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blehworld · 2 years ago

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the eclipse series: a review

i will forever love this series and it’s characters. it will be hard to let them go and i will surely come back to them for comfort or nostalgia. i will miss the eclipse fridays, the community built around it and coming here to spend hours reading everyone’s breakdowns and theories.

the incredible cast! (best thing about the series)

first and khaotung as the main leads;

two amazingly talented actors with great real-life chemistry, that translated beautifully into akk and ayan. the dynamic that they created for akkayan, their micro-expressions and eye acting elevated this series! they’re amazing at the emotional, the dramatic, the serious, the fluff, the suggestive, …i hope to see more of them together. gmmtv hit gold with them, finding two actors that match so well. they have what it takes to surprise us with a completely different concept and story. i look forward to see them separately too, as i’ve enjoyed their previous roles and have seen the evolution and range of their individual talent.

neo and louis as the secondary couple;

i had already seen them together in futs, where they were very cute. i had also seen neo, in a couple of other shows. it was interesting seeing their duality. neo being usually a comic relief character, got to show a more serious and tough side, while louis went from loud and clingy, to reserved and distant. i’m curious of what more they can offer as a pairing, and would certainly support them as a main couple. they’ve said that they want to continue working together so, will gmmtv make them stay as a secondary couple forever?

ploy, pawin and aj;

they did great in their roles for the little time they had for onscreen development; as the conflicted young new teacher that chooses to compromise, the misguided kid that wants to be included and belong, and, as the conflicted student with big dreams of becoming an indie movie director, respectively. i think it’s time that aj gets a main role (maybe with ploy? they seemed to be pushing them together a lot). he really impressed me in ep 11 when he was mad at akk, there was something in his eyes, i’d like for him to explore that. i’d seen all three of them before in other projects and they’re pretty consistent.

pak, tee and petch: the world remembers gang a.k.a. the youth rights club;

i loved them. they were the strong ones, the victims all along and who did nothing wrong! they wanted what's best for everyone. they deserve the world! the actors played them delightfully. a series centered around them would be incredible! they were never used for laughs. the show always took them seriously and so did the characters, and i am so thankful for that! this is unfortunately not the standard in bl series.

the adults: p’yai, p’sine, p’iang, p’jum and p’ron;

the “adult” actors that stood out were teachers waree and chadok, and the principal. they were incredibly intimidating, and played great antagonists. i loved to hate them. i have questions about their characters, though that has nothing to do with the actors, like: did waree believe in the curse? was the principal a teacher for chadok, the same way he was for akk? did the principal allow all those changes to suppalo after chadok resigned? and more…. i liked aye’s mother, and was hopping to see more of her. i also enjoyed uncle dika’s performance. we saw him only as flashbacks from different characters’ eyes, and he succeeded in transmitting every good thing that they thought of him.

the plot

the idea of showing a school as an allegory for a nation isn’t new, but it always has great potential, and i believe that they hit the spot many times! it wasn’t necessarily innovative, but it was brave. a courageous story to tell, from it’s preproduction and it’s crew, to the social commentary and political messages at its core, verbalized mostly by the world remembers gang and ayan.

the mystery wasn’t perfectly managed, but it also wasn’t really the focus of the series. it was largely the background for these characters to exist and these relationships to develop. however, it did keep me guessing at times and asking different questions, that were later answered, one way or another.

the diversity of queer representation

my favorite thing about this show was the different types of lgbt+ journeys:

akk who seemed to be only starting it, who was so scared and repressed to be himself. his economic background already made him stand out in the school, he didn’t need to also not be “normal”.

ayan who had already fully and confidently accepted who he was, thanks to his uncle and mother who were so supportive of him.

the 3jums who never really had the choice to hide, so they owned who they were and fought for their (and everyone’s) right of self expression.

kan who knew but wasn’t sure, tried to repress it because society made him think that it wasn’t okay to feel what he felt.

thua who was out, not explicitly by choice. he couldn’t hide it, but he could make himself small, take as little space as possible, to the point of never speaking up, so he would be ignored.

