Tin Tem Jai (2023)

Who needs a plot?

There seems to be a spate of plotless Thai BL dramas. There's really not much to say about this series - the author apparently couldn't think of anything to write so she just used whatever she did that day. Everything that happens in this is mundane day-to-day activity - largely eating snacks and bubble tea.

There is zero romantic chemistry between the leads - it's not clear what their age difference is, because they're both children at the same time, but later Park is a doctor, so that would put him in his late 20s, while Tin is either in high school or maybe college - it's hard to tell because he never seems to go to class. I was surprised to hear he goes to school when it was mentioned in the finale. Tin behaves like a small child almost all the time, so there is something kind of creepy about their relationship, only saved by the fact that the actors are similar in age.

Since there's no plot, there's no dramatic tension - and it looks like the writer realized she'd reached the conclusion without any drama, so she threw in a long series of fights over absolutely nothing between Park and Tin - which likely cemented the feeling the audience had that they really shoudn't be together. Except as parent and child, maybe.

There are lots of side characters, but they're all pointless and their stories never go anywhere.

I didn't think it was possible to have less of the story than Physical Therapy, but apparently it is. I rated this a 3 because while it's a total waste of time, it's not aggressively awful.

I'd skip it.

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Plots Are So Last Year

I'm going to preface this by saying that I very, very rarely drop dramas. I may put them on hold, but I generally will eventually finish them. I was sorely tempted to drop this drama after the first episode. The only reason I completed it is because it was only 10 episodes. Any longer than that and I wouldn't have continued. I kept hoping that things would get better, that a plot would emerge, the characters would get better, the sometimes confusing editing would improve, but it never did. It was just a giant ball of disappointment from beginning to end.

First of all, there's no plot here. I'm not even kidding, it is literally non-existent. It's like they threw a bunch of ideas into a bowl, blended it and popped it in the oven expecting something good to emerge. Suffice to say, that plan failed epically. I think they may have been going for a slice of life drama, but it's so poorly done that it's impossible to tell. It felt like a lot of the plot, miniscule as it was, revolved around bubble tea, orange juice, and snacks. There were far, far too many characters. I'm used to Thai BLs having a bloated cast, but this one really took the cake. I couldn't even begin to keep track of half the characters and some would pop in and out and it would be like, who are you and why should I care? Inconsistencies run rife throughout the whole of the drama. They just add to the general confusion and make the non-existent plot even more obvious.

The romantic aspects were by and large a joke. Two of Tin's friends would randomly pop up on dates throughout the drama which was weird and nonsensical. They weren't featured enough for me to have an opinion about them or care about their relationship. I just found them annoying. And Tin and Park didn't make much more sense. Tin spends half the drama pining after Park with Park pushing him away and insisting they're just brothers and then it's like a switch gets flipped and suddenly he's declaring his love and becoming all lovey dovey. I got whiplash with that one cause there was basically no build up. Yes, it was obvious that he was jealous of Tin spending time with Phloen, but that was it. And then, because the writer apparently decided the last episode or so needed to finish with a bang, we have multiple spats between Tin and Park that were stupid and added nothing. I didn't even know what they were fighting about half the time. The only couple, if you can really call them that, that I liked was Pao and Khana. They get very little screen time, but they had chemistry and felt like they worked well together. Unfortunately, we get a single make out scene between them and that's really it. It's implied that they're in a relationship, but not really confirmed and they don't really act like they're in a relationship, at least not overtly. There are some subtle clues, but I would have liked something more obvious, more of them spending time together one on one getting to know each other and clearer signs that they were together.

