always keep the faith

BkDk Inktober Day 4 (2023) - "Fantasy" + "Rain" Decided to combine two prompts today because I liked the atmosphere. I'm really proud of this one ngl!! 🌧

BRIDGERTON 3.02 | How Bright the Moon

Sometimes actions truly speak louder than words. Silence can speak incredible volumes, and in a really touching way. Some things don’t need to be said to have visible meaning. (insp)

#my two last braincells talking to each other

Fantasy Kacchan. Love of my life. Reason for breathing. The greatest man of our generation.

Also, I post my WIPs, PSDs and animation frames on Patreon

A comic I made back in march

Hold him just because.

"Draw your best friend!"

My body just moved on its own.

bonus:

✨Eddie " ( ◞•̀д•́)◞the nope◟(•̀д•́◟ ) " Munson✨ （3/?）

So, this is my part of the Teen Wolf Reverse Bang, which is a few months old already. I’ve worked together with tabris and as soon as possible and as soon as I know I will add the link to her story.

OSCAR ISAAC as MARC SPECTOR/STEVEN GRANT MOON KNIGHT (2022) 1.03 • The Friendly Type

Top 10 BLs Out of Korea

(Presented in order of my personal preference.)

Korean BL in Brief 

Korea has been in the BL sphere for longer than people realize, second only to Japan. This is probably because it has not been particularly prolific or consistent until Strongberry entered the field in 2017. (Prior to that it was mostly microfilms.) 

Korea’s first BL-tangential gay film was No Regret in 2006. Which, in keeping with tradition, ended in death and was full of obsession etc. However 2009′s Just Friends? (GaGa) took a huge leap forward dealing with themes of coming out, family acceptance, and mandatory military service. It’s not really BL, it’s queer cinema, and I like it a lot. It ends happy, so give it a try. It has a certain flavor in filming style, honest emotion, and nested realism that you’ll see color all of Korea’s offerings going forward. 

Starting in 2017, Korean queer film production company Strongberry started producing romantic microfilms (mostly BL some GL). To date their only full series is the excellent Long Time No See (2017), which is a mafia hitman gay romance. (Most of their stuff is on Vimeo and GaGaOOLaLa). They specialize in microfilms, some of which are quite quirky but always enjoyable. I always look forward to something new from this studio, here’s my favorites, all end happy. 

Here’s Strongberry’s exo talking openly on their YouTube channel all about the BL industry and queer production in Korea. He’s remarkably honest (and totally adorable).

Aside from Strongberry, the first Korean BL series of any length to make waves was Where Your Eyes Linger, which seemed to bridge the gap between Long Time No See’s hitman and true BL by using a bodyguard trope but in a school setting. 

The success of that series rather opened the floodgates. It was followed by Mr Heart a more traditional BL and then lighter fare like Wish You. 

Korea has a marked preference for limited cast, short runs (6-8 eps) that can be cleanly repackaged and cut together into 1-2 hour movies. But they honor these offerings with high production values and talent; great wardrobe, makeup, and lighting; workman-like yaoi influenced cinematography; and excellent sound & music - as one might expect from studios familiar with churning out K-pop music videos. Similarly, they often cast idols in lead roles for roll-over fan appeal. 

As far as story is concerned, Korea tends towards: 

They really like a weak seme/uke dynamic (so less heterosexually dysmorphic than Thailand but not as queer affirming as Taiwan) unless it’s set in high school or university. Their narratives tend to be lower heat (Strongberry excepted) with nothing more than a kiss at/near the end, in keeping with the purity standards of their het romance K-dramas. This means there are very few consent issues but it can feel a touch sex negative. 

Nobleman Ryu’s Wedding was positioned to cause major waves, as it featured most of these narrative elements as well as 3 established BL actors from 3 of their heavy hitter series. Korea was gunning for crossover eyeballs from both BL watchers and Untamed obsessives - and this was the way to do it. Unfortunately Korean BL often has distribution issues and that limited NRW’s international reach. They tried again with Tinted with You that had better distribution and a bit more success. But historicals seem to still elude them. 

All in all, I would call Korea very smart and strategic in their production of BL. 

You can watch me lose my tiny mind when Korea finally gave BL the ultimate love triangle (a K-drama speciality) in Light On Me. 

You can watch me loose it again when the unexpectedly executed the perfect university BL in Semantic Error. 

This is part of a series on top 10 BLs from each country coupled with a history of BL.

Where to watch it? 

Korean BL mostly launches in a way that is difficult to find internationally (sometimes you can catch a rip under a half-day time window on YouTube but it rarely lasts long) but it usually ends up on Viki or GaGa. Strongberry is officially on Vimeo and GaGaOOLaLa (which also has quite a few other Korean BL microfilms and older pieces from 2014-2016). 

Also possibly of interest: In which Devil Judge forces me to get into Hallyu marketing tactics, bromances and queerbaiting with regards to (non BL but maybe bromance) K-dramas. 

(This post’s top 10 is as of March 2022. source)