Only Friends (2023) – BL Drama (TV) Review

Why is it so great though? Multiple reasons:

Although it’s a college BL, it doesn’t focus that much on studying and some characters are also from different majors, so there’s some variety.
The characters are toxic, yes, but it’s part of the plot, doesn’t get romanticized, and instead calls lots of toxic tropes out.
Bi- and pansexuality are actually acknowledged, there’s no “I’m only gay for you” or “I was hetero but you turned me gay” trope.
Instead of a love triangle, we have a heptagon.
Two lesbian couples.
There’s an age gap relationship.
Everyone basically got to kiss everyone, so if you don’t happen to ship the endgame couples, chances are you’ll at least see some kinda make-out between your ships.
Some of my favorite love tropes: “rivals to lovers” and “friends with benefits”.
Date variety: inline skating, music shop, laser tag, bookstore, halloween party, blind restaurant, wakesurfing, shirt shop, dark room photography, and some more. (Not the typical places.)
There are actually switches – no extreme top/bottom stereotypes and everyone’s treated like a man.
Wonderful chemistry between the actors, platonically, romantically and sexually. Sex scenes feel real, not acted, and the kisses are hot.
Pretty much everyone is gay in one way or another, but there’s also a hetero couple I got butterflies for.
No homophobia, as well as no coming-out-scenes; everyone knew already they’re gay/bi/pan/etc (well, except for one character later on) and no one minded that – every sexuality was normal and not highlighted.
Simply a chill series.
Also, finally a realistic representation of a bookworm/booknerd.
And the comedy isn’t too forced/much, but actually funny.

(The links above are anchor links, which will lead you directly to the paragraph it is mentioned in.)

College BL

While the plot is based on the main friends’ graduation project, it doesn’t focus on college or studying too much, but rather shows the partying side of college life. There are also characters from different majors/classes, so you don’t have the whole cast from the same studying field.

No homophobia or coming-outs

A very famous trope in school BLs is the “finding oneself” by a guy flirting with them and them figuring out they’re gay/bi/etc. That’s usually accompanied by homophobia, albeit most of the time it’s the fear of homophobia, the fear of not being accepted or even bullied, especially by their own friends.

That’s not the case here.

Not only because everyone already knows their sexuality, but even in public, no one is afraid of PDA or getting seen or whatever. Even their parents know which gender their kids mingle with and it’s never been a topic. No one hates themselves because of their sexuality either.

Really, every sexuality is treated the same. It’s not highlighted in any way, not seen as something special, just chill.

But at the same time, also, there’s no heteronormatism. When new characters don’t know the sexuality/interest of other characters, they ask, instead of assuming things. Or they lean in for a kiss right away, without worrying too much about it.

So chill.

Gender equality

Even though BL Dramas target more women than men and the audience is mostly women, the female characters in the dramas are usually treated very badly. Why? That’s something I don’t know either. I guess they’re just going for realism and the way they’re portrayed is simply the way females are also treated irl in Thailand (?).

However, not in this series.

It might be genuinely the first Thai drama – no, the first asian drama –, where women aren’t treated like shit. They aren’t used as whiny characters, who want their exes back, or as flings one of the guys can make out with, to make their partner jealous, or just as “decoration” to fill the room, but essentially have no lines/voice and no saying in a matter.

None of that crap here. They’re actually equal, are respected, aren’t whiny, have a voice and are likable characters. Just like with sexualities, the genders aren’t treated very different, have equal respect and it’s just chill.

Of course, since it’s a BL drama with 3 BL main couples, there aren’t that many female characters to begin with, but with what there is, it’s well done.

Stereotypes

Stereotype: Tops/Bottoms

Another “equality” this series does, is the way tops and bottoms in BL relationships are treated. Usually it’s unrealistic and not really the way actual gay relationships are, because, again, the target audience are women, and straight ones to that. And what is one thing straights can’t seem to accept? That every relationship is different, and when you say “love is love”, it doesn’t mean queer relationships are just like hetero ones.
Heterosexual relationships are technically the only genre where top and bottom labels should be used, as you’ll rarely find a same-sex couple, where there is only one person doing everything.

And this series finally acknowledges that.

Not entirely directly and there are still things to improve, but it is going into the right direction.
For example:

two “tops” get a sex scene,
multiple “bottoms” each have a make out scene,
both the supposedly top or bottom are horny,
and both have scenes where they lead the way.

While it’s not directly said they are switches, it’s not needed, when you can clearly see that the one who’s been more dominant, also enjoys it the other way round.

What this does, is, it’s acknowledging that they are both men.

The tops and bottoms stereotypes have gone so out of hand in the last years, that the bottoms in the relationship are completely treated like a girl. Studios make them usually shy, more feminine, more emotional, more “innocent”, and all that crap.

