Mark and the food look good...

...but this series doesn't have much else going for it...

I think, like many others before me, the title mislead me. But that's because I thought the show was foremost a BL (Boy's Love). I realized from the first episode on that it was actually first a FL (FOOD's Love) and THEN a BL. "Bite Me" as in: "Don't you want to have a taste of this sumptuous food we are filming? Don't you feel like taking the phone and order something while watching our show?"

SYNOPSIS:

A cute boy (Mark) works for a company that delivers FOOD. One day, he goes to a new restaurant where a customer has ordered FOOD that he must deliver. The chef realises that this cute boy knows a lot about FOOD. So he decides to give him a job at his restaurant where they can make FOOD together. He falls in love with the boy and the show is about how they get together while making FOOD, entering contests about FOOD and, hopefully, they can make FOOD together for the rest of their lives...

STORY:

Paper thin. They devote so much time to plans about FOOD, that the rest doesn't get much chance te develop. Too many characters, not enough time to get to know them. The lead actor is the FOOD. The two would-be leads are the main couple and as much as we root for them because they're nice people who look good, we don't know much about what makes them tick. The payoff (if it can be called that) is there, but it doesn't feel deserved at all.
The secondary characters are so under developped that there's not much to say about them. There's even a secondary couple that you can find between plans of FOOD if you squint. They don't have much chemistry but they're there...

ACTING:

The FOOD is the star of the show. It always looks good and really knows how to work the camera.
The two leads are OK. Mark looks cute and can tear up when it's time to. I didn't feel much chemistry between him and Zung but they did look good together.
Aek's friends are all forgettable. I don't know much about the actors but they feel very green.
Aek's mum is a stand out for me.
The staff of the restaurant are equally forgettable. Not because of their acting but because we spend barely any time with any of them.

MUSIC:

I don't pay much attention to music in BL shows because I generally don't like it apart from a few exceptions. Here, it didn't bother me, so I guess that's good.

REWATCH VALUE:

This is a BL series with a beautiful cinematography and lovely plans about FOOD sprinkled with Mark cuteness but not much else. Tons of potential resulting in little more than a gigantic ad for Thaï FOOD. I like FOOD and I do think Mark is cute, but it's not enough for me.

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The title should've been a dead giveaway!

OK so this is my first review. I began to watch this kind of drama very recently. I usually NEVER watch any stories involving same sex romances. The reason is simple: they tend to be sad and end badly. Now, to each their preferences, but if I'm gonna watch this kind of series, my goal is clear: escapism from the usually dreary reality of same sex romances. When I discovered HIStory, I was overjoyed! Intersting stories, reasonably good acting and happy endings aplenty... until this series. Admittedly, the title initially appeared off-putting to me. But I was lulled in a false sense of security and risked it anyway. I dropped out right after the time skip as I knew where the ending was ended. And really, I should've known better. I had real problems getting into the story in the beginning. As good as the actors are (and I think they are quite good) I had a problem with their acting. To be precise, the humoristic scenes seemed WAY forced and a little out of place in a series that seemed to present itself as more "realistic". It's the first time in HIStory where homophobia (or something approaching) looks like something of a threat. Not to mention the fact that sex is present at all... But I still continued because HIStory hadn't disappointed me yet. But I gotta tell ya, the "realistic" flair was something of a red flag! Still, I decided to believe that, just because it's gonna be more realistic doesn't automatically mean it's gonna be sad. Well la-dee-da to me! Of course one of the lead had to die! The reason I am so disappointed is that HIStory was something of a safe heaven to me. I thought I had found a series could talk about same sex romances without resorting to the tired trope of "same sex romances usually end in tragedy". Well the false sense of security is gone. The reason I find it a pity is that there is enough sad same sex romances at the cinema and on TV. To me, this sad ending doesn't really serve the story and is a bit of a cop out. Now, at the end of the day, I'm sure that some people will still appreciate this series for what it is and I respect that choice. As for me, where before I would begin a new series of HIStory without any reservation, I learned my lesson. I will wait for it ti end and see if the ending is sad or not. Bad things happen and that's life, sure. But good things can happen too and LGBTQIA+ people don't always have the capacity to take that for granted as it is.

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It's all about your expectations!

So what was I expecting ?

