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forestsofpine) wrote2023-03-17 02:20 pm
forestsofpine) wrote2023-03-17 02:20 pm
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BL Drama Starter Pack For Newbies
I saw someone asking for BL recs to introduce a friend to the genre, and it got me thinking about which ones I would recommend the most for BL newbies.
I am still somewhat new to live-action BL dramas myself, having only gotten into them during the pandemic, but I have seen enough BL series at this point that I have some definite opinions about which ones I would recommend for first-time watchers.
I've included links to legal streaming sites for all the dramas recommended below, and multiple links whenever possible, as some sites, particularly Netflix and Viki, will region-lock some dramas. All dramas I've listed with Netflix and Viki links are currently available to watch there in the USA, but may not be in all countries.
A quick note: Cringe comedy is fairly common in Asian dramas just like Western tv shows and films, and just in case, I wanted to make it clear that when I describe something as "cringe" below, it's a reference to the style of humor and not a derogatory description.
Thai BL
The Thai BL industry has been expanding and changing rapidly in recent years, and right now it is the most prolific BL-producing country. The Thai BL industry tends to co-brand and re-use successful actor pairs, and many Thai BLs have some of the best chemistry in the genre as a result of the rapport they build up due to this system. Good chemistry is really important to me in romance television and film, so I tend to rank Thai BLs highly because of that. Thai BLs are less consistent in terms of overall production values than Japan or Korea, but the best ones can reach similar levels.
My favorite Thai director so far is Aof Noppharnach Chaiwimol, and these first three recommendations are all directed by him. His dramas tend to be easily accessible to non-Asian and non-BL audiences without being generic or bland, and to have solid production values, including good acting and cinematography. As an openly gay man himself, he also tends to have realistic queer character and relationship dynamics.
If you like mature, realistic characters and storytelling: Moonlight Chicken
This is my current favorite Thai BL. It's a beautiful and well-made drama that shows several generations of queer love, community, and found family set in a Hainanese chicken rice restaurant in the seaside town of Pattaya, Thailand. The main couple is played by popular Thai actor pair EarthMix, who are longtime friends in real life with great onscreen chemistry, and it's an age gap relationship (about 10 years difference) that begins as a one night stand and develops into a lovely slow burn romance with mature and thoughtful storytelling. The secondary couple is an adorable teen romance between a pair of high school students, one hearing and one deaf, played by talented up-and-comers GeminiFourth.
⚠️Homophobia, both external and internalized, and ableism play major roles in this series, so if you're looking for pure escapism, it isn't the best choice (see Bad Buddy below for a completely homophobia-free series). However, there is a happy ending.
It's available with subtitles on YouTube and I have one fic rec so far in my Moonlight Chicken tag (it just finished airing this month), and am hoping to find some more! I have additional (spoilery) commentary on it here.
If you like classic romance tropes: A Tale of Thousand Stars
Also sometimes called simply 1000 Stars, this is a very solid and enjoyable slow burn romance, also starring EarthMix, about a spoiled rich boy who receives a second chance at life via a heart transplant and volunteers to become a teacher in the remote village where his donor had worked. He soon falls in love with the village and its residents, especially the chief of the local forest guard unit. It has lovely rural Thai scenery and a fun cast of secondary characters as well, especially the long-suffering village doctor.
1000 Stars is lower heat than Moonlight Chicken, but the great EarthMix chemistry is still very much in evidence.
As a mild warning for my fellow secondhand embarrassment sufferers, this series has some, mostly due to the fish out of water elements, but overall I'd still describe it as low cringe.
It's available with subtitles on Viki and I have a couple recs for it in my 1000 Stars tag.
If you like university romance and/or enemies to lovers: Bad Buddy
This is a charming enemies to lovers BL set among rival families and rival faculties at a university in Bangkok. The main couple is played by experienced actors* Ohm Pawat and Nanon Korapat with delightful, rambunctious chemistry. Like most GMMTV series to date, Bad Buddy is low heat, but there's a great deal of cute horseplay-as-foreplay and one of my all-time favorite BL love confessions and first kisses. There's also a cute GL side couple.
Bad Buddy is available with subtitles at Youtube and I have a few fic and vid recs for it in my Bad Buddy tag.
* This is Nanon's only BL drama to date, but Ohm has appeared in several others, including the 2019 BL ghost romance He's Coming To Me, which was also directed by Aof. I enjoyed that one as well and only didn't include in this list because I didn't want it to be completely dominated by Aof. 😅
Moving on from his dramas...
