Lovely Writer (2021)

Bold but flawed storytelling

Things I liked about the series:
- I was so excited to see this series when I heard that Kao from Until We Meet Again was the main actor. I loved him as Kao, so I was looking forward to seeing him again. Since we’re already talking about Kao, let’s dive into his and Up’s acting and chemistry. No surprise, both actors were superb. I was so used to seeing Kao with Cooheart that I wasn’t sure how if I’d be able to picture him with Up. Surprisingly, Kao and Up seemed to suit each other a lot better than KaoEarth. As the show progressed their chemistry grew, and I loved their interactions. Playing someone like Nubsib wasn’t easy since the character had a lot of layers and personality to him, but Kao managed to play him amazingly. Same for Up and his role as Gene. Gene was so cute and adorable with his many facial expressions and his annoyance with Nubsib’s antics. I love this pairing so much.
- I want to dive into Up’s character more for a personal reason. Gene is an author who wrote his first BL novel—which was in the process of becoming a BL series—and was also writing another one due to popular demands. I’m also an author who wrote gay romance novels in my career, so I was able to relate with Gene on a deeper level. The subtle jabs at writing a BL novel—romanticizing sexual harassment, oversaturated NC scenes, concern if fans like a book for the plot or for the sex scenes—were all things I’ve experienced in my career, so it really hit home for me. Romance genre in general is notorious for romanticizing things like sexual harassment, nonconsensual advances, rape, etc, and the raunchier the book the more popular it becomes. It isn’t just the BL/MM industry, but the entire romance genre. Sex sells and we as authors are made to believe that we need sex scenes for a book to be a hit, even if we feel the plot doesn’t need it. It’s a very unsatisfying feeling when you don’t want those kinds of scenes in your book, but you have to put them in for fans to read them.
- Let’s also dive into Nubsib because I feel like this character has been getting a lot of unnecessary hate from fans and reactors. Part of that reason is the show’s misleading depiction of Nubsib being “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” Many people read that and believed that Nubsib was a bad guy who could possibly hurt Gene or manipulate him. The reality of Nubsib being a wolf was that he was Gene’s childhood friend, and honorary brother to Gene’s family. Both their families are neighbors and have regarded each other as family. They separated years ago when Gene went to study abroad. Years later, Nubsib heard about Gene’s book becoming a novel, so he pretends to not know who Gene is so he could try to make Gene fall in love with him without Gene looking at Nubsib as a brother. That was it. There was no malicious intent, or using Gene to get what he wants other than him wanting Gene as a boyfriend. Many people don’t understand why Nubsib would lie to Gene about who he was, so let me give you an insight. In Asian culture, dating someone you consider family, even if they aren’t related by blood, is highly frowned upon. So with Gene and Nubsib being honorary brothers, the odds of them being a couple if Gene knew would’ve been slim to none. So in that sense, I get why Nubsib lied, but it still doesn’t erase the fact that lying was wrong. And I loved that Gene made sure Nubsib understood that. In Gene’s own words, he said that if this was a novel, this would’ve been a sweet moment, but this is reality, and you need to understand that what you did was wrong. I love how Gene made sure Nubsib took responsibility for his actions instead of just sweeping it under the rug. Other than that, there wasn’t anything to depict Nubsib as a bad guy. His motives for getting close to Gene were questionable, but he’s never done anything to harm or abuse Gene. Even when Gene was drunk and throwing himself at Nubsib, Sib refused to take advantage of him. Consent was a big deal for Nubsib, always asking for permission before doing something with Gene, and that makes me love him even more. I’ve seen BL characters who are far more toxic and abusive who fans have excused time and again—like Tharn, Type, and Lhong from TharnType, and Khai from Theory of Love—but with Nubsib, people are looking for every excuse to hate on him. Quite the double standards if you ask me. Nubsib is one of the least toxic BL characters in the industry and doesn’t deserve any of the hate he was getting.
