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Light On Me - Blog Posts
Korean dramas I love.
Light on me. On Viki and it is the best love triangle drama. Boy wants to have friends and falls in with the school council and their problems. Adorable and you can’t hate any of the protagonists.
Devil judge. Dystopian universe where a judge takes down powerful people through the media. I ship the male leads because they have great chemistry but it’s not canon. Great drama and amazing acting, rather dark themes.
Colour rush. A soulmate bond between two boys and how it develops. A boy lives in a black and white world and meets the boy who brings his colour. Dark themes of suicide and murder but happy ending.
Strong girl bong soon. Girl has super strength and her journey as a hero and finding romance. Amazing male leads. Has funny parts but explores ideas of femininity. On Viki and Netflix.
Sweet home. A apartment complex fights monsters as they deal with the end of the world. Horror filled, gory and has amazing action. The characters are well written and the drama is brilliantly filmed. High key recommend. On Netflix.
Strangers from hell. Slow thriller with gay undertones. Subtle creeping horror with murder and amazing acting. The build up is good. On Netflix.
The uncanny counter. Puppy dog protagonist and found family vibes. Boy searches for the person who killed his parents whilst banishing evil spirits. Supernatural. Really well done, the mc is so adorable. On Netflix.
Mr heart. Adorable tale of what love is and what it can mean to a person. Gay drama, there is a movie version too. Could be filmed better, but they had a small budget. On Viki.
The tasty Florida. Another short gay drama. Adorable and fluffy about a restaurant and romance between a chef and a new boy to the city. On Viki.
My sweet dear. Enemies to lovers. Rivalry between two chefs for a restaurant position. Short bl drama. The actors are beautiful. On Viki.
True beauty. Girl tries to find her idea of beauty through makeup and environment. Explores how girls can view their self worth. On Viki.
not so quick pitch
Light on Me (2021 - Korea)
Rating: 10/10
Foundational Romance Trope: friends to love triangle
There were some who thought this BL slow, and I get that, but really it’s just subtle and quiet. With Light on Me, Korea gave us an honest to goodness high school set BL with some classic old school yaoi tropes almost like they were doing a bit of a,
“now that we’ve hit our stride, let’s perfect the vanilla sheet cake BL style.”
It was great, of course, but very refined and elegant which some found off putting. It made me think of something like this…
It’s what Korea does, repackage and perfect vanilla cake into this pretty glowing confection of precision joy. I’m cool with that. By all means, please include BL in the Hallyu take over. This is the K-pop of BL En-Hyphen style, manufactured super-powered cute but… restrained.
But that doesn’t make it any less gut wrenching to watch. In fact, it makes every subtle tentative movement of care that ShinWoo attempts that much more telling. It makes every fear of exposure that prevents DaOn from taking action that much more traumatic. It makes every moment of TaeKyung’s brutal honestly and blunt communication that much more powerful.
It’s like that intense moment of focus on the hand flex in an Austen adaptation - we are awaiting every crack in the sugar sculpture with bated breath.
The filming in this show was precision engineered. The frame was kept uncluttered, characters appeared exactly in the center, there was little visual noise, and the lighting was full on, even in night shots. To me this reflected the character of TaeKyung - honest and almost stilted in his mannerisms. I feel like the director filmed this series as if the show itself were TaeKyung: careful and clear and specific.
This may come off as one-note or simplistic to a casual viewer but it’s actually quite difficult to film something so precisely and still make it interesting to watch. It forced the viewer to focus almost entirely on the actor’s faces, their nuanced emotion, and their interpersonal relationships to the exclusion of all else. Lucky for us those actors served the lens beautifully.
There is literally NOTHING distracting about this directing style. It’s like the camera was a neutral white room, a well-lit gallery in which the narrative hung suspended for us all to stand and stare at in hushed silence.
A love triangle has never before looked so perfect or been executed so perfectly, and it never will again. All BL love triangles that come after Light On Me (and we will get them now) are going to be unfavorably compared to this show.
When I posted about Korea’s history with BL, I talked about how strategic and clever they are with tropes. Light on Me is a master class in how to use tropes to manipulate audience sympathy so they can’t decide which pair they prefer. Korean BL never just throws in a trope without purpose - they calculate its impact on story structure. Basically, LoM used this technique to infect fans with Second Lead Syndrome. It’s SO GOOD.
So yes, Light on Me was cleverly engineered, but it was also SPECIAL, and here’s why:
This show gave us a small cast of beautifully acted complex and sympathetic characters and dwelled on their different motivations, communication styles, and narrative roles. It gently explored not what it means to love, or even be in love, but what it means to act on love, and what that says about integrity and emotional courage. In doing so, it managed to treat its characters with integrity too. And not just the three main characters but the mentor, the faen fatal, and the best friend support characters too.
This show felt very fair. Fair to its characters. Fair to its story. And fair to us, the watchers.
For me this BL was classy, a real winner, not the least of which because they NAILED the landing, including the final kiss. Korea is DOMINATING 2021. Like seriously. What’s going on here?
Full analysis of the love triangle trope under the context of the second half fo this BL here.
Bravo, Korea.
