amedia

I started this drama in November of last year and managed to finish it earlier this month. I watched it purely to see Liu Minting, a.k.a. Tim Minting, better known in Guardian fandom as the adorkable scientist Lin Jing, in a secondary role. I got to see more of him than I expected!

The "screencaps" were taken by me aiming my cell phone at a television, so they're maybe not as sharp as they could be. But I think they'll give you a pretty good idea!

Liu Minting plays a pop music manager named Reese, who is trying to orchestrate a comeback for a former idol ("Neil") by teaming him with a promising composer ("Sea"); the idol and composer form the BL pairing featured in the ads for the show. Neil, traumatized by death of his brother, who was also his musical partner, has been schlepping around being miserable and avoiding music for years; Sea is one of those staple blank-faced BL characters with zero communication skills. I mean, this kid makes Adachi from Cherry Magic look garrulous.

So I found the main pairing pretty annoying and watched the show mostly in half-episode chunks. It was very nice, however, to glimpse Liu Minting fairly often. You know how some actors look kind of ... unfinished in their early roles, and then look quite a bit better once they're a bit older?

The first examples I thought of were Sean Connery and Michelle Yeoh, both of whom IMHO became a lot hotter when they hit middle age. This fella hasn't had quite as much time to age, but there's still visible improvement.

Liu Minting ages up nicely! It's amazing what a better haircut (or a less dorky wig), a sharper outfit, and a few years can do for an actor:

Getting all business-y! (By "let's" here, he's referring to Neil and Sea.)

But wait, there's more! A few episodes in, an old flame of Reese's turns up ... and Reese gets a BL storyline of his own. I was not expecting that! Orca, as he is called, brings a lot of welcome energy to his scenes.

Reese and Orca.

Orca is from Thailand; he mostly converses with the other characters in English, but wants to speak Thai with Reese. "Speak Thai with" is apparently what the kids are calling it these days. ;-)

Later episodes show us a good bit more of Reese! Waking up, for example.

In a flashback scene (you can tell by the bangs), where Reese appears to be in a relationship with Orca, he manages to look surprisingly yummy in pajama pants and a bathrobe.