Battle of the Writers (2024)

Tutor & Yim deserve better writing/editing

Overall: this series felt very choppy at times but I enjoyed the last few episodes more. Airing 12 episodes about 45 minutes each. YouTube cut version https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzTP1IMPICl6R_dsvgKnBAMp6htoQwswK (episode 1 uncut was 47 minutes 29 seconds which is what I added up the cut parts on YouTube minus the breaks between parts so there wasn't a difference in episode 1) and iQIYI Thailand only uncut version with delayed English subtitles https://www.iq.com/play/battle-of-the-writers-episode-1-21ue1zzg12c?lang=en_us I'm reviewing the cut version.

Content Warnings: non con picture taking, threat, stalking, non con kissing, drugged, non con touching?, injured/clubbed, violence/blood, manipulation

What I Liked
- aesthetics/visuals
- good/realistic that she wouldn't give out his phone number
- tropey falls but they were cute
- supportive group of friends
- sweet moments
- good intimacy

Room For Improvement
- with dreams, flashbacks, fast jumps, re-telling scenes from a different perspective, etc the series feels extremely choppy both in modern day and in the Xianxia parts
- the writing feels very contrived, the characters don't act like real people and what people would say/do, also inconsistent characterization with the guy in black who started by being self assured and then suddenly was nervous/anxious, a character who was multilingual chose to speak a language that no one else could understand
- having the panda face paint on the Chinese character felt a bit iffy
- completely not needed to character assassinate an established queer couple, there were multiple other ways the writers could have achieved what they wanted
- comedy sound effects detracted from the humor, the magic mushrooms in episode 3 were cringey and not funny
- the manipulation/lying by a character in episode 9
- no international release for the uncut version, only available in Thailand

Watch Suggestions (it was really challenging in the beginning episodes so I included the Xianxia parts and then also included some sweet/steamy scenes)
- episode 1 part 1 beginning to 2 minutes (zero explanation of why one was blindfolded...)
- episode 2 part 1 beginning to 2:15 (pinned against tree, sword won't harm soulmate)
- episode 3 part 1 beginning to 3:10 (got something in his eye), 6:43 to the end (seem to be in school???)
- episode 3 part 2 beginning to 3:05 (talking about a character, gets a royal decree to kill the other guy? then flash forward then flashback???), 4:13-4:45 (2 other random characters talking to the guy in white), 10:10-10:30 (short fight)
- episode 3 part 4 10:50 -13:12 (introduced a noble genius character who becomes the demon guy's master???)
- episode 4 part 1 beginning to 1:25 and then jump to episode 4 part 2 at 2:55-3:12 to see the end of this scene (flower from his hair)
- episode 4 part 1 8:10-end, roasting a chicken blew out dust from his eye (same scene as in episode 3 part 1)
- episode 5 part 1 1:50-4
- episode 5 part 3 beginning to 3 minutes, 5 min to end
- episode 5 part 4 6:17-6:32
- episode 6 part 1 3:30-6:45 and episode 6 part 3
- episode 7 has a random couple introduced but they kiss at 16:30
- watch episode 7 uncut 29:50-33:15 steamy scene and then 33:30-42:30 for Xianxia kissing
- watch episode 8 part 1 3:45-7
- watch episode 8 part 2 2:40-4, 6:15-end
- watch episode 8 part 3 6-7
- watch episode 8 part 4 4-5:50
- watch episode 8 uncut 16-18:55 for a steamy scene
- watch episode 9 uncut 27-36:20 for a very steamy scene and then 43-end

Read More

Better than MIDDLEMAN'S LOVE

it's better than so


THE MIDDLEMAN'S LOVE


I'm going to watch it till the end.
















































































Thank god they gave them a normal drama.
I may not give it 10/10 but it's good. give it a try

Read More

Unexpected

The trailer of this drama looked very interesting but I am not satisfied with this drama. First there are many rooms for improvement. I don't know how the script writers created this series but feeling like this is their first time . First few episodes were good but then everything became messy. Most disappointed point is the acting. The actors are definitely not professional at all , felt like they were telling us scripts. Heavy make ups on their face especially the MC really looked bad . The wuxia part was really funny , there are so many things which made that part stage play . But the most satisfied part was their historical costumes and modern costumes. Their visuals were great especially the ML's . Their friends were supportive, so many positive characters, beautiful OST .
Overall a Not Bad or so so types of drama. They should improve the wuxia part more .