- If we’re going to talk about jabs, then let’s talk about the main topic of this series. Lovely Writer was written as a way to spread awareness of the toxicity of the BL industry and fanservice. Honestly, I felt that we needed something like this, because fanservice is very destructive. Toxic fans have an issue separating fantasy with real life. They see a BL couple on screen and they automatically want them to start dating in real life. When they don’t, their ship sinks, and fans start attacking the same actors they claimed to love. Or if an actor reveals they’re dating someone else, fans will start harassing their boyfriends/girlfriends. To be fair, it’s not just the fans making this a toxic environment. Studios would have the actors play as a couple both onscreen and offscreen as a way of promoting their show, which I do not agree with. Their acting should just be on screen only, and let the actors be themselves off screen. All it does is further feed the toxic fandom which is damaging to an actors mental health. So many BL actors would leave the industry all together because of this. BL fans should understand that these couples will likely not be real couples off their shows. Majority of BL actors are straight, and trying to force them to date their male co-star is disgusting and disrespectful. Please know the difference between fantasy and reality, for everyone’s sake, and if you’re going to attack a BL actor for loving someone else then clearly you’re not a real fan.
- This series has given us a plethora of side characters to follow along, which includes the side character of Tum and Tiffy. I love the dynamic between the two, and I love how they both reversed the gender stereotype. Tum took on the more feminine role while Tiffy was the badass masculine biker chick. I also loved Gene’s best friend Hin, who acted as Gene’s support system. Both Hin and Tum had family dynamic issues; Tum with his controlling sister and boss, and Hin with his father abandoning his mother and leaving their family in debt. For Tum, I was glad to finally see him standing up to Tam in the final episode. As for Hin, he saw how successful Gene’s novel was, and wanted a piece of the action in hopes of getting his mother out of financial debt. Thankfully, the final episode gave him that opportunity.
- If we’re going to talk about family, I want to talk about Nubsib and Gene’s family. They’re all very close. Their mothers go to aerobic classes together, their brothers video chat with one another, Nubsib’s father wanting to do business with Gene’s. But I wanted to talk about Gene’s father in particular. Right away we were shown a glimpse that Teep wasn’t a fan of Nubsib and Gene’s relationship. At first we think it’s the typical homophobia reason, but the show surprised us with a unique revelation. Teep used to have a boyfriend before marrying Gene’s mother. His reason for not liking Gene and Nubsib’s relationship isn’t out of hate, but out of fear. Teep fears what will happen to Gene if their relationship goes public. Public pressure and lack of support caused Teep to lose his partner, and he didn’t want that for his son. We have never seen this concept in a BL before, and I was stunned when this was revealed to us, but I also love this twist. It’s a small yet important role that also helped Gene and his father become closer. When Nubsib and Gene had to breakup while Sib was under contract, the one person Gene could turn to was Teep. This was brilliant and I loved it so much.
- I want to digest the final episode for a moment. A lot of people were disappointed that during the press conference, Nubsib and Gene decided to go along with pretending that their relationship wasn’t real. In a perfect world, yes, it would’ve been nice to see them standing up for their love in front of everyone. However, this show was trying to portray the realistic situations of the BL industry, and unfortunately, that included pretending that no other relationship exists except for the main couple of the series. It’s heartbreaking, but no BL actor has ever gone against their contract. Doing so could result in legal issues. They could be sued, they could possibly never be able to work for another agency again, and their career could’ve ended on the spot. This is why a lot of BL actors wait for their contract to end before revealing their significant other to the world. It’s safer and less expensive.
- Speaking of the ending, those different ending reenactments that Nubsib and Gene did—Snow White, Cinderella, and Romeo & Juliet—were entertaining! But did they really had to do Romeo and Juliet? This was clearly an homage to Kao’s role in Until We Meet Again, which was essentially a Romeo/Juliet love story.
- Also, that surprise plot twist in the end with the actual author of the book “Lovely Writer” was a nice touch. Unexpecting, but genius, and a perfect way to end a series about an author.

