Absolutely Captivating!

The casting is top notch both visually and acting talent wise with the leads Bright Vachirawit and Mai Davikah as Kimhan and Nubdao who instantly captures attention both individually and as a pair with excellent chemistry along with a very strong supporting cast as well. I really enjoy how both characters have their own goals, struggles, and growth that the show begins exploring from the get go and how their paths align. The pacing is really good and always leaves me looking forward to the next episode. The ost perfectly accompanies the mood of the scene in every iteration of it's arrangement. Overall, Astrophile is a must watch!

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Character study on control, companionship, and closure

A story about broken people who find healing through an unorthodox situation done well. Despite In Ji's cold seeming exterior, she's actually deeply empathetic and caring. Jeong Won is a similar type of person on the inside as well, but he's been hurting for so long with his abusive family situation, both from his father and his ex-wife, that the contract marriage is what showed him what peace is like with a person that doesn't want to hurt him. It's wonderful seeing them gaining the strength to be a catalyst of positive change for the other person as they grew closer. Seo Yeon also holds her own pain that causes her psychologically manipulate and hurt Jeong Won to punish him. She is able to move on as well through her own journey with her contract marriage partner. The unhinged stalker is sadly realistic in his unrelenting harassment and escalating violence. Regardless of legal intervention, there is no enforcement that protects his victims against him. Jeong Won inviting him into the house where In Ji now lives and to sit down with them, was the most clueless man thing that he could do. Even well meaning men don't understand the severity of the danger for women. Ji Oh didn't get as much development as the other three characters, but he too was suffering from guilt from not stepping in when his colleague was murdered by stalker guy. He clearly didn't have any assassin skills, his boss did him dirty to ask him to be the one to do it. I like that both In Ji and Jeong Won moved on from the houses that was the husks with painful memories and lived their own lives for a good while before reuniting.

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Run away from this drama

The story is promising until it becomes unbearable, beginning with some interesting facets, highlighting issues of the wheelchair bound people, parasocial fan culture, mental health struggles, time travel and the rules of this particular version. Once Sol and Seon Jae meet, there is no chemistry though the engaging mystery of the lead figuring out her situation and how it works kept the pace going, but soon there is clearly not enough plot to to sustain 9 episodes, let alone 16 episodes of hour+ runtime because it just relies on tropes to pad out the runtime with all of the interesting set up just abruptly ending, unexplored and unaddressed. What the drama became was like the writer is actually desperate to write a comedy and is also really bad at it. There are so many shouty scenes of endless misunderstood moments, withholding information and intentions, stupid testosterone contests, side characters bickering that go on forever.

The acting of the leads aren't good enough to elevate anything either. The second lead Tae Sung is comparatively better than the rest and the character is the only one that has growth and change throughout the story which helps to make his quirky scenes that don't involve the inane one upmanship with Seon Jae, actually funny. Sol has always acted immature even as a 34 year old adult and her entire focus just revolves around Seon Jae when she goes back in time. She doesn't get to have an substantial moments to develop her bond with other people like her family who were also facing some serious problems like her mom's health, her grandma's eventual mental decline, or even her friend and future sister in law. Everyone is just a comedy bit. Even Tae Sung with his father when he rushes to the hospital after his dad was nearly killed by the escaped serial killer, the show just leaves it at a comedy bit. Seon Jae is actually even more immature as a 34 year old in all iterations of his life and also doesn't have a single serious moment with his father. The leads have no dimension in addition to no chemistry, so their relationship has no weight. Truck sama wiping out the serial killer is the ultimate lazy conclusion. They should have had Sol behind the wheel at least. The show hates depth and characterization. The sky high mdl rating as of this writing confounds me, there are dramas that are way better that don't have anywhere as near high ratings.

I do not recommend this drama. If you want a well done time travel back to high school plot to save a guy, watch Love for Love's Sake.

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There's better options to watch

The characters turned more distant than when they were friends which made even less sense with the second time jump having been together for two years. Not kissing, not even once is unsatisfactory regardless of queer or straight pairing of two grown consenting adult characters in a romance story. The actors should not have been cast if they weren't comfortable with playing a queer romance and the show shouldn't have been made if the production itself wasn't commited to fully portraying a gay love. Very disappointing since they seemed to be heading in a strong direction only to derail themselves completely at the end. I would not recommend, especially when there are plenty of other productions that do better.