If a sexy mafia romance sounds like fun to you: Kinnporsche
⚠️This one is a rec with trigger warnings and caveats. The mafia elements are dictated more by tropes and Rule of Cool than realism, but Kinnporsche is still a fairly violent show with warnings that include attempted rape, dubcon, torture, murder, captivity, abusive parents, and more. It also has quite a bit of cringe humor, secondhand embarrassment, and resulting mood whiplash, especially in the second episode, though it tones down somewhat after that.
Despite my strong secondhand embarrassment squick, I ended up enjoying this drama a lot thanks to the top-notch chemistry, hot sex scenes, exciting action sequences, and beautiful cinematography. The story is about a poor bartender who is forced to become a bodyguard for a rich and powerful mafia leader and ends up embroiled in both a messy romance with his boss and a power struggle between different mafia factions. Kinnporsche has a larger cast and more non-romance-based plot than your average BL drama and has been popular with fic writers as a result - there's already more than 8,000 works on AO3 in less than a year. You can check out my Kinnporsche tag for lots of recs and additional (spoilery) commentary.
It's available with subtitles on iQiyi (with subscription) or via 🏴☠️ sources. Make sure you watch the uncut version if you want to see the full sex scenes.
Kinnporsche is currently somewhat unique in its combination of high chemistry, high heat romance with lots of non-romance-based plot, so if you like it and want more of the same, this is a useful post that attempts to break down the different elements that made it such a hit and guide you to other dramas available (as of September 2022) that can give you more of the same.
If you enjoy classic seme/uke dynamics and emotional romance: Until We Meet Again
⚠️This rec also comes with a major trigger warning, as this series opens with a fairly graphic onscreen double suicide, and also depicts homophobia, familial rejection, and physical abuse.
Until We Meet Again (aka UWMA) is the oldest of these recs (aired in 2019) and in the fast-moving world of Thai BL, it's already a little bit dated as a result. Because of this, I've been a little torn about whether to rec it as a good choice for newbies to BL dramas, and have already written and deleted about three different introductions to it here. I do have some caveats that I'll get into in a moment, but overall I think UWMA is a really emotional and moving BL with a solid story and a charming cast of characters, so if it sounds appealing to you, I think it's worth giving a go even as a newbie.
It's about a pair of college students who discover that they're the reincarnations of a gay couple that committed suicide about 30 years earlier, and struggle to heal the trauma the suicides inflicted on each other and their families. There's a great side couple, who were so popular they later got their own show called Between Us, and a lot of good friendship and family dynamics in addition to the central romance.
The main couple in UWMA has a fairly strong and classic yaoi-style seme/uke dynamic with a tall, assertive, and protective seme and a short, kind, and shy uke. Depending on your taste in BL dynamics, this might be a good thing or a bad thing. I must admit I'm a sucker for a good protective seme, so I enjoy this type of dynamic when it's executed well, but YMMV.
While I enjoyed their dynamic overall, it unfortunately does tip over into sex negativity at some points, as was common in older classic yaoi. I found the sex negativity to be a mild but persistent annoyance in a series I otherwise enjoyed a lot, but YMMV on this as well.
There are also some fatphobic jokes and a diet program product placement scene that had me going "that character would NEVER" - I recommend skipping it entirely when you come to it. The last thing that was a little jarring to my WASP-poisoned Western sensibilities was the amount of crying, but given the main plot of the series, the amount of crying was actually pretty understandable (I cried multiple times watching, too!) and that's something I feel like I should be working on getting over anyway. There were plenty of sweet and funny scenes to balance out the emotional ringers anyway.
This series is available with subtitles on Viki, iQiyi, and YouTube, and I have a page of recs for it here.
⚠️ the trailer also includes some clips of the suicide scene, starting right after Dean says, "I started to believe that I was Korn, who shot himself on that day" (approximate timestamp 0:13-0:35). These are followed by clips of the grieving families at the funerals and a scene where Pharm wakes from a nightmare about his past life mid-panic attack.
I just rewatched the trailer before adding it to the post and started crying all over again, which does kinda go to show how much the story affected me, I guess!
So, those are my top five Thai BL recommendations so far.
There are also some highly regarded Thai BLs that I still haven't seen. Here's quick notes on some of them based on what I've heard from friends and other BL fans:
One more quick note about Thai BLs: they tend to have the most obvious product placements out of the different BL-producing countries. Some are facepalm-level awful, others are hilarious. Or sexy. Or sexy AND hilarious. Some classics to watch out for in the dramas recommended above: the cat treats in Moonlight Chicken, the seaweed snacks in Bad Buddy, the soap in 1000 Stars, the chips in Until We Meet Again, and the bread in Kinnporsche.
