#is it that hard not to be an asshole on the internet

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - Boyfriend Era is a Go

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

NOV 2024 Week 2

Ongoing Series - Thai

Jack & Joker (Thai Mon IQIYI) ep 9 of 12 - I have to say it, the heist stuff is stupid and all the sidekicks are idiots to the point of annoyance. But Yin and War are truly stellar at these parts. And in general in these roles. Can’t knock 'em. It’s been a year of some very good kisses and this has to have been the best. So this show is top of the standings this week for that kiss alone. Like srs boys? I mean to say, BOYS! How dare. Breaking the internet like that.

Honestly, let's be clear, these two have had killer chemistry since the En of Love and we all expected great things. And now, here we sit, suffering great things from these kings. Thank you, Sirs, may we have another?

Love Sick 2024 (Thai Sun iQIYI) ep 8 of 15 - I'm chronicling my experience with 2024 as compared to 2014 here. The Per Win story arc never interested me in 2014 and I’m not enjoying it now either. But Mick and Ohm are better in 2024. Nong Mick is a standout character, and a brilliant glow up in this version and he’s a confident little shit (affectionate). The mains are good too, but Phun and Noh always were great characters, and these actors are quite good. Possibly better than the original. 

Kidnap (Fri YT) ep 10 of 12 - More bf era delightful diabetes. They are the best boyfriends and the cutest family in the entire world. No exceptions. Next week is definitely doom tho. 

Every You Every Me (Thai Mon Gaga) ep 5 of 10 - Talk about making consent and communication sexy! *fans self* Whoah! That was unexpectedly great. The blatancy of the lust in this one was fun too. And the general casual switch nature of the relationship = delightful.

I like the little acting course we're getting from these tw. They are both quite good. I’m not sure I really enjoy the stories that they’re telling, but I do like how they are telling them.

Fourever You (Thai Thurs YT) ep 6 of 16 - Hill is the premier torch carrier of this year. My goodness. He sure nursed that crush. While I really like this main couple, I’m happy to have some of the others start to creep into the narrative at this juncture. Alone HillTer are a bit intentionally miscommunicative and saccharine. But the screen-time distribution amongst couples seems a little strange. That said, couple 2? No thank you. I really don't like North as a character at all. I find him incredibly unappealing. Ordinarily I'd be on his side because....... blackmail trope renders Johan automatically a complete arse. But at least this is 2 unlikable characters being jerks to each other?

Perfect 10 Liners (Thai Sun YouTube?) ep 2 of 24 - Say it with me Thailand: negging is NOT romantic. Frankly, Arc is just an asshole and a bully with anger issues. But…… Yay cute sides! PondSand they funny. (Book, to me = never very funny. I don’t think comedy is his bailiwick. Look, comedy is HARD ya’ll and usually not in that way.) 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Our Youth AKA Miseinen: Mijukuna Oretachi wa Bukiyo ni Shinkochu (Japan Tues Gaga) ep 1 of 11 - They’re doing some interesting stuff with the framing (both filming style and narrative) that makes this extremely old-fashioned feeling (like Takumi-kun level). I keep saying that this year, but it feels like BL is doing a lot of rediscovering its roots right now. This one even had a goldfish. And abuse. (The two, oddly, often go hand-in-hand in JBL ) And overall...... it’s a bit weird. Which I don’t mind from Japan. Japanese BL can get weird in a good way. Oh I like it. Bully meats smart loaner, total opposites attract, both are lonely and broken and NEED each other, and all that.

See Your Love (Taiwan Weds Gaga) ep 4 of 13 - Oh dear, our poor little rich boy is very broken indeed. The sides are utterly ridiculous.

My Damn Business (Korea Sat YT) eps 6 of 7 - I don’t normally like a love triangle, but I kind of like this one since it gave our uke a bit more depth and agency. And charm, quite frankly. So far he’s been a very dower character.

Eccentric Romance (Korea Weds Viki) eps 9-10 of 12 - Okay boyfriend era is a go. Goodness but they sure are adorable. 

Teenager Judge (Vietnam Sat YT) ep 7 of ? - The slow burn is really very slow. To the point of frustration. But I'm still enjoying the show, just not as much as I was.