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Goes nowhere with it's set up except to romanticize toxic relationships

The writers don't ever bother developing the parts that need to go between A and B, they just suddenly change things with zero development to earn them and even those moments are rare because they just keep the troubling status quo throughout the whole series. They never deal with the ramifications of the protagonists being groomed by their families, where Kuea is so controlled that he partitioned his self from neurotic man child when he's with Hia Lian and their family to being a relaxed functioning adult with interests when he's away from them. Hia Lian who has been conditioned to dedicate his life to the child of this rich family since he himself was a child, is emotionally abusive, controlling, manipulative, and he can't deal with Kuea having his own agency when actually confronted with that side of him which is something that should have been something the characters had dealt with, to see Kuea reconciling the two sides of himself and changing up their dynamic earlier in the series to bring them to heal individually and develop a healthier relationship, but this is never addressed either. The second couple is a mirror to this suffocating dynamic where the younger men are kept both dependent and in fear of their older partners. The only breath of fresh air is Syn and Nuea who develops their relationship organically through bits of screen time here and there. The show has a nice budget, decent music, a mix of actors of varying capabilities, and characters that could have been interestingly complex, but aside from couple three, there is no potential the show doesn't squander or fizzle to nowhere.

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The warmer side of tepid

I was more partial to the main couple, but this is still a nice companion piece to the series it span off from, especially for people who wanted to see more of the second couple. It takes some some time and a lot of suspension of disbelief to see the actors as high school characters, but the characterization of the relationship is well drawn. Since this is a direct prequel there was only going to be one kind of ending, unless it was going to show parts from the series. If there was something that could have been shown a bit more is Dong Hee's relationship with the aunt which is a major reason he took himself out of the equation for as long as he did at the end. I really like the build up to the kiss with Ho Tae refusing to call Dong Hee hyung and how Dong Hee has offered to teach Ho Tae what ever he wanted, which leads to Ho Tae asking Dong Hee to teach him how to kiss leading to Dong Hee thinking caveating the teaching lesson with Ho Tae calling him hyung would stop him, but it only doubles down the tension when Ho Tae asks his hyung to teach him to kiss. Kudos to the writing.

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"Happy" Ending

I do like that you could see that it's a mutual crush from both main characters from the beginning though it's not clear to the characters themselves. Then there is the ending, which is the more messed up the more I think about it. It's really unsatisfactory to see that the happiness of the gay character is left to interpretation. It's such an outdated copout and it's open ended in that it's open to the tragic interpretation that Hyun is only reimagining what he should have done that night after walking away from Dong Ho.

I think it's nice that the Strongberry CEO addressed a few important things to know for the context of this production.

1. Strongberry is the distributer of this series, they didn't make it.
2. The CEO asked why the director didn't end with a kiss in the bookstore for a satisfactory feeling ending, The director regretfully said, "I should have filmed that". The actor was even actually the one who showed up to open the door at the end, but was just never shown.

I'm so happy that the Strongberry CEO spoke my thoughts, because I do think the shortfilm/series was nice up until the end. Filmmakers need to remember they can and should SHOW instead of just tell or imply that these queer characters do have a happy ending. I feel it's so especially important to see that depicted if that is the intent.

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Enjoyable Fantasy

Gong Jun is captivating and effervescent as the spritely yet fierce DongFang YueChu. I really like how though YueChu's kind and easygoing, he is ruthless against those who has done truly unforgivable wrongs. Yang Mi's HongHong is taking a lot of flack, but HongHong is peak introvert representation. It's certainly weird that male versions of this personality type are beloved and have every minutia of their movements and dialogue analyzed and understood, but when it's a woman, suddenly that ability goes out the window. It's lovely how extrovert YueChu creates moments and opportunity for HongHong's personality quirks outside of her heavy responsibility protecting and running Tushan and it's great the drama lets the humor play out without either character dipping into childishness. It's so refreshing to see a drama actually use screen time to let the relationship of the main couple develop and strengthen organically and have the issues they are helping with also both parallel and explore their dynamics as well. I like the world building and the themes of different and evolving relationship dynamics, both of interpersonal/inter-species relationships and political conflicts. I'm always excited to see the next episode, can't wait till the new ones!

