Fish Upon the Sky (2021)

Rough around the edges, but super fun!

I had little to no expectations going into Fish Upon the Sky, as I found the trailer and concept pretty underwhelming and cliche. On top of that, it began airing a week after Tale of a Thousand Stars, which I absolutely loved, so the bar was set pretty high in my mind at that point. Now, after having completed the series, I can say with complete certainty that, although it does not surpass TOTS in the slightest, Fish Upon the Sky is one of GMMTV's stronger series over the past few years.

I'd first like to go over what I loved about this series and then what I didn't love as much:

To start, and I'd say this is the main selling point that sets it apart from it's predecessors, Fish Upon the Sky is absolutely one of, if not, THE funniest GMMTV series I've seen. I find a lot of the delivery comedy wise in GMMTV series to be a little cringy and sometimes hard to find funny, but this series does not have that problem in the slightest. Although Pi and Mork have some really funny scenes, especially towards the beginning, the humor really shines in the "Story of a fifth-year student" scenes with Meen and Duen. Both of them have really perfect comedic timing, and the ridiculousness of their scenes are so fun to watch!

That actually leads me to my next point, which is that the side couple is so charming! I often find myself skipping side couple scenes in a lot of GMMTV series such as MilPhukong in 2gether (I'm sorry FrankDrake!!) which is, similarly to FUTS, based on a Jittirain novel. However, in FUTS, the side couple is so incredibly likable and fun to watch! Both Neo and Louis give really fun performances and have great chemistry both comedically and romantically. To be honest, and I'll touch on this later, I actually would sometimes find myself skipping scenes with the main couple just so I could get to their scenes! Their dynamic is just so refreshing and cute! Towards the beginning of the series, they reminded me a lot of PickRome from Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey, but as the series went on, they proved to be a lot less toxic and a lot more lighthearted, which I absolutely loved. I believe Louis is a new face at GMM, and I absolutely hope that he has more roles in the future because he's packing so much talent (he can sing, dance, act, he's funny, and he's just so freaking adorable!! PLEASE I"M BEGGING YOU GIVE HIM MORE ATTENTION!!!)

I think the last stand out thing I really enjoyed about this series was Phuwin's role as Pi. I think Pi was a super unique BL protagonist. His struggles were super relatable, and his snarky attitude was really fun. I also liked that he wasn't afraid to stand up for himself when he was being harassed online Phuwin really really surprised me in this role, as I was only familiar with him from The Gifted Graduation, where I found his acting a little overdone and uncomfortable at times, but here, he felt super natural and authentic, like you could know him in real life! I know he's around my age, so it's super impressive to me that he's able to do so well as he did, and I hope to see him in more roles in the future!

Alright now onto the stuff I didn't particularly enjoy:

This is definitely an unpopular opinion, but I really did not enjoy Mork for the majority of the series. I think a lot of fans were really charmed by his looks (Don't get me wrong, I was too, Pond is VERY pretty), but I think because of that, they overlooked a lot of the glaring flaws in his character. For one, he was super pushy with Pi. He kept insisting and insisting and insisting that Pi really liked him, and ignored when Pi asked him to leave him alone. Moreover, him egging on the MorkPi fanpage shippers was really not cool, especially after Pi made it VERY clear he was uncomfortable with it. I just found a lot his behavior to be reminiscent of the toxic archetypes commonly used in BL, and that just did not vibe with me, I'm sorry. I think he did have his good moments, for instance, the confession scene in episode 9, but overall, he was just way too aggressive and forward with Pi for my comfort levels. On top of that, and I really hate to say it because he seems like such a sweetheart, but I don't think Pond's acting skills were developed enough for this big of a role just yet. As far as I know, this is his second role ever after The Gifted Graduation, where he wasn't even in the actual show, but a narrative ad that played after the last few episodes, and it really shows. A lot of his line delivery fell flat to me, and his more emotional scenes didn't hit me at all like Phuwin's did. I think he has a lot of potential, and I'll definitely follow his work moving forward, but I don't think he was ready for this performance.

Another thing I didn't love was the story. Like I said, before going into FOTS, I set my expectations low because the plot was so cliche, and although I was impressed and surprised by other aspects of the show, which I touched on earlier, the plot was absolutely everything I expected, and not in a good way. The whole "ugly duckling" storyline is super played out, and paired with the original enemies to lovers dynamic MorkPi originally has, it just feels like nothing new or interesting. What's worse, in the Pi is perfectly good looking even before his whole "transformation"!! I feel like "My Dear Loser: Edge of 17" is a prime example of a well told ugly duckling story because you see the transition in both looks and personality, and how those affect the protagonist, whereas FOTS doesn't fully commit to this storyline, so it falls flat and feels unnecessary.

This is kind of similar to my last point, but this series is really hypocritical in its message, as it tries to both denounce a lot of common BL tropes while feeding into those same tropes at the same time! The whole storyline with the MorkPi shippers is a great example. Pi stands up to the shippers and defends his privacy, telling them how serious what they're doing actually is, which is fantastic, but right after, the show goes back to making the shippers seem goofy and lighthearted when, just as Pi said, what they're doing is really not a joke. The female characters, which in this show are far and few between, are either annoying, or used as a plot device to get one of the two couples closer together, which plays into the incredibly damaging BL trope of demonizing women. Bam was a really great character because she genuinely wanted Pi and Mork to get together, and then in the end out of no where, with literally ZERO foreshadowing, she sabotages them because she's apparently been secretly in love with Mork the whole time? Like wtf? There was no reason to do that with a perfectly good character just for the sake of causing drama in the last episode, especially when it was all resolved so quickly.

Finally, and this is SUPER nitpick-y, but the music in this show is so bad?? I'm not talking about the opening and ending songs which are both really beautiful and catchy, I'm talking abut the random English songs they use constantly that are laughably horrible and really distracting throughout. I know that's like not important at all, but I haven't seen anyone mentioning it so I just wanted to point it out lol.

Overall, although it's littered with overused tropes and sometimes uncomfortable acting, Fish Upon the Sky is a really fun series that deserves a lot of the love it's getting. I can't wait to see what these actors do next!

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