Only Friends; futile devices

 
Out of all the fictions of the BL genre that in recent years have told stories about diverse characters coming out of the closet or navigating semi-complex relationships, Only Friends co-directed by Jojo Tichakorn and Ninew Pynia Chookamsri is presented as a different and mature story that wants to explore the complexities of human relationships, focusing on a group of queer and sexually active university students.
As director Jojo puts it during the screening of the pilot trailer, last year; (Only Friends) It’s not just sex, this story is about family dramas and how they affect the characters.

It would appear then that the greatest challenge Only Friend faces is that of covering and exploring all these complexities and different edges of human relationships and their intersection with sex.
That is why we can say, after 12 episodes, the problem of Only Friend lies in its ambition and various limitations; a limited budget, limited performances and lack of time to explore all the characters.
However, this string of limitations is not the main problem.

Only Friend’s fatal flaw is rather the absence of purpose, that something that propels the narrative beyond the situational drama that, when resolved, leaves us with nothing.

What are you trying to communicate? What is the axis of the story? Where do we go back to once the situational drama is resolved? What do all these characters share?

Although it can be argued that what unites these characters is sex and their relationship with it, the reality is that the narrative of the series emphasizes the friendship between the protagonists Ray, Mew, Boston and Cheum. It does so using dialogue, as well as the school project they are developing (a hostel), but it fails to show the true basis of this friendship, and with a foundation that is shaky, the story suffers greatly from this same contradiction and lack of purpose.

The friendship, unrequited love, emotional dependence, between Ray and Mew is the only connection in this group that has just enough foundation to convince the audience.
The rest of the interactions are superfluous as they don’t go beyond serving the plot ( Boston is the clear example of this, once his story with Mew and Top dissolves, the narrative fails him and he is completely relegated to being a villain, as long as the moral superiority of the other characters requires it, of course).
This absence of real connection, inevitably leads, as the episodes go by, to a series of disconnected scenes, linked to absolutely nothing, and we therefore are faced with a sudden narrative branching; the story breaks into three and rushes to develop the stories of three couples.

The three couples are different from one another, in both their conceptualization, and in the problems they go through. However, two of these couples suffer from a lack of development that in retrospect makes us wonder whether it was necessary for all these stories to coincide in the same series.

The only success in sketching one of these three couples, having the strongest and most passionate story; is the trauma and alcoholism of Ray, a young man haunted by the death of his mother and the abandonment and loneliness with which he grew up.
He accidentally meets Sand, a fatherless musician who works hard for a living selling liquor and singing, and who sees in Ray something like a project, someone he would like to protect, someone he can save.
The relationship begins with hectic encounters and verbal fights full of sexual tension, until it turns into mutual desperation to understand each other and be together. This is the only one of the three couples that balances carnal desire and the longing to love (Sand) and be loved (Ray), convincingly.

For this couple it is important to highlight the elements that lie in the background and give more depth to this connection between the characters; music is a central element; guitars and soft rock, Thai music from the 80s... Alcohol and vices, blurry montages.
Ray's car as a visual constant, always present, until the final scene of the series.
Bathtubs; the bathrooms and their privacy.

But it is the performances of Khaotung Tanawat (Ray) and First Kanaphan (Sand) what truly brings to life the emotions and tumultuous pasts of these characters, as well as the desire they feel for each other.
Contrasting perfectly with Ray's explosiveness; shouting and lashing out at Sand in endless emotions, pointing fingers, and crying; is Sand's calm restraint that says it all with his eyes while he receives Ray's yelling complaints. Disappointed and destroyed, Sand bursts into tears once Ray leaves, and finally lets out a scream releasing that repressed despair.
Their performances are honest and the most believable in the series.

Their story is, however, ruined on several occasions, especially towards the end. Topics such as Ray's rehabilitation are ignored. And after having vehemently proposed them, it would seem that the story would take the time to delve into it, however Only Friends considers it more important to include a flat character who serves as a catalyst and tests the three couples ––already in the final arc of the series,––in its last three episodes.
The story of Ray and Sand suffers from these slip-ups and becomes a story with more than wasted potential. Enjoyable for the performances and the soundtrack.

Top and Mew are a couple that could easily fade into the background.
They can go unnoticed, they lack that element that makes them unique in their presentation and unique in what they want to communicate. 

Mew (Book Kasidet) is a flat character who is referred to as the perfect friend, the perfect boy; intelligent, virgin and desired by everybody.
Beyond the physical beauty of the actor who plays him, it is difficult to say why Mew is so desired.
 His actions do not show it, the acting is simply flat; it does not offer nuances that help the audience understand the character's deepest thoughts and feelings.