chadok, who unfortunately lost his fiancé because of his own fear of standing up for himself. he chose the same antiquated system that had already hurt him so much for years, the system that doomed his lover, over his own freedom.

the cinematography and technical aspects

they didn’t have much budget, but the plot didn’t really demand it. the direction was purposeful and the cinematography was skillful; there were some very beautiful shots throughout the series. the symbolism of the eclipse always very present, sometimes quite obviously, but often subtle and organic. technically it was well done, with deliberate lightning and the sound being better than most bls. there were some small continuity errors, the biggest imo being the hair lenghts changing between some scenes.

however the writing;

as a whole (mostly the last two episodes) the writing was somewhat underwhelming, not meeting my initial expectations, nor the potential of the series… while most of the elements to make this series exceptional were there, what really affected the quality of the writing —not saying that it was otherwise perfect, but it was good enough— was that 12 EPISODES WERE NOT ENOUGH TIME!

this story, these characters, these conflicts needed, at least, a few more episodes to develop and come to a conclusion, at most, dividing everything into two seasons.

the pacing of the first 10 episodes was so pleasing to me. it gave me AND the characters, enough time to examine their feelings and talk through them. it focused on how the environment and the interactions in it affected the characters! we saw them exist in their world and with each other, without anything being rushed. it felt natural, i loved it.

but we lost this in episode 11. it was just revelation after revelation, leaving no time for the viewer, nor the characters, to process what was going on. unfortunately with one episode left, there wasn’t much they could do. so they ended up skipping what had once been their main focus; the internal emotional journey of the characters.

episode 12 was cute and fun;

i loved that we got to see akk come out to his parents, as well as him and ayan introducing themselves as a couple to them. those are important moments in the lgbt+ journey! especially for a teen.

i loved to see how after being finally out, the freedom akk felt was visible not only in his relationship with ayan, but also in his face and his whole existence.

i loved all the moments between akk and ayan; the rooftop scene, the pool side scene, everything at the beach and in akk’s room, the little classroom exchange, the —in the words of a twitter moot— mutual pinning,

i loved the full circle moments of opening and closing the series on the red boat, and, the school bathroom scene with the hoodies. these showed growth, making us think back at how akk was and felt at the beginning vs now; and how akk and ayan were and felt when they met vs now.

BUT

it brushed over the huge revelations of the previous episode and so the build up of the whole series fell flat.

the apology to the world remembers was one sentence each? i said it before, they deserved apologies and reparations! i needed akk to officially apologise to them, as well as thua, the prefects, ayan, all the students, and the teachers, too. i did like how akk wasn’t expecting to be forgiven.

actually, within the friend group, no one really apologized to one another. i wanted group therapy full of tears and apologies.

the outing was not addressed (as expected, but i had a slimmer of hope).

the changes to the school (although great) felt unearned… we didn’t see who made this changes and why? it just, felt weird to shove them in a couple of minutes at the end of the episode, when the school and its antiquated system were the main villain of the series! the change of heart of teacher waree also was too sudden.

i wanted to see a serious conversation between kan and thua about everything. i wanted thua to acknowledge his wrongdoings the way akk got to do, multiple times, with ayan. i wanted to see kan be there for him while he went through it. i needed this for closure with their characters and their relationship. these posts by heretherebedork go further into this better than i can. honestly, thua’s character as a whole felt very abandoned to me. they hinted at him having a possibly abusive stepfather, but then it was dropped. they showed us signs mental health struggles, with him wanting to disappear (did i imagine that?), they dropped it too. his friendship with ayan, or whatever they had going, was also dropped at some point. i think that, with him, they focused too much on kan, and not enough on thua as an individual. he’s the only main character that didn’t really grow and learn? everyone else ended different than they started.