As far as the characters go, they were a bit of a mixed bag.
-Tin was the most annoying character ever. It was like a whiny toddler was placed in a college age man's body. Seriously, 90% of what he did was whine and complain. And that's what he acts like for the entirety of the drama. He doesn't really mature or develop, it's just ten episodes of this man child constantly proclaiming his love for Park and pouting when Park doesn't act the way he wants him to. And the sad thing is, I could have liked him. He had moments where he was very sweet and compassionate towards others, moments of vulnerability, where I could see the potential the character had, but then he opened his mouth and that went right out the window.
-As for Park, what on earth did he even see in him? He talks about how cute he is, but I've rarely seen anyone less cute. I really did not get a good impression of why he fell in love with Tin or even why Tin fell in love with him, though the fact that he's clearly smart, handsome, and charming when he wants to be certainly helps. Also, the age gap between them was confusing. Flashbacks made it seem like they were fairly close in age, they were both wearing the same high school or middle school uniforms, but then you have Tin who seems to be a freshman in college and Park is already a full certified nurse. It doesn't add up.
-Barbie was a hit or miss for me. Sometimes I really liked her, other times I found her to be a bit annoying/boring. For the most part though, I liked her determination to forge her own path in the world and the way she was there for her friends.
-I really liked Pai. I know she wasn't in there much, but I enjoyed the scenes she was in. She was a straight forward, no nonsense kind of character, but she had moments of vulnerability that just made me want to give her a hug. The scene where she talks about how she came back for her brother and she was willing to sacrifice her freedom for him was a powerful one. I thought it was so sad that her parent's didn't realize what a gem of a daughter they had.
-I also liked Pao and Khana. They were such a study in opposites which I think is part of why I liked their relationship, minimal as it was. Pao, the golden child that everyone loves and compares others to, who has so perfected that façade, even his friends aren't aware of it. Everyone thinks he has such a great life and he has his life together, while under the surface he's depressed, he's struggling to the point that he turns to drugs. And then there's Khana, an apparently former drug addict, who's turned over a new leaf and is striving to become a better person. My heart went out to both of them and the struggles they faced and, again, I would have really liked for them to have more screen time learning about each other and helping each other grow.
-The other characters really didn't leave much of an impression. Phloen was cute but forgettable and Tin's friends were by and large annoying.

The acting was pretty subpar all around. Tiger, besides playing such an obnoxious character, was boring to watch which didn't help matters. There was no nuance to his acting, it all just felt very, very repetitive. He needed to massively tone down his character but it seems over the top is what he went for. Run wasn't much better. I've seen him in other dramas and liked him. He's the main reason I even watched this drama actually. But he was also pretty boring to watch with many of the same facial expressions appearing again and again and very little emotion a lot of the time. You can play a quieter character without being boring but he apparently didn't get that memo. The chemistry between the two was non-existent. Their kissing scenes were just awkward to watch. They didn't seem fully comfortable with each other and that definitely translated to the screen. The rest of the cast wasn't quite as glaringly bad, but no one really stood out to me. I will give credit though to Lee and Tong because they actually did have chemistry. Again, I wanted more of them!

The production value was pretty meh. There was a number of awkwardly cut scenes where there was just no transition, it would abruptly jump from one scene to a completely different one with no reference as to what's going on. It made following the story at times much harder than it needed to be. The music was another forgettable aspect. I honestly don't remember anything about it.

This drama is just bad all around. It's simply not worth the time or energy to watch it. This isn't one of those dramas that's so bad it's good, or is at least moderately entertaining. You gain nothing from watching it other than a desperate desire for it to end. Seriously, don't bother with this one.

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poorly done slice of life

Overall: I would advise starting it at ep 5 34 minutes and you'll avoid a whole bunch of random child characters. This is from the same production company that made: Ai Long Nhai, Coffee Melody, With Love and Second Chance. 10 episodes about 40 minutes long aired on GagaOOLala and iQIYI.