Japanese BL
Japan is the homeland of the BL genre and Japanese BL dramas are often adapted from popular yaoi manga. Japanese BL series tend to have good stories, good production values, and good acting, so they're a great choice for beginners to BL. They often have classic seme/uke dynamics, but aren't afraid to switch it up a bit either.
Old-Fashion Cupcake is my top choice Japanese BL for newbies. It's a really sweet and life-affirming romance between a mature couple with a lovely portrayal of a middle aged man rediscovering his joy in life and coming to terms with his identity with the help of a younger coworker. As a bonus, there's some mouth-watering food scenes and a really stellar love confession scene. It's low heat, but the leads have excellent chemistry anyway.
It's available with subtitles on Viki and GagaOOLala. I don't have any recs for OFC yet, but if you love it and want to wallow in feels some more, heretherebedork on Tumblr has a lot of lovely commentary/meta and appreciation posts for it in their OFC tag.
Cherry Magic is my second choice Japanese BL for newbies, and my personal favorite. It's an incredibly adorable and sweet office romance with fantasy elements. There's also some lovely aroace representation from my favorite secondary character. The only reason I don't place it at number one is that it has some of the cringe humor I mentioned above, and the secondary character Tsuge in particular was too much for my secondhand embarrassment squick, so I skip through most of his scenes on rewatch. It also has more classic seme/uke dynamics than Old-Fashion Cupcake, which can be a plus or a minus depending on your personal tastes. Regardless, Kurosawa is one of the softest and sweetest semes around.
Cherry Magic is low heat to the point of being almost zero heat (the side couple kisses onscreen, the main couple does not), but the leads have very good romantic chemistry and are super cute together to the point that I find it almost impossible to watch them without breaking into a big, sappy grin.
It's available with subtitles on Crunchy Roll or via these fan subs, and I have a couple recs for it in my Cherry Magic tag. I can't find an official trailer for it, so here's a cute gif instead.
If you're not interested in sweet and fluffy dramas like OFC and Cherry Magic, consider My Beautiful Man as an alternative. It wasn't my personal cup of tea as it involves the whipping boy trope, which is not my favorite, but it's undeniably well-made. Like OFC and Cherry Magic, My Beautiful Man is low heat but has good chemistry between the lead actors, so you never doubt the characters really want each other. It's available with subtitles on Viki and GagaOOLala.
Korean BL
Korean BL dramas have some of the best overall production values and often have interesting (although short) stories. Like the best het Kdramas, the best Korean BLs tend to be very tropey, but to nail those tropes with fantastic execution. However, they're almost all low to zero heat and I personally tend to find them a little bit lacking in chemistry, especially compared to my favorite Thai BL couples. YMMV, especially if you value higher production values over better chemistry.
The one I recommend the most, and which I think has the best chemistry, is Semantic Error, an excellent enemies to lovers college BL that's available on Viki and GagaOOLala. My fellow bisexuals, this one is especially good for you, as it comes with explicit bi representation AND one of the all-around prettiest casts - male and female - of any drama mentioned in this post. I have a couple recs for it in my Semantic Error tag.
Another Korean BL I highly recommend is The Eighth Sense. It's longer than a typical Korean BL (10 episodes of about 30-40 minutes each) and has an emotional storyline that deals heavily with trauma and depression on the way to its happy ending. The main couple had very good chemistry and there was even a brief but lovely sex scene full of laughter and tenderness. There were some delightful side characters as well, although I thought the antagonists were overly one note.
The Eighth Sense is available with subtitles by subscription on Viki or via 🏴☠️ sources.
A few other popular Korean BLs that I've seen that would make good choices for BL newbies include:
Also be sure to check out Strongberry, which produces BLs that are usually even shorter than average for Korea, but with better chemistry, higher heat, and more realistic queer representation. AbsoluteBL has a useful guide to some of Strongberry's BL shorts and series.
Many Korean BLs are short enough that they're often re-edited into films, and several of the ones mentioned above have received this treatment. They sometimes get second seasons, but these often seem to involve the couple breaking up and getting back together, which is not my favorite type of story, so I've never watched one.
BL From Other Countries
I haven't yet watched any Taiwanese, Vietnamese, or Filipino BL, but I do have a few on my to-watch list and will update this post with recs later if I think any are especially good for new BL watchers.
Chinese Censored BL
Open depictions of gay and lesbian couples onscreen are currently illegal in China, but Chinese media companies are nevertheless producing censored adaptations of BL and GL webnovels and other source media. While the censorship is frustrating, Chinese BL dramas tend to be significantly longer than the BLs from any other country, have larger casts, and often have historical or fantasy settings with much more elaborate plots and worldbuilding than the (usually) modern BL dramas from other countries. If you love epic fantasy or historical fiction, censored BL Cdramas might end up being your favorites.