WHAT WAS TEACHER SANI DOING AT THE BEACH WITH THEM, THEY WERE DRINKING? she traveled with them all the way to akk’s house… i was scared until the las second that she and wat would have a thing.

the ending felt a little too “coming of age” teen movie. not very fitting when the series touched on quite serious and heavy topics. i don’t mean the happy ending, i mean the way it’s was all so quickly wrapped up and summarized. i half expected the voice over to name each character and what they became. “after graduation, wat became a big name in the indie film scene; the world remembers gang became youth leaders for the community; kan and thua decided to adopt singto and moved in together; and as for me and ayan, he’s thinking of studying political sciences, to no one’s surprise. me, i don’t know yet what i want to do with my life, but that’s okay! for now we are taking some time off and traveling the world together, as boyfriends…”

closing comment:

all in all, i thoroughly enjoyed this series; the talented actors and lgbt+ diverse journeys being the main pull. a lot of work was obviously put into writing (most of) the characters, but the plot was underdeveloped. there was a weird tone and pace shift between the last three episodes, and i want to attribute that to a time issue. sincerely, i would not want to sacrifice the pacing of the first 10 episodes, for parts of 11 and 12 to feel less rushed. it needed additional episodes, not a faster pace.

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feuqueerfire · 2 years ago

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The Eclipse Ep 4 Live Blogging

First time waiting for a whole week for an episode since like 2gether, so I hope they make the 7 day wait for 40 minutes worth it (unlike 2gether cuz I started watching it around the time it fell apart in the later episodes T.T)

I'm excited and nervous. Saw this tweet (cr: gramyok) about how no accidental kiss has ever hit and it was an hour ago (self-admittedly by the user that it's very chaotic of them to say that like right before akkayan potentially do that) but yeah please let that one be a misdirect

The Eclipse Ep 1 - 3

Sep 02 - during the premiere

4-1

accidental kiss and frozen and paused too. well, I'll just ignore it

the second time Akk pulls Ayan's sleeve to stop/sit down against Waree

omg being good at school is sooooo attractive and I'm also a bit jealous even though that's not the point of this. Now that I'm in uni and terrible at knowing what's going on, this show made me miss school being understandable and sometimes easy for me in high school

Anyway, the teachers doing that as punishment... this school seems to love public humiliation as punishment. It went mostly fine because Ayan knew all the answers but if he didn't, it'd be cruelty and humiliation in front of the class (Waree was already gunning for humiliation if Ayan took like 3 seconds to answer)

4-2

Akk sympathizing with Ayan and even going to ask Chadok about it

that was such a good scene, don't fuck with me. Khao does this quieter, yielding, tired Ayan so well. Also, Khao's thigh tattoo was showing. There was one moment where Ayan looked so deeply at Akk after pulling him back from leaving that Akk turned away all dear in headlights and it was funny and endearing to me. We even got an allusion toward the Dika mystery. I wonder how seeing this side of Ayan will affect Akk. Favourite scene of the episode for now unless something in the following 2 parts blows me away fr

Ayan and Thua continue to be interesting, I hope Saturday is in this episode

I continue ignoring what happened in the showers during the cold open

Things I want in the next 2 parts: Ayan and Thua meeting on Saturday, Kan and Ayan scene. Update: both happened, nice.

4-3

Oh yeah, what happened to those protestors? Hope they're planning on making another splash

I love the trio of friends even though Akk has some terrible stalking ideas

a queer cafeeeeeee alksdflaksdfj O.O that's so exciting i could cry. There's a pride flag and a variety of queer people, it reminds me of Not Me and Badhaai Do, but the pride flags and celebrations were during momentous occasions, protests, and fighting for rights. This cafe was so lovely with its casual display of queerness and community, just existing. my post

it's making me a little nervous that Akk and Kan aren't gonna be able to watch Ayan and Thua sneakily though lol They'll probably get caught and either have to admit they followed Ayan or that they just frequent this queer cafe

omg Akk being like :D vs Kan's nervousness/uncomfortableness. It supports my understanding that Kan's the one who's dealing with internalized homophobia and is uncomfortable being associated with queerness despite being aware that he likes Thua whereas Akk's not really facing internalized homophobia, just mostly confusion and new feelings, so hasn't been keenly aware of his queerness the way Kan has been

I need to think a bit more to understand what just happened with Thua's mom, how it happened, and its implications

Update: Okay the mother thing confused me deeply but then I came to adopt SeekingIdleWild Hal's conclusion that makes to me (happened to Reddit and discord, so here's it copy-pasted):