Love is Like a Poison AKA Doku Koi: Doku mo Sugireba Koi to Naru (Japan Tues Netflix?) 8 of 10 eps - Even Japan is going through a bf era rn I see. How unusual.

Love in the Air: Koi no Yokan (Japan Sat Gaga) ep 2 of 10 - I’m slightly less annoyed by this one than the original (but I was VERY annoyed by that). I think mame is being tempered by a few things:

There’s so much less time spent on the back-and-forth, because this is a much shorter show, so I have less time to be frustrated by it and the utter uselessness of 75% of these characters.

Also, there's that innate Japanese awkwardness of portrayal & social interaction, which makes the unpleasantness of the characters' behavior and touch more understandable.

This, in turn, is married to the natural kink factor of JBL.

There’s a clearer Dom sub from the get go with this version, makes the blackmailing a little bit more tolerable because it's clearly Play. (negotiated or not) Simply put, daddy wants his brat to beg. And honestly? So say we all.

On a completely different note, the wardrobe for this show is terrible. Like truly bad BAD.

Blue Canvas of Youthful Days (China Sun iQIYI) eps 3-4 - Well I guess that’s that disability dealt with. Meanwhile, competitive bullying art students? I am very amused. Zoo date was cute. This is unquestionably a BL (I’m even more scared now). Still, the gay boys dealing with the straight dude’s crush was truly hilarious. So much "our gay drama doesn’t have time for your het bullshit." Classy move, I smell some Taiwan in this show.

Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo (Korea Thurs Gaga) eps 4-8 end - I was reliably informed this has an HFN end so I decided to watch. Noble and self sacrificing with both of them taking the blame.

My thoughts are...... mixed.

High school student Do Hoe lives with his brutal father who runs a Taekwondo gym. When cheerful Ju Young arrives to train, they fall in love. An unexpected incident forces them apart, they reunite over a decade years later. Essentially this is a brilliant narrative about finding love at the worst possible time, surviving chronic abuse, and the way we process mental, emotional, and physical trauma overtime. Yes it’s also a romance, but that’s not primarily what this story is actually about. I can recognize its genius, but this type of narrative is not for me. I’m reminded of bittersweet painful shows like To My Star 2, or The On1y One, or even Not Me. Is this BL tangential or is it some other genre entirely? Am I questioning my own taste because I did not like its content, or because I do not like its genre? And if it’s not BL should I even render judgment? I think I have to lean into the way I approached some of those other shows, which is to say: it is not for me but I recognize that it is of an extremely high-quality that is certainly for someone else.

Recommended, but only if you like masochistic cinema. Under those circumstances 9/10

(but know that if i were rating for my personal taste? 7/10 I’m never re-watching this, and there is a small part of me that wishes I never had) 

It's airing but......

Love for Loves Sake got some kind of special supposed to air 11/9. Not sure what, why, or where. Only the rumor that it...... is. I'll believe it when I see it...... literally.

The Hidden Moon (Sat WeTV) 10 eps - I've been reliably told not to bother, so I won't.

Bad Guy My Boss (Thai Sun Gaga) 10 eps - I DNF'd at ep 7, I couldn't make it. I am weak. Life is hard enough right now, this show is making it harder. It’s not what I want from my entertainment.

Bad to Bed (Taiwan Sat YouTube) 10 eps - This is a little too low production value even for me. And just very very odd. DNF

In case you missed it

Uncle Unknown finished its run on YT. Censored Chinese BL with paralytically bad production levels. But certainly BL. Boys reunite after a break up only to discover one of them is the step-Uncle of the other. Much to my own shock and surprise I watched all 12 episodes of this. Fortunately, each episode is about 5 minutes long. Under those circumstances is it worth it? Maybe. It’s bad. But not offensive. So that's a win. And you know me, I love a weird take on the stepbrother’s trope and incest taboos. 5/20 watch it only if you have nothing better to do

Next Week Looks Like This:

Gosh there's a lot on right now.

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

November BL:

11/15 Caged Again (Thai Fri Gaga) 10 eps - Penguin escapes zoo by turning into a human. Gets trapped again and a panther falls in love with him.

