The Eclipse (2022)

Enemies-to-lovers mystery school BL - what an interesting combination carried by a great pairing !

The story is pretty original for a school BL drama with some mystery vibes coupled with an enemies-to-lovers and opposites-attract tropes. It was quite predictable on some aspects and for some revelations, but I appreciated the drama taking the time to discuss important topics such as freedom of speech as well as critical mind regarding the authority's decisions. It could have taken things a bit deeper though it was still a valiant effort.

Despite the interesting scenario, there were some weaknesses in the plot in terms of logic as well as regarding the consequences of some actions being only partially addressed (or even totally brushed off...) with some too easy redemption narrative arc. That's why the resolution felt a bit lacking to me...But I still enjoyed the ending.

There was some brilliant chemistry between First and Khaotung. Their pairing is working very well and they share some memorable instants full of fragility together. They demonstrate great acting skills and really shine all along the series. Thanks to them, the intensity is very present, especially during their beautifully gut-wrenching crying scenes. Unfortunately, next to them, the secondary casting (for both adults and students parts) seem a bit weak. As invested as I was in our main couple, I could not bring myself to care that much for the secondary couple, and it is likely due to a mix of plot but also actors performances.

Production-wise, sometimes I felt the low budget, some of the scenes could have been better filmed to have more impact and I would have loved for the show to have a more scary / dark atmosphere, they could have pushed the concept of the curse further. The soundtrack was alright, I more specifically really enjoyed the opening track sang by Khaotung: un-skippable.

I would recommend this to people looking for a different kind of BL story set up in a school and coupled with a mystery. The writing is not without flaws and sometimes it can feel a bit cheap in terms of production, but the sizzling chemistry between the main actors and their great acting make it very easy to forgive those little defaults.

Lire davantage

Pretty good drama

I had been enjoying the series until episode 11. I had rated it a 9. It was very good until episode 11. I liked the chemistry between the actors. The main actors did a good job displaying the different emotions. It has been an enjoyable series until episode 11. Then I reduced my rating to an 8. With out spoiling anything I will just state: WHAT WERE THE WRITERS THINKING? There is a definite twist in the story. I don't think it was a good direction and it doesn't seem very believable. The story has building up in a certain direction and it lost momentum with episodes 11 and 12. I did like how they realistically tackled acceptance and being different. Without spoiling anything I will say that there was a scene in episode 12 that was really well done. You could really feel the emotion. The ending was good but parts of it seemed a little unrealistic. I did like the ending between Ayan and Akk. Overall the series was good. I would recommend watching it.

Lire davantage

I loved it so much, best thing ive watched so far!

this BL was amazing, usually i dont watch thrillers like this but i just couldnt help myself but love this series. at first i thought it was going to be like 2gether and have more bromance then romance but it didnt and i loved it. i love the way the characters were put together and i was so in love with the plot, my fav character was Ayan! omg i would rewatch this so many times and never get sick of it and the plot twist......LIKE PLS I SO SAD I FINISHED IT!! it made me want to watch anything that had khao and first in it haha! but i am really inlove with this bl, it made me cry and smile, laugh and get mad so i felt alot of feelings watching The Eclipse, i would tell everyone to watch it if you like romance and thriller cus if you dont you would be missing out. also i dont really like bl ost but i love over the moon alot!! :D

Lire davantage

communication, plot twists, interesting story

So I binge watched this show in like 2 days, honestly at first mostly for the actor First (Akk) but the story was really interesting so I kept wanting to watch it. I would say that for a bit Kan and Thua were my main reason to continue because sometimes akk's actions were annoying me (not a critique as I know it was important for the story to show how he acted at first)

MAJOR REASON FOR THE 9/10: episode 11, I absolutely loved the fact they went for different plot twists that werent over-used, they didnt go for the stupid breakup or for the jealousy trope, they went for some unexpected stuff and I loved it.

RANDOM STUFF: the calendar in Akk's room was always on september the 3rd for some reason and on the scene after Ayan gave Akk the necklace Ayan is the one wearing the necklace.

SOMETHINGS I DIDNT GET: why didnt the principal fire the 3 protesters if she was so bothered by them and they werent following the rules? Also, why did Ayan only get punished one time for not wearing proper uniform when he was never wearing it? Wouldnt they just punish him more ?

Lire davantage

Meh Story with Great Acting and a criminal "Outing" without consent

Just meh. tried very hard to find the story lurking somewhere behind the gaping huge plot holes the size of Australia, but sadly it remained elusive. All this mayhem over students choice to wear uniforms? It might have served the story better if the main conflict was over accepting homosexuality-- which I believe is still a huge red flag for schools in Asia; certainly the right to wear non-uniform clothes is just too unimportant for school authorities to fume and rave and go so far as to almost kill people?

However I could still forgive the lack of story, if they hadnt gotten away with a massively sensitive concept like "outing a person's sexual orientation without consent" Who on earth can excuse this? A child in the same situation as Akk might even be driven to suicide. Every basic alternative sexuality coda first principle is "Not to OUT without consent" . And yet a BL proceeds to do this. Someone has to be held accountable for such a criminal act, right? And this from a team which actually says in Episode 10-11- "BL is the soft power for Thailand" .

I guess the director writer was inspired by Dead Poets Society of Robin Williams-- they tried hard to bring the temperament --but by God, where is the story.... Dead Poets Society was an uplifting movie which brought in so many issues and how teachers can remodel students..... such a long way to go for Thai BLs to make anything even vaguely as meaningful as Peter Wier's film

Lire davantage

I took my time to really watched this series
Every bit of it was enjoyable.
First an Khao chemistry was on fire.
They acting was overall so addictive.
They fact that Akk knew what he was doing is wrong an kept on deceiving himself an they people around me was so sadden even for me,
Aye am the other hand really gave me the bad boy an good boy vibe at once for him being able to change Akk an make him trip for him without using force really got me going.
As for the teachers seriously was keeping the roles better than taking good care of the students an looking after them an stop having senseless meeting about stoping a course that does not exit from returning.

