Prior to watching this drama, I watched the two episode prequel which I very much enjoyed and felt was a setup for an excellent story. Instead what came to pass was a cheap story that very much deviated from the one begun in those two episodes and left me feeling disappointed and thinking of what could have been. I don't know who approved those changes, but I blame them for ruining what could have been something great.

If you too are planning to start this drama after watching the prequel, I urge you to stop right now. There are so many differences in terms of tone, story, and characterization that it serves little to no purpose to watch it beforehand. Watching it set me up for failure to like this drama from the get go because of those changes. Rather, I would recommend watching them apart and viewing them as two separate entities, albeit with the same characters and general story. Just my two cents.

Aside from the deviations from the prequel which I'll get to in a bit, this drama is just full of problems. The story makes no sense. Phu's decision to disappear for 10 years seems very over the top here. I understand being afraid of rejection, but to ghost your best friend for 10 years because you don't think he'll return your feelings? That's a tad dramatic. The decision to have half the male cast swooning over Nan was also unnecessary and didn't feel realistic. The drama it added didn't do anything to move the story forward really or at least not in a way that couldn't have been done in another fashion. Killing off Phu's grandmother was predictable and, again, unnecessary. Honestly, there was so much that was unnecessary in this drama. But having her die right after he and Nan finally confess their feelings was not okay. Also the whole thing with his grandmother thinking it was better to hide her condition. Like, really? That never ends well. The final episode was a trainwreck and full of more unnecessary crap. Khunkhao did not need to end up being Phu's half brother. I guess it gave them a way to end their feud, but it was lazy. Similarly, the plane disappearing with about fifteen minutes left was just stupid. What was even the point of that? There wasn't one. The pacing was atrocious, mostly I think because we have eight or so episodes of when are these two finally going to get together. It's dragged out far too long and we're left with almost no time of them together as an actual couple.

One of the biggest issues with this drama was the complete lack of communication between the main characters. Phu's failure to communicate with Nan led to their 10 year separation. And both of their failure to communicate afterward led to them almost missing each other again. The level of self-sabotage on both their parts is just astronomical. We also never see them have an actual conversation about what happened 10 years ago. Even when they finally confess their feelings for each other, we don't get to see them have an honest conversation about what went on between them, why Phu felt the need to leave, why Nan was hesitant to express his feelings as well, etc. Nan's anger at Phu is never really addressed either. It's there for a moment and then it's pretty much just swept under the rug and not mentioned again. In general, I don't think we got to focus enough on the myriad of emotions that both men had to be feeling, but especially Nan. I think his initial reaction of happiness made sense. After 10 years, he was just happy to know that his best friend was alive and back in his life. But eventually, those other emotions, not just anger, but sadness and confusion, would have come to the fore and while we saw glimpses of them, we never really saw them dealt with or even acknowledged to any degree. And then there at the end, Phu's lack of communication leads to a fight between them. Thankfully they finally have a moment where they do communicate and Phu tells Nan how he really feels about him going to China, but it's also a bit of a situation of too little too late since Nan had committed to going by that point. This is one of those dramas where I want to bang my head against the wall, because if they would only communicate, most of these problems would have never come up. And while lack of communication is incredibly popular in BLs for moving the story forward and creating drama, I find it extremely lazy. If you want drama, there are other more creative ways to go about it.

While Phu's reaction to run away was overdramatic, I found Nan to be more realistic in his reactions. Things like avoiding the fact that both Party and Khunkhao were attracted to him. He wasn't interested in either of them beyond friendship, but it seemed obvious that he could tell they were attracted to him and just didn't want to go there. He's not encouraging to either one, he doesn't lead them on, at least not in my opinion, but whenever they try to express their feelings, at least until they outright do so, he puts them off, creates some distance between them. I think a lot of people do that and not just in that situation. We think that if we avoid the situation, it'll go away. Clearly that didn't happen and he was forced to confront both men. Similarly with his comments that he wouldn't want to start a romantic relationship with a friend. How often do we say things that we don't necessarily mean as a way to protect ourselves? It was so obvious that he loved Phu but was too afraid to face that. Besides their lack of communication, fear was a primary barrier that prevented Phu and Nan from getting together sooner.

