International Dramas: ‘Love Like the Galaxy’

Promotional poster of (left) Leo Wu and (right) Zhao Lusi. Copyright goes to Rakuten Viki and Tencent Video.

Hi! It’s Annie!

Continuing with not talking about any piece of media involved in the current writer’s and actor’s strikes, I really wanted to start finding dramas that are outside of the usual big name streaming services too. Because the streaming services are one of the biggest targets of the strike and for good reason. They are paying their workers some of the least right now. So, in an effort to find a drama as disconnected from all of these as possible, I went searching on actual international drama services for something free and this popped up everywhere. If you want to watch this one right now for free, you’ll be able to find it on multiple (actually legal) sites and none of those are the regular big name streaming services. I was a little skeptical at first when I saw that it was free multiple places, but when I looked it up I saw a bunch of people saying that it was one of the best historical romances to come out in the past several years. After seeing nothing but rave reviews (and watching a couple of swoon worthy scenes online), I decided to give this one a shot. I’m so glad that I did! This has to be one of my favorite dramas I’ve seen in a while and one of my new favorite romances. I almost decided not to watch it when I saw that there were fifty six episodes. I ended up watching this drama in five days. Am I proud of myself? No. (Maybe a little.) Was it worth it? Absolutely, yes! It doesn’t feel like the drama is that long because it’s packed with so much action and romance. I’m just going to get into it! MAJOR SPOILERS ahead!!!!

Summary: Shaoshang is a clever and headstrong girl who’s lived in a loveless household her entire life after her parents abandoned her with her grandmother for other priorities. General Ling Buyi is loved by all the women in royal and noble households and has a long list of women wanting to marry him, but he is unwilling to marry anyone. After a few chance encounters he finds himself unwittingly falling for Shaoshang, who is completely oblivious. But his lifelong want for revenge may just ruin any relationship he may or may not have with the woman who likes him a little more than she lets on.

The Good:

The Female Lead- One of the things that I love about Zhao Lusi in anything is that she never plays a demure or helpless lead. She always faces first with a charm steeped in pure intelligence that you often don’t get in female leads in anything. I think she’s my favorite romcom actress right now just because of that. I seriously can’t think of a role that she’s played that wasn’t fiercely intelligent. I feel like a lot of dramas don’t feel that their characters can be well balanced if they don’t stick to a main trait. I have no idea why that is. Zhao Lusi always plays characters who are a mix of multiple things, which is a breath of fresh air. I’m glad that dramas are starting to stop with this idea that a woman can only be one thing. I feel like especially with women in dramas, people want to see a female character stick to a specific aesthetic. Often times knowing too much or being too intelligent is seen as taking away too much from the cuteness and innocence of a character. That is absolute bullshit and I’m very glad that this drama didn’t fall into that trap. She was adorable and still more clever than most of the men in this show. She fought for herself against bullies and took her own revenge. She stood up for herself, even against her own boyfriend at parts. She is a master healer which is viewed as a complete strength rather than a “female position” within the army. All of the other male characters miraculously massively respect her for her healing abilities. I mass watched this drama to cope with stress before a job interview and watching her gave me the strength I needed to just be myself and even have fun during the interview. She’s one of those female characters where I walked away from the drama wishing that women had more role-models like this character in media. She is strong, nuanced, complicated, and contradictory. Just like real women are.

Male Lead- At first glance he seems like the typical stoic general type character you’d get from a drama like this. He’s not one to show his emotions very easily and he’s the first one in the fray when a fight breaks out or someone sets a fire. He’s well known for both his intelligence and his brutality on the battlefield. In fact, towards the beginning of the drama they take this a step forward by talking about how he’s also known for his torture tactics. That was a particular detail I really wasn’t expecting. Because the point of this character isn’t that he’s perfect at the beginning. Despite having a kind heart, he has a deep seated need for revenge that’s made him pretty bloodthirsty on the battle field. And, just like the main female character, he also didn’t grow up in a loving household. So he doesn’t actually know how to take care of people that aren’t his soldiers. When he and Shaoshang first get together he completely flubs it. He tries to tell her what she should or should not do in trying to look after her health. He also attempts to get her and her family up early in the morning to strengthen them in self defense. None of this is asked for and it’s also not left alone either. Shaoshang threatens to break their engagement over him taking liberties where they aren’t asked for or wanted. And he takes each and every single one of her critiques to heart. He communicates with her, often the first one of the two to do so, and continues to grow throughout the drama to be not just a protective husband, but an actually respectful one. He treats her like an equal and becomes the best version of himself, including learning to show his emotions more. He’s also one of the most swoon worthy characters I’ve ever seen. Leo Wu plays him so expertly and every romance scene made me want to sob just because of how kindly he looked at her. His sword fighting scenes are also action packed and so fun to watch.

Romance- This drama is all about the couple getting closer not because of forced circumstances, but because they actually communicate. When there’s a problem they either communicate with each other or make the mistake of not doing so and learn from it. Towards the beginning of their relationship, Shaoshang is extremely bad at communicating and will only tell him things when she’s angry with him. He communicates with her that he wants her to talk to him when something is wrong and eventually they become amazing at it. It feels almost like a realistic view on a relationship, especially because we see so much of them as a couple and supporting each other. He goes from wanting to always protect her to trusting her to come back alive and respecting her boundaries while still being protective in a healthier way. She goes from not knowing how to communicate to encouraging him to communicate even more. And when there’s a problem, each of them show that they’ve actually learned. When he tries to tell her not to eat close to bedtime and she expresses that she’s uncomfortable with him trying to control things like that, he makes up for it by giving her a pancake around the same time. I love that this drama covered things like boundaries! That aside, the romantic moments here are also so swoon worthy. There’s a moment where she’s trapped by bandits and he comes to help her and gets injured. She’s the only one who knows how to safely pull an arrow out of his wound. Despite this scene being kind of graphic; the way he holds her wrists and never breaks eye contact made me almost pass out. And then afterwards he asks her if her hands hurt from pulling out the arrow instead of worrying about himself. It was one of the most romantic moments I’ve seen in an any drama ever, I keep looking it up just to rewatch it. When he later ends up sacrificing his relationship for his revenge he’s completely mournful of it, to the point where he starts to cry every time she enters a room. And he more than makes up for it by showing that he can be trustworthy and that he more than trusts her. This is a relationship between two people with horrific trust issues learning to fall in love and put their complete trust in someone else. It pulls at your heartstrings and makes you feel for each character. There’s not a moment where one of them does something that you can’t empathize with. And their relationship at the end of the show is one of the strongest I’ve ever seen in a drama.

Family- Even though Shaoshang hasn’t seen her family for most of her life, the way they eventually become close to her and stand up for her is amazing. The entire family is incredibly capable, to the point where all of them fight. I’m talking the women too. Her family is so badass! And the Emperor and Empress taking the main couple under their wing and really being there for them was also so cute. (Also, her eldest brother is absolutely gay coded and you can’t convince me differently. They even make sure that he doesn’t get married at the end!)

The Female Relationships- Though there are bullies, this drama really tries to focus on having healthy female relationships, especially where they are unlikely. The Empress and the Emperor’s concubine both have children who are trying to become the next Emperor. But they view each other as sisters and never try to hurt each other or each other’s families. That’s a first for me, despite the many historical dramas I’ve seen. Shaoshang has two best female friends in this that she talks to about everything. This drama likes its female friendships and I love it!

The Bad:

The Bullying- I could have done with a little less petty bullying. I understand why it was needed, but having so many instances of the same women bullying Shaoshang over and over and over again got a little tiresome. I think a few less instances would have made things more smooth.

Dropped Plotline- I loved almost everything about the Prince politics plot. Which is saying something considering I usually don’t like politics in my fantasy. But aside from the amazing plot twist at the end that Buyi was working for the third Prince instead of the Crown Prince the entire time; the end of the Crown Prince’s story kind of sucked. We knew that he was basically too nice to be in power, but we never heard what he truly felt about losing his power. And he ended up with a wife who tried to instigate the death of the woman that he truly loved. He deserved to be happy! He wasn’t malicious at all! Why did this drama never address how unhappy his situation ended up by the end?

The Villains- I don’t think any of the real villains were really developed. There were a few things I also didn’t quite get by the end. Like what that mist they were talking about was and why all those physicians that investigated it died. I liked the revenge plot line a lot, but none of the men and women behind it were very interesting.

The point of this drama really is the romance and the drama never loses sight of that. Which is why I don’t feel like a single one of those fifty six episodes ever went to waste. Each one was needed. Though the villain at the end especially didn’t have much of a purpose, you could see why it was important to the overall plot and the main couple’s relationship. And even though it mainly focuses on the build up of this relationship, there’s plenty of action to go around here. I loved the fight scenes and the choreography both with swords and with a plethora of other weapons. This drama is more historical than fantasy, so we don’t get magic as much as we get full on sword fights and I absolutely loved that aspect of it! The equality of the couple, the mutual respect, and the most swoon worthy romance scenes I’ve seen in a long time made this drama a completely re-watchable one for me. This absolutely goes onto my list of favorites. I really didn’t have much to nitpick here. Absolutely give this one a watch! And give something well worth it a view that has nothing to do with the big streaming services.

See you across the pond!

Sincerely, Annie

Video Games: ‘Coffee Talk’ Review

Screenshot of Baileys, Myrtle, Aqua, and Freya from ‘Coffee Talk’. Copyright goes to Toge Productions.

Hey! Hallie here!

Once again, it’s been a while since I’ve talked about video games on this blog, mostly because I’ve been revisiting games I’ve discussed on this blog before. But now I’m back in the mood to explore new games I haven’t experienced, particularly cozy games. As someone with anxiety, I gravitate heavily towards cozy content and video games are no exception. I’m always on the lookout for games that can calm me down after a stressful day and sweep me into an immersive story that appeals to my love of escapism. ‘Coffee Talk’ was probably the cozy game I saw most recommended on TikTok, especially after the Animal Crossing craze started to die down. But I resisted playing it, mostly because I heard it was very short. Still, I couldn’t get over the plethora of good reviews, so when I decided I was going to start looking for new games again this one was at the top of my list. But does the content really hold up against the short length? And does the gameplay make this a relaxing or frustrating experience? Let’s look at what ‘Coffee Talk’ has to offer.