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Try hard-chy

The early episodes of this drama is so busy trying to give an impression that it will be edgy like the western teen soaps that it seeks to ape that it forgets to set up characterization for any of the main characters moving into the story. It soon falls into the usual school drama cliches, just with a bigger budget and the lightest possible sanitized take on whichever taboo subject it's using for shock value. None of the cast have the acting ability to carry any kind of nuanced angst or charisma needed for any of these kids. The show is so wishy washy to fully condemn the bad behavior of the rich chaebol bully main character and there is also no bite to Kang Ha's plan for revenge for In Han. Putting aside he somehow easily got the probably highly sought after empty scholarship slot left by his murdered brother, he has no genius plan at all. He just lucked out finding Ju Won has all the illegally recorded videos and even after everything is turned over to the police, there is no cathartic change or justice aside from low pawns on the totem pole like the principal getting fired and the pedophile getting rightfully arrested for murder. Woo Jin is the minor being abused, but he's also definitely an accomplice to hiding the murder. It's also sickening the show keeps presenting the rich kids with wholesome friendship moments like typical kdrama leads and are so wrapped up in feeling bad for them that Kang Ha, the reminder of them being horrible classist bullies pretty much disappears for a lot of the episodes, so the show could pretend they are a whole different drama other than the one where these are the bad guys that they set up. Jae Yi and Ri An confirm their love for each other, but it doesn't evoke any strong feelings or romance, neither does Jae Yi confirming to Kang Ha that she did have a little bit of feelings for him. Aside from feeling horrified for Jae Yi being threatened by multiple people with both her illegally filmed by her brother sex tape (that's CP as well) and miscarriage, I don't feel bad for the rest of the chaebol bully crew at all, there is no dimension to their stories. This show is unable to form complicated characters, doesn't have any great acting to elevate it, and it's generally boring. The post credit scene of the last ep shows Kang Ha taunting Ri An after the latter comes upon a bloodied student. I can't even tell who that is supposed to be and why it means anything except for the show using supposedly shocking imagery but not delivering anything in the storytelling.

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Mostly middling

Much of the beginning episodes felt really rushed in post production with very messy editing, an issue that wasn't rectified until the final few episodes of the show. The main plot and the plot of the episode also didn't tie in with each other well enough to develop the main characters as individuals and their relationships with each other.

The creepy episode 3 and and heartbreaking romeo romeo episode 11 were standouts as stand alone stories, while the latter was also the rare ep that also gave more development to the main character, all the way at the end of the show. The queer love of friends who want to be more is also the foil to the aggressively platonic bromance of Khatha and Dome, which is certainly a choice.

The concept and casting of the show was really enticing, but alas the execution didn't meet the potential of what it could have been.

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La Meh

It's not a good sign when the best acting and storyline comes just from the parent characters when the majority of it is about the main characters. Neither of the main couples where very interesting despite the supernatural conceit of a mystical rain powered connection.

I find the psychic hearing/loss portrayed interesting in that there is more choice in it than the characters realize. It's appears to be a strong connection of some kind between two people that doesn't require mutual love and can be broken unilaterally as well. The maturity of the parents was amazing, from their break up to supporting the mom's new path in life.

From the focus on showing how psychic rain hearing doesn't mean a magic unbreakable love bond and can be platonic soul mates, it's so nonsensical to push the main characters Tai and Patts back together. Their only connections are the psychic rain hearing, that they are both man children, and the doctor being the biggest one between the two. It would have been better if they just broke up permanently and Tai learns to be a stronger person on his own than to get back with a emotionally volatile and physically violent guy who has a ton of issues of his own to work through.

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Romanticized abuser

This drama is like the fictionalized simulator of witnessing someone in an abusive relationship and being unable to help them. The abused person experiences all the abuse and will keep going back even with intervention from loved ones like friends and family.