Again, not here. Both people in a relationship are men and are treated as such. The “tops” here are just as emotional or sometimes even more than the “bottom”. A beautiful portrayal of this is SandRay.

There’s also an age-gap relationship (the actors aren’t that far apart, but the character should have at least 10-15 years), and while the older one was seen to take the lead and be more dominant, he wasn’t a top-stereotype, too had emotions, and they both felt equal, both were initiating things.

Stereotype: Nerd

Oh, and another stereotype they dropped or went against, was the nerd character. While he does seem stereotypical at first (having that innocent vibe), it is actually – finally – a realistic representation of a bookworm. Yea, they might have no experience irl, but by reading a lot of books, you are quite experienced and knowledged in things.
That shows, for example, by him seeing through others more easily, details that are usually overlooked by everyone else, or when people are lying, and has more confidence with his boundaries. And he slays his villain era.

As a bookworm myself, I cannot express how happy I am to finally get a goddamn realistic representation of us. No kidding.

Toxicity

By deciding against extreme stereotypes or stereotypes in general, it does already take a lot of toxicity away, at least for the relationships itself.

However, this series is based on and revolves around the main characters being toxic, each in their own way. But the difference is that it’s not being romanticized, and the characters are called out for their behavior.

For example: consent. Even though with that much toxicity going on, every character does value consent when it comes to intimacy. There’s no sex where one is drugged (like in KinnPorsche) or where one is asleep (like in TharnType).
Especially Mew has quite a lot of scenes where he voices his boundaries and the other characters respect it without pushing or gaslighting him.
After-sex care is also a thing – no, none of the “I’ll carry you because your butt hurts”, but asking if they’re okay with it being a one-night-stand or how it was.

The toxicity in this series mostly is abut being toxic to oneself and how this impacts your relationships/surroundings.

Comfortable actors

The actors here are just as comfortable with intimate scenes as the ones in KinnPorsche. The kisses are hot – or cute, if the scene isn’t supposed to be hot. The sex scenes feel real and not acted.

Maybe that’s also because the actors have acted before together in series – mostly as background characters, though – and therefore know each other quite well.
And some have acted as couples before – FirstKhao, who play SandRay, are also a couple in The Eclipse, and ForceBook (as TopMew) are also in A Boss and a Babe, so they have experience/chemistry already. I haven’t watched either of those two series, but you can see they’ve done this before. Particularly FirstKhao’s chemistry slays.

But not only the “hot” scenes are good. The actors also have wonderful chemistry with the platonic relationships they play. And romantic too, of course.

Additionally, the best way to describe this series is by saying, “everyone gets to kiss everyone”.

Therefore, actors don’t just stay in their bubble with that one other actor they’re playing a relationship with, but you actually get to see different actors acting together, who maybe never were seen in a scene together. Actors got to experiment and expand their chemistry.

Also, not only actor-wise, but character-wise: chances are, that if you don’t ship the main couples and instead some random side character with an MC, it’s likely you will actually see a kiss or hook-up between them. Which is great.

I also love this because I got disappointed in Big Dragon with the “rivals to lovers” trope, and this series kind of fulfilled it. Well, not all rivals became full-time lovers, but did have at least some kinda intimate scene. And I’m so here for it.

Basically as if the writers said, “why let rivals fight verbally or with fists, when they could just make out with each other?” And I love them for it, lol.

Thus resulting in this series not having a love triangle, but an entire heptagon. XD

GL

Since SOTUS had an open lesbian character, it’s becoming more common for other BL dramas to include GL as well. Although most of the time, if there is any of that, it usually is a mention of a couple with no visual “proof” – and if there are visual scenes, the two women usually seem like close friends, nothing romantic, let alone sexual. Kisses are usually on the cheek and even those are awkward (*cough* Big Dragon *cough*). Of course I’m happy we get at least *some* representation, but why are they still so shy about it in 2022+?

When starting this series, I had no idea there even will be a lesbian character, but got surprised in the first episode when it’s confirmed the main girl has a girlfriend already, and then we actually got to see the girlfriend very soon! While they did seem a bit more distant than their BL colleagues, it was definitely better acted/directed/written than in other series. And they also got a kiss! On the lips! <3

Before I even got used to the openness of the series, Gmmtv introduces another lesbian couple. Can you imagine?? One GL couple already is something for a BL drama, but TWO?? That was one amazing surprise.
Even better: they’re not teens, but old adults. Two moms of one of the main character, and one of them is confirmed bi. Old queer representation is also quite rare, so that’s another plus point. Love Gmmtv for doing this. <3

Hetero

Yes, here too you have that “one hetero couple because they don’t want a queer-only cast” trope.

But it wasn’t actually too forced. The actors had genuine chemistry, it felt real (in a sweet sense) and it wasn’t out of place. Their scenes were short, but still made an impact.