At most, I thought the movie would give us an extremely condensed version of the series with a few new stuff sprinkled at the end. Something like: "They married, adopted three kids, got two dogs, kept in contact with all their friends and lived happily ever after." Then I would shed tears of love and joy and all would be right with the world.

Were my expectations realistic? When I think about it, not really. I wouldn't love this series half as much if they hadn't taken the time to introduce a ton of lovable characters, a lot of ups and downs with some tasty slow burn... all things I love. All things that are not possible to translate in a 2 hour movie, however much I would like the think it is...

So were my expectations met ? Partly.

STORY

Do you like voiceovers? Have you always wanted to know what happened in Tine's and Sarawat's cute little heads as all those scenes we know and love happened (or at least the most important ones)? Do you like both of their voices so much that you dream of having them read you a story while you watch the scenes unfold?
Well look no further: this is the movie for you! Tine first, then Sarawat take you on this brief journey across the most important moments of the series (with some brief allusions to Still 2gether). This retelling is sandwiched between a few scenes of never before seen stuff in the not too far future. The new stuff is short and sweet but it's there.

So there you have it! If you knew the series before, the only interest is the actual voiceover to have some more context in the inner workings of our two adorable goofballs and the new stuff. As a fan, I'll say that it was mostly fun, but nothing more. If you've never seen the series before, THIS FILM IS NOT FOR YOU and I cannot stress this enough.

ACTING

The film consisting mostly of a shorter edit of the series, nothing new there. If you liked the acting then, it's still there with some voiceover on top.
As far as the new scenes go, we see the whole cast (at least I think so) but it's very brief. For all that we see them, they seem happy to be there and that's really all they need to be at this point.
As for the two leads... Bright is an excellent actor in my opinion and he really gives a great send off to Sarawat. Win is there... and that's it. It's still him, but it's my opinion that he was done with Tine far before this film came about. He is not a good enough actor (yet) to hide that he is required to be here but not much else. I found his smiles extremely forced.

MUSIC

Still good. Still familiar. Still there.

REWATCH VALUE

None? It was funny enough to hear the voiceover once and I managed to keep myself entertained until the end of the movie, but if I rewatch it, it'll be for the new stuff. FAST FORWARD BABY!

OVERALL

Set your expectations for this one guys ! We were never gonna get something as good as the series. They told us it would just be a little new stuff and a lot of what we've already seen. That's what they gave us. They even tried to make it feel new with the voiceover instead of just savagely cannibalising the series to make it fit a movie. Let's be happy with that and move on.
We already had 2gether and Still 2gether and now we have this little nice send-off to wrap it all up with a bow. Of course I was a little disappointed, but I'll live. I still love this series and I'll rewatch it many times. But it's time to say goodbye to Sarawat and Tine because Bright and Win won't forever wait for us to move on...

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"It's okay guys, he did it for love !"

Some dramas know how to mix a big dose of darkness and grit with a healthy dose of levity and humour. This drama does not.

On one side, we have the "best friends fall for each other while trying to pass as a couple trope" which can only be humoristic and on the other side, we have the "step-brothers not related by blood" trope, which could be played either with humour or completely seriously. Guess which they go with...

What that gets us is a group of 3 supposedly best friends who work together composed of the goofy couple and one half of the serious one. Talk about a tonal issue! The goofy couple are goofy all the time and the serious big bro feels completely out of place each time they are together. That's one part of the problem.

The other one is the introduction of the the little stepbro. For some reason, he is introduced to us as a menacing figure, stalking his big bro and he even assaults one of his big bro's friends for no other reason than because he didn't like him. His unlikable behviour notwhistanding, that's just setting him up to be hated.

And after that we have the famous drunk scene with the stepbro. That's when it stopped being even a little interesting to me. That's where I stopped watching. However cute we are supposed to find the little stepbro, these questionable years of preparing this "plan" (those who have kept watching will understand) make him a psychopath.

At no point is it even a little romantic to plan to do that to someone whatever your motives are. We all know big bro will forgive him - they are one the two main couples, how could he not ! But the writers are asking us not to take too seriously a story that they present to us with a serious tone. The set-up is unbelievable. The actors are not at fault here and they make the best of what they're given. The writing is questionnable.

I don't care that they are step-brothers. That's a common BL trope and I find it harmless enough. I care that they are premeditating abuser and victim. Yes, that's also a common BL trope, but this one is not harmless. That's just lazy writing and the incendary reviews are well deserved.

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