Gameplay:

The gameplay in this game is really simple. You make coffee for the customers that come into your shop. You have a select amount of ingredients that grows slowly as you progress through the game, and customers will give you either an exact type of coffee or the flavors they feel like having that day. You use those orders to put ingredients together and create the perfect cup of coffee, tea, or hot chocolate. You’re only allowed to use three ingredients for each drink, but the game will tell you how warm, cool, sweet, or bitter the drink is to help push you in the right direction. Also there to help is a list of recipes you can access throughout the game, but the game will only give you three recipes to start you out. The rest you have to figure out yourself through experimentation, which the game strongly encourages. There will even be characters who come back multiple times specifically so you can experiment until the drink they order is exactly to their liking. And lucky for you, you can also trash a drink up to five times before you serve it, so you get plenty of chances to get a vague order right. However, while the game tries to take importance away from getting orders right the first time to encourage mistake making, there are different endings to this game. And you only get the good ending if you get almost every single order right. So while the gameplay can be lenient, I wouldn’t exactly call it completely stress free, though you can play individual chapters to fix what you missed. Still, I found making drinks to be an overall fun and relaxing experience. My one hint to you if you start this game: A drink will usually be right if it has an official looking name. If you make something that has a name like Tea with Honey and Mint, you’ve probably messed up somewhere.

Story:

The story takes place in a modern-day Seattle that’s filled with fantasy creatures as well as humans. It plays out as various unrelated storylines converging on the coffee shop you, the player, own and run. Customers of the coffee shop will either open up to you or other customers, allowing you to get insights into their lives and troubles. The storylines are smartly framed around one character, Freya, who is friends with the player and wants to write a novel based on the patrons of the coffee shop to reinvigorate her writing career. Freya not only gives context to the story, but is also more outgoing than the player which allows more sensitive or shy characters the opportunity to open up. Amongst the characters who open up about their lives there’s a half-elf man and a succubus woman who are trying to overcome their families prejudices against the other in order to continue their relationship. There’s a werewolf and vampire who get existential about their long life spans amongst sexual tension. There’s an experienced game developer befriending a new independent game developer and helping her with a new release. A young pop star who’s overprotective father is complicating her job. A mysterious alien who’s looking to find love. There’s also my personal favorite, a cop who likes to slack off and gives amazing advice. Some characters are better than others, the game developers don’t seem to get as much attention as some of the other characters for example, but overall each storyline has its own charm. And it’s fun to see these characters grow and change with each visit to the coffee shop. I was also surprised by some of the plot twists, though the main ones only occur once you unlock the best, and true, ending.

Length:

This game is only about six hours. For regular gamers, that’s very short. And it feels even shorter when you consider how much gameplay the player actually participates in. The issue with this game is it’s a visual novel, so if you go in expecting much more than a visual novel, you’ll be disappointed. You don’t make that many drinks compared to the amount of dialogue you read in the game, nor does your character participate majorly in any of the storylines. You’re more of an observer. And because you don’t participate much, your reading speed effects how long the game goes. If you’re a fast reader like me, you can breeze through the story in even less than six hours without much gameplay to slow you down. It’s also not the most repayable game once you get the true ending. And while there is a mode that’s dedicated to endless coffee making, it doesn’t add to the story. Ultimately, wether or not this effects your desire to play the game depends on the player. This game is fun, but if you want a good amount of things to do in your games this one might not be for you.

I really enjoyed ‘Coffee Talk’. It was a nice cozy game with excellent pixel art, interesting storylines, and relaxing gameplay. I do wish that it was longer or in the very least, that the player was given more to do. Maybe even giving players a choice of dialogue, even if it didn’t effect the ending of the story, could have helped the player slow down and feel more important to the storyline. And speaking of the ending of the story, if you couldn’t tell, I have mixed feelings about the true ending. I liked the added elements when you go back through the story, but I didn’t think the true ending added enough gameplay or enough story to truly be worth it. But despite those things, I don’t regret playing ‘Coffee Talk’ and I can see myself returning to it on days where I want to relax.

Don’t do anything fun until I get back!

Hallie

International Dramas: Romance Tropes that Don’t/Do Deserve the Hate

Screenshot/ Promotional photo of (left) Zhao Lusi and (right) Chen Zheyuan. Copyright goes to Youku.

Hi! It’s Annie!

I am going to take the beginning of this to say an early Happy Birthday to Geonhak (or Leedo) of ONEUS. I’ve done an entire post on him if you want to check it out and if you haven’t listened to ONEUS, go do that! They are one of the best and most underrated K-Pop groups out there! I have obviously been very very into romance books and shows for a while now. And after consuming so much romance media I think I have a pretty big list of romance tropes that I very much like and ones that I really do not. And after being everywhere when looking at K-Drama reviews and also being semi-present on BookTok, I’ve found people with so many opinions on romance tropes as well. Including many who agree with my takes and also very much disagree. Romance is one of those things that’s really dependent on the reader and what they personally enjoy. But I do think there are some universally hated tropes and I thought it would be fun to argue for and against some of the tropes that come up the most. Which of the hate is deserved and which isn’t? Let’s just get into it!

Love Triangle:

I don’t want to spend too much time on this one because this is the one I’ve probably talked most at length about. I’m not a huge fan of love triangles unless it kind of looks like a love triangle, but really isn’t. That usually takes the form of the person in the middle of the love triangle actually having a preference from the beginning. The other person might be there to shake things up a little or maybe to be the hopeless lovable love interest that many of us actually prefer, but there’s already a clear way that this love triangle is going to go. A love triangle where the person in the middle is truly in between two characters, I usually feel like ends up under-developing the relationship and not giving the characters enough personality outside of romance. It spends so much time focusing on the drama of the situation that everything else gets lost. Not to mention, most people don’t actually relate to being in a situation like a true love triangle. Overall, for me personally it detracts from the plot and usually also detracts from character development. I like to see the true development of a couple, not just them getting together. Which is one of the elements that usually gets lost with a love triangle.

Conclusion- Deserved

Big Brother Dynamic:

This is one that has been coming up more and more and I can’t say that I’m mad at it. Hear me out, I do understand why there are a lot of people who don’t like this trope. And there are definitely ways that this trope can end up more creepy than anything else. I am not a fan when this trope involves two characters who were practically raised as siblings. I see this happen a lot in dramas where the secondary love interest will sometimes be someone who was also raised by her parents with her and who she looked at as a brother for most of her life. If someone was raised as your brother and you at any point considered them a brother, that’s just as bad as someone who’s actually related to you. Because, at that point, they might as well be. But I really do love this trope when it involves a brother’s best friend who the main character might have grown up seeing often, or someone who the main character was childhood friends with who was a little older, or even just an outside person who took them under their wing at any point in life and kind of had that caring big brother energy. As long as they weren’t raised as siblings; this is a trope I usually enjoy. Part of that is because I usually go for the big brother type when it comes to fictional characters… and also sometimes in real life. I really love a guy who’s super caring and has that responsible energy. I’ve recently gotten into ‘Hidden Love’ and that show has this dynamic exactly. He’s her big brother’s best friend and has looked out for her for years because of that. Because I already like this dynamic, it was easy for me to fall in love with this drama. This trope gets such a bad rep because of storylines that have actually resulted in incest or near-incest situations. And that I understand the hate for. But I honestly don’t think that this is most of what goes on with this trope and I really like the shows that just use this trope as an excuse to create a super responsible and respectful guy without connecting the male character so intrinsically with the female character’s childhood. Especially not their entire childhood.

Conclusion- Not Deserved

Third-Act Breakup:

I think all of us are more than familiar with this. In almost every romance story, no matter what kind of media it’s for, there’s usually a conflict and breakup that happens just before the ending. Shows seem to think that a resolution can’t be satisfying unless it’s a complete resolution that happens after fully breaking the couple up. I know that it’s formulaic at this point and there are absolutely times when a show can completely sell me on it. But there are also shows that don’t seem to know how to make the plot dramatic and compelling without having the characters break up and get back together multiple times. Or, in the case of many dramas, they don’t quite know what to do once the couple is together so instead of focusing on them as a couple they just break them up. Though this can sometimes be used in a way that I like, I usually appreciate a plot that can make the story satisfying without this much more. And I also usually find that the plots that don’t use the third act breakup will find conflict in something else for the couple to go through together. This is really good for character development and strengthening their relationship.

Conclusion- Deserved

Bad Boy vs Good Boy:

This is super prevalent and a trope that’s usually a sub category of the love triangle. The main character must choose between the sweet reliable one and the cool mysterious one. It’s always been a super popular trope and you still see it everywhere. It was very obviously in ‘Boys Over Flowers’ in the form of Junpyo and Jihoo and recently we saw it again in ‘Imitation’ with Ryok and Yujin. This always kills me because I am almost always more likely to go for the responsible sweet one and that’s usually the character that the main character doesn’t end up choosing in the end. I find that more often than not this trope involves the main female character having a preference from the beginning. So that’s not really much of an issue here. What gets me is the way this trope is often weaponized against women. Men will often say that women go for guys that they know aren’t good for them and that the “nice guys” are left in the dust. Firstly, I think that any man who is holding that much judgement against women and further victimizing themself through that judgement is absolutely not a “nice” person at all. Secondly, the whole point of the bad boy character is that often by the time that the main character ends up with him, he’s actually majorly cleaned up his act. Now it really depends on the guy. There are times where, like Junpyo, the guy has major red flags that the show refuses to acknowledge. Then you have the guys like Yijung who massively reform to the point where he asks to have time to be ready for a relationship by the time the show ends. This is often the fault of the writer for the most part who has trouble differentiating between actual flaws and things like jealousy. I think being jealous is healthy to a certain extent, but unchecked it can go way too far. If jealousy becomes controlling behavior, it is no longer even a little bit healthy. Or, in the case of ‘Boys Over Flowers’ it can be the difference between a playboy who gets controlling to get what he wants and a playboy who recognizes his playboy behavior comes from a place of insecurity and actually attempts to become a better person. Kind of interesting that both of those characters came from the same show. So this trope is really dependent on how well it’s written. But, overall, most of the hate for this trope seems to come from sexist men. And while this trope isn’t my favorite and often leaves me disappointed, that’s partly because of my personal tastes.

