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Chained To My Bully Stepbrother (AI Vertical BL Drama)

By Golu
This is the second vertical AI BL drama I've sat through, and honestly I went in knowing better. I had it on while I was doing cardio at the gym, and what struck me was just how much the plot echoed the last one I watched. Same step brother romance angle, same mystery girlfriend showing up near the end, same extra guy pining after one of the leads. Genuinely the only thing going for it was the runtime, the whole thing wrapped up in forty five minutes flat.  The setup kicks off with Finn moving schools because his mom just married into money. He finds out his new step brother Aiden goes to the same place, and he's warned to keep his distance from him. Their first run in at school is rocky, just like you'd expect, but there's this odd pull between them neither can shake off. Finn keeps telling himself not to read into it because Aiden's straight and openly homophobic. Things shift when some kids start bullying Finn and the student council president, Ryan, steps in to ...
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Counting For Thunder

By Golu
I heard someone say that this film was more like 'counting for minutes' and I couldn't have summed it up better. Apparently, a personal story by the lead actor of the film who also happens to direct the film; but fails to really engage the audience ins hat is it that he is really trying to say here.

The story is simple and straight forward. Philip is a struggling actor in Los Angeles who is called back to his home in a remote Southern town of Alabama when his mother reaches Stage 4 of lung cancer. The rest of the film is all about him reconnecting with his family including father and sister and his two friends in town; while taking care of his mother. Enter Joe, a neighbor who is in town fixing his parents home and went to same school as Philip and who suddenly starts flirting with Philip. The film also shows their growing relationship with each other, while they both know it is probably gonna be short lived. As expected the mother dies in the end but he cherishes the reconnections he has made.

The film has a lot of issues. Firstly the narration by Philip is so bland and uninteresting. We see scene after scene of random things but are those scenes and conversations supposed to contribute to anything to the story, I am not sure? No character besides Philip (who is by the way, in every single scene) is built properly. Whats the sisters deal? Why does he have a strained relationship with his father? Is he bisexual? Just one night before, he was sleeping with a girl and now he is with Joe! Also how much times actually passing by between these events? Has it been just few months o more than couple of years (since at one point someone mentions that the mother has been improving for over a year or something). Hows the family making money, if the son doesn't have a job? I have so many of these questions but I guess the director/actor was too busy just focussing on himself. He also looks a bit old for the part. Maybe, if the film had focused more on developing the relationship between Philip and Joe while the family is dealing with a tragedy; we may still have had something to look forward to.

I found the film really uninteresting. You are not invested in any actor and I really couldn't care less about anyone. If it was trying to make point, that did not cut through me. (3/10)
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