Content Warnings: past death/grief, blood, bullying, hit/kick/punch, transphobia mentioned, intimate partner violence, drug addiction

What I Liked
- Khana and Pao (who had almost no screen time)
- how Barbie called out those bullies in ep 1
- good discussion of how if you are queer you are held to a higher perfection standard, you have to represent all queer people and can't make mistakes/learn like non-queer people*
- supportive friends
- Tin told his mom off

Room For Improvement
- boring, nothing really happened, scenes dragged on for too long they felt randomly thrown together at times
- Tin is maybe supposed to be in university but acts like he's in middle school, comes across as whiny and immature and he didn't know what a boner was???
- too many characters including children, lack of development with main characters specifically Kana and Pao
- *the trope of a hypersexual trans woman
- not into the Park/Tin dynamic, the cold/angry/reluctant guy hitting the peppy/persistent/harassing character, in ep 2 also Park randomly was flirty at one point which was an odd shift, Park later had a personality transplant in the second half of the series and was super flirty which was better
- comedy sound effects didn't make things funny, I didn't laugh once
- ep 1 started with a voice over/exposition dump
- why doesn't anyone called an ambulance, they just stand around shouting and that cpr technique was terrible

Question - what does Tin Tem Jai mean,? Tin is a character's name, internet searching says 'tem' is 'to do' or 'to make' and 'jai' is 'heart'.

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Simple, Stupid, Seriously???

What the heck? Don't expect Any:

Drama
Excitement
Passion

or anything that makes any kind of sense. Not really a bl. Absolutely no chemistry. There is really no story line, I just don't understand how they make these shows and expect them to have high ratings. Honestly, I like a good bl, but there are so many truly bad and so many mediocre ones that I am almost ready to give up.

If you are like me, you watch every bl, hoping it will be better than the last one, the last two - this one and All The Liquors are both equally bad, boring, simple and no chemistry between the actors.

So disappointed. I think I could write a better script. Where do I sign up?

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Immature and Silly With No Plot

Honestly, I do not think this series was deliberately trying to make itself look bad, but it sure ended up summarily looking that way. There seems to be a whole host of reasons for this. A bad script. Unchallenging acting. Really bad editing. And a story that is so full of stereotypical, overused, trite behavioral patterns that all it seemingly did was repeat itself over and over again. The characters never grew. Never matured. And the plot simply went from one silly scenario to another. Sadly, this series played everything ‘safe’ and therefore went nowhere. The same silly plot and triteness spun around and around.

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Please don't waste your time on this

As someone that has always loved a good cringey show I did not have high expectations going into this. I expected something light hearted with a half assed plot but cute love with fluff on the side. I did not enjoy this at all and Ill fully admit I skipped a lot of this show while I watched it. The main couple has no chemistry at all and when they finally become a couple it just feels sorta forced. The side couple moment are so weirdly placed and just interrupted the flow. I also normally love a big cast of crazy. But for the love of God so many side and extra characters that I did not care about and did not need to see. Please save yourself some time and watch anything else.

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Plot… Story… what’s that !!

Obviously this show is made for people like me who watch anything in the name of BL.
A plotless directionless chemistryless drama.
What did they add to make a plotless drama to pull till 12 episodes - Repetitive dialogues… multiple unrelated characters… all characters with parental issues… some gender and sexual orientation issues… unrequited love.. love triangles… and all sort of daily problems.
Watch this drama for everyday chores. They have seriously shown everyone doing their daily mundane activities. Sleeping, Waking up, going to work, Eating, fighting with parents, even pooping and lots of bubble tea scenes.
A guy who was calling another person as a younger brother or even seeing himself as a father figure does things with him after 2 episodes.
Another thing with this drama is that you don’t reach anywhere, because you don’t start anything.
You can call it a slice of life drama, but I didn’t see much character growth.

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Don't Watch

I watched this because of LeeLong and Run. There's not a real story line...it's just all over the place. I couldn't tell one day from another. There were 2 good points to this drama but they don't save it at all: 1) the friends stand up for and support each other and 2) the community/neighborhood seemed to rally around the kid who's mom abandoned him. Still not worth watching.