Conclusion- Not Deserved

Obviously, I didn’t include many tropes that are really popular. Such as enemies to lovers or best friends to lovers. Mostly because, I mainly looked for tropes that are widely hated. Both of those tropes are ones that really seem to be universally liked. I don’t think I’ve met a person who really hates either enemies to lovers or best friends to lovers. But there’s a lot of controversy over love triangles or tropes that seem to edge too far towards something creepy. Which I completely understand. But I also think it’s important to see some of these from a different perspective when we can. What may not work for one writer or audience member at all could be the perfect match for another. And whether I hate these tropes or not, I can assure you that the tropes I hate would absolutely never make me stop watching my dramas or reading my romance books. They’re just too good for that. So whether you hate these or love them, just keep reading and watching!

See you across the pond!

Sincerely, Annie

International Dramas: ‘Because This is My First Life’ Review

Screenshot of Jung Somin and Lee Minki in ‘Because This is My First Life’. Copyright goes to Studio Dragon.

Hey! Hallie here!

With everything going on concerning the strike, I’ve been consuming a lot more media made outside of the US. That includes K-Dramas! A friend introduced me to this one with the promise that it has a much more mature approach to adult romances and relationships. As someone who can get frustrated with some of the more immature relationship issues that cause breakups and miscommunication in dramas, I was immediately interested in checking this one out. After watching it I was definitely surprised by ‘Because This is My First Life’. While not every trope in this drama necessarily appealed to me, the characters, their relationships, and even the way they express their emotions pulled me into the show. But was all the romance really as healthy as promised? SPOILERS AHEAD!

Summary

Jiho has always dreamed of being a writer, but she finds herself disillusioned with her work as a writer for the sponsored product segments of lower-quality morning dramas. To add insult to injury, she also has to do all the housework around the house she owns and shares with her younger brother and his girlfriend. When she discovers her brother and his girlfriend actually married and are expecting a baby, she decides to move out of the house to avoid a lifetime of serving the couple. After a search for new living conditions her friend puts her in contact with Sehee, an introverted man who works as a developer of a popular dating app and is searching for a roommate. The problem? Both are under the impression that they are living with someone of the same gender as them. Once they discover the truth, the two decide to marry under a two year contract in order to avoid scandal and appease their families who wish to see both of them married.

The Good:

The Female Lead: Jiho is a more unassuming female lead, which isn’t something I generally enjoy, but I still liked Jiho quite a bit. She’s very practical and organized, initially catching Sehee’s interest because she does her half of the housework with almost robotic precision and even cleans to get writing inspiration. She’s also very strong, never allowing anyone to pressure her into a decision she doesn’t agree with. At one point she gives up her writing because one of her coworkers attempts to sexually assault her, but she doesn’t let anyone pressure her into that decision. In fact, her coworkers attempt to pressure her into brushing off the assault, but she yells at her coworkers and quits her job. And even when she later gets an offer to come back to writing in a better company with more freedom and a good paycheck, she hesitates so that she can return the way she wants to. Often times we see characters like this written as if they’re cold and unfeeling, but Jiho isn’t. In fact, she’s the first to fall in love between herself and Sehee, at one point going so far as to rename his pet cat to something she feels is meaningful to their relationship. When he makes deliberate moves to push her away she gets angry enough to retaliate, forming friendships he doesn’t approve of and letting him know he can’t have her and push her away at the same time. There were things I didn’t like, which I’ll get into below, but overall I enjoyed this character.

The Male Lead: Sehee’s just adorable. Like Jiho, he plans out tasks and executes them with almost robotic precision. That’s initially the reason they get along so well. But unlike Jiho, he is painfully introverted. His only friends are his coworkers, his best friend being his boss who he, fortunately, became friends with long before he became his boss. His coworkers don’t even know him that well. Most of their experiences with him involve him glaring at them when they interrupt his work. But his introvertedness really does endear you to the character. He doesn’t really know how to interact with people, but in many ways he does try to reach out. And in moments where characters like Jiho reach out to find similarities with him, you see the cold exterior melt away into a quiet softness. I especially liked the scenes where Jiho and Sehee would sit down together to watch soccer, one of the only situations where we see Sehee fully unwind. And although Sehee is the last to admit he’s fallen for Jiho, he falls so much harder and it’s so cute. At one point, while Jiho is mad at him, she tells him he has to repay her by going to make kimchi with her mother. She fully expects her mom to let him sit out the kimchi making, and sure enough her mom encourages him to sit it out, but Sehee’s so concerned about pleasing Jiho that he won’t do anything less than the amount of work her mother is doing. I also liked the added drama of the reveal that he tries to push Jiho away not because of awkwardness, but because of a relationship his father ruined from when he was in college. It added so many more layers and made it even more heartbreaking when he broke down crying once Jiho tried to leave him. He’s just so soft.

The Side Couples: No hate to the main couple, but the side characters completely steal this show. I honestly like their relationships better too. First there’s Jiho’s high school friend Sooji and Sehee’s best friend and boss Sanggoo. Sooji’s a badass woman who can make men cower with a glance and never lets anyone insult her without fearing she might just murder them. But at work she smiles and laughs at inappropriate jokes or comments thrown her way without complaint. The reason is that she has a disabled mother she wants to take care of and she feels standing up for herself will hinder her ability to rise in her career, but it’s incredibly horrifying how she feels she needs to let men dehumanize her in order to do so. Sooji meets Sanggoo during a work meeting, where it’s revealed the two had a one-night-stand that Sanggoo fondly remembers but Sooji claims to have forgotten. But despite that awkwardness, Sanggoo feels uncomfortable on Sooji’s behalf with the way her coworkers treat her. And he doesn’t just stand aside either. He takes every opportunity to redirect attention away from Sooji and make the men making gross comments feel awkward. Sooji immediately respects him for doing this, but simultaneously brushes it off as him trying to get her to agree to date him. At one point she even tells him that they can’t date unless he sells his company, expecting him to admit he cares more about his work. But when she sees him next he breaks down sobbing, telling her he really considered it but couldn’t choose between his dream and her. Not only is this an amazing display of emotion for Sanggoo, but it kickstarts their extremely supportive relationship which consists of Sanggoo encouraging Sooji to stand up for herself, yelling in joy when she finally punches her boss in the face, and bragging about his girlfriend to said boss while getting on the back of Sooji’s motorcycle. I love this relationship so much. It’s my favorite part of the whole show.

The other couple in this show is Jiho’s other high school friend Horang and her boyfriend of seven years Wonseok. These two are the most adorable characters on the show, Horang being an upbeat waitress obsessed with getting married while Wonseok is a much less successful app developer who keeps a cheery exterior for his girlfriend. The two fight and break up a lot, but at the beginning of the show we’re shown that the fights are mostly petty and they always get back together. But when Jiho gets married Horang expects Wonseok to finally propose. And Wonseok not only misreads her hints that she wants him to propose, but fully resists them. This leads to the most angsty relationship in the entire drama. These two even have a full-blown screaming match in an empty theater. But you understand it. Horang has been wanting to get married ever since she was little, she even convinced Wonseok to start saving up for wedding expenses at one point for that purpose, and she really can’t see her relationship continuing on without marriage. But Wonseok has fallen behind on sending money into wedding savings because he isn’t making money as an app developer, and though he does at one point give up his dream in order to make more money for her, he finds himself miserable and still not completely stable enough to fork over the amount of money needed to marry Horang. Their relationship is absolutely heartbreaking, and when they do break up, you can’t help but feel it’s for the best. Luckily, this drama is all about the happy endings and the two find a compromise that works for them both, but this relationship is absolutely a tearjerker in a really realistic way.

Crying: All of the lead men cry in this drama. More than once. All of the women do too. It’s a healthy expression of emotions on all sides and I loved it.

What I Disliked:

Jiho at the End of the Show: Towards the end of the drama Jiho decides to leave Sehee and seek out a divorce without really consulting him, mostly because he didn’t give her the details about his first relationship. This despite the fact that their marriage was fake and she hadn’t even confessed her feelings for him, so why he should feel obligated to reveal past trauma to her is beyond me. And the way she goes about the whole situation is wrong too. She tells him to figure out telling his parents that he’s getting a divorce knowing that he doesn’t have a good relationship with them, ditches him, and then tries to make him a cake as if they’re still friends. At least when she figures out they’re accidentally sharing a living space again she decides not to leave him, but seriously. I couldn’t sympathize with her at all, especially with the amount of pain and trauma she left him to deal with.

That’s it! I really liked this drama! Marriage of convenience tropes aren’t really my thing, but it did really work for this couple and their strange non-romantic romance. But like I said before, the other couples stole the show for me. While I did like seeing the practical ways the main couple found to ease themselves into a happy marriage, I enjoyed even more the amount of support and care that came from the two side couples. Sanggoo isn’t even my type and I nearly swooned at the way Sanggoo tore down an old man for being creepy to Sooji. Clearly, I highly recommend this drama. While there are late-in-the-game breakups and a few misunderstandings, they all make sense and they never feel immature. It has the healthiest relationships I’ve ever seen in a drama and that alone makes it worth it to check out.

Don’t do anything fun until I get back!

Hallie

International Dramas: ‘Hidden Love’

Screenshot/ Promotional shot of (left) Zhao Lusi and (right) Chen Zheyuan. Copyright goes to Youku.

Hi! It’s Annie!

Because of the current strike we’ll be talking a lot about K-Pop and dramas from abroad as well as other forms of media instead of current US and streaming media for the foreseeable future! I finally finished watching this drama in its entirety after I had to wait for episodes to come out since this only came out at the beginning of the month in China. The minute I saw this I knew I had to watch it! I have always been into the big brother type for as long as I can remember. I feel like it holds a similar spot to the team leader because this male fictional character role usually automatically gives that character a good amount of respect and responsibility. Which is probably the reason why I like it so much! So I was all over the idea of the brother’s best friend falling in love with the sister plot. But as much as I do like this trope and honestly haven’t seen many dramas yet that focus specifically on this for the main plot; I also feel like it can be done so creepily if the writers aren’t careful. So many things could go wrong when it comes to characters who have known each other since either one or both of them were minors. So did this drama actually pull off this type of romance in a cute way? Or could they not quite get past the potential for creepiness? POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD!