"Did Thua come out to his mom before we saw their interaction? It didn’t show that and after a coming out I would expect more of a reaction even if it’s of support and love. I think it would’ve been a bigger deal for Thua as well if he was gonna come out

Did Thua’s mom already know and Ayan was just like yo lemme meet her :) with the ulterior motive of starting a conversation between Thua and his mom? I’m leaning toward this one ig"

"It never even crossed my mind that Thua’s mother doesn’t know he’s queer because considering the meeting place, I assumed he’s either about to come out to her or she already knows. Now that I’m seeing your and some other comments, I guess narratively it makes sense that she actually doesn’t know and that’s why the whole conversation was just kinda vague about everything. Logically, though, I cannot imagine bringing my mother who I’m not out to to a very explicitly queer cafe, especially if I’m not very very very certain that she’s supportive of queerness.

It also threw me off that Ayan just told his mom (who I’m assuming he just met but more on this later) that Thua was struggling. If Ayan picked up on the fact that Thua’s struggling because of his stepdad, how does he know he can just tell the mom (who is married to said stepdad) about it?

Also, I just don’t get this meeting happening in the first place. Was Ayan just like “come to this cafe I know and bring your mom!” to Thua who he has known for only a short period of time and whose mom he has never met? With no real explanation for why?

I love the existence of this cafe a lot, so I wish the writing and motivations behind the cafe scene was less confusing to me.

Edit: spoke with SeekingIdleWild and I’m adopting their opinion that the actual Saturday plans were probably just to hang out together at the cafe, the mom was just there to drop off Thua but sat down to chat for a bit (that’s why she had to leave quickly), Ayan took his chance to bring up Thua’s problem, then the two of them just hung out afterward like they planned but they didn’t show much of that. They also could’ve been wanting to plan something about the school but that probably didn’t happen since they knew Akk and Kan were there."

Also, when the mom mentions the dad’s “methods” I can’t tell if she means it in like his personality/how he deals with things, or methods as an euphimism for physical punishment.

There are like 10 more minutes, possibly less of actual content, left and I don't wanna watch it because it'll be over.

4-4

They're fr spying on Ayan going to his uncle's grave

yay Kan and Thua scene, though short as hell. Both of them trying to help the other in their own way whether it be Thua avoiding Kan because Kan doesn't wanna be associated with the gay rumours or Kan telling Thua to confide in him. Update: Ayan knew about Akk and Kan following them, so does Thua here know? Doesn't seem to mind if he does but he could also just not have noticed

oof, Akk and Kan starting to connect Ayan and Dika (Akk gotta stop with the faen thing lmfao) but they don't know Dika died

Akk asking Teacher Waree to stop punishing Ayan and let the Prefect Club handle him. This is the 2nd time Akk's asked a teacher about Ayan's punishment and he's doing it so polity with his prefect identify but technically he's disrupting their chosen punishment.

Ayan really lets a lot slide, he caught Akk tryna go through his stuff twice and knows Akk and Kan followed him on Saturday but he isn't punching him the way I would have

not Akk saving Ayan from a motorcycle lol a very seme move and the long ass hold that Ayan points out

lol they forgot about the "what did you tell Waree" "were you following me" thing ig

"You got used to my car really fast" that's what I was thinking lmfao Akk comfy and familiar in there after one ride

wait a minute what why is he kissing his cheek is it for a picture bye i don't understand where they stand with each other on the frenemies who are attracted to each other triangle and I don't think they know either, it's all very tumultuous

I'll skip the next episode preview once again I guess but like I don't expect to remain spoiler free lol last week people giffed/uploaded clips of it all.

Overall Episode Thoughts:

This episode didn't have anything about the curse, focusing mostly on the characters and their relationships. I think the Ayan and Akk interactions were a little wonky at the beginning (the accidental kiss - unnecessary) and at the end (the cheek kiss - I think I saw Ayan taking a photo of it and I guess we'll explore it next episode but I also wonder of its necessity. I guess perhaps this wouldn't have happened if not for the accidental kiss before and that was the purpose of that?). Anyway, these interactions made me confused about where they stand in the friend - enemy/suspicious person - attraction/to be lover triangle because they seemed to move around a lot during this episode. The scene with Ayan, Thua, and Thua's mom was confusing as well.