I have seen two: The Untamed and Word of Honor, and recommend both to newbies with some warnings and caveats.
Both shows deserve a ⚠️ for graphic violence, suicide, and other potential triggers, because god forbid we show two male lovers kissing onscreen but blood and gore is just fine. 🙄 Word of Honor also contains some rather disturbing ableism in one (fairly brief) subplot. Additional (spoilery) details on that here. Unlike Moonlight Chicken above, the ableism is NOT portrayed as negative, or even acknowledged.
The other main caveat is that first few episodes of The Untamed and the last few episodes of Word of Honor are rather confusing, due to a combination of censorship and low budgets. (Word of Honor in particular had such a small budget that a significant percentage of its production was funded by a gourmet nut company, and there's some hilarious product placement shout-outs to them sprinkled throughout the show.)
The Untamed is a genre-blending xianxia fantasy drama that combines romance, war story, political intrigue, family drama, murder mystery, revenge saga, and more. It was slow to capture my interest, due to the aforementioned confusing first episodes, but once it did, it consumed my life to the point of reading an average of about a million words of fanfiction a month for a full year after finishing the drama.
The official trailer is super spoilery for some reason, so have a music video instead.
There are a number of non-spoilery primers and character guides for The Untamed to help get you through the confusing first episodes, this is the one I used and here's one with a more thorough list of important characters.
Word of Honor is a villain4villain romance and wuxia fantasy about a former assassin attempting to retire by slowly committing suicide-by-magic out of guilt and grief for his lost sect brothers, and the head of a ruthless organization of outlaws who is hellbent on revenge for the deaths of his parents. Despite the censorship, it manages to include some of the most shameless flirting ever put to screen, plus it has a great script full of allusions and references to Chinese poetry and classic wuxia dramas, beautiful costumes, and fun action sequences.
A common point of confusion in the early episodes to clear up preemptively: the outlaws call themselves ghosts, but are not literal ghosts, simply ordinary humans who have rejected ordinary human society and morals for various reasons.
These dramas are both available with subtitles on Netflix (in some countries, including the USA: The Untamed, Word of Honor) and Viki (The Untamed, Word of Honor). They can also be found on YouTube, although the subtitles are not as good. I have a lot of fic and vid recs for both in my The Untamed and Word of Honor tags.
Although I haven't seen it yet, another very popular Chinese censored BL with a fantasy/sci-fi setting is Guardian, and I also have the historicals The Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty and Winter Begonia on my to-watch list.
BL Resources
Here are some resources and communities I visit to stay on top of BL news and upcoming series:
I also want to single out Absolute BL as a blog that's been extremely useful for me on my journey into live-action BL dramas. You might have noticed a couple links to them already in the post above. Their taste sometimes overlaps with mine and sometimes does not, so I read their reviews but don't necessarily take them as gospel. YMMV. However, regardless of whether their taste overlaps with yours or not, they also have tons of useful top 10 lists, discussions of common BL tropes, a weekly post with short reviews of what's airing and news about what's upcoming, and much more. A few posts you might want to check out:
I hope this post is helpful if you're interested in starting to explore the fun world of BL dramas!
I am still somewhat new to live-action BL dramas myself, having only gotten into them during the pandemic, but I have seen enough BL series at this point that I have some definite opinions about which ones I would recommend for first-time watchers.
I've included links to legal streaming sites for all the dramas recommended below, and multiple links whenever possible, as some sites, particularly Netflix and Viki, will region-lock some dramas. All dramas I've listed with Netflix and Viki links are currently available to watch there in the USA, but may not be in all countries.
A quick note: Cringe comedy is fairly common in Asian dramas just like Western tv shows and films, and just in case, I wanted to make it clear that when I describe something as "cringe" below, it's a reference to the style of humor and not a derogatory description.
Thai BL
The Thai BL industry has been expanding and changing rapidly in recent years, and right now it is the most prolific BL-producing country. The Thai BL industry tends to co-brand and re-use successful actor pairs, and many Thai BLs have some of the best chemistry in the genre as a result of the rapport they build up due to this system. Good chemistry is really important to me in romance television and film, so I tend to rank Thai BLs highly because of that. Thai BLs are less consistent in terms of overall production values than Japan or Korea, but the best ones can reach similar levels.
