 

We eventually learned that Ueangphueng and Mei conspired to bring Fongkaew into the house in the hopes that she would distract Robert. And they own that that was really fucked up, and they apologized for it. 

Ginny 

The way that his power makes everybody underneath him turn on each other and use each other as shields, and recognizing that that's not okay to do, but also you understand why they did that in that position. 

Ben 

You get the sense because all these characters had to be built out for the show. They were concerned about how these characters were interrelated to each other. I like the Robert character even though I despise him because I feel like they considered his role really well in the 1920s part. 

NiNi 

One of the things that came up to me while the show was airing was how it's kind of important, given Thailand's position in this era, that Robert is French and James is English, Thailand is never colonized, but the French were to the east in Vietnam and the English to the West. It's pincered between colonial powers, but it was never colonized itself. It was kind of like a buffer zone. Some of that feeling does come through in the way that the era is portrayed. There's clearly a lot of influence that they're getting from these colonial powers without actually being colonized themselves, and that comes through particularly in the character of the dad. 

He feels like somebody who is important, not in the sense of “I am important because these powers say I am important, but I have a sense of importance in myself.” I don't know how to explain it to people who are not from places that were colonized, but it gave it verisimilitude for me anyway. 

Ginny 

Clearly, so much of what he wanted to do with this project was bring in some of those historical perspectives and the sociological and political stuff. And I thought he did a really good job overall of putting that in the story in a way that felt natural and felt like it fit. 

NiNi 

There is a fair amount of political inside the story, which is very Tee. I also feel like, in a way, he almost didn't go far enough in terms of the way he normally likes to operate, because Tee, when it comes to this stuff, he's very in your face, and it felt oddly restrained. 

Ben 

One of the things that I remember seeing from Tee while we were watching this was that when they were trying to do research about this period, they did not have a lot of great primary sources of what life was like for not-the-ruling class at the time and so they were building out the world kind of based upon anthropological presumptions about the era. The one bit of this ‘happened during the era’ stuff we get is the piece of news delivered at the breakfast table about two women who were living together. It ends completely in tragedy. One of them is killed and the other maybe doesn't survive the grief. I don't remember exactly what happened to the other one, and it feels significant for me that Tee wanted to make sure he put living lesbians in this world, too, by building out this relationship between Ueangphueng and Mei, and then giving them the opportunity to leave and go do their own thing. 

NiNi 

That brings me to an interesting question. Tee was trying to accomplish a number of different things, I think, with this story. How do you feel the romance fit inside of the wider story that Tee was trying to tell? 

Ben 

Honestly, poorly. 

Ginny 

They did not feel super well integrated. The grace that it got for me was a lot due to how well the side characters that ended up involved in a, more political stories—Robert’s whole household. All those side characters were so nicely developed early in the series and I was so invested in them that I gave the story a lot of space to develop its different themes alongside each other, rather than having a ton of overlap. But from a story crafting perspective, they were not super well integrated. I would agree with that. 

Ben 

The big problem was their choice to make Jom so passive for most of the show. Part of why the episode 10 stuff doesn't exactly land for me is it didn't feel like Jom was as… active of a character I would have expected, given his obeisance to this system had felt like something he was affecting for survival, and not just something he just sort of slid into because he had been hurt, and then assaulted, and then hurt again right before all of this. I feel like him teaming up with James and everybody else would have landed because it would have felt like he was a mover in that world, and that his modern perspective would have mattered more. 

NiNi 

I feel like this is a consistent critique of Tee. This is something we talked about when we talked about Step by Step as well. The things that he actually cares about versus the vehicle that he's using to tell his story. There is always a tension there. I feel when it comes to Tee, you kind of have to choose your adventure. You have to choose which side of the story, I guess, you're gonna pay attention to. And because I always gravitate towards the romance, I think I have a different-slash-better time with a lot of Tee’s stories than others might. 

Ben 

I don't like that he does that, sincerely. I don't like when BL feels like three pitches fighting for relevance because somebody with money who liked all the pitches wanted to see them play out together. I really don't like the side quest feeling of this constant theme in Tee's work. I don't like the things being loosely connected via setting or… underlying theme he thinks he's building towards? It consistently irritates me in his work. 