I love sweet dramas. Even the ones that are so sweet they'll give you cavities. I also don't mind the "slow burn" dramas as long as the chemistry between the characters can carry it. This was so disjointed and unconnected that both the sweetness and slow burn were lost. There really wasn't good chemistry between Run and Tiger.

Seriously, don't waste your time.

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I tried, I really did…

I wish I could give this show more stars but I just can’t lie to y’all like that. Would not recommend…

I don’t know if it was the writing or directing but the mark was missed every time. The story didn’t suck me in, dialogue was blah, and the MCs chemistry sort of fizzled but never BANG’d. Hottest scene was between Kana and Pao. I even found myself rooting for Plearn & Tin more than Park & Tin. I saw real chemistry there and I think Tin would have feed off of Plearn’s warm intensity!! There were about three storylines but family seemed to be the underlying theme. Tin was abandoned, Bie and Pai’s family don’t approve of them, Kana’s home is disruptive and Pao received too much praise. Pao’s drug overdose came out of no where, like why. Then Pai only earning respect from her parents once they found out she was rich…shocker!

The last two episodes with the heavy scenes just seemed so misplaced. It felt like a lackluster attempt at recreating the LITA special episode. From the moment Park flipped Tin in that bed, we could have cut it. Stiff “riding” accompanies awful kissing paired with poorly portrayed frustration due to “unwanted interruptions” with the phone calls. BRUH TAKE IT!! End this nightmare PLS!! Both bath scenes could have been deleted and the film burned.

All in all, great concept, poor execution.

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Plot? We don't know her.

The trailer looked really promising. It looked really interesting, and it seemed like we will get some forced proximity between our main leads, which I was really looking forward to as it has been a while since I watched a BL like that. The beginning of the series was, sadly, all over the place – we were introduced to a crazy number of characters who I didn’t get the chance to really tell apart, for whatever reason everyone and their mom is babysitting a niece or a sister or is leaving her with “friends” and strangers! What are all these little girls bringing to the story, to the plot?

There is no actual story to follow. There are also many inconsistencies with what is going on to the point that it becomes annoying. Like Tin meets his sister and then asks two of his friends to take her to his place – but he is going there as well, yet he takes much longer than the three of them! And the sister and other kids are waiting outside the house for Tin while Park and the rest of their friends are inside, yet not one of them said anything to the kids?

Also, how old is Tin supposed to be? At times, it seems like he is still a high school student, talking about what major he should pursue with his friends. He is childish enough to fit the age group well. And then at other times, he seems to be older, as someone who should already be in university or maybe even done with it. Especially considering that Park is working and seeing had to get a degree first, their age gap might be quite big. But that doesn’t really make sense to me with relation to their childhood. It’s confusing.

To be honest, I am way more invested in Pao and Khana. I think the two of them will make an interesting couple. Especially with them being so different, there is this idea of Pao being a golden child and Khana being the black sheep. I am excited about seeing more of their dynamics. I do get a sense that Khana doesn’t think himself good enough for Pao, which is why even after they have their moment, it feels like he is not happier.

I don’t like how the series addresses some very serious and sensitive topics. For example, the whole family situation with Khana when he seeks shelter at Park’s house was dealt with awfully. Yes, he is an adult who has probably done this before, but he is still the victim in this whole thing. Has been since he was a child. And to see how Tin (and even Park at some point) treat him is wrong on so many levels. Being cute afterwards does not make things okay.

It does deserve the recognition in one aspect though - I like how they adressed the fact that LGBTQ+ people are often held to a higher standard than others. It's true and it often seems that the world is just waiting for them to make the smallest mistake, so they can be condemned for it.

I am ready to drop this one. I really wanted to like it, but I am just not feeling it. The main couple lacks chemistry, the story is getting boring and very repetitive. There is also nothing really happening, no new developments in their relationship. I really wish they made Pao and Khana the main couple. And it would be nice if they didn’t include that many kids with no meaning to the plot.

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