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Chained To My Bully Stepbrother (AI Vertical BL Drama)

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 ...

Best Sisters Forever (Mandarin Short Film)

A short film of about 35 minutes, focusing on love, life and most importantly friendship was a nice warm uplifting yet funny film, which deserves its own quick short review post.

Two 'queens' (I hate the word) gay friends (who call each other sister) have had a terrible misunderstanding  10 years ago. Snow thinks that Adu has been flirting with his boyfriend whereas the truth is that the boyfriend has all along been trying to force himself on Adu. Its been ten years since they were estranged when Adu left after that incident. A text from Snow bring Adu back in his life. Snow now has pancreatic cancer and his boyfriend took his money and left him few years back. The ‘sisters’ reminisce over the past while talking about the future. Though they are still very fond of each other, both have changed and a palpable tension can be felt over dreams unrealized and disappointments in life. Knowing their days together are numbered, the pair set out on a few adventures hoping to gain lost opportunities and make happy memories. Along the way, they make important discoveries about life, love, each other, friendship, and family.

Even though the story might be simple and straight forward, but it does teach us the importance of friendship, trust animist importantly communication. I know of so many cases where just because of lack of communication people drifted apart. Only if the friends (sisters) had talked through the miscommunication all these years ago, they would have cherished the ten years of their life they were apart. Sometimes ego gets the best of us and we stop seeing the picture completely. The good thing is here they reunite after 10 years and are with each other as friends taking care of one another. The two leads almost breathe life into their characters. You feel they have good chemistry and are really close friends. Since it was billed as a short film, you feel things removing too fast, which could have been improved upon. And even though the subject is sad, the dialogues are witty and funny; for example when Snow asks Adu to do her makeup after death. Such scenes bring alight heartedness to the film. Its not a great short by any means, but still decent enough. (5/10)

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