Read More

I want to battle these writers

When I first got introduced to Tutor and Yim in Cutie Pie, I fell in love. The announcement of Middleman’s Love had me super stoked, and then the end-result was so bad, I couldn’t even watch it. The whole thing gave me so much secondhand embarrassment that I physically couldn’t get myself to finish it because I was cringing so hard. I was super sad about it because outside of GMMTV artists, Tutor and Yim are one my favorite BL ships. However, looking back, there is one positive about the whole Middleman’s Love debacle — my expectations for this new show were at an all time low. I expected absolute garbage saved only by TutorYim’s chemistry, and that’s exactly what I got. Though chemistry only goes so far, and in the end, nothing could save this mess.

I don’t even know where to start with this one. It’s so absurdly badly written that one would honestly think it’s some kind of parody. The whole thing is so poorly done that it’s actually pretty hilarious to watch. Definitely falls into the so-bad-it’s-funny category, which is the only reason I watched up until episode 10, albeit with a lot of skipping. Well, that and TutorYim. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they’re the best actors, not at all. I think Yim is a bit better with his emotional delivery, and he has managed to make all his characters at least a little bit unique despite them all feeling very samey. He’s also incredibly adorable with his puppy eyes which is a plus. Tutor feels pretty much like the same guy just with varied outfit choices in all his shows. However, I do love their chemistry, and I’m glad to see it’s still there. The series does pretty well in creating moments for their chemistry to shine, so that’s nice. Just sad that it gets ruined by an overdose of cringe. Still, their chemistry might be the only positive thing I have to say about this show.

Actually, there’s one more positive: When Ozone catches Shan trying to kiss Ob-un while he’s asleep, he calls him out on it. More of that please because I’m sick and tired of this cliché being romanticised.

That’s it on the positives. Now, let’s get into the negatives, aka the entire rest of the show...