Despite that, still a very enjoyable episode. We got to see how the school is starting to punish Ayan and how Akk reacts to that (doesn't like it and tries to subtly stop the teachers from doing it - a very small step back from his 'krap, ajan' motions). We got to see how Ayan reacted to the punishment and how Akk was there for him, even if not in so many words. Khaotung is very impressive, as is the rest of the cast but Khao stands out as an actor and Ayan stands out as an interesting character. The Cafe for All is great. Akk and Kan are slowly inching toward Ayan and Dika's connection and finding out Dika's not just teaching at a different school.

I also loved getting to see Ayan’s reaction to the kiss (my guy dropped the shampoo/soap he was holding and then walked out all flustered lol all that bravado and flirting and yet) + him being exhausted and crying due to being picked on by the teachers + how happy he was that Akk was looking out for him. Also, we got to know that Ayan’s not just being contrary for the sake of it (the way teachers seem to think) or even because only he’s standing up for his beliefs (which is what I thought) but also to figure out how the school deals with disobedient people. We never got to hear Dika’s answer to the question “How will they punish us?” is ep 1 or 2 but maybe Ayan didn’t either and is trying to figure it out.

What I wrote on Discord about Ayan/Akk’s current dynamics: The current dynamics for Akk and Ayan is interesting to me because they're somehow in every stage of "enemies to friends to lovers" like they're the whole damn scale. frenemies who are accidental kissers and also are attracted to each other in every possible way

Really liking all the characters looking out for each other

Akk -> Ayan: Trying to get him to sit down when he's tryna go against Waree, softly questioning Chadok about the punishment, being there for Ayan at the stairs, softly redirecting Ayan's punishment so that he instead is responsible for him, saving Ayan from getting run over

Ayan -> Thua: telling his mom Thua's struggling so that they can be open with each other

Thua -> Kan: He noticed Kan doesn't like the judgment and assumptions that may come when they associate with each other and thus avoids him. This one's a bad sad one, hope it changes esp because of the next one

Kan -> Thua: telling Thua to tell him when there's anything on his mind

Also, I really liked this post about their parents.

Excited for the next episode, didn't watch the preview but heard it's intense. I hope there's more about the curse next ep, someone mentioned class disparity is discussed so I'm excited about that, hope there's more of Wat and/or Namo and their own storylines, more of the Akk - Kan - Wat besties trio, also want to understand Akk more because the stuff we know about him is mostly like yeah he's a rabid prefect + obsessed with Ayan. Unlikely to get all of that in 40 minutes next ep but a few would be good.

Fave Scene: Akk beside a tired Ayan in part 2. The emotions and dynamics in that were just so good.

Curse Culprint Suspects:

No changes because there were no curse activities or really even any mentions of it in this episode. Akk and Namo are still the main suspects for me.

Most viewers that I saw per part during the premiere

4-1: 7.2k

4-2: 5.6k

4-3: 8.9k (had like 5 minutes between the ending of part 2 and the premiere of this part, so people who were watching but paused somewhere got to catch up)

4-4: 10.6k

The 5.6k was lower than Episode 3's lowest view count of 5.7k but the other parts were on par with or higher than Episode 3's highest view count of 7.3k. I wonder if last week's preview of almost showing the accidental kiss had anything to do with it or if it's just the growth since more people are watching as the weeks go by.

12 hours later

Part 1: 378k

Part 4: 268k

Views Tracking (just because I'm curious. Wish I had other GMMTV/popular non-GMMTV data to compare with):

3 Weeks Later

Ep 1 - 1: 1.27M (+100k)

Ep 1 - 4: 712k (+100k)

2 Weeks Later

Ep 2 - 1: 825 (+165k)

Ep 2 - 4: 630k (+130) (Continues to have higher numbers than part 2 and 3)

1 Week Later

Ep 3 - 1: 750k

Ep 3 - 2: 556k

TODO for later eps: Avg of all 4 parts for an ep

#the eclipse #ep by ep commentary

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