Home School (2023)

Home School: A prison disguised as a boarding house or a safe haven?

Thirteen students with troubled upbringing who were essentially abandoned get selected as the new generation & enrolled in a “mysterious” boarding school to continue their studies for the next three years. What seems like your typical prestige school for well off kids to further their education & future, hides many secrets within. With its strict rules, eerie teachers, and isolated location, the students must put their differences aside and work together to unravel the truth of a missing student as well as the school’s origins & true intentions.

With each new episode, we learn a little more about each student, their upbringings, their traumas, etc. “Unique & peculiar” in its curriculum is definitely an understatement. In the beginning I couldn’t tell whether or not the Masters were secretively clever or just outright insane, and maybe they were both but IT WORKED!! The lessons and teachings were far from the typical “norm”, and instead consisted of games that dabbled in physical and psychological aspect. It focused more on morals & values. To be better people in society, because without "good people" they cannot achieve a good society. Instead of punishing the bad kids or the ones who did wrong "which kinda annoyed me in the beginning lol” they punished the ones who were good, punctual, obedient etc…
And it made sense because life & society is not fair...bad guys get away...and in order to create fairness in society people have to expose the truth and find the truth if they deem suspicion. Make them grow, reflect, and heal as individuals. See the world for what it is to make changes but don't look at it so negatively with hatred, otherwise nothing will change and will only create monsters of destruction. In theory Home School was sought to be a safe haven for students who had no one to depend on, however its good intentions were shrouded with hatred that everything ended up becoming twisted causing more harm to the students.

One thing I wish this series did focus on though, is more background on the teachers/masters. I felt like they were soo essential to the students experience within the boarding house, they explained some but not all. It wouldve been more interesting to see how they got recruited, what they went through to want to be apart of Home School etc etc and even some more details on the previous generations. BUT all in all, with all its flaws I was without a doubt pretty engrossed in this show, and with that bonus ending, Im really manifesting for a S2…and i dont like multiple scenes but I kinda want more!!

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Be patient with this one

It is easy to give up on Home School halfway through. After all, we may not really care much about most of the characters at the start. The teachers at Home School are either cold or creepy (often both, actually). And the students can be pretty unlikable too. But I guess the creators took a bit of a gamble here. The characters do become more interesting and likable apart from the one who turns out to be the main villain of the series.

It is unfortunately very easy to be frustrated with the series if you start off with the assumption that Home School and its teachers are part of an unrevealed dark conspiracy. This is because of the ambivalent way in which they are portrayed. They seem every bit like the bad guys who have tricked parents into enrolling their children in a school that ends up abusing the children and cut off the children's contact with the outside world. However, some of the "lessons" the teachers try to teach seem to have values even though the teaching methods are highly unconventional and manipulative to say the least. There were times when I was left incredulous, thinking that the writers have made the teachers laughable villains. At times, the teachers seem to place emphasis on conventionally good things like love and trust for one another; at other times, they seem to be cruelly teaching the students about the ugliness of the world. The ambivalence in the portrayal of the school does, however, have a purpose. There are early hints about this and it becomes increasingly clear to us--the school has not always been what we think it is like.

To be honest, the ethicality of the tactics employed by Home School to educate the young people remain questionable all the way even though a twist in the story makes us focus more on the main villain or the mastermind behind the villainy. Regardless of what Home School aims to do, I can imagine how emotionally scarring it can be for a young person to go through the school, especially for someone like Pennhung who appears to be a character with unspecified special needs. This is one of the weaknesses of the story, making the plot twists less convincing than they could have been.

At times, I also wished that the writers had written in more interesting lessons. Some of them are just too predictable. Take for example the game in which the students are made to play a musical-chairs game. They are told to find a place to sit down before the music stops--the number of chairs keep decreasing, but those who fail to find a place to sit down will be punished. Of course, it turns out that the students did not have to sit on a chair. They could literally sit anywhere. In another game, they students are made to play a game in which they have to identify the lizard, who can order anyone of them around. Of course none of the students turns out to be the lizard. The atmosphere would be different if there had been more interesting "lessons" written into the script.

Despite the flaws of the series, there is enough in the series to keep me watching. The strong performance by many of the actors and the good story pacing contribute to making the series more watchable. There are holes here, but the story is quite good

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New mystery concept of a school

Everything I see in the beginning just left lots of questions in my head, making me curious about what happened. The school is so mysterious, even those students were brought to it without knowing any clues about the direction. The weird curriculum also made me surprised. I love some personalities from the students (especially Pennhung he is so soft wth)
I see metaphor of bad treatments from parents to their children. All of the Home School students have their own scars that come from the same source ; family. And the mystery between the masters made the story more thrilling, and also the weird exams. And the ending??? Is there s2 for this? Because there are still a lot of things that left question marks.

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Annoying

All the character are not likeable at all and even if they are it only some scene. They are spoiled, selfish, and get angry over the dumbest stuff. First of all if they were served bad food they complained. If they were served good food they complained. If they were served nothing they complained. All they do is complained. Complained. Complained. And complained.

Furthermore, the drama centers around building friendships. However, given how much the characters dislike one another and how easily they get on each other's nerves, it's hard to believe that they will ever form any meaningful connections.

Overall, this drama left me feeling frustrated and disappointed. While it may appeal to some viewers, I found it difficult to enjoy due to the unlikable characters and the lack of meaningful relationships.

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Dark story with great themes but not my cup of coffee

I'd say it's really entertaining, my favorite actors are really great in their roles like Chimon who already has my heart, then the twins, Jane, Film, View, Love and mainly Gun who stole the show with few scenes.
But what disappoints me here is that the school is always talking about justice and truth but don't even punish the ones who should be. They punished Pheng (Love) by making everyone look down on her and exposing her lies so why Jingjai, Hugo and Jean haven't been also humiliated like this? I saw not a single sign of guilt for putting Pennhung in the traumatic situation. Hugo may have apologized but Jingjai just stood there like statue. Plus Hugo and Jean are often getting into fight with girls or guys. They bullied Pennhung just for being cute. But single apology and confession was enough? They were made to confess just to stop those punishments, they did not do it because they felt guilty, ahh! It's already frustrating me but besides intro and these three characters it's really great and I recommend it.

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