




Lovesick, formerly known as Scrotal Recall, is the brainchild of writer Tom Edge that tells the story of a young man, Dylan, played by Johnny Flynn, who has found himself diagnosed with an STD by the name of chlamydia. The premise of the show is based around him contacting previous partners to inform them of his diagnosis.
The plot is interesting for sure; this is a different kind of love story tackling a topic that isn’t often seen in shows dealing with romance. Along the way there are also two friends Evie, played by Antonia Thomas, and Luke, played by Daniel Ings, going through their own issues with one of them struggling to express her affections towards Dylan, the main character.
The show is set to be very relatable, I think many people can find themselves in the characters on this show in how they deal with personal intimacy issues and relationships. It’s humorous in its storytelling while giving light to very serious issues.
The actual format of the show is cool as well with much of the show being set in the past and told through reflections of events jumping to the present to show the events that have taken place as a result.
Great writing, great cast, currently with two completed seasons and hopefully a third on the way to Netflix sometime in the near future.
Spa Night ,directed by Andrew Ahn, captures a young Korean American man as he is on a path of self discovery struggling with issues of sexuality, and a fracturing home situation. It’s important to see different voices dealing with topics that usually aren’t accustomed to a particular culture so getting to see a person of color especially someone Asian American go through this type of hardship is extremely refreshing. Kudos to the writers, I wish there was more storytelling involving intersectionality on this level.
In the beginning you see this thriving hardworking family running a restaurant, but an unexplained event occurs leaving them with a closed restaurant and not much prospects in the way of work. The parents are doing their best to find work and all they want is for their son David, played by Joe Seo, to be successful and go to college. He’s hardworking and only wants to help his struggling parents all the while dealing with the fact that he is gay and trying to figure out a way to embrace it.
Dialogue is not the strongest point in this movie. It’s very much in the actions, gestures and expressions of the characters where you’re going to get the story. The story revolves mostly around an intimate spa setting where David finds work and it’s here that you see David start to change after encountering some risqué scenes.
In the way of a plot, I don’t think its strong, its not groundbreaking, but it is groundbreaking in the characters chosen to tell the story. I’m hoping 2017 brings more multidimensional roles for minority characters.