Summary: Sang Zhi has had a crush on her older brother’s best friend, Duan Jiaxu, for almost as long as she can remember. But despite the fact that he’s always been the guy for her in her eyes, he doesn’t seem to see her as anything but a younger sister. When she moves near him to go to university and he comes back into her life in a big way, it starts to feel like maybe he’s not so unattainable. And maybe their relationship will shape into something she never could have expected.

The Good:

The Male Lead- I don’t think I have to say that the male lead in this drama was quite possibly my favorite part of the entire thing. Like I said before; he’s kind of my type. The drama didn’t make it so that he really felt like her brother; he was more disconnected from her than that. It wasn’t like they were raised together. But he did care for her like she was family because he was best friends with her brother. Instead of settling on a typical semi-cold and distant lead, this drama really decided to go for the caring side of the big brother type and I absolutely loved it. Duan Jiaxu is every bit as responsible and respectful as you would expect and he’s also like a big puppy on several occasions. He’s just the most adorable character! He takes care of everyone and nobody can stay mad at him because he’s just such a genuinely nice person. He’s also so reliable. When she needs him, he’s there. And this has been something that was true for her for most of her life. When she needed a tutor in a subject he knew well, he became her tutor. When she was still not grasping the concepts, he took her to a museum to help her get more interested in the subject. When he noticed a period stain on the back of her skirt, he immediately sent her to the bathroom while he went off and got her tampons and a new skirt. And the show also doesn’t shy away from him showing emotion. He’s had a difficult childhood and when his father, who has been in a coma for years, finally passes on he doesn’t shy away from crying. He cries again at the end of the series when he proposes to Zhi. I’m also a sucker for a guy who stands up for and protects his girlfriend (as long as it’s equal and it’s not a way to show that he somehow has more power than her) and there’s plenty of that to go around in this too. Including him putting up with so much until it affects his girlfriend and because of her he takes a stand for both himself and her. There are just so many tropes with him that I love and this doesn’t even cover my favorite things that he does in his relationship with Zhi.

The Female Lead- I loved her! She was adorable and so many times when a female character has cuteness as a leading character trait, the drama will make her completely helpless and very demure. That was not the case here at all. Zhi stands up to her boyfriend’s stalker on multiple occasions, almost takes her brother’s head off when she realizes that he punched Jiaxu for dating her, and tells Jiaxu several times throughout the drama that she’ll protect him by not letting anyone bully him. This is one of the best dramas I’ve seen for protection in a relationship going both ways. She also cries during confrontation on occasion, which I loved because I do that too. And the drama didn’t act like she was less strong for doing so. I also absolutely loved how they dealt with her at least five year long crush on Jiaxu. Instead of being overly obsessive, she’s very careful in making sure that Jiaxu feels comfortable around her. When he comes back into her life and her feelings start resurfacing, she tries to make sure that Jiaxu likes her first and then becomes very nervous about the prospect of telling him that she’s liked him for so long. Eventually the information becomes kind of obsolete, but she eventually tells him and the information only makes them feel closer to each other. And it’s mostly because he realizes that she hasn’t been saying it because she’s afraid it would make him uncomfortable. He doesn’t make a huge deal out of it either and because of that, I think this was handled so well! I was a little thrown off at first because this actress played a warrior badass in the last drama I saw her in, but she pulled this off too. And I also like how a cute and girly character could have just as much strength as her last character who was more tomboyish. Just because a character is cute and girly doesn’t mean she has to be demure!

Relationship- It’s so important that this relationship isn’t reciprocated and doesn’t become an actual thing until she’s in university. There is no point where she’s not an adult yet and he is and there’s something romantic going on. There is a five year age gap between the two of them, which actually isn’t that bad. And they completely avoid making it creepy by making sure they are both adults when the romance part of their relationship begins. They also do an excellent job of making sure that the two don’t really focus on their past together once they get into a relationship. They are completely present with each other and despite the age gap they take equal responsibility in their relationship. I love how equal this feels! They get together about half way through the drama so we also get to see plenty of them being a couple. This is also not interrupted because the writers decided against a random third act breakup. There’s one moment where because her parents are reluctant to accept the relationship, Zhi worries that Jiaxu wants to break up with her. But as soon as she sees him, he immediately explains that this isn’t the case. They have so many adorable couple moments and this also includes them being super supportive of each other’s careers. By the end of the drama they have to be long distance for a while because he’s moved where both of them are hoping to live and is starting his own business while she’s finishing her degree at her university. Seriously, they are the cutest together! So supportive and also almost tooth achingly sweet. This drama has so much fluff, so if you’re like me and you enjoy that type of thing, you’ll absolutely love it!

Consent- This had to be one of my favorite parts of their relationship. This drama actually tackles consent in a way that I can honestly say I’ve never seen any drama do before. I think consent is still an issue for any romcom no matter where it’s from. For example, though ‘Business Proposal’ is a hilarious show, it still has one of the most disturbing scenes I’ve seen of a man sleeping with a woman who is obviously too drunk to properly consent. In this drama, after the main couple starts seeing each other, Jiaxu tries to go in for his first kiss with Zhi. Zhi, who has never been in a relationship before, is very nervous about anything physical in the relationship and gets automatically uncomfortable. Jiaxu sees this and immediately backs off, assuring her that he doesn’t want her to be uncomfortable. He later asks her if it’s ok to hold her hand specifically in order to get further information on what she is and is not comfortable doing. He tells her the reason he’s asking and everything. When Zhi later decides that she’s ready to be intimate with him despite the fact that she’s nervous, she clearly communicates these feelings with him. I’ve seen so many dramas use the “if we start I might not be able to stop” line as a romantic thing. This drama felt like the antithesis of that, which I’m so glad for. This might be one of the best dramas I’ve ever seen when it comes to consent!

The Friendships- I really liked that this drama showed each of the main character’s lives outside of their relationship too. That’s so important! Zhi had her college roommates who she found it just as important to go out with as her boyfriend. And Jiaxu had friendships with his coworkers as well as his old college roommates. This drama made sure that there was plenty of room for friendships. And uplifting female friendships as well! All four of the girls supported each other completely and all of them were shown to have different lives and talents despite majoring in the same thing. The other girls weren’t focused on a lot, but we still saw snap shots of their lives and how they worked within the friendship. And when one girl’s crush ended up having a crush on her friend instead of her, she never blamed her friend. She just accepted that he wasn’t all that into her. I was so shocked! I just loved how the drama made a point of showing that being social outside of your relationship is also important.

The Bad:

Male Control- It was really funny because this showed itself in very specific ways and not where I expected it to at all. Zhi’s Mom is probably the stronger one in the relationship with her Dad, but at the same time their relationship is remarkably equal. So her Dad isn’t a part of this as much. The way this shows the most is actually Jiaxu and Zhi’s brother taking care of her before she gets to university. And even a little afterwards. There are times where a male character will tell her directly not to do something. She’s told several times not to date, though she doesn’t listen. Jiaxu has a huge problem with her dating before he decides that he wants to date her. I think this is probably because most university students in some cultures are strongly discouraged from dating while they figure out their careers. This type of male control didn’t really show up in any other form, but it felt strange when it did considering how little it shows up in literally any other capacity in this drama.

Child Actor- When Zhi and Jiaxu first meet, she’s fourteen and he’s nineteen. Like I said before, because the writers are careful about when feelings are reciprocated and when the relationship actually starts, it isn’t much of an issue. They don’t start dating until she’s nineteen and he’s about twenty-four and that’s also their ages when he starts to reciprocate her feelings. Which I personally feel is completely reasonable. The only issue here is that they decided to cast a child actress for when she’s fourteen. It’s really strange because as soon as she turns sixteen, they use the main actress. It honestly doesn’t make much sense. And the child actress looks more like she’s ten or eleven than fourteen. Considering that she starts having a crush on Jiaxu at this age, it’s really strange to see them playing romantic music whenever Jiaxu appears but Zhi oddly looks like a small child. I personally think they should have rewritten it to avoid casting a child actress or cast someone who looked a bit older at least. It was just kind of weird.

If you’re in the mood to watch a cute, lighthearted, drama that doesn’t have a super complicated plot but instead has a ton of fluff, this is the watch for you! Dramas like this are usually ones that I’ll watch over and over again for comfort. It doesn’t have many side plots at all and doesn’t focus on them much if they do. Which is why you’ll notice I didn’t have anything to say about any sub-plot romances. And again, no communication based break ups either! When they have problems they talk it out! So if you’re in the mood to watch a lot of drama, I’m not sure I’d recommend this one. But it has a strong romance plot and the absolute cutest couple. And so so much consent! I absolutely recommend this one as a super cute and lighthearted watch! I think we all need those once in a while. And they’re always some of my favorites to watch too.

See you across the pond!

Sincerely, Annie

Sci-Fi: ‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Ep 4-5 Review

Screenshot of Jess Bush as Christine Chapel, Babs Olusanmokun as Dr. M’Benga, and Ethan Peck as Spock in ‘Strange New Worlds’. Copyright goes to CBS Television Studios, Roddenberry Entertainment, and Secret Hideout.

Hey! Hallie here!

We’ve gotten two more episodes of ‘Strange New Worlds’ so that means it’s time for another review! I have very different opinions on both of the episodes that came out recently, but I can say that I’m very much liking this season of the show so far. While not every episode is perfect, the show still captures the whimsey of ‘The Original Series’ while also tackling interesting moral and philosophical problems. Not to mention the amount of chemistry this cast has which makes the entire ship feel like one big, happy, family. ‘Strange New Worlds’ has become one of the best Star Trek shows at fully utilizing its ensemble cast to create a found-family dynamic, and that’s something I just can’t resist in Star Trek. So let’s get into the two most recent episodes and the good, and bad, of both! I’ll be reviewing these episodes a bit differently than I usually do, but with no less detail. SPOILERS AHEAD!