(source)
Sae On: This will be my first kiss scene of my career.
You Seok: This is my first romantic drama, first kiss scene.
Sae On: Same! 😲
Sae On: I will never forget this experience. ☺️
You Seok: I love you, Taekyung ♥️
Sae On: 🙈☺️🥰😄
The fact that this is both their first kiss scene in their entire career makes the kiss scene and the entire series more meaningful and more memorable!!
All I can say is, LEE SAE ON AND KANG YOU SEOK BEST BOIS!!
Thank you for waiting for me. And for having such honest ears.
This may be pretty weird and really minimal but I really appreciate how Light On Me doesn't make fun of picky eaters? I feel like most of the time, people don't truly get it, especially with neurodivergent folks. Actually, I want to say, as an autistic person in general, that this drama makes me feel safe and loved. Taekyung's neurodivergency is accepted by everyone and a key point to the plot. The characters love him for who he is and learn more about themselves thanks to him. It doesn't matter if it's intentional or not, the representation feels more genuine and respectful than in other series where they have a canonical autistic character.
Light On Me makes me feel validated, hopeful that one day we will find people that understand us and treat us with kindness.
i can not tell you how happy i am these 2 are together they deserve all the cute and happiness
#just boyfriend things 🥺
that finale was perfect.
i don't think any other drama has handled a love triangle as healthy and softly as light on me did. how each character grew and did what they said they were going to do: change for the better.
how the two "rivals" still managed to keep being friends and not hold their "grudges" or whatever against each other. still just vibing, like friends should.
HOW SHINWOO AND TAEKYUNG STILL MANAGED TO BE BOTH CUTE, AWKWARD AND STILL BICKERING LIKE THE FIRST TIME???? the only thing that changed was them now being allowed to be disgustingly cute as boyfriends WITH SO MUCH HANDHOLDING and not caring what other say.
light on me really did that with the budget that they had, twice a week, 16 eps and 20min run time. one of the best series of 2021. don't even try to change my mind.
THEY LEARNED ABSOLUTELY NOTHING
Light On Me, Ep. 16: Can I Walk You Home?
Daon learned how to say no.
Taekyung learned how to have friends.
Shinwoo learned how to be more expressive with his feelings.
But not a single one of them learned how to throw a surprise party.
LIGHT ON ME (2021)
i’m wearing the boots you gave me. you told me to wear them and not be nervous, but… i’m really nervous. if you feel nervous on stage, just look at me while you talk. there will be a lot of people in there, so how will i find you? i’ll stand where you can see me. somewhere you can see me at once.
LIGHT ON ME (2021) EP. 15
You are the Prince in everyone's heart ❤
without needing a reason.
noh shinwoo. what? i saw that you sent me messages. a lot of them, actually. what if i never saw them? i didn’t care. i just… figured you’d realize eventually. then… were you thinking about me all this time? yes. yesterday, today and probably tomorrow, i will continue thinking about you.
LIGHT ON ME (2021) EP. 13
the symbolism in light on me
everyone's been talking about light on me displaying a whole lot of symbolisms to show the growth of the boys' relationships and the contrast between tae and daon and tae and shinwoo. im not gonna repeat them all, but here's the one i noticed today.
have u all stopped to think about the difference in purposedly forced things and fate-like accidents?
with daon, it all seems a little forced, like everything had to be done on purpose for it to happen. they met bc tae decided he wanted to make friends and purposely joined the student council. they becane friends because daon purposely forced encounters with tae to make him feel more at ease and open about people and friendships. they started liking each other for this exact reasons, bc they kept meeting through acts of help and kindness that were planned by them both.
with shinwoo its different. the first time shinwoo saw him was by accident when he saw tae helping the man carry the trash bags, and then accidentally saw him reject the hang out with those boys in class and the ONE time he tried to purposely force an encounter with him by bumping into his shoulder, it went wrong and nothing came out of if. still, fate seems to have brought them together by chance, by mere coincidences. like how they met, and how tae found out about shinwoo 's feelings purely accidentally bc he happened to want to get his phone fixed that day. also, the way tae accidentally found the keychain that had been bought for him in contrast to him purposely giving the bracelet to daon.
to me, all of this points that things that are meant to be are never forced, they come to you when u least expect them and they are often the most precious things that will happen to you in the end.
This is ✨ PEAK ✨ romance and no one can tell me otherwise.
make a moodboard revolving around your icon/profile picture
thank you for tagging me dira!! <33 @tichawongtipkanon
i’m tagging @yuhaosturtle @lcveislove @oh-aew + @isakeijjser if y’all want to!
Thank you, Noh Shin Woo. I’m serious. If it weren’t for you, I would’ve collapsed on the street from crying. You’re exaggerating.
Mr. Seo giving more gems of advice on a teachers salary.
Crying today because I learnt that -
if someone lets you go because of lack of courage and not being able to take a stand for themselves, don't worry. Because there'll definitely be someone out there who'll always be there to lend you a shoulder or open their arms to comfort you.
when he wants to give you something, but you’re a dumbass
Love Triangles & Tropes
I have to talk about love triangles for a moment and it is all Light on Me’s fault.
