BLISS RATING: ★★
“You are not afraid to love you’re afraid of being loved.” – Unknown
Utterly crushingly disappointing. This series started out with such great promise and an enduring premise. But finished being afraid to really show what magical love is and ended up lame, stupid, and made to feel as if love between two guys is shameful.
It is a simple story revolving around Adachi (Eiji Akaso). To say that Adachi is a nerd sort of living in his own little world would be an understatement. He works in a company where he tries to blend in and do the best he can. Unbeknownst to him, he does have an admirer in the office who is one of his superiors by the name of Kurosawa (Keita Machida). Kurosawa is an incredibly handsome man who is admired by all the women in the office and envied by the men. But he is a very reserved person yet is polite and easy going.
Adachi only has one friend, Tsuge (Kodai Asaka). Tsuge is a romance novelist who is about the same age as Adachi. Much like him, Tsuge is a recluse, introverted, and lives alone with his cat. There is a certain irony in all of this since he is a romance author. They have been friends since their college days, and both lean on each other for support.
In accordance with the legend, if you are a virgin (loosely meaning) by the time you reach 30, you will become a ‘wizard’ and in this case, be able to read the thoughts of others by touching them. The only way to lose that wizardry is to connect through love with another person. When Adachi reaches his sexless 30th birthday, he wakes up and realizes that he can indeed read people’s minds by touching them. He is terrified and frightened by this power and does not know how to handle it.
When he goes into work, he accidentally touches Kurosawa. He can hear him say to himself how excited he is to be near Adachi, and he wishes he could express that he is wanting Adachi and would love to be with him. Thus, starts the journey to an amusing and fun ride of adventures.
Tsuge who also turned 30 is now also able to have the same power. He accidentally touches the very handsome delivery boy named Minato (Yutaro Goti). Thus, his amazing and goofy adventure to win over Minato begins.
These parallel stories take different paths to get to their destinations. In the scheme of things, Tsuge, who is just as inept at love as Adachi, is bolder and is able to overcome his anxieties and fears at a much quicker pace and subsequently loses his ability to read minds. (I bet you can guess how that happens). The relationship between him and Minato is rather endearing, and it is obvious that they deeply like each other, even though instinct tells us that they are opposites. Somehow, it works.
Adachi is not that secure or sure. He is painfully slow in dealing with realizations and looks at everything negative in his life as a roadblock and due to his unworthiness. It is obvious that Kurosawa is in love with him, and he knows that since he can read his mind. Yet, as he hones in on his reading minds, the more insecure he becomes, the more he needs to rely on its mind-reading power. Finally, he comes to the realization that if he lost his power, the relationship he has with Kurosawa would end in disaster. So, he breaks up with him because he cannot live with the power but is terrified to live without it.
Adachi meets up with Tsuge who explains to him that even if you do not have magic, you will be able to read each other’s minds. Truer words were never better spoken as that is a truism. He counsels him to read his own mind through his heart and his heart has nothing to do with magic. This is coming from an individual who was just like him. In that instant, Atachi knew what he had to do.
Who really S.T.O.L.E. the series? This might seem like an odd choice, but I think the rather enigmatic character of Minato played by Yutaro Goti is very interesting. He is the only one who seemed real and not faking it. What you saw was what you go. I loved his characterization of a character that does not stand out yet seems somehow so dynamic. He is not polished, yet he carries himself with a level of sophistication by knowing who he is. He is solid, knows himself, and incapable of phoniness. Kudos for showing complexities to an individual who was not meant to be so.
This is just a sweet story that meanders a bit but it’s aim is to show that in reality it is not outside magic that brings people together; it is the heart and its own magic which we possess. It is just an endearing and wonderfully told story, up to the end. Sure, there are some other characters involved in the series that add some comic relief. Rokkakuya (Kusakawa Takuya), is a well-meaning but bumbling co-worker who is as charming as he is irritating at times.
While this series is light fluff and cute, the ending, I am sorry to say, left me feeling empty and a bit taken aback. Adachi and Kurosawa do reconcile but in a very intellectual way and all of it is implied. I can excuse that based on who they were and the nature of the culture and customs they grew up in. But there is no physical connection at all with these characters. No magic moment of what should have been the highlight of this series. Both these actors appear very wooden at times and are not very demonstrative in their connections in general. In the end, they do not even come close to brushing their lips together let alone kiss and barely hug.
But in the next scene, as they obviously lay in bed together, Kurosawa tells Adachi ‘Merry Christmas” with a twinkle and a smile. (Are we supposed to stand up and cheer for that?) We are to assume that Attachi lost his virginity. Utterly disappointing. While it may be cute, it should have been magical, and we should have seen the spell broken; not in a bed scene but with a look and action between two people that would have shown that it was lost; not merely implied. There was really only one requirement here — and that was the kiss to end the wizardry. But it does not come. Utterly and profoundly disappointing in what otherwise would have been a pretty good BL series (do not forget; this is what the series is).
Look, for whatever reasons, the production did not include this BASIC requirement — that there must be some physicality between two people who are supposedly in love. That begins minimally with a kiss. The whole ending looked silly and so contrived and to insult us by trying to show us, indeed went out of their way to show us, that Adacchi lost his ability by placing them in bed, as if all that made it alright and acceptable. In reality, all that was essential it to make this series truly magical was a simple kiss. And we did not even get that. Sigh. This series should be renamed as Mythical Magic.
Let me put it another way. Can you imagine the outcry if this was a ‘straight’ story without a simple unassuming kiss that showed the world that they were in love? This is an insulting story and made me (as a gay person) not feel welcome at the table of love simply because you were afraid, ashamed, too graphic, actors did not want to do it, or any other number of euphemistic reasons to not show two guys kissing. We get no magical moment.
This is a forgettable series for me. I shall not apologize for my distain for this series and overall disappointment.
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