I've always had kind of a love hate relationship with Chinese historical BLs. Some are genuinely excellent, but then there are others that cram in so much plot that keeping track of all the layers of betrayal and scheming gets exhausting, and I end up checking out mentally. Part of the issue is also just how much content is out there in this space, so something really has to stand out to keep me hooked. In this case, the production value is genuinely impressive, top tier stuff, but story wise, I just couldn't bring myself to actually care about these characters. There's a ton of political scheming and backstage manipulation running throughout. Somewhere in the middle of all that chaos, a hostage ends up falling for his own Prince Charming. The show runs eight episodes, each around 50 to 60 minutes long. After spending three years guarding the border, Fifth Prince Yin Qi gets called back to the capital because of a secret letter, only to end up walking straight into a deadly...
Captain Muengman finds out on his wedding night that his wife is actually a lady boy who ends up taking his virginity that night and leaves him. He is now assigned to take on a very special mission. On a banana cruise ship habited by many other ladyboys with their leader Golden Flower. Golden Flower wants to kill all men and women in the world so that it can be ruled by queers. To accomplish this mission, Captain Muengman need to aboard the ship which can identify of you are queer or not. So in order to complete the mission Captain Muengman and his navy team must disguise themselves as ladyboys to infiltrate Golden Flower’s hideout. A famous queer director is hired to teach them, who also uses this training opportunity to make a reality show kind of film out of the whole experience. Training concludes, the navy goes on the ship and of course defeats the terrorists.
There are a few other subplots of other characters as well. For example, we see that Captain Muengman's wife actually has a twin sister who is also on the ship to being her brother/sister back to meet their dying father. Not hat this story adds anything, but it just adds an interesting dimension. The training scenes were a bit funny when the director tries to make three macho men act queer. As I mentioned before, none of this is supposed to be taken seriously even for a second. The plot and the whole premise is as ludicrous as it comes but hey at least someone thought out of the box. So I will give it that. Also adding the touch of making a film while training was funny and it somehow worked. There are plenty of scenes where logic is thrown out of the window, but logic was never supposed to be the forte of the film, so it should be excused. Among actors, Captain Muengman stands out and so does the main villain Golden Flower. Everyone else is alright. The ending of the film is in fact funny, although I think we all knew exactly what was going to happen. (3.5/10)
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