SOUL MATE – 2026 – Japan/South Korea

BLISS RATING: ★+

“I realized that I don’t remember seeing your back.  Because you were always beside me.”  – Quote from Soul Mate

Overall, this is a series steep in the imagery of ferocity, harshness, and seemingly emotional intensity. But it is a ruse; a gimmick. You do not get to witness that fervent intensity until the VERY last scene when the very last line of the series is finally delivered. And even then, we never see our protagonists – our heroes, the emotional nonpareils – deliver the words: we only hear their words. I cried. I found that so profoundly sad. That, sullenly, I felt. We had to literally wait until the end to find out that they were deeply in love with one another. I cried because I wanted those words to be spoken much earlier. They never did.  Or at least inferred. They never were, and thus they never were.

The only emotion that this series gets undeniably correct is sadness. Unfathomable despondency. This is by far one of the saddest, if not the saddest, series I have ever seen on all appraisable levels. If you are wanting or expecting it to be emotionally passionate, you are going to be disappointed. Perhaps it might be better, ironically, to watch this series from its end to the beginning. Then the whole picture is made clearer. They got the editing all wrong.

This is a story of two lonely, repressed guys. One Japanese and the other South Korean; both of whom are surpassingly resplendent. It begins with Narutaki Ryu (Isomura Hayato) escaping to Berlin. The escape to Berlin is not just running away from a realization but also an escape mechanism from having to face who he really is. While visiting his childhood female friend Shinonome Sumiko (Hashimoto Ai), who is studying fashion, he has an unexpected encounter with a Korean young man named Hwang Johan (Ok Taec Yeon). Their encounter becomes full of symbolic meaning. The Church where they accidentally meet is burned down by a misguided young man who is confused and scared of life, much like our two protagonists. Although Johan saves Ryu, it strangely felt that maybe this was not what Ryu’s true karma was. A metaphysical bond now was being forced between them with their lives seemingly intended to be intertwined. In essence, they are unable to escape one another. However, while fate brought them together, it was up to them to define how their relationship would unfold.

The hardships and pains that Ryu and Johan face are legendary and perhaps would have broken others. But the fact that the two of them together had synergy which gave them strength to face everything that was thrown at them. Despite their closeness and seeing them together, we really could not define what their relationship was. It was obviously not romantic, despite both had gay tendencies. They never seemed to have an intimacy about them, although they would pledge to never leave each other. There was never any sense of amorous entanglement or even longing for one another. If anything, they treated each other more like brothers but not on an intrinsic level emotionally; like brothers would. I could not even call this a bromance because that would imply a deep emotional attachment between the two. However, that was never the case, honestly.

At the same time, they had a symbiotic relationship with each other, they still did not behave like an intimate bond existed between them. Respect, concern, friendship and an almost transcendental devotion existed, but no intimacy: I did not feel or see. It had the appearance of a platonic gay relationship (not my phrasing) but this seems the most apt description. They had no intimate relationship even though each might have wanted, maybe even longed for one. In the end, when it truly counted the most, Johan could not be genuine. He could not take the final step to defining love for him and Ryu. So, he, like Ryu, escapes and runs away from it; ironically, back to where it all began – Berlin.

This story is deceitful and deceptive. While it makes you think it is emotionally entangled, it frankly is not. It is just a brooding and melancholic chain of events. This unequivocally is not a BL but is a gay-leaning series that projects a message that screams: Beware all kinds of nasty things will happen to you if you even think about being gay and do not comply with the standard and acceptable format of living a ‘normal’ life. What awaits two guys who even consider liking one another has an outcome even darker, more sinister and more vile than imaginable. Yet again it presents another prime example of two guys having just a hint, a whisper of feelings for each other, and have never acted upon their feelings, but even these deeply buried thoughts will lead to despicable karma all around them, including affecting their friends.

Who really S.T.O.L.E. this series?  The acting in this series is nothing short of spectacular. Acting is not the issue with this movie. The protagonists took what is a nebulous plot and made the best of it. However, I do not think any of them really dug deep emotionally into who the characters were because frankly who the characters were, were meant to be vague. The closest person who came to being a full and complete individual was Hashimoto Ai as Shinonome Sumiko. In Berlin, she was a free-spirit and somewhat of a Bohemian. When she returns to Japan, Ryu’s best friend Oikawa Arata, played by Mizukumi Koshi falls madly in love with her and they become engaged. To say that they were an unorthodox couple would be putting it mildly. While she is pregnant, tragedy strikes and she is forced to not only become a mother but also live with Johan and Ryu. We see in her the internal conflict she has with trying to juggle being a professional career woman and mother at the same time. Hashimoto added depth and meaning to the role and in a sense, we see her grow and mature but not necessarily happily or contently. However, she does so at the expense of Ryu’s kindness and vulnerability. To put it bluntly, she used Ryu’s vulnerabilities to advance herself.

The series leaves many troubling elements and unanswered questions unresolved because of its overtly heightened theatrical presentation.

