Duen Pradab Dao (2017)

Wish to see Preem paired with generation older Chakrit, or with the hairy Bomb? You'll get both.

I like Preem Ranida. She started being nang'ek very young, yet she never felt immature teenager onscreen. So seeing this lakorn got her a double role, I knew she can pull it off. It's her partners I was worried about.

Chakrit Yamnarm is IMMENSELY cute. If not for that, he couldn't have remained pra'ek till almost middle-aged. Still, to watch him courting a college-student looking girl, or calling the fellow actress "mother" (yeah, I guess she had him at age 9) IS kinda weird. The characters were supposed to be playing around as kids. We are shown their past being a little girl, and a boy that's way taller. But I'd think to play together, the boy could be like 6 years older... Not 18 years older. As for "Bomb" Tanin, he's kinda awkward, as always.

What is also awkward is the (unnecessary) thing that one of the twins lived abroad. Preem Ranida can speak decent enough english, but I got extremely irritated when she and the character of her abroad friend started speaking thai replacing solely the thai word for "I" (or "you") with the english one, always literally saying "you" among the other thai words in the thai sentence. It's not how an expat would talk, it's how a moron would talk.

I usually don't enjoy twin romances. But I gotta admit this one started out nice. The opening credits feature Preem Ranida interacting with her own self really graceful, supported by the title song, too. It's soft, not shrill or fervid as lakorns usually use. For the feelings to develop, the scriptwriters usually do the jealousy arch. Like, to watch the person we don't fully realize we like, dance with someone else. Suddenly the jealousy pangs, and bang. Classic scene. Here, this scene has something more. The heroine can watch the guy dance with someone else... whom he thinks HER. She can now see only what the others can see (like the others who'd tell you "oh, you didn't notice that he likes you?"), she can watch him and see how he is taken with her, how he looks at her... Bang!:) Then of course, as we have 2 couples featuring 4 people, it gets soon interrupted, as the show is kinda crowded.

But being crowded doesn't put this show down! It resolves in the two pra'eks having full dance battle right there on the spot, surrounded by plentiful crew:-) There goes my deviant love for bollywood movies getting rocks off, LMAO. Chakrit rocks:-) So cute and funny... No, this show is something else. I can now forgive it being totally age-surreal, and whatever flaws. I thought: If it's going to be fun like this, I'm gonna love it unreservedly:-)

I knew nothing will probably be able to beat the bollywood moment, but from then onwards I continued watching without any more complaints. I hope it's not considered a spoiler if I mention the twins sometimes did switch. For the one sister to be able to go away on a "holiday", the other had to act as her "stand-in":) It was interesting to watch how well - despite being, and staying, completely different person - she was able to do that, how she connected with everyone. Especially the scenes of her with the mother were a treat. While the other twin had her own romance line with the workaholic pra'ek Chakrit portrayed. I liked how well this was delivered, too. It seemed the direction of this lakorn was quite good so I looked at MDL, and found out director is actually very beautiful woman (nang'ek:). I thought: Well, she can be proud of this.

But! It was all enjoyable only till the two girls stayed friends. I appreciated how smoothly it went when they first met, they decided to do DNA test to learn whether they found a sister or "just" a friend, but they WERE cool about it. Then their behavior changed and the whole show changed. Regrettably, it all takes another twist. Situation arises such the truth SHOULD get revealed. I did not understand why the other twin kept pretending THIS time. It's no longer joy to watch the good interaction with the parent she DIDN'T grow up with, now she's doing something unforgivable (and for no reason whatsoever). NOTHING makes sense any longer. Either the writer should get smacked, or I am disappointed in ALL the characters. It's not even a twins story anymore. At any rate, I don't like the course it all has taken. I thought: Shall we have another bollywood moment? Because only THAT could cheer me up now... In short, exactly at the half of the series, EVERYTHING I PREVIOUSLY PRAISED HAD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN.

The remaining episodes, I wished for one of the girls to stop acting like a TOTAL moron and tell the truth to the mother/Kanlong IMMEDIATELLY (as for Warat, he knew there were 2 of them, he should know by himself) which would be the only thing that would redeem the character, even if probably not the show. That really took a bad turn.

There was one more dance scene, this time just a simple couple dance, which I LOVED, it was exquisite, both Chakrit & Preem's dancing and FACIAL EXPRESSIONS during the dance... The sadder I was dance scenes are so rare in lakorns and we have it in this dumb and dysfunctional one... with not even really a couple... Such a waste.

From then on, it dragged even more unsufferably (even having 10 episodes only, it felt VERY long). I have watched many lakorns featuring rapes, steals, murders. Yet I have never felt so bothered by the story's morality as watching this one, LOL. Just what the writers were thinking was beyond me. Absolutely nothing made sense. It all felt so bizarre. It should really not be difficult to shoot something decent with the cast (Um Apasiri should deserve special praise). Basically any stupid thousand-times seen story would be better and SMARTER than this:)

Sorry about my rating, I'm not usually this harsh but this is really WEIRD piece of work and I can't even count it as a proper lakorn.

Read More