11/17 Your Sky (Thai Sun iQIYI) 12 eps - A naive freshman and the campus’s popular senior agree to pretend to be a couple - but their fake deal begins to generate real feelings.

11/20 Winter Is Not The Death of Summer (Thai Weds YT) ?? eps - Criminals who meet in prison fall in love

11/20 The Heart Killers (Thai Weds YT iQIYI) 12 eps - Jojo directs FirstKhao & JoongDunk in an action romcom about assassin brothers (Khao & Joong) who meet a tattoo artist ex-booster (First) and a mechanic (Dunk). I'm highly amused that Joong plays the older brother to Khao and that we have a take on the Taming of the ShrewBL. I like that everyone is morally gray. This has all GMMTV's best chemistry in one BL and some fresh concepts that I've only seen tackled in m/m romance novels (check out Amy Lane's Racing for the Sun, thank me later). I'm excited. My only quibble is Jojo, I like his style but his characters can get unreliably messy so…... this gonna be interesting.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

The insane level of his babygirl heart eyes.

Just, have mercy.

(last week)

The tag BLigade: @doorajar @solitaryandwandering @my-rose-tinted-glasses @babymbbatinygirl @babymbbatinygirl @isisanna-blog @mmastertheone @pickletrip @aliceisathome @urikawa-miyuki @tokillamonger @sunflower-positiiivity @rocketturtle4 @blglplus @anythinggoesintheshire @everlightly @renafire @mestizashinrin @bl-bam-beyond @small-dark-and-delicious @saezurumurmurs

[ray-winters]

I am about to get a lil sappy here, but…I remember when I was in middle school, I was in private Catholic schooling, and I was dealing with the fact that I knew I was gay. I knew this was “wrong” because that’s what I was taught, so I suppressed it and tried so hard not to be. I told myself I’d do what my uncle did, which was push it down, marry a woman, and have kids like I was “supposed” to.

I remember specifically one day, I was home alone, and I knew I couldn’t keep it in for much longer. Jurassic Park was on my TV (weird detail to remember but I do) and I was sobbing on the couch pleading to God to just make it go away, and to make me straight. I didn’t even care if it made me an asshole and changed my personality I just wanted to be straight. I remember thinking it’d be easier to straight up just die than to live the rest of my life this way. Keep in mind this was around 2007-2008, gay marriage wasn’t even close to a reality, I had no positive gay rep that I knew of on TV or in movies, and again, private Catholic school so I was surrounded by homophobia. I didn’t come out for about 3 more years from this point.

I give this depressing backstory so that I can say-

I just woke up next to my husband, he is in the kitchen making us coffee, we have been together for 10 years, happily married for 1.5, and our only plans today are to play video games and then go do a performance of SCREAM’D together. I truly don’t think I’ve ever felt more fulfilled in who I am or what I’m doing in life. I have a great group of friends around me, I feel love & support from people from all across the world. I have truly made a genuine effort to create and portray queer characters almost exclusively and hopefully in doing so given people some representation that maybe they’re searching for. I’m 29 now, and if I could go back and tell 15 year old Ray that everything was gonna work out in its own way and in its own time, I would.

I know it’s cliche, but it does get better. It just takes time. And sometimes, you’ve got to make it better yourself. If you’re struggling, if you’re in a religious school, if you’re in a conservative area, I just want you to know that I know it’s tough rn to keep the faith; but it’ll be okay. You’ll be okay. It might just take a little bit of time. Find likeminded people, whether it’s irl or on the internet, there’s a community of people for everyone. There is a world of love & acceptance out there for you, you’ll find it 💙

[shmeegledeegledorp]

The craziest thing I will constantly see on fandom twitterdotcom (regular twitter Is Worse) is when someone posts fan content abt a particular series, movie, game, character etc. and theres like 7 Dumb Assholes in the comment section who will say shit like "actually i hate this thing and you suck for liking it kys" and its like???? Why are you posting your Hot Takes under fanart of the thing you hate. are you fucking serious

