I honestly think this might be the first time I’ve actually enjoyed a proper horror BL. I’ve checked out a few others in the past, but they usually felt a bit unpolished or amateurish—I can’t even remember their names, to be honest. This one is definitely a slow-burn rather than a fast-paced romance, tucked away inside a world of supernatural mysteries and fantastic secrets. You can tell the production is high-quality and well-researched; it feels like the creators really pushed themselves to give the audience something fresh. If you’re into BLs mixed with suspense and ghost stories, this is right up your alley. Just a heads-up: it’s a massive time investment. There are 12 episodes, each over 75 minutes, and the finale is basically a two-hour movie. The story follows Khem, a young guy in his twenties whose life is getting harder by the second because of a heavy family curse that lets him see ghosts. There’s this terrifying rule in his family where the boys don’t live past age 20, so hi...
The primary story is about Kelli Peterson , a senior in high school in Utah, who was the first person to start a Gay Straight Alliance club in her school. What started off as a safe space for gay and lesbian people to be in their comfort zone soon turned into something that no one would have ever imagined. The event soon becomes political, where a small high school group becomes a national debate and before she realizes Kelli is fighting for her rights and eventually wins it. In between the main story of Keli, we are also told of stories of other very prominent historical figures like Michael Wigglesworth, a 17th-century Puritan cleric, at the 30-year love affair of Sarah Orne Jewett and Annie Adams Fields, at Henry Gerber's attempt after World War I to establish a gay-rights organization, at Bayard Rustin's role in the civil rights movement, and at Barbara Gittings' taking on of the American Psychiatric Association's position that homosexuality is illness.
One of the interviewers makes a comment that "To create a place for ourselves in the present, we have to find ourselves in the past." And this statement resonated with me quite well. We hear the love letters and other multiple anecdotes by some stalwarts said in a calm serene voice to give us the time to absorb the magnitude of what has happened. Having said that, I personally think that the documentary would have been a lot more impactful, if the focus had been only on Kelli, the Utah student. Her story is so fascinating, she is a charmer in interviews and is a very good orator. I would have loved to hear more of her back story and her family's reactions in her journey of coming out and the whole details of her fights for the gay straight alliance group. I felt that in hope of including many more stories form the past, the makers rushed a bit in telling Kelli's story. Besides that it was a quick easy watch and something I would still recommend people to watch and learn. (6/10)
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