My favorite Thai director so far is Aof Noppharnach Chaiwimol, and these first three recommendations are all directed by him. His dramas tend to be easily accessible to non-Asian and non-BL audiences without being generic or bland, and to have solid production values, including good acting and cinematography. As an openly gay man himself, he also tends to have realistic queer character and relationship dynamics.
If you like mature, realistic characters and storytelling: Moonlight Chicken
This is my current favorite Thai BL. It's a beautiful and well-made drama that shows several generations of queer love, community, and found family set in a Hainanese chicken rice restaurant in the seaside town of Pattaya, Thailand. The main couple is played by popular Thai actor pair EarthMix, who are longtime friends in real life with great onscreen chemistry, and it's an age gap relationship (about 10 years difference) that begins as a one night stand and develops into a lovely slow burn romance with mature and thoughtful storytelling. The secondary couple is an adorable teen romance between a pair of high school students, one hearing and one deaf, played by talented up-and-comers GeminiFourth.
⚠️Homophobia, both external and internalized, and ableism play major roles in this series, so if you're looking for pure escapism, it isn't the best choice (see Bad Buddy below for a completely homophobia-free series). However, there is a happy ending.
It's available with subtitles on YouTube and I have one fic rec so far in my Moonlight Chicken tag (it just finished airing this month), and am hoping to find some more! I have additional (spoilery) commentary on it here.
If you like classic romance tropes: A Tale of Thousand Stars
Also sometimes called simply 1000 Stars, this is a very solid and enjoyable slow burn romance, also starring EarthMix, about a spoiled rich boy who receives a second chance at life via a heart transplant and volunteers to become a teacher in the remote village where his donor had worked. He soon falls in love with the village and its residents, especially the chief of the local forest guard unit. It has lovely rural Thai scenery and a fun cast of secondary characters as well, especially the long-suffering village doctor.
1000 Stars is lower heat than Moonlight Chicken, but the great EarthMix chemistry is still very much in evidence.
As a mild warning for my fellow secondhand embarrassment sufferers, this series has some, mostly due to the fish out of water elements, but overall I'd still describe it as low cringe.
It's available with subtitles on Viki and I have a couple recs for it in my 1000 Stars tag.
If you like university romance and/or enemies to lovers: Bad Buddy
This is a charming enemies to lovers BL set among rival families and rival faculties at a university in Bangkok. The main couple is played by experienced actors* Ohm Pawat and Nanon Korapat with delightful, rambunctious chemistry. Like most GMMTV series to date, Bad Buddy is low heat, but there's a great deal of cute horseplay-as-foreplay and one of my all-time favorite BL love confessions and first kisses. There's also a cute GL side couple.
Bad Buddy is available with subtitles at Youtube and I have a few fic and vid recs for it in my Bad Buddy tag.
* This is Nanon's only BL drama to date, but Ohm has appeared in several others, including the 2019 BL ghost romance He's Coming To Me, which was also directed by Aof. I enjoyed that one as well and only didn't include in this list because I didn't want it to be completely dominated by Aof. 😅
Moving on from his dramas...
If a sexy mafia romance sounds like fun to you: Kinnporsche
⚠️This one is a rec with trigger warnings and caveats. The mafia elements are dictated more by tropes and Rule of Cool than realism, but Kinnporsche is still a fairly violent show with warnings that include attempted rape, dubcon, torture, murder, captivity, abusive parents, and more. It also has quite a bit of cringe humor, secondhand embarrassment, and resulting mood whiplash, especially in the second episode, though it tones down somewhat after that.
Despite my strong secondhand embarrassment squick, I ended up enjoying this drama a lot thanks to the top-notch chemistry, hot sex scenes, exciting action sequences, and beautiful cinematography. The story is about a poor bartender who is forced to become a bodyguard for a rich and powerful mafia leader and ends up embroiled in both a messy romance with his boss and a power struggle between different mafia factions. Kinnporsche has a larger cast and more non-romance-based plot than your average BL drama and has been popular with fic writers as a result - there's already more than 8,000 works on AO3 in less than a year. You can check out my Kinnporsche tag for lots of recs and additional (spoilery) commentary.
It's available with subtitles on iQiyi (with subscription) or via 🏴☠️ sources. Make sure you watch the uncut version if you want to see the full sex scenes.
Kinnporsche is currently somewhat unique in its combination of high chemistry, high heat romance with lots of non-romance-based plot, so if you like it and want more of the same, this is a useful post that attempts to break down the different elements that made it such a hit and guide you to other dramas available (as of September 2022) that can give you more of the same.
