BLISS RATING: ★★★★+
“Everything about you is documented in my head.” – Quote from Tide of Love Season 2
I simply adored this series! It is so allegorical and deeply intriguing. All the characters are emblematic. This is a thoughtful and insightful delve into an intense psychodrama. Do not get sidetracked by the ornaments and trimmings around the superfluousness of its mundane filming technique. They are distractions. Its aim is simply trying to answer the proverbial expression: Can love conquer all? Unquestionably and brilliantly, I might add, this sequence displays that answer. Perhaps darkly and broodingly and in a quirky fashion, but romantically at the end, if you keep an open mind to the journey.
One must look at this ongoing relationship of our protagonists from Season One from a symbolic standpoint. Who really is Han Jae Hun (Jung Myeong Cheol)? He embodies all the negative aspects of a relationships – jealousy, resentment, possessiveness, loss of love, and every other negative emotion that can tear a relationship apart. Who then is Kim Hae Jun (Kim Hyeon Seo)? He exemplifies all the positive aspects of a relationship – steadiness, omnipresence, and most importantly, love. These two take on new meanings and challenges in this season.
Intrinsically, they want to continue their relationship into an idyllic world, as long as their world is the two of them. For me this whole series represented a strange allegorical journey of two lonely men who find each other, saw something in one another that is clearly defined as love, even if the rest of the world says it is not, or wrong, or sick. For them, it absolutely worked and goes against all conventional wisdom of how we define a relationship should be. And for many of you, it drove you off the proverbial cliff; for me, I was mesmerized by the intensity and depth of their love which you literally could nor did not want to see.
However, once external forces (which are projected internalized forces) are thrust upon them that want to drive them apart, their world becomes tortured. We then see their love story fray, become more challenging, with the ugliness of the past come close to cracking their foundation of love.
Who really S.T.O.L.E. this series? Kwak Geon Hee as Kang Su Hyeok did. He is a good friend of Han Jae Hun. Their actual relationship is unclear and murky, and it is strongly hinted that they were undoubtedly at one time lovers. Long past. Kang Su Hyeok is a master manipulator and tries desperately to drive a wedge between Han Jae Hun and Kim Hae Jun. If you liken his personification to the imagery of the ‘devil’ on Han Jae Hun’s shoulder always trying to feed doubt, fear, temptation, and mistrust into his ear. Kwak Geon Hee is masterful as he represents all the dark, bad things that have happened to Kim Jae Hun in a cold, calculating almost seductive fashion. Even as an instrument to drive a wedge between them using several resources, he is unable to do so. On the other side of Jae Hun’s shoulder, representing the counterpoint to Kang Su Hyeok, is Kim Hae Jun, the ‘angel’, if you will. Is he stronger and more powerful? As dark as the story is presented, the point to this story wins out – love does conquer evil. However, forever lurking on Han Jae Hun’s shoulder will be the ‘devil’. He will always be a part of him and may from time-to-time rear his ugly head to try and disrupt their relationship when self-doubt/self-hatred/self-loathing creeps back in. That is his nature to want to do (as he so states at the end). Kwak Geon Hee’s portrayal of Kang Su Hyeok is eerily sociopathic but nurturing. Handsome and manipulative, he knows, for now, he has lost but not completely defeated – yet. Our demons somehow always seem to remain with us. Always young and forever present, if we let them.
This is an astonishingly disturbing and psychologically distressful as well as a painfully real portrayal of the reality of two men who are both aberrant. There is no question that Han Jae Hun had been abused by his father and grew up emotionally stunted and looked at love only as a result of a series of transactional exchanges. When he finds Kim Hae Jun who can see past the transactional nature of Han Jae Hun and still fall in love with the man – him – deeply, unconditionally, unequivocally, and without reservations. What kind of man would do that and why? Here was a rare individual who was willing to guide Han Jae Hun to feel love was genuine and not transactional. Kim Hae Jun showed this in so many ways that perhaps was missed. Although he ‘complied’ with his demands when Han Jae Hun slipped into his darker moments, he did so as a prerequisite – not love. When so, Kim Hae Jun became cold, distant, and resistant to his intimate kisses. Yet, he was there. He performed much like a waiter or servant would if serving a meal. It became meaningless to Kim Hae Jun and therefore after a while, it became meaningless to Han Jae Hun. When Kim Hae Jun showed love to Han Jae Hun, the servant then became the master. Not in any sense of a dominant role, but only in the sense that he revealed to Han Jae Hun that his love was unconditional and would always be there for him. A powerful and more powerful instrument for change than domination.
That point got lost in most individuals watching this series. This is not a BL obviously but a story of love, certainly not in a traditional sense but nonetheless just as real. Their romance was displayed in a different format. Unconventional for sure but a love that is deeper than any of the loves that are portrayed in the so-called world of BL. For this one dealt with painful realities, psychological traumas, and a love based SOLELY on accepting the other for who and what they are. Is that not the truest form of love? So many missed this beautiful point. It is the strongest form of love between two men I have seen.
It is an allegory of a love story told with archetypes and in a didactic fable format.
Frankly, this is one of the best made ‘near misses’ and has to end up on my “Must See” list because it is surprisingly evocative and esoteric.
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