Again, I am stepping out of the comforts of Thai BL dramas and dipping my toes into some new ones. This time around I landed on the highly reviewed Taiwanese BL drama, Kiseki: Dear to Me.
I have no clue what that title actually means, but I do know that this show had two couples with some insane chemistry. I also didn’t realize how recent this drama actually was. It’s a product of 2023, and it’s done so well that Thailand is looking to adapt it in the near future. That’s high praise! From a high level, this story focuses on the land of gangsters with grudges. High school student, Bai Zong, gets sucked into this world unwillingly when he stumbles across an injured Fan Zi. Through some light blackmail, Fan Zi has Bai Zong take him back to his small apartment to both help him heal and to hide from Zhang Teng and his gang.
After a lot of sulking and reluctance, Bai Zong and Fan Zi grow into a sort of natural rhythm, and it comes as no surprise that they both start to fall for each other. These two have CHEMISTRY y’all. Unfortunately, their love story is stricken by reality and so much insane stuff happens that I’m surprised they got their happy ending at all. Two tactics this show used that I both liked and disliked was how short the episodes were, and how much time passed over the course of twelve episodes. The short run time means that the fat was cut, as far as useless scenes and subplots go, but the amount of time that passed seemed to have cut out some potentially interesting details. A part of me thinks that this series actually could have benefited from having hour long episodes.
In any case, we got what we got and I was still pleased with the outcome. Fan Zi’s family history gets Bai Zong into some serious trouble on his behalf, but since Bai Zong is a minor, he serves a much shorter amount of jailtime. Bai Zong is fine with this fate, even though it will ruin his future as a doctor, because he truly loves Fan Zi. I think this period also helps him realize he doesn’t really want to be a doctor. There is some silly fake memory loss plot that gets thrown in and I was most mad about that because it cut time off for these two characters to spend together, but otherwise, I was happy they got to be happy.
This series also had a great secondary couple in Ai Di and Chen Yi. These two best friends have known each other since they were small and have a bond like brothers, though Ai Di has had feelings for Chen Yi for quite some time. Chen Yi must be blind to not realize this, but he is adamant that he protects Ai Di because they are brothers. After a night of drinking, the two go further and that pushes Ai Di to leave their criminal world and help protect Bai Zong in prison. It’s after this time that Chen Yi realizes his feelings for Ai Di are more than just brotherly, but it takes a lot of hard work for Ai Di to open himself up again. Don’t you fret, these two get their happy ending, as well.
It felt like this series was wrapped up into a neat bow, but it sounds like there’s some source material out there covering the romance of a tertiary couple and I’d be totally down to see that in the future! I also wouldn’t be opposed to more of this story, or even just seeing these pairings work together again in the future. The chemistry is that good! I was especially surprised to learn that in real life the actors portraying Bai Zong and Fan Zi are actually ten years apart! Anyway, this was another great BL and I can’t wait to see what else Taiwan has.