I am acearo but I am now also desparately in love with Man. The amount of times I said "goddamn," in response to his mannerisms cannot be counted– he exudes attractiveness, and I normally only find people pretty at best. Chot is a perfect character, I wish Chot was in every scene, but I am biased here as well as I have been ferociously interested in Bruce since Lovely Writer. Up until episode 8 or 9 this was an almost perfect series to me and I intended my review to be a dissertation on how wrong it is that the rating is 7.1. Obviously, my rating now is now far below that, so let's get into it.

Pat is uniquely irritating. He cries at the drop of a hat, is never in the wrong despite always being the problem, and generally manages to make every issue excruciating to watch. I do not like the character. I actually did at first because he had a lot of pizazz and determination, but that kinda disappeared around the halfway mark.

The storyline gets more disjointed as the show progresses and, at some point, it feels distinctly like the writers forgot their own plotlines. The coworkers (Ying especially) are gossipy, mean, and basically bully Pat and then they all chat happily at badminton?? Jen tells Jaab he'll stay away from him and then....doesn't. Like at all. Not even for one scene. Jaab tells Jen they should stay friends but last we saw them, Jaab was still 300% cooked for Jen and we get no insight as to why he suddenly decided not to go for it. Actually, speaking of JaabJen, I've never been so disappointed by a formerly interesting couple. Up through the kiss, I was invested in them. Right after the party when Jaab for some reason decides to shoot himself in both feet, I had to force myself not to skip through their following scenes right through to the end. It was just so stupid, entirely unwarranted, and woefully under-explained.

The entirety of the Jeng's dad plotline was meh. Put was.....there? I was kind of indifferent to him (I love Up, so he was at least nice to see) and the story around him and Pat, especially after he's shown caring only about Pat, then taking him for granted the moment they get together, then caring only about Pat again once they're apart. He felt more like a plot device than a character. I really want to disparge Pat more right now, but we'd be here all day.

Jeng is perfect, I have nothing bad to say. except maybe he should leave Pat and the company and just vibe at his restaurant.

Tbh, I had a feeling that, to maintain my high rating, I should've just stopped at episode ten because we all know how ep. 11 goes, but I chose my path because Man is not in any other BLs and I do not like him enough to subject myself to any form of not-queer media. I enjoyed how much of the office we saw and the maturity (read: this is not the right word) of the characters (bar Pat and like, all the side character coworkers). It's rare to have older characters be the focus of a BL so I really appreciated it in this series— not being in high-school, college, or fresh out of school is really a blessing for this genre.

The music was okay at first but once the waterworks kicked off (so much fucking crying is2g) it got irritating hearing the sad piano all the damn time. The acting was ok to good. I can see why people might be underwhelmed with Man's acting, I thought he was good though, provided he wasnt trying to act sad. Pat was good provided he wasnt crying or being dramatic or speaking. Chot was perfection, as was Ae and her husband.

I will probably rewatch this, but really just for Bruce and Man, so make of that what you will. Maybe worth one watch if you stop at episode 10 before the bs. 3000% worth multiple watches if you drop it around episode 8. I actually like that the episodes were long, I didnt really get bored, but I always watch everything at at least 1.5x so.

I am once again trying not to hate on Pat but dear lord he is the entire reason this show went to shit. Like even the bullshit storyline between JaabJen has nothing on how annoying Pat's character was. I hate that he was babied throughout the show; everyone can hear mean or realistic things except Pat. But Pat is the one who needs the reality check the most. I had a lot of sympathy when he was being bullied at the office but the moment it stopped he became one of the most insufferable characters I've ever had the displeasure of watching, and I've watched some real garbage. Pat's character feels like the type of person to show up to a wedding in white and then cry when they're reprimanded. Just spoiled and self-centered. My rating was actually still a reluctant 7 until episode 12, at which point Pat wore through my already hair-thin tolerance and I dropped it. What a waste of good potential. Tbh, I'd give this a 9 if Jeng didn't take Pat back. Fuck Pat fr.

Thats about it. This started great and then shot its own feet until it was just mediocre.