The characters were okay, but not amazing. I preferred the Phu from the prequel. He came across as more confident, less self-conscious than he was in the drama and less afraid. Don't get me wrong, the fear was still there, but he didn't let it control him as much. Here he just felt kind of weak and almost cowardly. I never felt he really took responsibility for his actions and the damage they caused. Nan's character was more consistent which I appreciated, but I felt he lacked the depth he had in the prequel. He became more one-dimensional which was disappointing to see. The other characters were tolerable, but nothing great. Frankly, aside from Party who was the only down to earth one, the rest were just annoying. Gigi with her tarot cards and mumbo jumbo was annoying most of the time. Also, who wears clothing like that at a professional job? Don't get me wrong, she's a beautiful woman who can rock probably anything she puts on, but it was just jarring to see the guys wearing suits, the other women professionally dressed and then she's there in a crop top and mini skirt with a suit jacket. Man was unbelievably annoying. I really wanted to see Ken give him a proper dressing down, but of course that never happened. I don't know why Ken kept him around when he was so completely useless. Khunkhao just came across as a jerk. I liked him better in the prequel as well. His character seemed more subtle and interesting there. Here he was just possessive and overbearing. I liked Party both for his personality and character. He was smart and dependable, but not flashy about it. I liked his courage in confessing to Nan and his maturity when he was rejected. I also loved how he treated Phu. He was never rude to him even though they both loved the same man, he gave him fair warning when he decided to confess to Nan, and after he was rejected, he not only gave Phu advice, but also helped the pair get together by blocking Khunkhao. Aside from him, Dena and Grandma get honorable mentions. I really liked Dena in both the prequel and here. Despite being a minor character, she had a great presence and like her brother, I appreciated that she didn't fly off the handle when rejected and turn into an ass. One thing I will say for this drama, I liked that they didn't use a woman to come between the leads. Yes, there's one minor scene where Nan misinterprets events, but I don't really count that. But Dena wasn't a harpy and once she realized she had no chance, she gracefully bowed out. Grandma was fun with her sassy attitude. I enjoyed her and her friends and the way she razzed on Phu. Their relationship was very sweet.

The acting wasn't terrible, but again, not amazing. For that, I am laying full blame though on the script and director, mostly the script though. There's only so much you can do with garbage. I actually like Kun and Kiak together. I thought their chemistry was promising and they interacted well with each other. I preferred Kiak's acting over Kun's. His performance was more nuanced and he was more emotive, especially with his facial expressions. He also managed to convey a good amount of emotion just with his eyes. Kun wasn't bad, he just tended to stick to one expression more. It's like he would get stuck in a rut for a bit then realize he needed to use other expressions. He doesn't have the same amount of experience as Kiak though and again the script was awful, so I'm not writing him off yet. I liked Boss as Party. His expressions were great and I just really enjoyed what he did with the character.

All of the negatives with this were just compounded by one primary problem, the glaring differences between the prequel episodes and the drama. I really enjoyed those episodes. They weren't perfect, but I liked the tone of them, the emotions, the depth, the symbolism, and the maturity. I felt it worked quite well. The drama though just went in a whole other direction. Gone was the more mature and serious tone of the prequel. Instead, we get a weak rom-com that got maybe two laughs out of me. It wasn't funny or clever. Most of what they seemed to think would get people to laugh were in fact just annoying. I'm thinking of Man specifically who seemed to be included to bring laughs but was about as unfunny as they come. The very story was altered. In the drama, Phu and Nan share a kiss and Phu panics and disappears. In the prequel, Phu is planning to confess his feelings for Nan in what I'm sure would have been a much more romantic scene than what we got, but instead sees Nan apparently accepting the feelings of a girl they know. He leaves thinking that he missed his chance. While still an over the top reaction, it made more sense and I could get onboard with it better than the kissing excuse. We also get left with the understanding that Nan is aware of Phu's feelings as his landlady essentially told him, revealing how Phu had carefully picked out the flowers in the bouquet he planned to give to the one he was going to confess to, the exact same style of bouquet as he received on his graduation day. We also have the symbolism of the pocket watch Phu gave Nan which I loved. The way it stopped working and then right before they meet again, it starts again. I was so sad they completely left that out. The one area I will give credit to is that Nan's episode gives background to his relationship with Khunkhao and how they meet and develop a relationship. There are more minor discrepancies, like the comment in the prequel that they're from the same faculty but different majors whereas in the drama they're both marketing majors which, as a side note, made no sense since Phu makes a comment about not knowing how to market his grandmother's coffee farm. Also the girl Phu sees confessing to Nan is named Gigi, but it's unclear if she's supposed to be the same Gigi from the drama. Presumably not since they're played by two different actresses and neither she nor Phu acknowledge ever having met before in the drama. But truly the biggest differences were just the tone, the story and the way the characters acted. I couldn't stop comparing the two and the fact that they were night and day just left a bad taste in my mouth and really colored my perception of the drama.

This is yet another drama in a string of dramas or specials I've watched recently that had so much potential and then just fell flat. I can only imagine how amazing this drama could have been if it had explored its character's emotions and motives, spent less time on the drama and focused more on our leads rebuilding their relationship and taking it to the next level. A lot of dramas leave the love confession until the end, but I think this one had the unique opportunity with the prequel episodes to get that out of the way early on and follow up maybe with Nan struggling to come to terms with a confession after 10 years and Phu having to rebuild that trust like I mentioned before. It would have given us the opportunity to see them together as a couple and all the challenges that would bring. It's just so disappointing that this is what we got. In all honesty, I wouldn't recommend this drama. Go watch the prequel and stop there unless you want to be like me, haunted by what could have been.