NiNi 

I feel like, Ginny, you and I are more closely aligned sometimes when it comes to some of this stuff that Tee is coming out of, partly because we get the swoonies and Ben does not. 

Ben 

Y'all give me shit about New Siwaj. Y’all gonna eat this shit over Tee Bundit. 

NiNi 

[laughs] Ginny, how do you feel about that? Do you feel that underlying tension in Tee’s work, and how do you reconcile it? 

Ginny 

As much as I love the romance and the swoonies, I would love someone to give Tee a bucket of money to make the sociopolitical drama that it feels like he desperately wants to make. What it feels to me like is he has to put things through this BL lens because there is money there as a creator and there's an audience there. There could have been a stronger, more cohesive drama, but I liked both halves of what we got and I didn't feel like they were actively in conflict, and I'm easily pleased. So I was okay with it. 

Ben 

I think he gets away with it here, but I don't think it's good, not as a unified piece.

00:49:15 Anticipating the Special (Or Not)

NiNi

So, there's gonna be a special! The special is not part of the timeline of the show, it's a non-canon kind of AU, not quite AU thing. Are you guys going to be watching this special?

Ginny

Probably. Yeah. 

NiNi

Ginny's like, who am I kidding? Yes, I'm watching it. [laughs]

Ginny

Yeah.

NiNi

Ben? 

Ben

I am genuinely uncertain. 

NiNi

I think I’m not going to watch it. I'm so emotionally immersed in this story? I don't think I'm interested in a time-out-of-time, non-canon AU. 

Ginny

Well, I'll tell you both how it is. 

NiNi

Please do. 

Ben

[laughs] I just don't know that I care! I like Nonkul and Bright well enough, so I'm not opposed to seeing them bro it out, I guess. 

NiNi

To me, the story between these two got so emotionally deep, I don't want to watch them have hijinks. 

[Ginny laughs]

Ben

It feels unearned. The story’s not complete. I would be okay with a “present Yai and Jom get to go to the fair and have a good time,” if this was coming after the second section with the Commander. 

Ginny

I do kind of agree with that. I will still watch it.

[Ben and NiNi laugh]

Ben

Even though I did not like this show as much as NiNi, I am not saying that this show is bad and people shouldn't watch it or enjoy it. But… I don't really want to return to this show. That's the real thing here. We got the tag about the Commander and I was like, “ehhh… do I want them to get a second season?” I kind of don't. I don't know that I want to go back to this. I don't think I care enough. 

NiNi

I am curious about two things. One, this is a period of Thai history that we haven't seen in BL. We're now getting into Thai history and BL, period, and as a person who is kind of a history junkie, I want to see what that looks like. Then the other part of it is, they can't go back to the same dynamic, right? So it's not gonna be a retread of the 1928 story. This has to be a different story because… Mustache Yai is a different character from 1928 Yai. And Jom, having been through the experience of meeting and falling in love with Yai and being separated from Yai, is also going to be a bit of a different character going into this? 

So this is not the exact two same people having the exact same story, if they do this. This is two different people figuring out a different dynamic, a different story. And I am actually interested to see that, because I am impressed with the acting. And because I have been impressed with the writing. So for me, that's where I'm landing. I want the second season because I want to see that. 

Ben

Well, I hope the Quantum Leap BL does a better job closing itself out next time. 

NiNi

[laughs] So mad at you for calling it Quantum Leap. What about you, Ginny, you gonna watch season 2? If there is a season 2?

Ginny

Oh, definitely. I don't think the story is complete as it is. I think they tied it up enough, and that's where—I needed us to see modern Yai, because that tells us if we never get a season 2, there is a Yai and a Jom that can live out their life in the same timeline, and I need that for my peace of mind. There's a happy ending out there sometime—and hopefully we'll get to see the story take them there. But I did want to at least know that it's there for them. 

But I don't think it's complete as it stands. So for that reason alone, I want the second season. I don't… know that I have a lot of faith in how good it will be? So I'm also nervous? But I'm also not afraid of bad television, so I do want there to be a second season, and I will watch it. 

00:54:08 Final Thoughts

NiNi 

Ginny, what did you score I Feel you Linger in the Air, and why? 