UPDATE: As of today, the SAG-AFTRA leaders currently striking on behalf of actors have discouraged any content creators from talking about projects that are currently stricken, meaning projects that are promoting and releasing. Though supporting works as an unpaid creator is a complicated discussion and does not technically cross the picket line at the moment, I will still be cancelling all content related to upcoming and currently releasing projects, including upcoming episodes of ‘Strange New Worlds’, with few exceptions. Please support the WGA and SAG-AFTRA at this time while they put their livelihoods on the line for fair working conditions and wages.

Amongst the Lotus Eaters:

This episode is framed as an episode for Erica Ortegas, an idea that I was immediately excited for. She’s the one who gives the opening officer’s log to gush about how she’s about to go on her first away mission, and she also gives a somewhat triumphant log to close out the episode. Except she doesn’t play a major role in the plot. She doesn’t even go on the away mission. The whole thing is thwarted when Spock randomly discovers that there’s an astroid field surrounding Rigel VII, something that Ortegas has to personally deal with, so she can’t go down to the planet. The rest of the plot proceeds without her and she’s given a side plot that’s returned to without nearly enough frequency. Sure she gets a badass save-the-day scene, but she doesn’t even solve the main problem in the episode. Meanwhile, the main plot aims to answer a question fans have had since ‘The Original Series’ hidden pilot was aired, which is kind of cool. In the episode Pike mentions a past trip to Rigel VII that ended in disaster, where he lost a yeoman and had to fight warriors of the planet. The strange thing about this event though, is the details were muddled between episodes, creating discrepancies surrounding what happened on Rigel VII. This episode cleverly decided to solve that problem by creating a plot in which everyone in the planet’s vicinity who doesn’t actively stay in the planet’s palace slowly loses their memories. This definitely raises the stakes, but I wouldn’t say going through an episode where the characters don’t remember who they are is really my cup of tea. Especially because plots like this mean we get less character development. I also can’t say I really appreciated the way Pike went about treating his crew in the lead-up to everyone losing their memories, which was less caring and more preoccupied with his meh girlfriend. So, not a horrible episode, but not something I can say I particularly enjoyed.

Charades:

Who doesn’t like a good Spock comedy episode? Ethan Peck’s Spock might be the most comedic we’ve ever seen Spock, and that’s probably because he manages to make Spock seem so strait-laced and so innocent at the same time. It’s especially fun that we get to see his depiction of Spock turned on its head for ‘Charades’, where Spock and Christine are in a shuttle accident that results in an alien species trying to “fix” Spock by removing his Vulcan half and making him completely human. Unfortunately for him, he’s also expected to perform a ritual with his future In-Laws to further cement his engagement to T’Pring. Because Spock has never been completely human before, he winds up going through the developmental stages of a human teenager. So he’s hungrier and moodier than ever before as his mother tries to teach him to lie his way through the ritual. This episode is just really cute. Amongst the entire crew trying to put up with teenage-boy Spock, we have Pike and his amazing facial expressions back. I honestly feel like this is the first time we’ve seen casual Pike back this season and I missed it so much. His expressions during the Vulcan ritual left me breathless with laughter. We also have some great girl-bonding in this episode. This includes Uhura, Ortegas, La’an, and Una chatting and joking around with each other, plus a hilarious scene where they’re trying to teach Spock how to act Vulcan in order to help him prepare for the ritual. But it also includes various scenes where Uhura and Ortegas have honest conversations with Christine where they try to get her to confess her feelings for Spock.

As for Christine, she gets the side-plot in this episode. She’s been talking about leaving the ship to intern with the Vulcan Academy all season and we all know part of her reasoning is to escape her feelings for Spock. While preparing for the interview to get the internship, she doesn’t even consult Spock on how to navigate a Vulcan conversation and winds up instantly regretting it. But Christine also finds herself in the position of trying to turn Spock back to his normal self before the Mind-Meld part of the ritual, an act he can’t fake. In contacting the alien species that changed him and convincing them to turn him back, with the encouragement of Uhura and Ortegas she confesses to wanting more of a relationship with him. Meanwhile, Spock has been feeling similarly towards her and, even after returning to his normal self, feels even more separated from his Vulcan side when he sees the way T’Pring’s parents treat his humanity as well as his mother. By the end of the episode Spock and T’Pring decide to take a break. We also see Christine blow off the Vulcan Academy for being jerks. Hell yes. But that isn’t all. It turns out during the shuttle accident Spock diverted all the shields to protect Christine, information which leads to Spock and Christine confessing to each other. Finally! But what is a break to T’Pring? Is this a Ross situation? And also, we know that Spock and Christine aren’t together during ‘The Original Series’ though she does flirt with him. We also know that Spock doesn’t completely break it off with T’Pring until ‘The Original Series’. So is this relationship really built to last? I suppose we’ll have to see. Either way I loved this episode and it reminded me exactly why I love the character dynamics in ‘Strange New Worlds’.

That’s all for this week! I’ll be back for more reviews of this season once we have a few more episodes released! At first I wasn’t sure if this season would be able to match the charm that the first season had, but even with a few missteps I feel like this season is winning me over. It’s so much fun, and even when it’s not at its best, it still has hilarious moments and themes that make you appreciate what the writers are attempting. I can’t get over how much I love this Enterprise crew and I can’t wait to see what they do next!

Don’t do anything fun until I get back!

Hallie

ATEEZ: Happy Birthday San!

Promotional image of Choi San. Copyright goes to ATEEZ and KQ Entertainment.

Hi! It’s Annie!

As usual this is a little late, but I really do want to say the absolute warmest happy birthday to San right now! San is the most biased member of ATEEZ and that is certainly because he is one of the most eye catching members of any group ever. It’s really difficult to not notice San in just about anything. But I also know that this comes at a time where I know I’m going to have to address something recent. I will address it as a notice below because I don’t want to make the entire post about that. Really, it’s not my place to judge how harmful or not harmful it was. But I do think it’s important to remember that, as I have always said, idols are human beings. That means they both deserve to be respected and to have boundaries and it also means that they mess up sometimes. I think that San is one of the most positive and caring members of ATEEZ and I can’t imagine that he’s not feeling remorseful right now. But that aside, his caring nature and positive energy have helped many people see the light on particularly dark days. I know that he’s always been a big part of the comfort that I get from ATEEZ. So I’m just going to get into how amazing this man is! One of our primary vocalists and the man you physically cannot look way from.

NOTICE: If you are at all triggered by racism or already know what went down and don’t want to see it again, that’s understandable. SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH and keep going on with the birthday post! Recently a behind the scenes video was posted of San singing and dancing to the curry song. A little while before then Seonghwa had mentioned the curry song on a variety show that they did. This song is incredibly racist and KQ Entertainment has since issued an apology. I think it’s important to know that idols are human beings and that means we are going to see them make mistakes and learn and grow from them. Every person is flawed. But that doesn’t take away from the pain that this song has instilled and continues to do so when idol groups keep singing it. We definitely need to spread the word so that incidents like this can stop. But flinging blame everywhere doesn’t help anyone.

The Entertainer:

I think everybody can agree that San is a massive entertainer. Many Atiny have joined the fandom because they saw one of his fancams and couldn’t look away. From the beginning San has been noticed for his facial expressions and acting during stages as well as his impressive dance skills. Though San has been teased by his members multiple times for adding his own twist to specific dance moves, you can’t deny that Atiny go crazy for them. For a long while, and still to this day, San has received hate for being overly “dramatic” with his performance style. I honestly believe that all of those comments are made out of some form of jealousy. Yes, his members have teased him for it before. But they also have talked about how eye-catching he is. I think his performance style is a huge factor in the worldwide interest that we see around San and that’s because he completely draws you in. He makes you feel the emotions or absolutely swoon and there’s no in between. It’s intense and so addictive at the same time. And we’ve seen in any part of the music industry that big performers like San are always incredibly successful. There’s a reason why San was originally given the opening chair choreography in all of their performances of ‘Cyberpunk’. And his pain and anguish almost made me cry when watching his ‘INCEPTION’ fancams. He is the entertainer of the fourth generation and you can’t convince me differently.

The Cutie:

One of my comfort videos is one of the pre-debut trainee videos that ATEEZ and KQ released when they were still going by KQ FELLAZ. It’s a video of all of the members going to Universal Studios Hollywood. Theme parks are something that I grew up with living in California and have always been safe places for me. After my family stopped being able to comfortably afford Disneyland because they were driving up their prices so much, we started going to Universal Studios Hollywood instead. We would have had annual passes around the time of ATEEZ going there for this video. It always kills me that we could have seen ATEEZ before their debut and we just wouldn’t have realized. But somehow knowing that we share a similar comfort place makes me feel so much better. One of my absolute favorite parts of the video is actually San though. San is someone I relate to immensely because I also find a lot of comfort in plushies. And seeing that San found so much comfort that he brought around his plushie Shiber, makes me feel less alone. Especially because I also used to do the same thing. Watching him coo over Shiber is always the cutest part of the video for me and one of the parts that, funnily enough, makes me feel seen. San has always given off that energy though. He has the extreme duality of being devilishly attractive on stage and then getting off stage and being so devastatingly sweet and adorable.

The Caretaker:

To not talk about how San is with the other members would be like skipping an entire portion of his personality. San very much acts like a caretaker of the group and is one of the members most likely to initiate skinship. You can often find San cuddling with other members. Most often those other members will be Wooyoung, Yunho, and an unwilling Yeosang. Lately San has been snuggling the most with Yeosang. In a most recent ATEEZ-centric episode of Idol Radio, all of the members of ATEEZ were asked to choose a member that they feel a particular current affinity to. Yeosang and San ended up choosing each other and were asked to play the ‘I love you’ game along with Wooyoung and Yunho who also chose each other. A lot of adorable hugs ensued. San has been saying more and more often over the past few years that Yeosang is his. During their most recent video chat fan signs an Atiny told San that Yeosang belonged to himself and not to anyone else. San dismissed this. When the fan pointed out that Yeosang was actually living with Yunho, San defended himself by saying that some married couples don’t live together. San has also talked about being roommates with Yunho for a long time and how he would play games with Yunho whenever he pouted because he just wanted to make the large puppy happy. San is always about including people and making sure that everyone is happy and well taken care of. San seems to be one of the members that works like glue for the other members. He keeps everyone tightly wound together. That is not something that we should take for granted!