If you enjoy classic seme/uke dynamics and emotional romance: Until We Meet Again
⚠️This rec also comes with a major trigger warning, as this series opens with a fairly graphic onscreen double suicide, and also depicts homophobia, familial rejection, and physical abuse.
Until We Meet Again (aka UWMA) is the oldest of these recs (aired in 2019) and in the fast-moving world of Thai BL, it's already a little bit dated as a result. Because of this, I've been a little torn about whether to rec it as a good choice for newbies to BL dramas, and have already written and deleted about three different introductions to it here. I do have some caveats that I'll get into in a moment, but overall I think UWMA is a really emotional and moving BL with a solid story and a charming cast of characters, so if it sounds appealing to you, I think it's worth giving a go even as a newbie.
It's about a pair of college students who discover that they're the reincarnations of a gay couple that committed suicide about 30 years earlier, and struggle to heal the trauma the suicides inflicted on each other and their families. There's a great side couple, who were so popular they later got their own show called Between Us, and a lot of good friendship and family dynamics in addition to the central romance.
The main couple in UWMA has a fairly strong and classic yaoi-style seme/uke dynamic with a tall, assertive, and protective seme and a short, kind, and shy uke. Depending on your taste in BL dynamics, this might be a good thing or a bad thing. I must admit I'm a sucker for a good protective seme, so I enjoy this type of dynamic when it's executed well, but YMMV.
While I enjoyed their dynamic overall, it unfortunately does tip over into sex negativity at some points, as was common in older classic yaoi. I found the sex negativity to be a mild but persistent annoyance in a series I otherwise enjoyed a lot, but YMMV on this as well.
There are also some fatphobic jokes and a diet program product placement scene that had me going "that character would NEVER" - I recommend skipping it entirely when you come to it. The last thing that was a little jarring to my WASP-poisoned Western sensibilities was the amount of crying, but given the main plot of the series, the amount of crying was actually pretty understandable (I cried multiple times watching, too!) and that's something I feel like I should be working on getting over anyway. There were plenty of sweet and funny scenes to balance out the emotional ringers anyway.
This series is available with subtitles on Viki, iQiyi, and YouTube, and I have a page of recs for it here.
⚠️ the trailer also includes some clips of the suicide scene, starting right after Dean says, "I started to believe that I was Korn, who shot himself on that day" (approximate timestamp 0:13-0:35). These are followed by clips of the grieving families at the funerals and a scene where Pharm wakes from a nightmare about his past life mid-panic attack.
I just rewatched the trailer before adding it to the post and started crying all over again, which does kinda go to show how much the story affected me, I guess!
So, those are my top five Thai BL recommendations so far.
There are also some highly regarded Thai BLs that I still haven't seen. Here's quick notes on some of them based on what I've heard from friends and other BL fans:
- I Told Sunset About You (Viki) - angsty, realistic teen romance, great chemistry, and some of the best all-around production values in Thai BL
- My School President (Viki) - cute teen romance starring GeminiFourth
- Not Me (Youtube) - leftist activists and identity porn, starring the very popular actor pair OffGun plus First Kanaphan, one of my favorite Thai actors
- Manner of Death (WeTV or 🏴☠️) - gay romantic suspense thriller starring MaxTul, an actor pair with some of the best chemistry and highest heat levels around
- 180 Degrees Longitude Passes Through Us (GagaOOLala) - a three person show reminiscent of live theater, age gap and lots of messy interpersonal drama
One more quick note about Thai BLs: they tend to have the most obvious product placements out of the different BL-producing countries. Some are facepalm-level awful, others are hilarious. Or sexy. Or sexy AND hilarious. Some classics to watch out for in the dramas recommended above: the cat treats in Moonlight Chicken, the seaweed snacks in Bad Buddy, the soap in 1000 Stars, the chips in Until We Meet Again, and the bread in Kinnporsche.
Japanese BL
Japan is the homeland of the BL genre and Japanese BL dramas are often adapted from popular yaoi manga. Japanese BL series tend to have good stories, good production values, and good acting, so they're a great choice for beginners to BL. They often have classic seme/uke dynamics, but aren't afraid to switch it up a bit either.
Old-Fashion Cupcake is my top choice Japanese BL for newbies. It's a really sweet and life-affirming romance between a mature couple with a lovely portrayal of a middle aged man rediscovering his joy in life and coming to terms with his identity with the help of a younger coworker. As a bonus, there's some mouth-watering food scenes and a really stellar love confession scene. It's low heat, but the leads have excellent chemistry anyway.
It's available with subtitles on Viki and GagaOOLala. I don't have any recs for OFC yet, but if you love it and want to wallow in feels some more, heretherebedork on Tumblr has a lot of lovely commentary/meta and appreciation posts for it in their OFC tag.