Ginny 

Why did I give it a 9? I agree with Ben that the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts. That's a really fair and accurate way to sum it up. The ending, I think, failed in execution? I don't disagree with any of the choices that it made about what happened, but I think it could have done better with the timing. I think a little bit more explanation would have been good. 

So there were some misses. But I liked so many of the parts so much, so I gave it a 9. 

NiNi 

And what about you? Where do you sit? 

Ben 

I gave this show a 9. My ranking system is almost always about whether or not a show can be recommended to viewers, and so it becomes a 9 because it's the kind of show that BL viewers can have a very good time with, and it's the kind of show that recent converts might have a good time with? But the failures in execution from episode 10 and 12 hamper this show getting a higher score from me. It's a 9 because the parts of the show that are good are some of the best we've seen this year, but the parts that are not are frustrating in ways that also feel fair, and I kind of hate that, too. 

They hedged on the finale because they hadn't gotten really greenlit for a second season. Okay, I understand the awkward place you were in. But modern Yai is probably the biggest mistake I think they made. I think they were afraid the audience would be like me and would be really put off by how unhappy that finale is, and so they threw modern Yai at us to make people feel better—but I didn't like it. 

But I think the show is really, really watchable. I think it's really beautiful. I think it's a great example of what Thai production teams are capable of. I think it's also a really good showcase of what Thai talent is capable of. I think across the board the entire cast is really solid, even with my issues with the lack of conviction at the end of this series, I think this was an excellent show. 

NiNi

I gave this show a 9.5. This show is incredibly expansive. There's so much that's happening in this story that I really found resonant. I feel like I felt all of the emotions that the show wanted me to feel. I followed that emotional throughline and it was an incredibly easy emotional throughline for me to follow. I didn't feel like I had to qualify my emotions when I was watching the show. If something on the screen was meant to be making me happy, it was making me happy. If something on the screen was meant to be making me feel sad it made me feel sad. There wasn't a tension between what I was feeling and what I felt like the show wanted me to feel. As a person who is very much into the fields and the vibes, it was a 9.75. 

I feel like in terms of shows that we scored really highly and say that we actively like this is probably the most critical we've been of something that we have scored highly? 

Ben 

There are times when a show is genuinely good but doesn't hit every note that well, and you're going to hear it and you're going to go, “Oof. We definitely downloaded this from Limewire.” And—

NiNi 

[laughs] Benjamin!

Ben 

And—Look, I can never hear a very specific song from Third Eye Blind correctly because the track I had was a fucked up clip [laughs] from Limewire for years that had two different skips in it. 

NiNi

Oh my God. You can’t say Limewire! The children don't know what that is. 

Ben 

I do not care about these fucking kids. [laughs] And so…

NiNi 

[laughs] Ginny, Ben said “Fuck them kids.” 

Ben 

So, the thing can be good and still be criticized. Criticism is not inherently negative. This show took multiple huge swings and missed some of them, and I think it's totally fine to acknowledge that the show did not hit every swing it took, even if we can applaud the swings that it went for. I think it's still good to take big swings even if you don't hit them. 

Ginny 

Yeah, I would rather watch a dozen shows that swing big and don't hit the mark than a dozen shows that are kind of boring and self-contained, and do fine at executing an easy thing. 

NiNi 

Okay, so the average of 9, 9, and 9.75 is some kind of messy number between 9 and 9.75 closer to the 9 side of things, because that's how maths works. I'm not going to try to actually calculate that number. It can get a 9 from The Conversation. 

Ben 

It's 9.25. 

NiNi 

9.2—look at, look at Ben!

Ginny 

Ben's like, “The math is simple actually, Madam.”

NiNi

So I Feel You Linger in the Air gets a 9.25 from The Conversation, and hopefully a commitment from Ginny that if they do come up with the second season, you're gonna be right back here on the pod talking with us about it. 

Ginny

Absolutely.

NiNi

There we go. That's gonna wrap us up on our Swoon episode, our I Feel You Linger in the Air episode. We out. Say “bye,” Ginny. 

Ginny

Bye! 

NiNi

Say “bye” to the people, Ben. 

Ben

Peace.