Trab Fah Mee Tawan (2020)

She should have SUED that family, with the exception of sweet uncle!!

I started this drama because of the good reviews found here and because of the lead actor, who I loved in My Husband In Law, but imagine my surprise that when I saw it, I felt as if I traveled back in time to the bad old golden times of unbelievable Mexican melodramatic telenovelas, where the male lead is god incarnate and the poor female lead has to accept all the horrible treatment dished out to her, until he finally consents and graces her with his "love".

Story:
The story started with an interesting setting, where the ML (Arthit) didn't hate from the get go the FL (Paeng), who is a 16-year-old high school student. This drama can be divided in three: the death of Paeng’s parents and Arthit’s tragedy, the redemption of Paeng and Arthit’s prisoner’s guard Mexican telenovelas torture cookbook tendencies, and finally when Arthit falls in love.

The first part was the introduction, which was excellently presented to explain the second part. Poor Paeng lost her parents at the early age of 16, while going through changes in her life and experiencing hardships all related to her over reliance on her parents, since she has difficulties making friends. On the other hand, we have Arthit, who is living a perfect university life, surrounded by friends and family. Unlike Paeng, he remembers their connection and at first, he tries to understand her, being her first real friend and the only one that actually cares for her. This leads to Paeng making Arthit her anchor in life, which leads to the tragedy waiting to happen. Arthit’s mother and maids are horrible, the only one who is nice in that family is the father, seriously I lost all possible sympathy on the mother early on, such a horrible two-faced character, bullying a kid who just faced unbelievable loss, even though she does not know the whole story, she knows Paeng lost both her parents!! Then the tragedy happens, while trying to attach herself to the only person who likes her and treats her well in that family, she unwittingly creates a misunderstanding; leading to Arthit having an important accident and she get all the blame for it!! I mean, I understand that she precipitated it, but he had a big share of the blame!! He drives while drunk and upset, but noooo, all the blame is put on Paeng. This goes on from episode 1 to episode 5, and I have already lost my patience with mom, the two maids and by episode 3 with Arthit too.

The second part, is where we see the personal growth of Paeng and are finally introduced to the real person she is, a nice girl trying to live her life. She was sent to Bangkok to continue her education and to get over all the tragedies she suffered, with the help of Arthit’s father, who is the most likable character of the show. Arthit’s character goes through a reversal, where he becomes a thoroughly heartless, merciless, bastard, full of his own importance, who only lives in the past and derives great joy in torturing poor Paeng. What I do not understand, is why, oh why, she put up with all the abuse dished out by Arthit? What any normal person would have done was, leave that bloody farm as soon as possible, at least until Arthit’s father arrived! Say to uncle, “I tried to do what you want, but I will not put myself through the sheer physical and mental torture that horrible son of yours wants to put me through, since it is quite obvious everyone here lives in the past and no one has forgiven me, nor wants to give me the benefit of the doubt that I have grown up. Your bloody son still believes I am dying to be with him, that he is still my ideal and will continue to harass him, when that is furthest from the truth as to be laughable at this point in my life.” As you can see, I totally hate this storyline, since it reminds me of the horrible Mexican telenovelas of the bad old days, where the FL suffers through all the indignities and abuse that the ML and his family consider their right to dish out to the poor FL. I believe in this day and age, we have grown up from those horrible times, and can accept that women have their pride and dignity, and that no man should be able to treat you as he bloody well pleases, just because he believes you deserve it. This part goes on from episode 6 to episode 12, where I dearly wish that Arthit would jump from a CLIFF and leave Paeng alone, at the very least I would be quite happy if he does not get his happy ending, because let me be clear, HE DOES NOT DESERVE IT!

The third part is, as I mentioned before, where he finally acknowledges his love for Paeng, and now he has an uphill battle to convince her of it, since all he has done before does not help his case at all. I would have enjoyed him suffering more than he does here, but let’s face it, it’s a “romantic-comedy” of course he will get the girl at the end and since he is the ML, with almost zero groveling and making up for his past actions. Here, he just decides he wants her, and he gets her. Although, Paeng does make it a “little” difficult since she does not fully trust him and continues to doubt his intentions, but accepts his 180º change sooner than I would have expected. I concede that when Arthit does realize he loves her, he is deeply in love and quite cute in trying to show it to Paeng, I am totally convinced of his love for her by the end of the tv show, it’s just that his earlier behavior for me was unforgivable, more so since he never does apologize for it. At least, in the end he does concede that his accident wasn’t wholly Paeng’s fault, but that he does share some of the blame as well. This part goes from episode 13 to episode 19, and it is the most watchable of the tv show, since the torture is over and lovey-dovey scenes are here.

Acting/Cast:
The main actors, Mark Prin and Kao Supassara were great in their portrayal of their characters. But of them deserved special mentions, because they portrayed such different emotions.

Mark was simply amazing, you can see him change from being a super nice guy, then to exasperated, then to deep hatred, to starting to fall in love, while being confused and finally to when he is deeply in love. His facial expressions and voice intonations, are perfect, considering I don't know a thing of Thai, it is remarkable the emotions he transmits and makes the audience feel. I respect the character growth he went through and the excellence he demonstrated of his portrayal of an unsympathetic character, who is very easy to hate deeply and who very slowly tries at the end to gain my sympathy. I never understood Arthit, with his unreasonable hatred for Paeng, when he shares a lion's portion of the fault for his accident, and his need to be as degrading as possible to her, to the point where a normal human being would sue him for mistreatment. But that is the point of a good actor and I respect the portrayal, if not the horrible character.

Kao was great in showing a poor 16-year-old, who is suffering and confused, who is looking for that someone who understands her and cares for her, leading to her having her first love, which quickly turns to obsession and brings tragedy to the male lead. I never hated her, because I was acutely aware that she is just a teenager, who has suffered unbelievable loss, and who knows that in the house only Arthit (first 2 episodes), his father and her two maids understood her or at least they tried. She goes through some personal growth that leaves you awed at the pure strength of will required to accomplish it, and boy does she succeed! When she returns to the farm, she is more of a mature adult than anyone there, with the exception of the Arthit's father. The actress is so good, because she managed the transition naturally and made you root for her from beginning to end, unlike some other characters in the show. She is so understanding and has learned her lessons, wanting to atone for the wrongs she committed, being an amazing human being, deserving much more than Arthit at the end, she deserved a prince or someone much more wonderful.

Music:
I loved the music, the three songs I remember were great and had a great message in tune with the story. I still listen to the music, because it is so good, the rhythm and the lyrics were amazing and I loved it.

Rewatch value:
Nearly nonexistent, I couldn't stomach the show since episode 3 up to 13, which is nearly half of the show. Arthit, his mother and his mother's two-house maids, should have been accused in a court of law for serious mistreatment, violence, cruelty and torture of Paeng, since at times it was physical as well as mental. His falling in love so slowly is understandable to the story, but what is not is Paeng staying at the farm, where she is seriously mistreated and accepting it as normal, any other woman would have sued that horrible family. I don't understand how she could be in love with him after all that she suffered at his hands, she should have left the bastard behind as quickly as she could and leave him to be miserable for the rest of his life. Any sympathy I could have felt for Arthit was lost by episode 8, and I was hoping that Paeng would make him suffer more before he gets his happy ending, so I was seriously disappointed with the outcome. I can only stomach to rewatch from episode 13 to 19, and only certain scenes.

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