BLISS RATING: ★★★★★
“Sex is the consolation you have when you can’t have love.” – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Painful, melancholic but erotic. This is not your typical BL series because it centers around persons who are now a bit older and are on their way to careers. So, it is way more pensive. It involves a rather complex and, in a sense, deeply lustful relationship between Kijima Rio (Takezai Terunosuke) and Kido Shiro (Yoshida Munehiro). They were former college classmates, but fate brought them together. Kido is an editor of porn novels and convinces Kijima to try his hand at it, since he is a very gifted writer who now is down on his luck. Thus, begins a journey of no return for both men. They meet up with a top writer of porn novels, Gamoda Ikuo (Oishi Goro), who is dying and wants to write his manuscript. What transpires from that meeting is how the journey to an intense relationship between Kido and Kijima begins. Ikuo, perhaps, unwittingly, or perhaps not, is the catalyst that changes their lives forever.
This is a profoundly sad and painful story of what will be an unrequited relationship. This story is one of intense lust that I am not sure every carries over to a love or even liking. It is fantasy that is lived out but never fully is satisfying enough. There are some of the most intense erotic scenes in any BL series I have seen but are obviously not pornographic. Since these are older guys, the whole feel of these scenes is not carnival like but one in which the world stops for a brief moment so that this intense connection between them happens and that will always remain with each of them. The irony of having mad passionate sex at the funeral of Ikuo is so fitting and yet in essence it symbolized the beginning of the end of their intense connection.
These two men understand each other in more ways than each lets on. Deep down, they both know that it is not their destiny to be together. Each changes the others in ways that only come to fruition later in their lives. You want these two to be happy, but they realize that each must be happy in accordance with their own private destinies. One succumbs to the norms and traditions of the society while the other does not. It was meant to be that way and they both know that.
The irony of this series is not the lack of a happy ending but of one of real life and real outcomes to the decisions that we make, and where life takes us. At the end, as Kito drives off, he thinks to himself, “somewhere in my heart there will always be a flickering flame [for Kijima]. I think that flame will flicker until my dying day.” That sums up this story in magnificent simplicity — this intense connection in which time stops. It may never happen in many people’s lives, but when it does, it leaves you feeling empty, sad, yet glowing for having met someone like that. I know from personal experience what that is like. Like this story but still different. You simply never forget. It is like two ships passing in the night.
Who really S.T.O.L.E. the series? This series is a quiet gem and so brilliantly acted. Kudos to Oishi Goro who played Ikuo with a grittiness yet displayed a quiet human understanding of the role. And an understanding of others. Honorable mentions to Takezai and Yoshida who also put their souls on the line in this series and made it feel raw, gritty, and utterly intense. They made this series authentic.
This is a profoundly moving series. Hard to watch without becoming a bit melancholy yourself. The beauty of this series is (perhaps for me only) was to realize that no matter what happens in their lives or in their current relationships, they shared with each other an intimacy and connection to each other that touched their souls and impassioned their deepest fantasy of lust that very few people ever get to experience. That can never ever be taken away from you. No matter what, that is worth celebrating.
This is not a BL and its story goes beyond love and into sex. It is one of the best examples of raw sex between men that sometimes happens with the reality that it might be more meaningful than any love relationship. It is brilliant.
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