The Dynamic Duo:

San and Wooyoung have always been close and have very often been paired together for MVs or promotional content. I would say that them being paired together has only gotten more frequent with the passing years. In recent tours we’ve seen San and Wooyoung get amazing dance breaks together that make all Atiny go crazy seeing live. In the MV for ‘BOUNCY’ their characters were linked together as San was a boxer or street fighter and Wooyoung was his manager. And their move in ‘Deja Vu’ towards the end made everyone who saw it fight to continue to breathe afterwards. While these two go together very well, one of the reasons they do is because of how different they are. Wooyoung has a clean cut style and playfulness that matches San’s more dramatic dance style and almost devilish stage nature. I don’t think many other groups could boast having a duo quite like this, which is one of the reasons why KQ knows to put them front and center whenever they can. Their dance breaks break time. You just want to live in a loop of seeing them over and over again.

The Smolder:

It would be a crime to go through this entire birthday post without mentioning San’s smolder. Can we talk about that eyebrow quirk, please? He does that every time during his spoken part in ‘The Real’ and I always feel like I’m not going to survive it. This can kind of go back to San’s facial expressions, but I can honestly say that I never thought I was going to see a guy successfully smolder. I know that we’ve seen Flynn Rider do it in ‘Tangled’, but I also think that not even he was really successful at it. San with his quirked eyebrow and the way he holds his lips? Now that’s a successful smolder! And yes, I did have to include this exact facial expression from San as the main photo for this post. I mean, how could I talk about it and then just not include it!

I could go on and on about this man and his performance skill. I mean, he wasn’t originally part of the dance line until fans forced KQ to realize that he really needed to be. Though I can’t imagine any member of ATEEZ not being a part of their dance line. They are the best and most advanced fourth generation dancers! And I could also go on and on about how incredibly sweet he is and how much he takes care of the other members. I really don’t think we’d see as many cute member moments without San. He really has the biggest heart and the way he treats each Atiny who meets him like they are his entire world makes me tear up. It’s seriously difficult for me to get through a video of an in person fan sign without San making me tear up at some point or another during it. I really do hope that he gets the opportunity to apologize after recent events, but knowing KQ I don’t think that he’s going to be allowed to. I guess we’ll see what happens. But knowing that this man exists gives me a little more comfort and makes me feel a little lighter. I hope he knows how much his Atiny love him. Happy Birthday, San!!!

See you across the pond!

Sincerely, Annie

Book Adaptations: ‘Good Omens’ Season 2 Expectations

Poster for ‘Good Omens’ Season 2 featuring Nina Sosanya as Nina, Maggie Service as Maggie, Michael Sheen as Aziraphale, Jon Hamm as Gabriel, and David Tennant as Crowley. Copyright goes to Amazon Studios and BBC Studios.

Hey! Hallie here!

I’ve been surprisingly quiet about ‘Good Omens’ season 2, which is very strange for me because this is by far my most anticipated project of this year. ‘Good Omens’ is one of my favorite books and likely my favorite television show of all time, so there’s very little that could keep me from wanting to see this next season. And the more hints and trailers we get, the more excited I am! I haven’t really talked about any of it since the New York Comic Con panel last year but there’s a lot to catch up on and speculate about. So if you don’t want any information on season 2 or its plot, I would recommend looking elsewhere. I’m going to be putting everything together that I know about the season, including deep dives into the trailer and details given in interviews. We even have the entire intro of the show to look at! Let’s try to figure out what we’ll see on July 28th!

Gabriel: When season 2 was first mentioned Neil Gaiman told us the story would start with an angel wandering into Aziraphale’s bookshop without their memories. From all the promotional material we now know the angel is Gabriel, which doesn’t bode well for heaven. In fact, the entire tagline for the season has been “Something’s going down in the up,” which REALLY doesn’t bode well for heaven. Other posters have invited viewers to “unravel the mystery”. Amongst clues as to what happened to Gabriel, we have a poster of three cups forming three different images. A teacup has a halo hovering above it in steam, a wineglass spills out in the pattern of horns, and a mug’s steam forms the shape of a heart. Though some have been confused by the presence of the mug, which was Aziraphale’s mug in season one, we’ve seen other posters with Aziraphale holding the teacup and Crowley holding the wine glass. It is Gabriel we see holding the mug in the trailer. So what could that mean? Is Gabriel turning into a cupid-like angel? Well, Gabriel seems to know just as much about that as the audience. The full clip we saw released for the new season consists of Aziraphale in a panic while trying to figure out what’s going on with Gabriel. In the scene a clueless and naked Gabriel mentions that he has a feeling something terrible happened to him, but his lack of memory and short attention span ruin Aziraphale’s attempts to get answers out of him. He does say that he knows it’s the reason why he had to come to Aziraphale’s bookshop and give him a delivery, but he hasn’t given Aziraphale any delivery and doesn’t remember anything about it. In other posters we’ve seen Gabriel appear in human clothing with a duster, apparently helping out in Aziraphale’s bookshop. So it looks like Gabriel is going to spend a lot of the season under Aziraphale’s wing, so to speak, until Aziraphale can figure out what’s happening with him.

Trailer: The entire trailer for season 2 also focuses on Gabriel. In the trailer we see Crowley get intel from the new demon stationed on earth, Shax, that Gabriel’s gone missing and the angels are trying to find him. We even see Liz Carr as Saraquel using the replica of the globe Aziraphale uses in the first season to look for him. From the trailer it looks like the new angel stationed on earth, Muriel, is sent down specifically to find Gabriel. Very much like Gabriel in the first season, she comes down to Aziraphale’s bookshop with no knowledge of humans and accidentally forces Aziraphale to pretend everything’s normal while she plays the role of an old timey police officer. Because of the scene only attendees of New York Comic Con were shown, we know that her meet up with Aziraphale gets quickly interrupted by Crowley’s sudden appearance. But when she reports back to Uriel and Michael (Left in charge while Gabriel’s gone?) as seen in the trailer, she mentions seeing Aziraphale, Crowley, and Aziraphale’s bookshop “assistant” who she doesn’t recognize but is clearly Gabriel. As is implied in the next scene, where Aziraphale closes all his windows and reveals Gabriel to Crowley, who screams in surprise when he sees him. The rest of the trailer sets up Aziraphale and Crowley as the protectors of Gabriel while they try to figure out what happened to him and return him to the way that he was. Amongst a few very interesting shots of Gabriel’s eyes turning back to the deep purple color he has as an angel and a statue of Gabriel as an angel, we see Crowley actually go up to heaven disguised as an angel with Muriel evidently in on the plan and helping him out. In the NYCC panel Muriel was talked about quite a bit, and given the brief scene in the trailer where we see her looking very uncomfortable in an elevator alongside Michael and Uriel, it makes sense that she would join Aziraphale and Crowley’s side.

Heaven vs Hell: Though this has been a smaller theme in the promotional content we’ve seen for the upcoming season, this does seem like it will play a major role in the new season. Shax, played by returning actress Miranda Richardson, appears to be friendly with Crowley. She delivers him his mail, attempts to sign off on his bills for him, and acts as his informant concerning whatever’s going on in Hell. But in posters we see her amongst other demons in what appears to be armor. Meanwhile, Aziraphale has a message thrown through his window in the trailer that amusingly reads “surrender the angle”. He even states in the trailer that he thinks his actions, presumably on behalf of Gabriel, may have started a war. And on top of all of that, the beginning of the released opening credits see Aziraphale and Crowley walking directly into what appears to be Hell. It does make sense that Hell would try to take the opportunity to take power while Heaven is at their weakest, and given how much Hell and Beelzebub are featured in promotional content, I think it would be unwise to think the only problems Aziraphale and Crowley will be facing this season are internal affairs in Heaven.

Aziraphale and Crowley: Now let’s get to what we all are really excited for. The Ineffable Husbands. Firstly, there has been a leak regarding the storyline of these two. I wouldn’t recommend seeking it out. I was half-spoiled in that I know what the leak was but I didn’t see the screenshot that was circulating. Neil Gaiman was very upset by this leak and I completely understand why. I think it’s important to leave this to your first viewing experience and let it play out as it was meant to be played out. All that said, I won’t be discussing what that leak was here. I will say that their story for this season surrounds romance, something Neil has pointed out himself. And I think we all know who the romance is between. First there’s the trailer, where Gabriel explains the instinct he has to be near Aziraphale because he feels safe with him without knowing why, a feeling Aziraphale immediately ties to Crowley. Then there’s the opening credits that seem to hint at their future relationship with the two seen sitting on top of Aziraphale’s bookshop while hearts are raining down around them. We also know famous romance novelist Jane Austen will be brought into the story in some way. Maybe playing into the portions of the story that take place in the past? Regardless, I do think Gabriel will be playing a role in all this, mostly because of the heart-shaped steam we saw coming out of his mug earlier.

As for the two characters individually, Crowley looks to be experiencing the most changes after facing the repercussions of last season. In a few moments in the trailer and in one recent image of Crowley, we see his belongings, particularly his plants, shoved in his car. We also know from the scene we were given between him and Shax that Shax expects his mail to now be delivered to his car. I think it’s fair to assume that Crowley, now no longer being provided money from Hell, is living out of his car. But in the scene NYCC fans saw, his plants were being moved into Aziraphale’s bookshop. And we also have confirmation from Neil Gaiman that we’ll be seeing more of Aziraphale’s living quarters in the bookshop this season. There’s not a lot of doubt in my mind that Crowley’s going to be moving in with Aziraphale, and I think that’s going to make their dynamic very interesting. As for Aziraphale, most of the promotional content concerning him has to do with Gabriel, though we do know that magician Aziraphale is coming back at least. What I’m most interested in when it comes to Aziraphale are the promotional images of Aziraphale presumably around the time he bought and began to run the bookshop. In the very least we know we’ll be getting Aziraphale in the past as he explores the Soho street he winds up living on. I’m very interested to see if Aziraphale’s motivations for running a bookshop are revealed.

