Padbok and PadbokSab - What Will Happen?

(Made before S2E9 has aired)

So in the past couple of months, since some time before Gen Y 2 aired, there were some people who were worried about Junior who's Padbok's actor. Someone in the comments mentioned that he had removed the STARHUNTER ENTERTAINMENT info from his bio in both his ig and twitter. I didn't follow him at the time, but when I checked, sure enough the info was not there.

If you don't know, at least in the kpop industry (and I'd imagine many other entertainment industries), doing this usually signifies that the person is not a part of that company anymore. So we were all worried because I'm sure a lot of can agree that Padbok is a very interesting character and there definitely seemed to be some interesting drama between him and Thanu.

Season 2 starts and well...there's no Padbok. Eventually in one of the earlier episodes, Jill offhandedly states something like "Oh, Padbok is taking all of his time working on a big project" which hints that he will more than likely not show up. At this point, I've been keeping tabs on SH's and a lot of the other actors' ig pages and noticed that Junior never appeared in any of the BTS pics and clips. And a lot of us begin to worry even more.

It wasn't until they were filming the 4th quarter of S2 in January that two BTS clips popped up: one strongly hinting at Junior's return and then finally the second one being a short clip where we could see Junior in the back of the group celebrating the end of that shoot. So, yay! He's back! Will we finally get not just more Padbok, but maaaaybe a scene with Padbok and Sab? In case you don't recall, there were a couple of pretty funny scenes in S1 where Sab stood up against Padbok; he seems to be the only one with a lot of gall to do so. Which could also potentially make for a great ship.

Speaking of PadbokSab: Junior and Kad (Sab's actor) are (were?) screen partners. They had a short BL show where they played as new roommates who eventually fall in love, and there have been some events and livestreams where they're together. However, to be very honest...I always thought their chemistry seemed a little off? Especially compared to the other screen pairs, like KimCop, DunBas, and BankBo. This is based off of some clips I've come across.

There's this video (here: https://youtu.be/lHqqivAI23w?t=243) where at one point, Junior states that if he could play as any other character, he'd play as Sab because he gets more money for how many times he shows up. This is from Nov 2020. This is all speculation of course, but when I saw this video, I began to assume that maybe this alongside his character's odd lack of appearance in S2 and his somewhat off chemistry with Kad might very well hint at him either actually leaving SH and/or just BL dramas in general...

But then very recently it came out that he's going to play the lead in a BL called Boxer In Heart (https://www.instagram.com/boxer_in_heart/). Produced by a different company. With a different screen partner. And so far, their chemistry seems pretty good.

To make matters worse, according to BPG, some of his social media bio that still had "Star Hunter Entertainment" on it is now void of that; I checked them out and sure enough, they're gone.

So based off of ALL of this, it seems as though Junior has left S.H.E. I definitely would not be surprised if when he shows up in the last few episodes of Gen Y 2, that his scenes may be short and that the issues between Padbok and Thanu may be some level of anticlimactic. 

I feel like for sure if Junior allegedly wasn't leaving/had left S.H.E. then the Padbok and Thanu situation would've been explored throughout S2. This mysterious subplot had *a lot* of potential. BPG and I even thought that if there was a S3, that these issues between them would be the main conflict of that season and that it could totally work.

What do you guys think? Have any additional information?

TL:DR - It appears that Junior left Star Hunter Entertainment at some point, which far more than likely affected Padbok's appearance in S2. I'm expecting his character's return to the show to either be very good or very poorly done due to this.

 BadPennyGirl:

Sab's actor, Kad Ploysupa also posted yesterday that he was the only one left at Star Hunter that had no bl partner.  He seemed sad, but tagged SH in the post.  And when I posted a response that I was sad he and Junior wouldn't be a pairing, He liked my comment immediately and there was no refutation.  

So definitely Kad and Junjor aren't in a CP together anymore.

I was thinking of mentioning this!
But the reason I didn't is because he seems to like every comment he gets, and he tags SH in most if not all of his stuff. He also uploaded this pic with the caption when it was Valentine's Day over there, too. So there's a chance it may not be any deeper than that.

Here's the pic for anyone who's interested!
https://www.instagram.com/p/CZ6k8BjhkV9/

Padbok's story is one I will miss.  I found him a vibrant, interesting character.  I do hope his actor finds his feet, where ever he lands.

Sab is one of my favorites because he seems very intelligent and insightful.  He's got a very developed moral center, but he tends to stay out of other people's affairs, except for Wayu.  And he's funny.  I don't think we'll see Sab paired in the Gen Y universe.  Which is sad.  I just hope his actor gets a new romantic acting partner.

I have a theory that's been brewing for a while now, and after watching episode 10 and waiting to see if Padbok would show up (spoiler: he did not),I think it's now safe to talk about my theory.

So, this season was basically about separation: the three main couples(ThanuWayu, MarkKit, and PokTong) had time spent apart and each character were either distracted by something that kept them from being together with their partner/friends or were dealing with a lot of emotional baggage. PokTong and MarkKit were too busy dealing with the emotions of being separated and what lead them to being this way. Though very poorly executed in my opinion, MarkKit's situation makes sense especially story-wise: if you guys recall, Mark and Kit were there for Thanu and Wayu in S1, Mark more so for Wayu. So I believe having Mark and Kit deal with their stuff doubled as an excuse to have Mark so distracted that he doesn't really help Wayu after episode 3 or 4.

