I don’t know what’s been with me lately, but it took me entirely way too long to both watch and finish this “new” Korean BL, Thundercloud Rainstorm.
And I liked it, is the thing! I feel like I’ve been really bad on watching TV shows these days. Instead I find myself getting sucked down the black hole that is Youtube. Which I’m annoyed at myself for doing because there are truly a ton of shows that I both want and need to watch. Like, tell me why I haven’t seen the newest season of Slow Horses yet when I’ve been cursing Apple for holding onto it for so long after filming wrapped? No excuses, just disappointement. Hopefully the surge of viewing I’ve done this week on a handful of shows is the inspiration I need to start watching more.
Thundercloud Rainstorm honestly should have been a three day watch for me that I somehow spread over the course of the last three months. Inexcusable. Anyway, from the highest level possible, you could categorize this show as enemies to lovers. But I will break it down a bit more. We first meet the almost desparately pathetic Iljo on the day of his adoptive father’s funeral. Since he’d been his father’s caretaker for the last however many years, this loss hit particularly hard. To add insult to injury, his “brother” is furious that his father left his house to Iljo and starts to beat him up outside in the pouring rain.
It’s here that we meet the stoic, angry, and mean cousin, Jeonghan. I think mainly out of pity, he invites Iljo to his own home to get back on his feet. It’s a little unclear to me if the house is held up in some sort of legal thing, but that’s the reason I’m sticking with to explain why Iljo hangs around for so long. Adding to his problems is an emergency surgery, of which he doesn’t have the funds to pay for. Jeonghan suggests he can be paid back through “his body.” I, like most, would probably assume that means housework. And it does for a little while. But then we learn that Iljo has been harboring a crush on Jeonghan since they were in grade school.
I also don’t really think it comes as much surprise that Jeonghan has also been crushing on his “cousin.” Soon, Jeonghan relents his impulses and strikes up a physical relationship with Iljo, much to his astonishment. The chemistry between these two is strong! The first half of this show is terrific, so I wish they would have just made it a four episode thing, or just kept going in the same direction. They added some rather confusing story elements that had Iljo leaving, then coming back, and a bunch of other things that made me want to scream into my television screen. Alas, they do eventually get their happy ending, but I could have done without all of the convoluted drama.
What could have been a more highly rated BL on my list sadly fell flat. However, I really hope the two lead actors do something else together in the future. I was really surprised to learn that Iljo was played by the leader of disbanded K-Pop group Wanna One, Jisung. And I was even more surprised to learn that the actor playing Jeonghan has been a close friend of Jisung’s and that they completed their military service together! That explains the easy chemistry, but I would not be doing a series like this with one of my close friends….either way, I’m not mad about it. Hopefully more from these two in the future!