Cherry Magic is my second choice Japanese BL for newbies, and my personal favorite. It's an incredibly adorable and sweet office romance with fantasy elements. There's also some lovely aroace representation from my favorite secondary character. The only reason I don't place it at number one is that it has some of the cringe humor I mentioned above, and the secondary character Tsuge in particular was too much for my secondhand embarrassment squick, so I skip through most of his scenes on rewatch. It also has more classic seme/uke dynamics than Old-Fashion Cupcake, which can be a plus or a minus depending on your personal tastes. Regardless, Kurosawa is one of the softest and sweetest semes around.
Cherry Magic is low heat to the point of being almost zero heat (the side couple kisses onscreen, the main couple does not), but the leads have very good romantic chemistry and are super cute together to the point that I find it almost impossible to watch them without breaking into a big, sappy grin.
It's available with subtitles on Crunchy Roll or via these fan subs, and I have a couple recs for it in my Cherry Magic tag. I can't find an official trailer for it, so here's a cute gif instead.
If you're not interested in sweet and fluffy dramas like OFC and Cherry Magic, consider My Beautiful Man as an alternative. It wasn't my personal cup of tea as it involves the whipping boy trope, which is not my favorite, but it's undeniably well-made. Like OFC and Cherry Magic, My Beautiful Man is low heat but has good chemistry between the lead actors, so you never doubt the characters really want each other. It's available with subtitles on Viki and GagaOOLala.
Korean BL
Korean BL dramas have some of the best overall production values and often have interesting (although short) stories. Like the best het Kdramas, the best Korean BLs tend to be very tropey, but to nail those tropes with fantastic execution. However, they're almost all low to zero heat and I personally tend to find them a little bit lacking in chemistry, especially compared to my favorite Thai BL couples. YMMV, especially if you value higher production values over better chemistry.
The one I recommend the most, and which I think has the best chemistry, is Semantic Error, an excellent enemies to lovers college BL that's available on Viki and GagaOOLala. My fellow bisexuals, this one is especially good for you, as it comes with explicit bi representation AND one of the all-around prettiest casts - male and female - of any drama mentioned in this post. I have a couple recs for it in my Semantic Error tag.
Another Korean BL I highly recommend is The Eighth Sense. It's longer than a typical Korean BL (10 episodes of about 30-40 minutes each) and has an emotional storyline that deals heavily with trauma and depression on the way to its happy ending. The main couple had very good chemistry and there was even a brief but lovely sex scene full of laughter and tenderness. There were some delightful side characters as well, although I thought the antagonists were overly one note.
The Eighth Sense is available with subtitles by subscription on Viki or via 🏴☠️ sources.
A few other popular Korean BLs that I've seen that would make good choices for BL newbies include:
- Our Dating Sim (Viki) - an adorable and low angst second-chance romance with a sweet, domestic couple who are unusually touchy-feely for Korean BL
- Roommates of Poongduck 304 (Viki) - enemies to lovers/forced proximity office romance with great chemistry
- Where Your Eyes Linger (Viki) - bodyguard trope with good pining
- To My Star (Viki) - actor and chef forced cohabitation
- The New Employee (Viki) - office romance with more-realistic-than-average queer representation (for Korea) and a couple great female side characters
- Light on Me (Viki) - high school love triangle
- Color Rush (Viki) - interesting magical realism story, but does have an especially egregious "dead fish" kiss
Also be sure to check out Strongberry, which produces BLs that are usually even shorter than average for Korea, but with better chemistry, higher heat, and more realistic queer representation. AbsoluteBL has a useful guide to some of Strongberry's BL shorts and series.
Many Korean BLs are short enough that they're often re-edited into films, and several of the ones mentioned above have received this treatment. They sometimes get second seasons, but these often seem to involve the couple breaking up and getting back together, which is not my favorite type of story, so I've never watched one.
BL From Other Countries
I haven't yet watched any Taiwanese, Vietnamese, or Filipino BL, but I do have a few on my to-watch list and will update this post with recs later if I think any are especially good for new BL watchers.
Chinese Censored BL
Open depictions of gay and lesbian couples onscreen are currently illegal in China, but Chinese media companies are nevertheless producing censored adaptations of BL and GL webnovels and other source media. While the censorship is frustrating, Chinese BL dramas tend to be significantly longer than the BLs from any other country, have larger casts, and often have historical or fantasy settings with much more elaborate plots and worldbuilding than the (usually) modern BL dramas from other countries. If you love epic fantasy or historical fiction, censored BL Cdramas might end up being your favorites.