Lire davantage

It's worth watching

Little spoiler

It was good, but there was few stuff which i wanna talk there was good concept about protest also other stuff but i wanted them to get more depth into those stuff rather than swimming on surface of that topic, but it was nice especially the couple and verious scene, i really liked the boat scene where thay almost kissed, it was a beautiful shot, also there are various beautiful shot, and now the other thing i wanna talk is, i just didn't liked that thay wasn't able to convey and shoot better the story of his uncle love story, thay should have make it more connected to make audience feel the emotion of their story which we didn't feel because of badly presenting and less feel of emotions in the way thay shot also the story writing of his uncle love story could have been presented better, that stuff messed the story, other than that it was good i really liked the main couple, it did gave me good memories, acting was good also the ost's bgm

Lire davantage

OK, but NOT the genre I expected

Based on the summary I was excited for this series. I thought we were going to get a potentially supernaturally themed BL. I want more genre variation than comedy or drama. I was fine with another school setting if there was gonna be a fantastical element to the story. I was excited.

Without spoiling as to how or why, let me just say that the genre expectation was a bait-and-switch. It didn't end up being the genre I hoped it would be.

The only reason I knew about this show was because Khaotung (Aye) was starring in it. I really liked his performance in 2gether the series, as a side character, and I wanted to see if he had a lead role in a BL series. I was anticipating it so much that I waited until this show was done airing to watch it.

The story had a lot of potential, even with the genre bait-and-switch which disappointed me, but it ended up being merely average in the end.

Maybe I just shouldn't watch GMMTV productions, but I feel like there aren't enough romantic scenes to give the actors a chance to perform or get comfortable with each other as a couple. Compared to other Thai BL productions it feels like there is an unnatural avoidance of showing PDA between romantic couples onscreen. Unless this is an overall problem with maturity ratings in Thailand where GMMTV has to limit it to keep the PG13 rating for sponsorships?

I liked the actors. There just wasn't much they could do with what they were given.

Lire davantage

THIS DRAMA WAS SUPER GOOD

Thank god i didn't read the reviews here before planning on watching it. I saw rel on insta and planned to watch it. It was such a good series.

Seriously i was so so so bored of seeing same same story plot of every series. Just campus or school love story with no background.

It had real PLOT.
Mystery was there too.

It showed that the MC Ayan was not any stereotypical shy polite lover as we see normally and that was so refreshing.

The ML was president but there were many moment where he was soft unlike stereotypical strong personality of ML's.

All i want to say is if you are planning to not see due to reviews plz rethink.

Lire davantage

"you're allowed to be weak, at least with me." *cries forever*

I think most of the people who give less than positive reviews for this are focusing too much on the plot.

Which may sound silly or counterintuitive, but the plot is just not the selling point of this drama, and if you can put that aside, you'll enjoy it more. The plot is nothing really special - if you're looking for a crazy deep and mysterious storyline, you won't really find that. The "twists" they try to throw in late in the game seem totally unnecessary and don't really land. But if you focus on the characters - their interactions with each other, their chemistry (even in the friendships), the dialogue and emotion, this show is really enjoyable.

The chemistry between the two leads is insane. The unwavering eye contact. The gay panic in the first half.... *chef's kiss* There were several scenes I went back and watched several times because I was so enthralled by their interactions (the nightmare scene, the night beach house scene, the pool scene). I am really excited to watch more of First and Khao together in their next series, they are both incredibly talented and feed off one another beautifully.

One complaint I have regarding character development was that I wish they had done more with Akk struggling with his sexuality (on screen). They definitely touched on it but I think it could have been a bigger part of his story. As an LGBTQIA+ person, it is really refreshing to see that depicted as it is usually a huge part of our lives and finding ourselves as people. I liked that they went into it instead of the classic BL "Well I'm just gay now" but I felt like it could have been more fleshed out.

In a nutshell - watch it for Akk and Ayan alone, it's worth it! Going to watch the Our Skyy 2 specials now :)

Lire davantage

Nice Plot But...

Whew okay, First thing first, regardless of everything this is my personal opinion. It's always best to watch the show for yourself and not to judge it blindly because of a review. That being said without further ado......

1. FirstKhao
They are so cute!! and watching Safe House at the same time, this absolutely put the icing on the cake for me. They have made their way into my list of fav BL ships.
I lived for all of Akk and Ayan's cute moments. Like seriously the "narrowing the gap" scene had me rolling around in my bed.


2. Plot
I loved the potential the plot had but unfortunately, ep 11 really killed it. Like I was expecting some big climax with a plot twist or some lesson learned or something but nope nothing. I feel like they wanted to fit everything into 12 eps but cut too much out and then tried to make up for it with the "film project" at the end. It was kinda disappointing.

3. Rant
MF THUA!!! I'm not going to go too deep into my irritation at Thua for spoiler precautions but OMG!!
Also as much as I liked Akk and Thua(in the beginning) I find it hard to realistically believe that after everything they just got some measly punishment. Like come on they were basically young arsonists.

Overall
I really liked FirstKhao and honestly stayed because of my love for enemies-to-lovers romances, but I'd be a liar to sit here and type that this show deserves full stars. The beginning was nice I loved the mystery it showed and it really caught my attention and had me eagerly waiting every Friday for a new episode. Even though Thua ended up kicking me in the back I still loved to hate him at that moment.

P.S.- everyone go listen to the OST "Over the Moon" Khao sang it and it sounds so nice!!!

Lire davantage