I’m quite surprised myself, but this might’ve been the first hetero couple in a queer show that I actually got butterflies for, when they hugged.

Maybe also because they too dropped the gender stereotypes here, and it wasn’t about them being hetero, but rather just another two people in a relationship.

Sexualities

So, we have confirmed gays and lesbians (and heteros), but there’s more.

Bisexuality is actually a thing, and none of the tropes “I’m only gay for him” or “I was hetero but he turned me gay” exist.

There’s also a pansexual character – while it’s not said explicitly, he pretty much confirms it by saying, “I’m open to all genders, appearances don’t matter to me”.

There was also a bit of hinted poly, though, again, not entirely confirmed. But one character often mentions he wouldn’t mind a threesome (I counted 4 times throughout the series) and that he can have feelings for multiple people at once.

Demisexuality also kind of was hinted, by one character pausing a make-out scene and saying they’re not ready for sex because they don’t know that person. Only when they got to know each other more, they slowly got more intimate. When that maybe-demisexual character was making out with someone else he didn’t know, he looked quite uncomfortable, compared to other people he does know.

While it would’ve been nice if the labels had been used (like with gay and bisexuality), it’s still better than nothing and I am very happy for the diverse representation.

Comedy

As dramatic as a drama can be, every series will have some comedy. Some dramas have too much of it where it feels forced, others may have too little.

Here, I found the comedy to be perfectly balanced. There weren’t really any characters who explicitly served as a comedic relief, instead, everyone got to have some funny scenes. And it was actually funny.

Gotta add that point because most of the time I don’t really find all comedic scenes funny in dramas, even when they are technically good, but there’s always some scene I don’t like. Here, however, I don’t think there was ever a moment where I didn’t laugh.

Generally it was a very fun series, not just during the explicitly comedic scenes.

Yes, there is drama, but it’s not overly dramatic in a sad sense. They focus more on everyday toxicity you’d find in every random person, and not make it about sexualities or genders. That doesn’t mean it’s kept overly lighthearted, because it does tackle deep issues like depression, and one character also goes to therapy because of an addiction.

But for me, at least, it was a fun series that I could really enjoy in a positive sense and never be afraid of certain things.

For example, it’s also a meme/trend to make episode 11 in BL dramas to be full of sadness and heartbreak (because it’s two straight lines), but that wasn’t the case here. The heartbreaks or sad scenes were scattered throughout the series and there wasn’t really anything “special” about ep11.

What I didn’t like

Nothing is perfect and of course there are things I didn’t like.

“Couples have to be endgame” trope.

With particularly one couple (won’t spoiler which one). Even though they would be better off separately, the producers feel like they couldn’t risk that much because fans would die if their OTP isn’t endgame. I personally didn’t ship them much from the beginning, and while I do see their well-developed growth character-wise, I think it would’ve been a much better lesson to let them go separate ways.

Dramas in general always have that idea that relationships last forever, so, even if it’s toxic, you’ll have to fight for it, because you’ll never find the same again. Sure that’s true in a sense, as no relationship is the same, but what if you find something better?
Just because you have both changed each other to a better person, doesn’t mean you have to get together again. Some people in your life are simply meant to be lessons for you to do better in your future.

I’m not too angry with this, because they did let one couple go their separate ways, albeit for a bit of a different reason. (Not gonna spoiler which couple.) And that was really great.
Still, though, I’m not too much of a fan of that other couple.

The crying scenes.

Some actors did a really good job with the crying scenes and I’m not annoyed by them in itself, but rather the amount of crying scenes two particular actors got. Khaotung (Ray) and Mark (Nick).

Khao already had lots of crying scenes in Tonhon Chonlatee, and, just like with Gun (another gmmtv actor), they’re kind of obsessed by his skill, so end up overusing it. At least it wasn’t in every episode and didn’t feel too forced (like Gun in Theory of Love), but maybe 1-2 crying sessions too much. (Although I’m not sure which ones should’ve been cut, because they are well done…)

Overall

Compared to everything I did like, the negative points are very minimal. Overall I enjoyed it, will now watch FMVs of my favorite couples/characters and definitely recommend it to anyone.

The entire series feels like Gmmtv simply wanted to try some new things out, without having any real “goals” or targeting a specific audience (in the BL fandom), and I really love that. It totally became my favorite series from them. I hope they do more like these or at least aren’t afraid to be more adventuresome, instead of chewing the same tropes over and over again.

I really hope there will be a 2nd season, as it has been hinted in the last episode, but nothing confirmed yet.

Watched the series: 8th – 9th January 2024
~Arden Skye

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Criteria	Scores	Our Score
Acting	1 – 5	4,5
Script	1 – 5	4,5
Cinematography	1 – 5	5
Soundtrack	1 – 5	5
Originality	1 – 5	5

Only Friends (2023) – BL Drama (TV) Review

Why is it so great though? Multiple reasons: