After having seen some good food based BL series, I was quite looking forward to this one. But despite having a high production, having spent money on presentation , decent actors, there are way too many issues with this show. The series is a classic example of a huge potential going to waste. There is absolutely no passion, no excitement, no drama, no connection; nothing. Of course, when expectations are huge, the disappointment is big too. I will talk more about it later. The show has 11 episodes of about 45 minutes each.
Aek is a university student. He is very interested in cooking since he was a kid. HIs mother runs small local restaurant in his hometown, but despite Aek's interesting cooking, her mother wants him to focus on academics and get a job so he doesn't have to work in kitchen very day. To make ends meet, Aek works as a food delivery guy. One day his food pick up at a high end restaurant is delayed, the chef Aue personally comes to apologize and gives him food as a sign of apology. Aek immediately recognizes the aroma. Impressed Aue offers him a job as a chef in his restaurant, which he initially declines because of his mother butter agrees to after being coached by his close friends. The two of them have a good tuning going on. Aue is looking to participate in a cooking contest in which he also gives Aek's name. This upsets him and he agrees to it later. In fact he even says that it has been his dream. While all this happens, we get to see some basic stories of some other characters. One day finally chef Aue opens up to his feelings for Aek, but he declines and says he thinks of him no more than a brother. Aek apparently is still too focussed on letting his mother down. The mother son finally have a heart to heart and Aek finally accepts love of Aue.
You must be wondering if that's really indeed is the plot of this show. Trust me, there is actually no plot. Amongst the many problems of the show. , one of the biggest is incoherent screenplay. They just keep throwing scenes at you without a proper thread. Since it was a food show, in which by the way, you get to see some gorgeous mouth-watering recipes, I wanted to give it a go, but it was hard to keep attention. Firstly the show moves at such a pathetic slow pace, right from walking to talking to everything else, you could even watch the show in 2x speed and still feel it is extremely slow. The conflicts are added just for the heck of it. Aek throw random tantrums. First he rejects job, then he rejects participation in contest, he then rejects the love; I was like what there'll is wrong with the guy. All his outbursts of emotions made little sense and they never explained why he was so paranoid about every little thing in his life, when most of problems were exaggerated and could be solved with one conversation. Not to mention that Aue was no less. Just because Aek likes food and is a good chef, was this the only reason that he fell in love with him. There is absolutely zero romance or love build up. And then less we talk about all the side stories thrown at us, the better. Suddenly we have Aue's ex who is befriending Aek. Then the restaurant manager girl's affair with some other chef and plenty more like these, which are not just boring but have zero bearing to the continuity of the show.
The show started off so well with its amazing production quality, stylish presentation and I was hoping for something sophisticated, but oh man! What a downhill it was from there. Literally nothing happens till like episode 6 or 7. Uninteresting drama, poor dialogues, unnecessary conflicts; all of these have no impact at all. Both Aek and Aue are decent actors and very good looking but their interactions are so watered down that you'll barely feel any passion between the characters. In fact, there's almost no intimacy between the two. The visuals of food were the actually only impressive part of the show. Everything else was mediocre, with mostly style and no substance. And I really don't know why everything was soooooo slow in this show. With good editing and some rewriting, this show could have been a good 1 hour film, but as it stands now, it is not bad but just a big bore. (4/10)
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Miisu-trying-to-see-the-positive-in-this-and-that :D
nothing misses your sharp keen eyes