- The series is entirely unhinged. It thinks it’s funny on purpose by including random and stupid shit like Shan and Ob-un getting high on mushrooms and acting like animals. Whenever it’s trying to be funny, though, it’s not funny at all. The only time the show is funny is when it’s trying to be serious, because the whole thing is so laughably bad that you really wonder what they were smoking in that writer's room.
- The dialogue feels incredibly unnatural and oftentimes forced without a natural flow. Conversations shift in topic incredibly abruptly, always reminding you that someone wrote this dialogue rather than it feeling like two humans actually talking.
- While I like the concept of a group of writers collaborating on a project, the inclusion of it is incredibly confusing. The scenes from the novel feel disjointed and don’t really tell a cohesive narrative. The show is almost over, and I still have no idea what the story they write is supposed to be about. We get the same scene from different perspectives, and the scenes jump around in time, so you never get a grasp on the story as a whole. There definitely was a better way of including this.
- For the first couple of episodes, the show always starts with a scene from the novel, but they just kinda give up on that for no reason. Also, Tutor lowers his voice for some of the novel scenes which sounds comedically bad. Luckily, he stopped doing it after a while because I could not take him seriously. On top of that, the scenes are shot in such a horrendous way and are acted out so poorly that it feels like they’re making fun of wuxia storylines. It’s in really bad taste even if it’s probably not done on purpose.
- The editing of this whole thing is a MESS. Scene changes are abrupt and confusing. We see a visual representation of the group chat which happens in someone’s imagination, I suppose, but the first time it cut to it was incredibly awkward and left me wondering what the hell was going on. All in all, the editing feels jumpy and scenes feel scattered in a random way. There are also flashbacks to things that happened less than two minutes ago which is a personal pet peeve of mine. The story of one side couple is almost told entirely through flashbacks, instead of interweaving it with the actual present narrative. I really dislike when shows do that sort of thing unless it's warranted.
- Plot lines seemingly get forgotten about. Things that matter in one episode suddenly don’t matter in the next. The worst example is the whole plagiarism thing. It’s the big deal in the first episode, then Shan and Ob-un never talk about it. It’s not picked up again until episode 6, and even then, it’s not addressed properly. Sure, the whole thing wasn't plagiarism, but only Shan and Ob-un know about that. I assume Ob-un's readers are just left to believe he ripped someone else off, which leaves me wondering if they'd still support him, or if his company still would. But I digress. Similarly, Ob-un having a fight with his roommate and being thrown out never comes up again. It was just there so he could move in with Shan. In the first episode, it was also established that Ob-un needed to work as a delivery guy to make ends meet because writing wasn't enough. Once he gets fired, he never looks for another job again, though, and is seemingly fine without one. Well, I guess he has a rich writer sugar daddy now, so I suppose he doesn't really have to work.
- Most of the show is over, but I still have no grasp on any of these characters because they aren’t characters in the first place. They have one defining trait (if even that), that’s it. The one thing that is focused on most is the genre each character is writing in, however, we never get any real feel for the kind of stories they write beyond the genre being mentioned.
- While I like that there’s a bigger focus on writing than in most shows about writers, I don’t think it’s a very accurate depiction. The idea that a group of guys could write a cohesive novel together with as little discussion about it beforehand is one big joke. Their story would be plot-hole galore, and it most definitely wouldn’t be as well received as theirs apparently is. Now that I think about it, maybe that's how this whole show was written. Just a rag-tag group of writers with big ideas and little planning. So, one threw in the plagiarism thing, another wanted to write about a blind guy, and a third wanted to just make this a series of exaggerated sex-scenes with no plot. They met somewhere in the middle, each writing an episode without asking the others what happened before or after. Maybe that's how we ended up here.
- Shan and Ob-un meeting before the whole plagiarism thing was entirely unnecessary. They should’ve just met for the first time at Shan’s press conference thingy. I still don't understand what the purpose of all that was, and it kinda seems like part of an entirely different show in retrospect.
- The scenes of the Chinese actor are dubbed which is incredibly distracting.
- The entirety of episode 6 is just one massive flashback which, granted, does finally explain some things, but was incredibly clunky in execution. Surely there’s a better way at sprinkling in shorter flashback scenes throughout the series or something like that. The story as a whole came to a halt for an entire episode which is definitely not what you want in storytelling. It’s the TV equivalent of a massive chapter-long exposition dump in a novel.
- Speaking of their past… I find there’s something very disturbing about BL’s obsession with the whole 'They knew each other when they were kids‘ thing, especially in this case because Shan is a lot older than Ob-un. It felt like a teenager prying on a little kid, and if he was a few years older, it would’ve definitely felt like grooming. It comes across as creepy instead of cute. Sure, Shan mentions in a throwaway line that he didn’t fall in love with Ob-un until they met again as adults. But that goes against everything the narrative is trying to push. He’s literally been obsessed with the boy, actively including elements of their summer together in his writing. It sure seems like this grown man is pining after a kid. All in all just very creepy and obsessive. Their story could’ve been cute if they were both the same age when they first met. Them coming up with this story about the fox and the hedgehog and then getting into a plagiarism controversy over it, leading them to meet again, could’ve been cute and fun in theory. The execution ruined it though, because now we have like a 16 year old teenager fawning over a 10 year old child well until his adult years. No thank you.
- In episode 7, there is an abrupt shift to a third couple that comes out of absolute nowhere. Again, the story takes a break to basically recreate Love, Sea The Series just even more insta-lovey. I think they literally fall for each other in a day, at least the dialogue makes it sound that way. Also, it’s very bold to introduce a third couple when you have yet to make any sense of your secondary couple. Focus on fewer things, but do them right instead. In episode 10, the same thing happens with the other side couple. Clearly, the story fails at integrating the three couples in a way that makes sense, so it just takes certain episodes to flesh out the story of the side couples, which is a big fail in terms of story-telling because it unnaturally shifts away from what the rest of the story is about. It just feels so awkward and shoehorned in, like both side-couples were an afterthought.
- It’s getting pretty tropey with falling into each other’s arms, drying each other’s hair, sleeping on each other’s shoulder on a bus, and stuff like that. It's giving BL bingo.
- Shan pretending he's still blind after regaining his vision is obviously horrible, and Ob-un forgave him for it way too quickly in episode 9. However, what makes it worse, is that this whole thing leads straight into a sex scene — one with a BLINDFOLD. Like, come on! You're lucky your eye condition didn't leave you permanently blind, and the first thing you think about when regaining your sight is using a blindfold in bed? After you just pretended not being able to see? And Ob-un is okay with that???? I'm not trying to shame anyone's kink here, but after what happened, it was just a very... odd... choice.
- Speaking of their sex scenes... This show thinks it's insanely hot, but the sex scenes set in the wuxia novel are nothing more than over the top cringe. Again, making the whole thing feel like a parody. It isn't tasteful and it doesn't feel intimate or passionate, it's just borderline unbearable to watch. If I didn't laugh so hard about how bad it was, I might have cringed myself to death. In episode 10, it's no longer just the wuxia scenes, but also the ones in real life. I had to skip. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for shows being sex-positive, but it just feels like this whole show has crumbled into a series of sex scenes which doesn't go with the first half of the show at all. It feels like the writers gave up at whatever mess of a story they created and were like 'Fuck it, let's just have everyone bang for the rest of it. And let's make it as cringe as we possibly can because why not go all in at this point?'
- All in all, the longer the show goes on for, the more overbearing the cringe factor of it gets. By episode 10, it got so cringey that I've decided to drop the whole thing entirely, because I just couldn't handle it anymore without wanting to crawl out of my skin from secondhand embarrassment. We're talking Middleman's Love territories of cringe here, and I can't stand that.

