Reviewed this at episode 8, but I have now lowered my score from 9.5 to 8.5. I stand by what I said but this show could have benefitted from some editing down. If like two or three episodes worth of content was removed, this would have been perfect. There just wasn’t enough plot to keep it running for 14 eps.

This resulted in some scenes dragging on unnecessarily.
I also feel like the flow was a little off . The last episode should have been an episode or two prior, and then the final episode could have been a goodbye to the characters, as it was a character focused show.

That being said:

This is what Theory of Love should have been, unrequited love at its finest. There, I said it.

I think the biggest difference here, and what makes this feel so genuine is the display of their relationship. Rather than telling us they’re best friends, joined at the hip since birth, and practically each other’s other-half, they SHOWED us. You see them grow up together, and see the special bond they have. Kudos to the actors because they did a phenomenal job establishing emotional chemistry that rivals a lot of my favorites.

The character depth adds layers to this. You can understand why Eiw loves Cake, because we see Cake from his perspective.
Not only that, but you can see that Cake truly loves and cares for Eiw, romantic feelings aside, from the very beginning. I think Cake was really well-written and his storyline so far has been crafted in just the right way that he doesn’t come off like an inconsiderate asshole. It would be very easy for his character to go south, if he was not written the way that he was. He isn’t oblivious to Eiw pushing away from him in earlier episodes. He understands that Eiw is upset about something and tries to communicate with him, even scratching the surface of the issue. Gasp, a ML with emotional intelligence? Shocking.

Eiw might be annoying for some. I don’t mind it but he is whiny and pouty. His actor is really incredible at crying though, I’ve thought this since LBC and UWMA lol. Honestly, the emotional scenes between the leads really pack a good punch. Like I said, their emotional chemistry is really solid.

I would recommend this. Even after completing this, I’ll argue this is nearly the most ideal unrequited to requited BL out there.