I have seen two: The Untamed and Word of Honor, and recommend both to newbies with some warnings and caveats.
Both shows deserve a ⚠️ for graphic violence, suicide, and other potential triggers, because god forbid we show two male lovers kissing onscreen but blood and gore is just fine. 🙄 Word of Honor also contains some rather disturbing ableism in one (fairly brief) subplot. Additional (spoilery) details on that here. Unlike Moonlight Chicken above, the ableism is NOT portrayed as negative, or even acknowledged.
The other main caveat is that first few episodes of The Untamed and the last few episodes of Word of Honor are rather confusing, due to a combination of censorship and low budgets. (Word of Honor in particular had such a small budget that a significant percentage of its production was funded by a gourmet nut company, and there's some hilarious product placement shout-outs to them sprinkled throughout the show.)
The Untamed is a genre-blending xianxia fantasy drama that combines romance, war story, political intrigue, family drama, murder mystery, revenge saga, and more. It was slow to capture my interest, due to the aforementioned confusing first episodes, but once it did, it consumed my life to the point of reading an average of about a million words of fanfiction a month for a full year after finishing the drama.
The official trailer is super spoilery for some reason, so have a music video instead.
There are a number of non-spoilery primers and character guides for The Untamed to help get you through the confusing first episodes, this is the one I used and here's one with a more thorough list of important characters.
Word of Honor is a villain4villain romance and wuxia fantasy about a former assassin attempting to retire by slowly committing suicide-by-magic out of guilt and grief for his lost sect brothers, and the head of a ruthless organization of outlaws who is hellbent on revenge for the deaths of his parents. Despite the censorship, it manages to include some of the most shameless flirting ever put to screen, plus it has a great script full of allusions and references to Chinese poetry and classic wuxia dramas, beautiful costumes, and fun action sequences.
A common point of confusion in the early episodes to clear up preemptively: the outlaws call themselves ghosts, but are not literal ghosts, simply ordinary humans who have rejected ordinary human society and morals for various reasons.
These dramas are both available with subtitles on Netflix (in some countries, including the USA: The Untamed, Word of Honor) and Viki (The Untamed, Word of Honor). They can also be found on YouTube, although the subtitles are not as good. I have a lot of fic and vid recs for both in my The Untamed and Word of Honor tags.
Although I haven't seen it yet, another very popular Chinese censored BL with a fantasy/sci-fi setting is Guardian, and I also have the historicals The Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty and Winter Begonia on my to-watch list.
BL Resources
Here are some resources and communities I visit to stay on top of BL news and upcoming series:
I also want to single out Absolute BL as a blog that's been extremely useful for me on my journey into live-action BL dramas. You might have noticed a couple links to them already in the post above. Their taste sometimes overlaps with mine and sometimes does not, so I read their reviews but don't necessarily take them as gospel. YMMV. However, regardless of whether their taste overlaps with yours or not, they also have tons of useful top 10 lists, discussions of common BL tropes, a weekly post with short reviews of what's airing and news about what's upcoming, and much more. A few posts you might want to check out:
- Top 10 BLs to SUCK in new fans - ABL's version of this post. 4/10 overlap with my recs here, 5/10 if you count my blanket Strongberry rec and their specific one. The rest of theirs I haven't seen yet, but most are on my to watch list!
- Top 10 BL Narratives With The Best Stories - A very useful list if you value good storytelling
- 10 High Quality & Cinematic BLs - A great list if you value high production values
- 11 BLs with the BEST Chemistry and 10 GREAT Chemistry BLs to Binge right NOW! - if you like good chemistry like me, these are good guides to some of the best in BL, even if the dramas aren't always the best quality
- High Heat BL - if you're in it for the smut 😇
- 10 BEST Low Heat BLs - Soft & Sweet (Safe to Watch with Parents) and BL series to get my very conservative, very religious mother to watch? - useful if you prefer low heat or want to watch with teen or preteen children or conservative parents
- BLs to recommend to your queer friend - starter BL recommendations for queer people
I hope this post is helpful if you're interested in starting to explore the fun world of BL dramas!
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[Just a reminder that both Netflix and Viki operate with region-locks which means that eg around here (Finland) neither The Untamed nor Word of Honor is available our Netflix but are on Viki. Guardian is region-locked on Viki but some episodes are available on YT.]
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For Thai BL, I also recommend Love in the Air.
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The sex scenes in LITA were so hot. I was happy to notice the fic fandom for that one has taken off a bit as well, I've been keeping an eye on the OT4 tag in particular 😄
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