Things that I didn’t like about the series:
- This show had a great idea of showing toxicity of the BL industry, but unfortunately, the execution was sorely lacking. We only got crumbs of the BL industry because the show had too many side stories fighting for attention. I wish we had a lot more of it because it is something that needed to be addressed. While I’m satisfied with the last two-three episodes for really showing us how toxic a fandom and shipping can get, the problem was for the most part it felt like an afterthought throughout most of the series when it should’ve been a main focal point.
- What can I say about the writing? It was cluttered and messy, especially the first half of the series. The problem with having so many characters and side stories in a 12 episode series, is that they can at times clash with one another, which creates an inconsistent mess. Some side stories could also get left behind, and I feel that’s what happened with Hin's story arc. His story was compelling, but we had very little to no development until the very last episode. Aey’s side story with his parents and his relationship with Mhok was also left behind with no development, and was completely forgotten about. It’s like the writers didn’t have a clear sense of direction on where they wanted the story to go. Either that, or they tried biting far more than they could chew. There were also a lot of scenes that either lagged for far too long in order to create tension, or scenes that didn’t need to be in the series at all. One example being Tum fishing his phone out the toilet. Why was this put in? An example of a scene lagging for far too long was when Nubsib was trying to get Gene to listen to him, but Sib never says anything. So, it was thirty seconds of absolute silence.
- Since I brought up Aey, let’s talk about his character. This was by far the most confusing character in the whole series. Aey was someone I generally felt bad for because of his terrible relationship with his parents, but much like the writing for the entire series, there was no cohesion with his development or motives. I honestly don’t even know what his motives were at all, or what his goals were anymore. One minute we see he wanted to become a maker and study in France, then that whole thing was nonexistent. Next we see him wanting Nubsib, but then turns around and says he wants Gene. Aey does things and say things, but then says he regrets it the next. What is this character supposed to be about?
- In addition, what was the point of Mhok being in the series? I felt like he was only in the series for maybe two-three episodes, and then was long forgotten. I thought maybe Aey would accept Mhok as a partner, but that never happened. Instead it looks like Mhok moved on with a new series, so what was the point of having him in the show to begin with? We also don’t know anything about him? We know he’s a friend to Aey’s family, but that was it. We don’t know anything of his and Aey’s history, or his purpose in keeping an eye on Aey. Nothing like that.
- I honestly forgot Hin was even in this series until the last 3 episodes. It was like his character was completely forgotten about it, which is unfortunate because I actually liked him. I would’ve loved to have seen more of him and his journey to become a writer.
- I raved about Tum and Tiffy, but even they gave me something to be disappointed in them about. Mainly towards Tiffy and her constantly thinking that Tum is gay. Literally how many times can he say he’s not before she believes it? He’s never even given her reason to think he was! Also, her yelling at Tum when news of Nubsib and Gene’s relationship surfaced. Why? Tum literally didn’t do anything, so why was she blaming her? And the show never gave us a clear reason for why she quit being Aey’s manager, what happened?
- Okay, I’ve defended Nubsib but even I have to admit that his pursuit of Gene is somewhat problematic and stalkerish. Do I think there was malicious intent? Of course not. But yes, I can see the issue with Nubsib always needing to be close to Gene and know what’s going on with him. But again, he’s one of the least toxic BL characters I’ve seen.

Overall Thoughts:
Okay, I think I’ve covered everything I had to say about Lovely Writer. Overall, this was an entertaining series to watch with some serious discussions about the BL industry that was in desperate need of addressing. While the series plot was bold and original, the execution fell a little flat. That said, Kao and Up were an amazing pair to watch and fall in love with. The messy writing aside, I was not bored with this series. It was anything great, but it wasn’t terrible. I think what will make this series pass the test of time is the concept. This series will always be brought up when discussing the toxicity of the BL fandom, so congrats to the writers for making a strong enough impact.

Rate: 7.5/10

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