1. There should not be this much confusion as to what the exact relationship was between Ryu and Johan. What is the nature of their ‘love’? If they loved each other in the Biblical sense, why did we have to wait until the end to find that out? In addition, why did we not even get a chance to see that together? That was a cheap shot that simply left the audience feeling emotionally empty and continued to make the protagonists even sadder figures. The story is a ruse.
2. Why did Sumiko wait a whole year to tell Ryu that Johan is dying? I found her behavior unconscionable and reprehensible. She was at best tone-deaf or at worst down-right cruel. I tend to suspect it was the latter.
3. Why did we have to wait until the end to get the full picture of the encounter of how Ryu and Johan actually met? Again, that is a cheap production ploy that is unnecessary and diminishes the story; not pique its interest. Knowing this in the beginning would have helped significantly move the story along more smoothly and would have made the transition into the story more coherent. This story IS confusing and is made deliberately so by its editing.
4. Why is this story so purposively pathologically dark and painful? While I know bad things happen to people, these stories seem to heap disproportionate suffering on gay characters—or even on those merely perceived that way—making their lives relentlessly troubled and ending in tragedy. That is a sad commentary on how production companies see even perceived gay relationships as happening.
5. How Ryu handled his best friend’s confession could have been a real learning moment. Instead, they went into a troupe-driven, cliché standard format of him trying to commit suicide. While there is NO DENYING that this does happen, just once, I wish for a gay series this would not be use the standard operating procedure. How about doing something positive for a change! And how about making Ryu act a bit more understanding and respectful and impactful. While he has nothing to do with the suicide and did not cause it or influence his decision, he could have been more supportive of his friend. That whole portion seemed to be awkwardly handled and just quickly vanished.
6. The iconography in this series is just overwhelmingly negative. It did not matter how many ‘good’ deeds a gay guy (even conceived gay) could do. It will never be enough for him to overcome what his destiny is. His life will always be full of agony and end in tragedy. Gay will always equals pain.
7. I detest when series become deliberately obtuse and when stories do not recognize the agony and torment, especially in Asian cultures, these guys go through to admit to who they are. It is clear that Johan was gay or at least leaning to accepting that he was. Ryu struggled more so with it but obviously felt a ‘love’ for Johan. But none of that was honestly explored in this story. Just the ugly-side of their lives because of this connection. We never saw them having the remotest bit of pleasure, or intimacy, even with another individual. This story deliberately denied that aspect completely for both Ryu and Johan. That is unrealistic and flatly wrong. Ironically, this story, called soul mate, never once touched upon any aspect of what would have made these guys soul mates. I appreciate the individual who labeled their relationship as platonic gayness. For that is what it was. Their love was just below the surface of recognition. While they could not live without the other, they could not love each other. Neither their psyche nor cultural norms would allow them to do so. If in another time and place, their love would have redefined the term soul mate to soulmate.

When this series did not get so negative or dark (which was rare), it did a great job in storytelling. The warm, everyday interactions between Ryu and Johan were gentle and soft and nice to see. The interactions with Ryu’s parents and Johan were just a beautiful slice-of-life view. While nothing was said nor actually implied, somehow, I felt as if the parents ‘knew’ of their unspoken relationship and was accepting of it in surprisingly open terms. The gentleness and commitment to raising Sumiko’s child was a bonding part of their lives. It was disappointing that the series gave so little attention to the positive sides of life, which could have created a better balance. We understood early on that their lives were miserable.

If you are looking for a meaningful or redemptive relationship or even something that makes sense, you will not find it in this series. They took the talents of perhaps two of the most photogenic and handsome Asian actors and made them hyperbole. These characters were not real. They were not human. Mostly sad and lonely, repressed figures who truthfully never enjoyed life. I wanted more and they frankly deserved more.  I am so sick of seeing gay people being portrayed with groveling painful lives.

The saga tries too hard to convince us it is a story of intrinsic feelings. Sure, we are overwhelmed with ardencies, but we have no time to feel them. The story continuously takes us on along a journey into a world of hurt, leading into forks in the road that only lead to other levels of affliction. As if somehow, all this represents the only way life is for them. It does not. This odyssey became corpulent with deleterious effects and therefore hard, at least for me, to know what to sense and thus, I shut down. I saw and felt no real connection between the two of them.

I write my reviews as I see them and how I think the general audience will understand its message. If I was not gay, I would not frankly understand this series. Here is how I would see this series: Why were these two astonishingly handsome men together for so long and feel/make/sense no physical attraction towards one another? Was it simply a platonic connection? However, they had been through so much together, so why could they not be honest with each other, especially Johan, and say they had at least feelings for one another? Overall, it sure does look like guys who might like or even think they might like each other, will have horrible lives together. Gay life for real must always be lonely, full of pain, untruthful, and simply goes down a path of having to face nothing but one torturous dilemma after another. How sad.

Really!? Is this legacy you wanted for this series?