Joe is used, kidnapped, tied up, and struck with a bat, gets his career destroyed which lead to his death. When he gets a miracle second chance, he goes right back to the same conditions that led to his initial death, working for a scumbag actor and worse selling his body and time to the abusive ex that ruined his life rather than borrow money from a friend he knows is generally a good person and wouldn't take advantage of him.

Ming has been a selfish, unhinged, obsessive, abusive person from the start. All his actions are his own, regardless of Tong manipulating his feelings. He just realigns his obsession from Tong to Joe, he's the same person that would hurt others to satisfy his own obsession. He threatens and manipulates the second Joe into sexual slavery. It's so horrific watching him love bomb Joe and Joe going back to him. Ming has done nothing substantial to show growth or change, just selfishly getting his way. Part of it is the bad writing/directing and another part of it is also the actor can't show any further nuance to Ming. Abusers can truly love the people they abuse and vice versa, but it doesn't change dangerous toxicity of the situation and certainly doesn't redeem the abuser in anyway. The resolution of the show is ultimately unsatisfying and empty.

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Bland and lacks both flavor and filling

Even the writers felt Lukchup and Ramin don't have the energy to sustain the full 14 episodes as they focused way too much on the over the top bully and her psychological and physical torment on Lukchup, evoking the dated drama trope where the lead is a helpless doormat until the end. While it's nice his family, friends, and boyfriend rally to help him, he never steps up to help them help him in any significant way. They should have developed Sky and Paitong as the secondary story, they're a fiery, mature contrast to Lukchup and Ramin's slowburn relationship instead of suddenly throwing them in the final episode. The acting was so-so, the music was okay, and watching this drama once is more than enough.

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The leads got shortchanged

Shin Min Ah absolutely shines as Son Hae Yeong who in the hands of another actor would probably be a very misunderstood character. I love her range from being organically cute without any over acting like in the scene she's munching away on the kimbap with her chair pushed back out view in the car and does her little moo to breaking my heart when she confronts the pain that her parents caused her. Genuine foster parents are very important, but I agree with the advice for people considering fostering that if their biological children can't handle it well then fostering is not a good fit for their household. Hae Yeong was just a child who still needed to be cared for and they put their own needs to be saints above their daughter. It also hurt her every time someone who became family would leave her. All she wanted was a stable homelife and to be loved in return, she doesn't even hate the foster kids. She fiercely loves the sisters that came back and stayed. Sadly the show also put the happiness of all the side characters above Hae Yeong.

I loath all the side pairings which also has the worst characters Gyu Hyun and U Jae, both of whom are scumbags who abused Hae Yeong in a professional setting with Gyu Hyun the creep who both spammed Ja Yeon with hate comments as well as making his secretary do it then demoting Hae Yeong out of spite because she's married to his father's extramarital child and U Jae who dumped her to marry up, creepily stalked her after he's married, and stole her work and keeps failing upward. It's so much worse that the show chickens out and makes it that Gyu Hyun did not write the worst hate comment, they don't even let his character growth count for anything. He also never rectified what he did to Hae Yeong. He should have given her all the money she wanted for her start-up as compensation. The lip service to the polyamory storyline ends in the most heteronormative way with Hee Sung marrying the one guy and having the child instead of getting an abortion and being the independent person she wanted to be.

I did enjoy Hae Yeong and Ji Uk's romance. He knew who she was, but truly got to know here as they gradually built up their rapport through their interactions at the mini-mart and supporting her schemes. I also like how their first meeting made sense because it's her house that he was staying at and was trying to walk by to avoid her while she was contemplating smoking for the first time and he just so happened to have a lighter which foreshadowed their future as co-schemers turned lovers. He actually looked better with his longer hair, it frames his face very nicely. Ji Uk's story was also swallowed up by the annoying side characters. I would rather see his friendship and brotherly/fatherly relationship develop with that guy that was formerly the Bok family secretary and settle his angst with his birthmother. Hae Yeong and Ji Uk deserved their fantasy ending being happy in love, snuggling with their cat Baby and her with a successful business venture instead of ending on a kiss after reuniting post a long separation.

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