Other Important Things: First, there’s the box. Along with the angel without memories, Neil Gaiman has been telling us about the importance of a cardboard box since the announcement of season 2. My guess is the box is the same box we saw in a poster released a couple months ago, which happens to be a shipping box with Aziraphale’s, Crowley’s, And Gabriel’s feathers floating out of it. What that means I have no idea, but I am suspicious that this box is the same box that holds Gabriel’s delivery for Aziraphale. What’s inside it is clearly very important, but I don’t think we’ve seen many hints for what that could be yet. Then we haven’t talked much about Nina and Maggie, two characters who are now partially responsible for giving the Soho street Aziraphale lives on some new life. We’ll be seeing the entire street and establishments on both ends of it this season, including a coffee shop, owned by Nina, and a record store that Aziraphale acts as landlord of, owned by Maggie. These characters are heavily featured together in posters, but only appear briefly in the trailer to react to strange weather patterns. All we know is that Nina’s love life will play a major role in both of their stories. Maybe more romance is in the air? Last but certainly not least, let’s talk time and space travel. Neil has talked about both in interviews, and we already know we’ll be seeing more of Crowley and Aziraphale in the past like in the cold open for episode three of the first season. We also know based on a few images of Gabriel in posters and the historical paintings the Good Omens Instagram account has been editing Aziraphale, Crowley, and Gabriel into, that we will be seeing Gabriel in the past as well. As for space, in the opening credits for the new season we see a lot of planets and stars shifting around. But I don’t think we’ll be seeing Crowley and Aziraphale running away to Alpha Centauri this season, so we’ll have to see what role space plays in all this.

There are many, many more details I could get into, and possibly will before the start of the show, but I have to put an end to this post for now. I’m unbelievably excited for July 28th! We should be getting the entire season on the same day just like the first season, but I haven’t been able to find an official announcement about the way they’re releasing episodes. I’ve even seen larger websites reporting that episodes are coming out weekly, though there doesn’t seem to be any agreement between larger geek sites on this either. For now I think it’s safest to go by the posters and expect the entire season on the same day. I know my plan is to binge watch the whole thing as soon as it drops. I’m dying to see Crowley yell at people to stop feeding ducks bread in context. We only have three more weeks to go but it feels like it can’t come soon enough!

Don’t do anything fun until I get back!

Hallie

ATEEZ: The ATINY Wars

Promotional image of Choi Jongho. Copyright goes to KQ Entertainment and ATEEZ.

Hi! It’s Annie!

I think we can all agree that this most recent comeback is one of the best and most successful from ATEEZ. Not only was all of the music on the album breathtakingly amazing; but ATEEZ hasn’t stopped the hype since the promotion of this comeback began. It is absolutely impossible to become tired of any of the music here no matter how many times they perform it and they have also been on a streak of winning awards and breaking records. I can’t even begin to say how proud I am (and really all Atiny are) of them! This promotional tour for this comeback has given them some recognition that we all knew they always deserved. And while I could go on and on about how much they are owning this comeback; there’s been some problematic behavior to say the least when it comes to several parties in the way they’re treating ATEEZ. For a lot of Atiny, this comeback has been a constant struggle. And this has nothing to do with the boys. This has been all about protecting the boys. So if you’re not in the Atiny loop and wonder what I’m talking about when I say “Atiny Wars”, I’m going to go into the different things Atiny have been fighting for and against this comeback. And why they are entirely justified.

I-tiny vs. K-tiny:

This is probably the most problematic and prevalent Atiny war going on right now. And frankly, it is absolutely disheartening. If you don’t know what those two terms mean; I-tiny is international Atiny while K-tiny refers to the Atiny located in South Korea. And right now a lot of International Atiny are extremely angry at Korean Atiny. This has been a battle that’s been gearing up for a while and before this comeback I couldn’t have told you where I fell when it came to this. Some of the issues brought up by international Atiny seemed important while others, like the fact that most fan signs happen in South Korea, seemed superficial and entirely impossible to control. Like BTS; ATEEZ was a group that gained international fame before they got much fame nationally. I know that I-tiny have felt that they had to pick up the slack for K-tiny for several years. I have always been a fan that has voted and streamed, though probably not nearly to the extent of some other Atiny. I always make sure to give ATEEZ several votes and to stream their songs and MV whenever I get the chance; but I know part of me having the time for this is that I live comfortably and ATEEZ are my ult group. There are absolutely K-Pop fans who are multi-stans who are always working. And so I understand why some people say that they don’t necessarily have the time to vote and stream. I’ve talked in a different post how different fans interact with and support works in different ways. I’ve never really known where to draw the line between what’s the bare minimum and what’s something that takes a little more effort. Something that seems like a very little amount of effort for one person could easily be crushing to somebody else.

Until now. This comeback has shown us what the bare minimum looks like. And we know that because K-tiny haven’t been doing it. Bare minimum is the difference between streaming the song every once in a while when you get the chance and seeing the faces of your favorite idols fall on live television because nobody in their country was streaming their music. And now I feel like I’ve landed on the side of International Atiny, which I am, because the results at these award shows were beyond ridiculous. There are plenty of Atiny internationally who are busy, who are multi-stans, who can’t find the time to stream as much as they would like. And ATEEZ has still been charting in several international countries and has gotten countless streams from them. When the numbers at the award shows showed results that indicated that I-tiny were trying and that K-tiny couldn’t even be bothered to listen to the album more than once, I got angry. And maybe I wouldn’t have been so angry if we didn’t get to see ATEEZ’s reactions live. If we didn’t see our boys have the initial shocked and stricken reaction before they smiled again to accept their award. But we did. And yeah, it does make me a little angry that before one of the shows where national streaming markings were the lowest, they were outside doing a meet and greet in hot and humid weather. And that, at said meet and greet, there were several K-tiny breaking boundaries and touching their faces even though they weren’t supposed to. ATEEZ are human beings, they aren’t your dolls. It makes me a little angrier every time I have to say something like that on this blog. K-tiny have been railing back at this criticism by saying that I-tiny are racist and that we’re just jealous that we don’t get meet and greets. Do we want meet and greets? Yes. But that’s not the problem. Firstly, you don’t get to call a group of people racist that includes several races, cultures, and backgrounds (Including Koreans who live in other countries). Secondly, nobody is saying these things because we’re jealous. We’re saying these things because so many K-tiny didn’t stream or vote at all. Even a little bit would have been fine. We’re not asking for you to do something impossible. We’re asking for you to stream occasionally so that we don’t see our boys’ faces fall again. There’s literally nothing we get out of this other than to see them happy.

Where’s Jongho, KQ?/ KQ Treatment:

Now we come to the next battle going on; the battle to get Jongho screen time in literally anything. If you noticed, which I hope you did, Jongho didn’t get much screen time in their most recent MV. In fact, he definitely got the least and the amount of lines he had was also pretty scarce. The line distribution seems to be KQ attempting to test ways to even them out for some songs. For a long time they were accused of relying too much on Jongho and barely giving anything to Yeosang, so it felt a little like they were trying to balance that out this album. But too much. And Jongho should have at least gotten more screen time than that. Getting KQ to treat Jongho like the other members has also been a bit of a battle. We constantly see his merch sell out last or KQ cut down his time in videos. In a most recent behind the scenes, Jongho was pretty much just not in it. This happened once before when Jongho was sick. I addressed that then because it’s important for us to make idols feel like they don’t have to show up in every piece of media, especially when they’re sick. But, as far as we know, this has not been the case this time. Yunho has also suffered from this as the second to least biased. In this comeback there was a huge advertisement in South Korea that depicted all of their character posters; except it had San’s poster twice and no Yunho. But Yunho has been getting some more fans since ‘Imitation’ and ‘Idol Radio’ and so most of this behavior is directed at Jongho. I still have no idea why maknae, golden voice, sweet, and gentle Jongho doesn’t have more people who bias him. But seriously this has to stop. Jongho deserves so much more than what he’s getting right now. And the previous complaints about a lack of Yeosang did not mean that we wanted another member to be treated like that. All eight of them should be treated equally. This lack of Jongho is beyond disheartening and I hope that we get to see more of him soon.

Because KQ honestly hasn’t been doing the best lately when it comes to looking after ATEEZ. I know we’ve been told by Hongjoong that we shouldn’t worry because they like to work and prefer to work. But they don’t get any breaks. KQ just keeps adding tour dates and while I’m so so happy for the Atiny who get to see them live, having them tour all year can’t be healthy. Especially because we know they’re probably just going to start this touring circuit again come Fall. I really hope that they get breaks when they need them or that some sort of break is coming soon for them. All of the fourth generation groups have been constantly working with absolutely no breaks and this is not the kind of work culture I approve of or want for any of them. As much as I can’t wait to see them tour this new album, at this rate I think I would be even happier if they announced a break for a few months. Either way, I just hope that all of them are doing well. And that KQ actually treats them better in the future considering the fact that ATEEZ basically shot their company to recognition. But that seems like too much to ask for from KQ.