Most BLs don’t employ true love triangles. Instead they throw in a faen fatal as a plot device who is obviously not a real threat to the main couple for various reasons:
They’re an underdeveloped character with little back story.
They’re the wrong gender.
They enter late in the narrative and/or have very little screen time.
They engage in no significant romance tropes with the lead.
With a faen fatal we all know that our two boys will end up together.
A love triangle is different.
In a love triangle the audience actually believes the second lead has a good chance of winning over the main character. The second lead is given back story, is the correct gender to be competition, and has significant screen time. And, of course, tropes are used to make the burgeoning romance believable.
Guess who is great on love triangles and even better at giving audiences bad cases of Second Lead Syndrome?
Why yes, that would be Korea.
When I posted about Korea’s history with BL, I talked about how strategic and clever they are with tropes. I think this is one of the reasons they are so good at believable love triangles.
But so far they haven’t given us a love triangle in BL… until NOW.
Light on Me is the Perfect Love Triangle
For the purposes of argument (and because of various elements like the lingering gaze, romance narrative conceits, focus of the camera lens etc) I am going to go with the following:
TaeKyung = our POV or main character (uke*)
ShinWoo = Lead (seme)
DaOn = Second Lead (seme)
* In addition to specializing in soft low heat BL, Korea likes a slow burn romance and a weak seme/uke dynamic. So we are going back to the original definition of uke: basically the character the others are pursuing and want to take care of.
Light on Me is using heavy hitting BL tropes to weight TaeKyung’s options fairly. Almost every time the director doles out one significant trope to SinWoo they will then give the same trope to DaOn or vise versa. It’s so smart and fun to watch I started keeping score.
Crash Into Me AKA Proximity Alert
(Camera then shows ShinWoo watching this, when it’s a trope he already got to have with TaeKyung.)
Messy Eater
(Camera then shows DaOn watching this, when it’s a trope he already got to have with TaeKyung.)
Meet Me In The Library
Head Touch
(Honestly I am Team ShinWoo solely based on this neck grab.)
Wound Tending
Light on Me is a master class in how to use tropes to manipulate audience sympathy so they can’t decide which pairing they prefer. Basically, this is how you infect fans with Second Lead Syndrome. It’s SO GOOD.
Also, did you notice how they spaced this flip-flopping out at first, but then it got closer together? Crash into me with seme 1 then not with seme 2 until a few episodes later. But as the series progresses and the tension increases, the same trope for one seme comes closer in time to the same trope for the other seme, until finally at the end of episode 8, both semes want to wound tend TaeKyung in the same scene! Which mean’s this show is also pacing its tropes to amp up love triangle tension.
This is clever enough to be mind boggling. I can’t even.
On the other hand, they will dole out specific tropes to each seme (that the other one doesn’t get to have). So ShinWoo got to tie the shoelaces. But DaOn loaned the umbrella. SinWoo gets to grab and physically demonstrate interest. DaOn gets to flirt and verbally indicate interest.
Partly this is because TaeKyung is on an enemies-to-lovers arc with SinWoo, but on a friends-to-lovers arc with DaOn (see True Beauty). But also it’s because the two semes are very different personalities.
Similarly the narrative parcels out TaeKyung’s responses accordingly.
So TaeKyung collar grab’s SinWoo. This is a trope that is always uke to seme in an agro relationship, because when an uke acts aggressively you know something is going down. It’s commonly used to give uke agency for the first kiss (see We Best Love). TaeKyung also rescues ShinWoo from bullies and gets hurt in the process, another aggressive move with relation to this particular seme and more common in enemies to lovers (see PeteKao in the Kiss series).
Since DaOn is on a friends to lovers track, TaeKyung is a lot softer with him.
In fact TaeKyung keeps trying to take care of DaOn, and even performs some seme acts of service (even though he’s the uke character), which is Korea being unbelievably clever with their love triangle. I mean how can we not root for them as a couple?
Look, I’ve seen the seatbelt trope a million times but only PeteKao have ever flipped it so far as I can recall, and that’s just because Pete keeps getting beaten tf up. This is the kind of proprietary behavior (see also buckling on a safety helmet) only performed by seme on uke.
Also TaeKyung took care of DaOn when he was sick, remotely, but still he used the umbrella to tell DaOn who was doing it. This is playing with the idea of mutual responsibility and partnership which is very unusual in BL, and makes me like them as a couple all the more because they act on an equal footing. Mutual care is adorable. (See Oxygen for more of this kind of exchange.)
The interesting thing about DaOn as a second lead is that we know more about his back story than we do our mains. We know he is a neglected child, a people pleaser, and the ultimate caregiver. We watch him fall in love with TaeKyung because TaeKyung is the first person to give DaOn care back. Of course he wants to hold onto that. Also it makes DaOn very very VERY sympathetic to watchers.
It got bad enough in episode 8 that I begin to wonder, despite all the many narrative clues, if DaOn actually might win TaeKyung in the end.
See what I mean?
Second Lead Syndrome!
I know this has been a praise post, but flipping heck do I hate a love triangle. Because ARGH I want them both!
Bravo, Korea.