The list goes on, but those are the most glaring issues. It’s kind of ironic how in a show about writers, they’re basically setting an example of all the ways not to write a story. So if you’re a writer and looking for a bad example, this is the show for you. Otherwise I suggest you either don’t waste your time, or you just go into it to make fun of it. Since my bar was so low, I’m not really disappointed. While the show is better than Middleman's Love, we're comparing two dumpsterfires here. So, really, there is no winner or loser. Or, well, the real loser is me, because I genuinely do love Yim and Tutor, so them getting put in all the shittiest shows really sucks. I sincerely hope they’ll get to be in an actually decent show sometime soon, since wasting their chemistry on garbage like this is a real shame.

Read More

Tudor & Yim are Top Tier BL Actors!

I cannot reiterate how good the kissing and NSFW scenes are in this series. They are better than any BL series you've ever seen. Now with that said there's a lot more great things about this BL series but I just had to start off with the fact that these are the best scenes I've ever seen and I'm sure when you watch this series you will agree.

Watching on iQIYI using a VPN. See note at the end for detailed viewing instructions. The seies is worth the effort

Okay let me start off by saying the story is amazing and the writers have done a fantastic job. It may be a little confusing for some people because there are at least five realities playing out . The male leads and the supporting cast have their own storylines, so therefore you have to keep up with what's going.

Just keep in mind that what is bieng shown:
1) T he current time line,
2) The past, (flashbacks)
3) The group text is visualized around a table where all the writers sit, wearing cute costumes,.
4) Various visualizations of novels from several writers .

The rewatch value is a 10

Storyline- This story has it all spicy, sexy, sexual tension, mature conversation, amazingc chemisty, affection, tenderness, cute and fluffy, action, humor (thats actually funny), and some good naughty fun too.

1) The supporting cast have their own storylines and arcs. They are living thier own lives and have thier own love interests and plot points. One supporting couple has a flashback scene.

2) The male leads share a past together as well as the current timeline. Multiple flasback scenes.

3) Several of the cast members (the leads and supporting cast) are writers and therefore we get to see various visaul depictions of thier novels.

4) The male leads chemistry is on fire, so believable. The casting for the other couples is also completely and totally amazing , all the couples are on fire, all the couples have amazing chemistry and all the couples have amazing kissing and NSFW scenes.

5) Oh and don't let me forget to mention that the whole cast is gorgeous. I mean these men are beautiful, they are handsome, sexy, mature men living their lives, not afraid to say who they love, not afraid to ask for what they need, and not afraid to display love and affection.

6) No stupid miscommunications and stuff like that. No over used tired BL tropes No lazy writing. Great pacing. The story is pushed forward by grown man doing grown things. And I'm all for it.

Cast- The two male leads are just fantastic. The supporting cast is also fantastic. I'm the acting is amazing.

Production- The production is as good as it gets. Just as good as any International film. The scenery is totally amazing. The lighting and cinematography are excellent. The camera work is excellent. The editing is excellent. The production value is second to none. The visual and special effect are excellent. The costumes are excellent. This was a high budget project. They don't even have the annoying product placement commercials that you see in a lot of BL series.The BL Community should support this film for the production value alone.

OST - The songs are meaningful and played at the right times.

Note: International fans viewing instructions below. The series is not released Internationally maybe it will be in the future.

1) Install a V PN. I use Nord, but there are several to choose from.
2) Install iQIYI and purchase the standard plan. ( If you already have iQIYI, then you have to uninstall and reinstall). You will have to sign up using a different subscription because if you use your old subscription you won't be able to see the content.

Read More