M-Net/Award Show Treatment:

It’s no surprise that award shows have been treating ATEEZ badly. I made an entire post about the grievances committed against ATEEZ by M-Net alone. And they only just seem to continue. M-Net not only sabotaged a show ATEEZ was supposed to get a major award on; but they have also been releasing horrible fan-cams for ATEEZ this comeback. And so have a bunch of other companies. Would you like to have a full fan-cam just for a camera man’s back? No! Especially not when it’s one of Yunho’s best fits for this comeback! The grievances just continue with award shows downplaying their achievements or, as I referenced before, the complete cancellation of a show ATEEZ was supposed to win on. Many Atiny had been voting for that show for weeks. And while they still won the award, they don’t get any of the streaming or publicity from the show. And I think it’s pretty clear why ATEEZ is being targeted in this way. For years, K-Pop was the big three. They were untouchable and they rather liked it that way. And then BigHit stepped in and we had problems because suddenly it went from the big three to the big four and then YG started losing money to the point where we’re pretty much at the big three again with HYBE taking the last slot. We also have the whole mess at SM happening right now with artists attempting to flee from them, for good reason, which leaves the entire K-Pop industry changed and shaking in their boots. I personally think that the reason why ATEEZ is being targeted is the same reason why JYP recently went on an unhinged rant about how listening to K-Pop when you aren’t Korean is a form of cultural appropriation. With worldwide interest in K-Pop, the game has suddenly become so much less predictable. They can’t seem to predict who international fans will like and many of the groups becoming popular are from smaller companies. Instead of having to deal with and predict several countries full of people, they suddenly find themselves tasked to try and predict an entire world’s worth of people. While I can’t say if eyes around the world is a good or bad thing for the industry, I personally feel like we’re seeing a bunch of huge conglomerates getting scared and lashing out in whatever way they can to keep things under control. And I definitely think we’re going to see groups from smaller companies, like ATEEZ, pay for that. I just hope that this change in K-Pop will shake things up enough to get groups from smaller companies the recognition they deserve and broaden the game. It would be nice to not just have three companies anymore. But this is all complete speculation.

I know it’s really easy to look at all of this and get discouraged. But I don’t think there’s a reason to completely despair here. While some people might not be giving ATEEZ and their accomplishments the recognition they deserve, we certainly can! We can celebrate with them and support them! We can keep fighting these battles and standing next to them. We can show them that we are here for them and that they have a community that will back them. And there’s a lot of good and a lot of hope in that. So let’s keep this going for our boys!

See you across the pond!

Sincerely, Annie

Sci-Fi: ‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ Ep 1-3 Review

Screenshot of Paul Wesley as James T. Kirk and Christina Chong as La’an Noonien-Singh in ‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’. Copyright goes to Roddenberry Entertainment and Paramount+.

Hey! Hallie here!

‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ came back with season 2 about two weeks ago, and I have obviously been keeping up with it. Season 1 was so incredible that I couldn’t miss the newest season, but I’ve been so busy that I haven’t been able to talk about it. But now that three episodes are out I have a lot to catch up on! I’m going to go through all of my thoughts on all of the episodes so far, but I’m not going to separate this review by episodes. Instead, I’m going to discuss all of my likes and dislikes of the entire season so far. Knowing me I’m probably going to stick mostly to what we’ve seen of the characters, but I’ll definitely be getting into plot as well so SPOILERS AHEAD! Let’s look at what this season is bringing to the Star Trek universe!

The Good:

La’an: La’an is one of the few characters who didn’t completely win me over last season. I didn’t love the over emphasis on her being “tough” during her introduction, and the rest of the episodes cementing her as one of the more boring members of the crew according to her own peers didn’t help the situation much. However, La’an’s already more than making up for it this season. I thought opening the season with some closure for the victims of the Gorn she was aiding and bringing her back to the crew was an excellent move. Then she got a really interesting role in the second episode, where both her closeness to Una as well as her Noonien-Singh related self hatred were played on in order to seamlessly integrate more character development for her into an episode that wasn’t otherwise about her. And then we have this week’s episode. Though I wouldn’t say a time travel episode that primarily asks the question “Would you go back and kill a mass murderer when they were a child?” is anything new, I did appreciate that the series is finally having La’an deal with her feelings about Khan. The scene where she came face to face with child Khan was surprisingly heartwarming, and I do think the badass acceptance of who she is by the end of the episode felt earned. Surprisingly, I also liked her relationship with Kirk. No offense to fans who love Kirk, but Kirk gets on my nerves easily. But somehow La’an played off of him so well that I actually did care about their budding relationship and felt horrible when La’an attempted to reach out to her own universe’s Kirk and wound up heartbroken. ‘Strange New Worlds’ is doing some amazing writing for La’an this season. I can’t wait to see what’s next for her.

Spock: Spock took the spotlight in the first episode of this season, and while I wasn’t expecting it, it was a pleasant surprise. I really enjoyed the takeover of the Enterprise he led, mostly because it reminded me of the crew rebellion in ‘The Search For Spock’ and this time we actually got to see Spock in on the action. I especially loved his awkward interactions with newcomer Pelia, played by the lovely Carol Kane. The way she absolutely confuses him makes me excited to see more of their interactions as the season goes on. The first episode also dealt with Spock’s recent problems controlling his emotions, the focus of that being on Christine Chapel. Though I have no idea where they’re going with this storyline given Spock’s original storyline in TOS, I still felt for Spock when he almost broke down on the bridge as a result of thinking he had killed Christine. Spock actually crying over Christine after she nearly died out in space made me want to cry. I also like this season’s goofier approach to Spock. I enjoyed his adorable enthusiasm when drinking with the Klingons, his brief but hilarious “argument” with the Vulcan Star Fleet prosecutor, and even his handling of the Vulcan lute-related noise complaint. Though his issues controlling his emotions is a serious problem that will likely have to get resolved soon, I’m very much enjoying the light-hearted Spock we’ve gotten so far this season.

Other Crew: Within the first three episodes I can’t say the rest of the series regulars have gotten much time, but I do really enjoy their presences as usual. M’Benga and Christine were given several kick-ass fight scenes in episode one, and though it was interesting to see Christine wrestle with her mortality in that episode, M’Benga has been the star doctor of the season so far. I thought his PTSD related to the Klingon war was the most interesting storyline in the first episode and I kind of want more. We have to address that he nearly killed a Klingon with his bare hands at one point, right? I’m also loving his position as advice-giver this season. Between his sparring scene with La’an (Babs Olusanmokun actually teaches Jiu Jitsu!), and the scene with Ortegas where he stops to read Spock’s body language, I feel like he’s been keeping a closer watch of the crew this season than Pike has. I’ll get to that later, but go M’Benga! Ortegas is another joy to watch. She never fails to be absolutely hilarious, and yes, I cheered during her piloting scene in the first episode. I adore every moment Ortegas is on screen. Speaking of, give me more Uhura please. She’s still my favorite character in this series, and though she hasn’t gotten any storylines for herself yet, she steals every moment she’s on screen. The amount of confidence and snark that comes from her is more than enough to win me over each episode, but she deserves even more. I know there’s going to be an episode for her in this season somewhere, but I’m so impatient to get to it!

Neera: Though I’m not the biggest fan of Una Chin-Riley, especially when she’s put up against some of the more interesting crew on the Enterprise, I do want to highlight her episode. But I mostly want to do it for Yetide Badaki and her spectacular performance as Neera. The ideals about discrimination and respecting the cultures of others felt well timed in this episode, but it was Neera who sold those ideas. It was bold to come to a trial episode like this from the perspective of a guest character, but Neera’s position, not only as Una’s betrayed friend but as an Illyrian who was cast out because she refused to hide her identity, made her the perfect person to follow. She establishes herself as a good lawyer immediately, making her easy to root for, but her character development makes everything more complicated. At first she uses her amazing lawyer skills to try to take down Star Fleet for upholding a discrimination law while being known to break various other laws. She takes the case to enact vengeance, not caring who gets taken down as long as Star Fleet looks the worst it could possibly look by the time the process is over. The plot doesn’t fault her for this, but it does make clear that it isn’t ultimately helpful to Illyrians in Star Fleet at the present moment. So we get to see her slowly come to terms with why Una joined Star Fleet and start to care about that as well. Though she can only really help Una out on a technicality, her cleverness ultimately makes it still feel like a win and they sprinkle in some hope for the future as well. Una’s episode was basically just about Neera, but I’m ok with that.

The Bad:

Pike: Why has Pike been practically gone for three episodes now? I love Pike. I love him as a captain. I have never had a Star Trek season go so long without bringing their captain to the forefront and I don’t think I like it. He gets some role in the second episode, but his only purpose is to worry about Una and his only scenes consist of various people telling him that he needs to sit on the sidelines and wait her case out. Which he does. In the other episodes he’s had about two lines per episode. I think we’ve gotten to the point where every member of the crew has played a more important role than him in the season, and that includes Kirk. This is a really odd choice and I hope it ends soon.

Prequel Problems: The first two episodes of this season deal with storylines that heavily suffer from relevance issues. I don’t mean that the two episodes are irrelevant to the season. The opposite in fact. But because a show that is a prequel to everything else we’ve seen in Star Trek is doing these storylines, it suddenly feels like these major events have no major impact on Star Trek’s story at all. Take the first episode, where we’re primarily dealing with Spock’s new inability to control his emotions and his conflicting feelings for Christine. We know that in TOS Spock is probably too good at keeping his emotions in check. He doesn’t really start opening up until Kirk and Bones encourage him to do so. We also know that Christine pines for Spock in TOS, but Spock apparently doesn’t return those feelings. So how is Spock and Christine’s current storyline relevant if they don’t end up together by TOS and if Spock goes right back to being great at dealing with his emotions? No idea. How is Una’s trial relevant if augments in every other series of Star Trek get heavily discriminated against by Star Fleet? No idea. I appreciate what the writers are trying to do here, but their hands are a bit tied because ‘Strange New Worlds’ is a prequel, and I’m not sure they can always find their way around that.

Spirk: This isn’t as much a critique as it is a defense of the fanbase, but I have been noticing that between the Spock/Christine pairing and now the La’an/Kirk pairing, ‘Strange New Worlds’ has been keeping Spock and Kirk in very straight relationships. Spock and Kirk haven’t even interacted in the show yet. But Spock/Kirk is one of the most famous fan pairings in fandom ever, to the point that fans of this pairing basically created fanfiction. All I’m saying is at least a nod in the direction of these fans would be nice. They’ve been waiting for something, anything, for so damn long and Star Trek is more progressive than it’s ever been before.

That’s all I have for the series so far. I jumped around a little bit but I tried to make this as coherent as possible. I’m really liking this season so far! Though I won’t say that it started out as strong as the first season did, it’s still one of the most engaging (yes, that was a pun) Star Trek series I’ve ever watched. I can’t wait for next week’s episode, and I’m especially anticipating the appearance of Mariner and Boimler from ‘Lower Decks’ soon. There’s so many crazy things from this season that we haven’t seen yet and I’m impatient to watch them!

Don’t do anything fun until I get back!

Hallie