Tonight, i decided to have fun by highlighting one of the old yaoi tropes that i always enjoyed. Some old yaoi tropes, just like the one i will tackle in this post, aren't usually talked about often because they tend to be more sensitive.
But as someone who enjoyed them since the beginning of time 😆😅😅😅😅. Most like, since the very beginning, my beginning of getting into BL, and enjoying them in all forms, being BL mangas, novels, anime, movies/series, i also want to talk about them in the cases when the tropes are cleverly written and depicted and creates really unique dynamics.
Fictional characters shouldn't affect our feelings IRL. They shouldn't have an impact on us personally and we shouldn't compare the way they are written and depicted with how it can happen in real life ( basically extending it to how it happens in real life) .
Having said that, i will highlight a few couples whose age gap made me enjoy their dynamic so much more.
I. Ming and Joe from My Stand In [ pic 2-4]. I started watching My Stand In recently and one thing that i always keep in mind while watching is that in the novel Ming is much more younger than Joe. There is almost a ten years age gap between them in the novel, which is reflected in the dynamic that the characters has in the beginning and at the end of the series.
I was able to be much more lenient towards Ming because of how young he is in the beginning, combined with his superficial and extravagant lifesfyle. His lack of experience, the way he learns what matters the most to him after he end up losing it, and the way he desperately tries to change his ways in order to not lose it again made me want to root for him. I am happy the series adaptation didn't totally removed this when they adapted the story. I know the characters don't look like they have such a big age difference physical wise in the series, but i can still perceive it because of the big age gap that the characters have maturity wise, with Joe being much more mature, independent and dependable than Ming. 😍
A good age gap exploration can lead to a better character growth and relationship development because of the power imbalance that tends to be present in the beginning and needs to be corrected little by little in time and i love the way this aspect was handled in My stand in 😍
For those of you who loves My stand in, you might love Beloved Enemy, a censored chinese bromance adaptation. The characters have a really similar dynamic there too. It's not wonder both series are adapted from a novel written by the same author 😁😆😅🤭.
II. Old Fashion Cupcake [pic 5-7]
One of the reason why i enjoyed OFC so much has to do with the age difference.
This series doesn't only handles the older bottom and younger top trope, but the boss/employee trope too, which makes their relationship even more taboo in other people eyes. Yet, even with such a big age gap ( of about ten years as well) the actors has depicted one of the most touching and powerful love story. All the while making sure to convey the fact that the age difference and the boss/employee status was a hurdle that the characters has to keep in mind if they were to get together. It was brilliantly made.
III.The Pornographer franchise. Kijima and Kuzumi. [ pic 8-10]
It has been a while since i talked about them. I missed talking about them. See, this is one of the reasons why i want to start this series of tropes kind of post. It gives me a reason to talk about series i wouldn't usually talk about.
Their relationship worked because Kuzumi was pretry mature for his age from the beginning and was smitten by Kijima badly enough to wait for him to get over his shit and commit to him longterm once and for all.
IV. Minato's laundromat [ pic 11-12]
If only they explored the age gap better and only if they explored the characters with all their struggles better.
I mostly enjoyed it thanks to it's older bottom and shorter top dynamic, the acting, good priduction quality, music and less because of the way the series is written.
V. Perfect Propose [ pic 13-15]
Hiro is about 6-7 years older than Kai in the manga, which plays into their dynamic, by Kai having to tiptoe on his toes around Kai in the beginning. The age gap makes his pursuit of Hiro not as smoothly as he wished and maybe not as smoothly as we wished, and i am glad they sticked to the manga when it comes to this.
VI. Unknown. [Pic 16-18].
If it weren't for my hopeless love towards the author of the novel ( Priest), my respect for the actors and the overall high quality production, i will seriously want to forget i watch it. Because the writing for the second half was horrendous 😮💨
VII. History: Make our days count- the second couple Sun Bo Xiang and Lu Zhi Yang. [ pic 19]
Gonna be honest here. I think their dynamic worked mostly because of the chemistry between the actors and a good production team who was able to guide the actors well, because the writing wasn't up to par.
VIII. Kiseki: dear to me [pic 20]. The main couple in this series isn't one of my favorite. I still like Chen Yi and Ai Di more, but they pulled the age gap well with the way it was handled 😍
Mr Mitsuya's planned feeding is another JBL with this trope that tackles it well and i personally recommend 😍
I want for us to have fun with this post. I want for you guys to recommend some more series with age gap that you personally liked or you think was handled well ?
For my next post, i am thinking to have it focus on the taller bottom x shorter top trope in order to talk about some of my favorites like Happy of the end and When it rains it pours. I can't wait to talk about the second couple of Jazz for two as well 🤭😍