[valtsv]

i feel like i'd be unstoppable if i could just hold my own in verbal conversations but the fact is my concentration issues, hyperactive and intense personality and inability to emote appropriately or sincerely overshadow my strengths (friendly, kind, capable of picking up on and following things quickly, good listener, thoughtful and articulate) and make me an incredibly uncharismatic conversational partner 😔 i'm working on it but it's hard when for most of my life i've rarely gotten the chance to actually share anything more than a handful of words of small talk with another human being

[shahs1221]

thanks for not putting any sort of nsfw label on that art like I totally wanted to see that shit it's sooooo cool that you didn't give enough of a shit to even tag it as nsfw or nsft so my filter would catch it

Hey anon, I would've definitely tagged it as such if you were just you know, nice about it. It would've been SOOOO easy for me. But I suppose that was super difficult for you, so guess what?

I'm not gonna tag it.

Fuck off.

[outeremissary]

US moment (cringe), but had to go to a meeting at work today (first of more I suspect) about what to do if our jobs become illegal 😭 I'm glad my boss has made us talk about this since June so no one is freaking out and everyone is ready but Woof. Everyone wanted that to be paranoia talk, y'know?

[mountain-lion-gremlin]

you can still be physically nonhuman if you were awakened to your identity through the internet (like me!)

You can still be physically nonhuman if it takes you a long time to shift

You can still be physically nonhuman if you always knew since you were young

You can still be physically nonhuman if you don't know why you shift or how it works

You can still be physically nonhuman if you believe that there is no way to logically explain your shifts

You can still be physically nonhuman if you believe you cannot change your form from human

You can still be physically nonhuman if you are growing limbs of your creature

You can still be physically nonhuman if you want to look like a hybrid between nonhuman and human

You can still be physically nonhuman if you figure out you are clinical/delusional. (I don't know too much about being clinical so sorry!)

You can still be physically nonhuman if you believe in p-shifting

You can STILL be physically nonhuman if you have multiple different creatures/species

You can still be physically nonhuman if you are a therian, or otherkin

Do what you want forever people!! They are just labels!! There is no set guidelines to be physically nonhuman, do what feels right to you and embrace it!

[kjzx]

I absolutely have 0 desire to bring a child into this world for many reasons, including ones from many different axis, so I don't see it changing, but the anti natalist folks are fucking evil man lol. I haven't seen the worst of the world, so my optimism can be and probably is just naivety, but hating the idea of having kids and judging(!) other people for getting them because the world is irredeemably evil is such a "I have depression and this philosophical thing is relatable so it must be how the world works" take. Just looked up the tag on here and someone said that in this world, misery is guaranteed, and happiness is not, and like. Point me to a human that has never, not once in their life, has experienced joy.

[actual-corpse]

Watching Avatar the Last Airbender...

Politely reminded of the time people wanted my head because I said that ATLA ruined storytelling because some people can't fucking think critically of media before trying to tell you what's so good about it.

I LOVE AtLA! Adore it! But like.... A majority of people watched Zuko switch sides and said, "Damn... What if we redeemed ALL the villains?" Without realizing Zuko wasn't a true villain in need of redemption.

But... The Redemption Game isn't truly JUST the fault of AtLA... There was a shift in the Moral of the Story. Idk how to explain it bc I'm half asleep, but like...

[demonic-shadowlucifer]

Just because people are responsible for their own triggers doesn't mean you shouldn't add trigger warnings when asked. "Real life doesn't have trigger warnings" is not an excuse to not add trigger warnings when needed (and also real life *should* have trigger warnings actually). Yes. People are responsible for their own triggers. But you should *still* add trigger warnings when asked. It's just common fucking decency and respect.

[nonuggetshere]

So I know you are creating an AU but it's a bit hard to know what's in the AU so this is what I got from it. IDK what the name of it is lol. PK finds out that The Hollow Knight is not Hollow and he just lets them live a relatively normal life? Is that related to your drabble where PK almost gets killed and PV reveals themselves to not be hollow? After that then what exactly happens? PK tries to find another way to seal the infection while PV/Flower just finds themselves? I also understand that they are in a polly relationship with two of your OCs. How did they even meet?

Sorry if there were too many questions, I just need some clarification on the AU.

