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...
Joey and Craig are roommates and their dynamic is warm but also a little uneven. He pays the rent and she doesn't, which means he gets away with things like asking Joey to stay in her room with the lights off when his Grindr date comes over because he's told the guy he lives alone. The film opens with Joey sitting with her therapist recounting this long winding story about how she met someone called Brian, slept with him, and how he turns out to be an alien. This monologue goes on forever and covers her whole messy history with Brian before eventually getting to how Craig came into the picture. When Brian reappears in their lives and their apartment becomes basically unlivable, the two of them end up spending a weekend at his place. Brian has this alien ability where a simple touch can calm and subdue whoever he comes into contact with and naturally both Joey and Craig find themselves drawn to him in ways they can't quite control. There's tentacle sex with Joey one night and then with Craig, and from there it just spirals into this chaotic mess of the two of them trying to figure out how to escape Brian while also being furious at each other for being attracted to him in the first place. There's also a woman who works for Brian and desperately wants to be his queen but he keeps her at a distance. It all builds toward complete mayhem involving sex, murder and a lot of gushing blood.
This film is going to split people right down the middle. It's crass, gross and graphic from the very first scene to the last and almost the entire thing is shot in a single location. I kept wondering if it was meant to be a satire of something that I just wasn't picking up on. Visually it's strange, both in terms of the special effects and just the general look and feel of many scenes. Credit where it's due, it's brave to even attempt something this different, but that kind of swinging for the fences approach is always a hit or miss. Here it mostly misses. The story is nearly nonexistent, with the characters just drifting around the house either chasing Brian or trying to undercut each other out of their own insecurities. Very little of it is funny or interesting. The comedy leans heavily on treating the whole alien thing in this deadpan matter of fact way but most of what Brian actually does isn't eccentric enough to be funny or threatening enough to be gripping, so it just kind of sits there. The actors do their job well enough and that's genuinely the nicest thing I can say. Oh and as I mentioned, Craig being gay and having one inter species encounter with Brian is really the only queer element in the whole film.
Some people will probably get a kick out of it but it just didn't work for me at all. (3/10)
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