Now, Wayu was too busy trying to be there for his dying ex boyfriend and deal with all of that plus the heartache of feeling bad that he's with his ex and not his current boyfriend. And Thanu stated he wanted to give Wayu some space to deal with all of that, which is fine, but also...doesn't quite make sense?

They're already together, so it'd make A LOT more sense to have both of them work through everything together; Pha is Thanu's best friend, after all. But I believe they needed a reason to keep Thanu away from Wayu. And you know what would've been a GREAT reason? Padbok.

In S1, we're told that there's some past beef between Thanu and Padbok. So much so that it's brought up numerous times, and it turns into this one giant mystery: what in the world happened between them?? What happened that made Padbok so desperate to attempt to keep Wayu and Kit away from Thanu? What happened that not even Jack or Jill are willing to talk about it- that *no one* is willing to talk about it? What happened that makes Padbok snap just about every time he seems Thanu?

Wayu even points out a couple of times that Thanu will tell him when he's ready. And the season ends with no answers. And that's because all of that was very clearly meant to be build up for something huge in S2.

I wholeheartedly believe that the main drama in S2 was going to be about the Thanu and Padbok debacle. It makes sense! The build up, the fact that we don't know too much about Thanu, and it would have been a fantastic way to keep Thanu away from Wayu in S2. It also would've added more strain to ThanuWayu's relationship because I can see Thanu saying everything is fine so that he doesn't give Wayu anymore stress. But then Wayu at one point notices things are off with Thanu and that he isn't giving him answers. Wayu is so distracted by Pha initially that he has no idea that Padbok has reached his breaking point and that Thanu is trying to deal with him. Maybe initially Jack and Jill have no clue either because it's very clear where they stand when it comes to the debacle and Padbok knows they won't side with him, so he doesn't tell them.

But then at some point, issues arose between S.H.E and Junior (Padbok's actor) which lead to Junior allegedly leaving the company. And the timing must have been awful because the production crew had to scramble to fill in all of the empty spaces in the script. And last minute changes are terrible to work with in pre-production. If they had enough time, they could have replaced the actor, but clearly they didn't.

What they went with instead is arguably fine. There are some issues execution-wise in the later half of the season, which I believe is when a bulk of the Thanu-Padbok drama would have happened.

What do you guys think?

 BadPennyGirl:

It's a great theory!  I think some of the pacing with Wayu and Thanu would have remained the same, just with a different cause.  So it fits.

I will argue a couple of tiny things.  I don't feel Thanu backing off from Wayu to give him space felt necessarily unusual.   To me what felt a little off was Wayu leaning into it.  But as his turmoil evolved, that too felt more natural to me.  And I don't think Pha was ever Thanu's best friend.  Padbok was.  Hell, Thanu was as close to Jack and Jill as he was Pha.  

I think also something of the pacing later would have been filled with Padbok/Sab evolving.  That might have padded the pacing out quite a bit.

It's a great theory.  It's certain that having to cut away Padbok's story affected the season's flow and plot.  But with only rare exception, I think the season works.  Despite its pacing warts I've enjoyed it.  But wow do I really miss Padbok a LOT.

Yes! There definitely would've been some good PadbokSab moments woven in there. And writing-wise, to keep Sab  away from helping Wayu, I can see him getting very nosy about Padbok's whole thing and eventually being swooped up into it. 

I don't think Thanu staying away was weird, but more so that he kept away for as long as he did? I remember we both discussed how he should've gone back to Wayu already at some point. But I'm not mad about it because I think it's just their way of filling some of the spaces.

And about them being best friends: I don't recall them ever calling each other that, but I assumed they might've been because Pha did trust Thanu enough to do something pretty big for him in S1, which was to look after Wayu for him. So I figured that level of trust must've meant they were more than casual friends, if anything, and that Pha was one of his best friends.

Oh! And instead of getting small, random JackKoh moments each episode, maybe once Jack gets involved in the PadbokThanu debacle, he gets injured at one point and Koh stays with him at his place to help him out. So maybe we'd get to see some good quality time spent between the two of them instead of seeing how they act in public like we do now. Which I do enjoy, but it could've been a little more in depth, I think.

I didn't see any Padbok moments in the preview images.  I am still holding out that we'll see him one last time.

 Harsh_S:

Oh my god finally someone is discussing about Padbok and Sansab...they were one of the reasons why I started watching season 2 so eagerly...their chemistry in season 1 was sizzling and I absolutely loved it..I hope they get together somehow...

I don't think they will get together.  Junior is no longer in a CP with Kad.  Which is super sad, but hopefully Kad will get a CP with a new actor soon.  And the setup in episode 11 today definitely cemented Sab's dislike of Padbok with NO time left in the season to explore a hate-2-love romance.  

So I am hoping for a season 3 but the only chance of a Padbok/Sab relationship is if they recast Padbok after season 2.