Hi! Happy you're interested :] Yeah, it's basically like that

The drabble is related but not that exact AU. The main AU is called Fragile as a Flower, while the drabble is from an AU of that AU called Wayward Royals AU. AUception

As for how they met I talked about it here

[art-crumbs-main]

Once you get this, you have to say five things you like about yourself, publicly. Then you have to send this to ten of your favourite followers. Thank you! :3

Lord, I hate doing chains like this. Uhhh.

• I like my eyes. I get a lot of compliments on them.

• I love my creative abilities. Writing and drawing are both things I'm very skilled at and took me a long time to develop.

• My arms are good. Very buff.

• I like how compassionate I am-- it's made me a lot of wonderful friends.

• And I like that I strive to be authentic and full of integrity, which leads people to trust me (best feeling in the world actually.)

[death-rebirth-senshi]

I feel like so many posts on the subject do not get that the point of moralizing your dislikes and a lot of discourse in general is like...the desire to be The Most Correct. To protect against ever feeling shame or cognitive dissonance. You just make a moral framework that enshrines your opinions and turns shame onto others, forcing them to conform or be labeled an enemy. In either case you can be assured of your own righteousness and do not have to endure the pain of examining your thoughts and biases or simply accepting that you and another person simply disagree.

I'm not saying creating a moral high ground to feel better is a fine and neutral behavior, it is bad, I'm just saying it's very common and a tale as old as time and that I feel like posts that are like "do people know they can just dislike things" (often there are social consequences for not liking things other people do!) or "You can say squick instead of trigger!" ("squick" doesn't provide that rush of moral superiority) miss this point.

(The fact that often people don't simply let you disagree of course compounds this, and the internet being so ridiculously large and social media facilitating bandwagoning and public shaming just amplifies it all x100, like it's no wonder so many people have anxiety disorders. The audience you feel you have to justify yourself to, the fact that you can't really talk to people in person, the amount of people you can potentially have against you...it's a lot to have to handle and I sometimes get why people rush to making very stupid hills to die on just to make themselves feel superior.)

[aroceu]

i love having my online friends but now that i'm nearly in my 30s and still navigating this space i'm like. wow some of you will say literally anything to a total and complete stranger on the internet huh

[echthr0s]

idk why everyone's so scared of reddit. reddit is like the akashic records to me. when I have a specific question about anything 9 times out of 10 I get the best results from doing my search with the "site:reddit.com" filter added. reddit fully introduced me to the delightfully insane rabbit hole that is TES lore. reddit is where I found out about the lifesaving (hyperbole, but only barely) properties of Gold Bond powder -- and NOT all the damn commercials I had to hear from them on the radio in the nineties. reddit is where all the people with the same ultra-specific tech problem I'm having have gone to beg for answers. reddit is without a doubt the one place where all the most autistic people in the world congregate to write dissertations about whatever hyper-niche thing they care about because somebody on reddit is gonna give a fuck, and if not, then some future person doing a hyper-niche google search will be incredibly grateful for it

reddit is also the best source for hobby drama, fun bots (there was a great Ben Shapiro bot in my city subreddit recently, lmao), people being demonstrably weirder and more unhinged than you (if you're like me and sometimes need that bit of perspective), people being exactly as weird and unhinged as you (thank god I'm not alone), people having the funniest relationship drama imaginable (offsets the people who are having the most awful relationship drama imaginable), legendary stories that are so indescribably cursed that you will never recover (the jolly rancher that was very much not a jolly rancher comes to mind...), and learning way too much about a subject you hadn't even cared about until you hit the 'random subreddit' button and got introduced to your new sudden-onset hyperfixation. also, poem for your sprog is there.

[mocacheezy]

I pulled a fucking Boston Lobster in x10 summoning event (the probability of getting him in this pool is 0.12%)

And then my HALF ASLEEP BRAIN ACCIDENTALLY SWAPPED HIS SHARD FOR MINGSIXI (his probability was 0.13%, so also rare BUT!!!)

He's a new UR still, and when I wake up I'm probs gonna find out he's a good soul, but.

Lobster man. That was such a lucky pull, and I got two SR souls in this draw too so having this misclick happen is just