Niti Man Society and Lover (2021)

For a BL series that has one main couple and two side (BL) couples that are only hinted at, it is very odd that the side couples turn out to be portrayed more effectively.

The side couple that is less hinted at, Jay and Song, turns out to be my favorite. That the two actors look good individually and cute as a couple is an added bonus. There is barely any overt indication of them becoming a couple and a somewhat cryptic scene in the last episode with Jay smiling in his final scene, but the scenes of them together manage to suggest the potential for a more-than-friends relationships. We see the closeness between them early on when Jay refuses to take a drunken Bom to his room and it is revealed that he only allows Song into his room. When we see Jay writing a song for Bom about his feelings for Jin, we may wonder if Jay is ultimately also writing about his own feelings for Song.

Keam and Ball are worth mentioning as another side couple of sorts. Keam is a somewhat perplexing and inscrutable character. At times, he seems more mature than his friends, but his behavior is weird. He seems aware of his feelings for Ball, but he has a girlfriend. Or does he have feelings for some other guy at first -- Bom? He protests when Bom is drunk and the rest ask Jin to take Bom to his room. Nevertheless, from the first time Keam bumps into Ball in the series, we can see the sparks. At least it is obvious that Keam has a soft spot for Ball. The scene isn't even anything original or difficult to do, so it is strange that the main couple isn't given a sort of similar treatment. Instead, Bom seems almost hostile towards Jin at the start, and one can be forgiven for assuming that their relationship is the enemies-to-lovers sort. Except it isn't.

It turns out that Bom has always been secretly in love with Jin though Bom does not seem to know Jin when we first see them together. (It is only revealed in a flashback much later that we see that Bom has been in love with Jin since they were freshmen.) To add to the messiness, we have Jin quite earnestly saying that he doesn't dislike Bom but can only be friends with him in one scene, but in the very next scene, he shows no discomfort or objections when Bom hits on him and wants to call him every day. And in the scene that follows, we see Jin eating an ice-cream off Bom's hands--quite publicly, so it seems like he's not even like he's afraid of being seen as gay or afraid of giving Bom the wrong idea ....

Another problem is with the characterization of Jin, who is an important character. He is at first really devastated as his girlfriend, Aim, breaks up with him. He seems like someone who is really serious about his relationships. Then suddenly we have people warning Bom that Jin is a playboy, and it's supposed to be true. Yet, Jin's actions don't show him to be a playboy. Before he realizes that he actually loves Bom, he shows some interest in a girl and starts talking to her. But Jin soon realizes that he loves Bom, and when the girl confesses her love for him, he tells her honestly that he is in love with someone else. How is this guy a playboy?

The silly crisis to Jin and Bom's relationship also undermines the story. For some reason, Aim (Jin's ex-girlfriend) is preoccupied with bringing Jin and Bom together. Ok, maybe she wants to do something for them because she feels guilty for jilting Jin for another guy, and for "snatching" Jin from Bom despite knowing that Bom likes Jin. But to go to the extent of masterminding a bizarre plot to bring them together is an unusual level of crazy. E.g. She makes Bom's friends dope his drink with an aphrodisiac and secretly slipping a condom into his pocket (er, how on earth is he going to use it if he doesn't know it's there?) Apart from the question of why Bom's frinds would go along with such madness, there is the question of how many Bom horny would help him win Jin's love. And .... the shenanigans do not end here. At times, it looks more like Aim is aiming to break Jin and Bom up rather than bring them together--yes, I think it's supposed to be a twist when it's revealed that she's trying to bring them together.

Jin and Bom do make quite a nice couple when they are together, and I find the actors' acting quite ok. But somehow the set-up for the two characters to fall in love is terribly done (or should I say not done?). On the other hand, the set-up for the side couples, who get scant attention and development, is done pretty well. So it's not as though the production team is incapable of doing things properly. The ending also doesn't give a sense of a true closure, perhaps because the crisis is so badly done that we have an anti-climax instead of a climax in the story and one keeps thinking that there's more to come. Confession: I forgot that Episode 10 was the last episode and was stupidly waiting more more until I saw in MDL that this is a ten-episode series. I'm not a big fan of cliffhanger endings hinting at the potential for a Season 2, but even a cliffhanger ending would have been better than the way the series ended without a bit more development for the side couples.

The odd thing about this series is that there are many aspects of the production that show that the team involved in it is quite capable of making something pretty good. And yet, something managed to go wrong somewhere, resulting in a series that underperforms in critical areas like the portrayal of the main couple and the development of their story. The result: a series that managed to keep me watching and a series that managed to keep disappointing me rolled into one awkward combination.

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