But what makes this couple forgettable is the fact that the problems they face throughout the 12 episodes are caused by third parties. First it is Boston who betrays his  friend and has sex with Top.
Then it's Boeing, Top's ex who wants to destroy their relationship without any real motivation ( revenge but we don’t know the character at all to even care). 

That is to say, these characters are simply handled by the situations and tested by other characters, their problems do not come from their character or their vices, but are imposed on them.
 And this complicates being able to empathize on a deeper level with the characters.

While Mew and his “radical” change-in search-of revenge becomes the reason why his relationship with Top simply cannot be fixed, it is debatable whether all that ridiculous tangent in the narrative even serves a real purpose. Because by the end of the story Mew and Top decide to give their relationship another chance and live together.

Top (Force Jiratchapong) suffers from the little introspection given to his character.
It's perhaps in the second episode where we learn more about him and his childhood trauma, one that involves fires.
Top could be a more interesting character if his traumas had a bearing on his character, on his actions, if only we knew more about him.
The trauma with the fires is visited for the second and last time at the end of the series, in the penultimate scene of the last episode. Serving what purpose?

In an attempt to make Top and Mew a more traditional couple, the limited performances, a weak script and zero audio-visual or symbolic elements that give a particular essence to the couple, make this a forgettable relationship.
 
The final story in which the narrative of Only Friends branches into is the one starring Boston and Nick.
Boston (Neo Trai), who lives his sexuality freely without any commitment, meets Nick (Mark Pakin), a boy who is more of a romantic and falls innocently in love with Boston's charms.
Their relationship is a friends with benefits arrangement, although Nick wants something more. This contrast between what each one seeks from the other generates tension and drama in their story.
The chemistry between the actors is good and the intense scenes keep the audience interested, however its biggest problem and the one that makes Only Friends falter the most is what I would call The Rise and Fall of Boston.

The series builds a character who is selfish, but charismatic, irreverent but somehow very entertaining. Boston understands that he is selfish at the same time that he accepts that his way of relating sexually and emotionally with people is not entirely wrong, it is just different. That is to say, the fact that Boston is a slut does not make him the villain, (at least not at first) but rather his lack of empathy.

However, during the fall of Boston’s arc, his redemption or attempt to- comes into play.
Left friendless and somehow trying to please Nick, the only person who seems to love him, Boston fights to conform to a more traditional relationship, i.e. monogamy.
But Boston simply can't change who he is, so his relationship with Nick ends.
And it's not the end of a relationship in which both parties wanted different things what ruins Boston, it's the narrative around Nick's decision and how it is presented as a punishment for Boston.
It's not even relevant that Nick assures Boston that everything is fine, that he doesn't have to change, if the rest of the characters, especially Mew, will continue to emphasize that his betrayal, and “vices" can never be forgiven.

This little lesson in morality is perhaps accidental or simply the result of a script that had too many things to tell and could only end it all in a fairly safe and boring way.

The inconsistencies of the series are not limited to the plot and as I point out with the characters and their hastily changing narratives, but are also present in its form; its structure.
Clear proof of this inconsistency is the use of interesting visual and narrative resources such as the inclusion of a confessional- where the characters speak to the viewer, and share their feelings, (clearly emulating those in reality shows) but these are resources used once and abandoned.

The same thing happens with the continuity of scenes; The next episode begins where the previous one ended. Or in episode 5, where as an introduction a montage is presented, decorated with illustrations, presenting the idea of time with a character  - to then end with an illustration as well, and return to the idea of time but now with a melancholic undertone after the events of the episode.

These visual-narrative resources make the series more attractive, more unique, even if they add simple fun or continuity, or drawings on a scene.
Starting with episode 6, the marked thematic and visual continuity would be abandoned and what follows would be many disconnected scenes that sought to follow the plot-thread of each couple but it was simply difficult to put them all under the same thread, the same axis. .  And what are a bunch of scenes together, without a clear sequence, without continuity?  

This is where the main problem with Only Friends , the one that I raised at the beginning becomes more than evident; the core, the essence of the series is conspicuous by its absence.
Without a clear purpose it is easy to change direction as the story progresses. This lack of clarity is evident towards the end of the series.

The last episode is a closure for Nick's story. A punishment for Boston. A last test for Sand and Ray.  As for Mew and Top...I'm really not sure.
This lukewarm, rushed ending is not at all organic and feels like a completely different series than it was in its first five or six episodes; The entanglements and dramas have been resolved but...what happens after that?

Only Friends suffers from clinging to futile narratives instead of clearly establishing the message it wants to present.
That's why at the end of the series, a montage of the three couples driving their cars through a tunnel at night, reminiscent of an American teen-indie movie, elicits nothing but a lukewarm reaction. It is cheesy because it tries to be something that it never was. Because it contradicts itself.
Only Friend is a series of forced interactions, futile narratives, futile resources, characters abandoned by their authors and a prevailing feeling of emptiness.