In Love Forever - I know it’s fake.

In Love Forever: 1x06.

Six episodes in, this might be the happiest and most stable that we’ve seen Runch and Neen in their marriage. Runch is happiest when her little acts of service – bringing flowers, tea and cake to her wife in the office, for example – make Neen (and Neen’s assistant, who voices that Runch’s setting of standards makes it hard to find a partner of her own who measures up) smile. They’ve decided not to divorce, they are giving their marriage a second chance, and for now, they look like they’re living through a honeymoon period that showcases what they would be like without the malicious outside influence that has been haunting their marriage before it even began. Under the surface though, something much darker is happening: they are living in completely different realities, where Runch exists in the happy delusion that her mother has truly changed and is attempting to make up for her past transgressions, while Neen is convinced that Kingkamol is only pretending and is in fact executing a plan to drive a wedge between them yet again. Something about the happiness of their scenes together, when they are alone, co-existing with the loneliness of Neen being convinced that she is right but being unable to bring Runch along into this realisation, makes it even more heartbreaking: because Kingkamol has invaded their private sphere, lives in their house, is always there, meaning there’s nowhere to escape to anymore.

What makes the situation worse is that the viewers know that Neen is completely correct in her assessment of Kingkamol, even before she openly reveals that this is part of a devious plan, that she is still pursuing her ultimate goal of destroying the marriage. Neen knows that she can’t just tell Runch what is happening, that Runch won’t believe it until she has irrefutable proof – in the beginning of the episode, she gently probes her for suspicions and there are none. You could blame Runch for that naivete, but it must be such a seductive dream for her to have everything she wanted, to have the central conflict of her life seemingly resolved with Kingkamol finally apologising to Neen and, apparently, treating her with respect for the first time ever. Runch is not a character who will go into any interaction or personal relationship assuming the worst, in spite of all of her bad experiences with both her mother and with Att. Runch’s natural position is always seeking balance (to a fault), even when she should be making a firm decision, and so it is no wonder that she is enjoying what she thinks is a detente between her wife and her mother. At the same time, there’s something undeniably comical about her essentially turning into the “this is fine” dog in the meme while her house is burning down around her (but it’s very, very tragic for Neen). And what can Neen do, when Runch’s perception of her reality means that any retribution, any fighting back, would look like pettiness against someone who is trying to redeem herself? For someone whose nagging and insults started off as being fairly ineffective because they never hit where Neen could really hurt (the pain came from not being defended by her wife), this particular plan seems immaculately conceived to truly destroy Neen (and, because Neen is Runch’s happiness, Kingkamol’s daughter as well).

Neen’s family is so happy when they finally reveal that they have decided to stay married, it’s like an alternative universe in terms of what their marriage could be like if it was fully supported. This time, when Runch drinks with Neen’s dad and brother, it isn’t an act of small revenge on her, but a genuine celebration of them finally “being a real family” (but even then, Neen can’t join in because she knows she will have to drive them home because of Kingkamol). When they return home to find Kingkamol waiting up for them who blocks their way with so much fervour that her daughter not only finally speaks her mind a little bit (because she does speak up when she’s drunk) – “I’m all grown up now, I’m not a child” but also vomits on her. It leads to the most direct conversation that Neen and Kingkamol have had about their warring ideas about what Runch needs and should do: Neen says she doesn’t want to constrain Runch, that she is giving her the freedom to make her own choices. Kingkamol complains that Runch never used to get drunk when she lived with her and Neen says “Maybe she didn’t have the courage to live life the way she wanted yet.” It’s such a mature way to stand up against Kingkamol because ultimately this isn’t a fight about possessing Runch for Neen, but a struggle to give Runch the option to choose her own happiness, her own life, over an overbearing mother who insists that she still knows what’s good for her daughter and should have the right to choose for her. It’s freedom vs control, which makes it very clear who genuinely cares and who doesn’t really value her happiness – because to Kingkamol, her identity is so caught up in her daughter’s that she doesn’t see her as her own person, with her own thoughts and wishes. Neen even acknowledges in that conversation that she knows how much Kingkamol loves Runch (even if it is a deeply twisted love), but that she is the one who lives with her every day, because Runch has already chosen to share her life with her. 

Nothing that Neen will ever say to Kingkamol will change her mind though, and so she continues to terrorise their life together in every way possible. She vacuums the house in the morning to wake them up. She bullies her daughter into calling off a date night so she can cook for her, which leads to a hilarious competition between her and Neen that ends with two inedible overly salted dishes that Runch still has to bear with a smile because she’s trying to keep the peace. After Neen directly confronts Kingkamol over her intentions and gets confirmation that her suspicion was correct (“I’ll do whatever it takes to get you out of Runch’s life”), her behaviour escalates even more: she gossips with a neighbour about Neen not taking care of her wife, even inviting her into the house that isn’t hers. She buys trees to “ward off evil” (she’s still there, so clearly it’s not working), permanently changing a home that isn’t hers, literally planting her own roots in her daughter’s marriage, without asking anyone for permission. She records a fight she has with Neen to play it back to her daughter, making herself appear as the victim, the reasonable demure one, Neen as the aggressive and unforgiving daughter-in-law (and Runch never questions why her mother would be recording the conversation in the first place, it’s her friend overseas who points out to her how insane that is). And throughout, when Neen pleads with Runch to see through her mother, to at least question her motives, Runch remains steadfast in her conviction that her mother is being sincere. What breaks the camel’s back in the end is Neen overhearing the neighbours gossiping about her marriage when they go on an early-morning run – and it’s no wonder that this is what makes her snap in the end, because we know that Runch delights in the very acts of service that are being twisted into something ugly here, that this is how Runch expresses her love and that Neen lets her do it because she knows that it makes her happy. It’s malicious because it questions the very basis of their love for each other, while disregarding all the ways that Neen looks after Runch (and it’s perfect that it happens in an episode where Neen does so much to accommodate her). When Neen confronts Kingkamol at home, she doesn’t hold back, but in the scuffle that ensues, Runch ends up protecting her mother, raising her voice at Neen, and comforting her mother when Neen runs out of the house, exasperated. It’s the natural outcome of them existing in different realities, with Runch’s inability to see her mother for who she really is, even after what she tried to do with Meilin – and it’s bad enough that Neen moves back with her parents for now.

Natee, in France, talks some sense into her after the fact, and maybe part of Runch’s problem is that there are so few outside voices of reason in her life, that she is so isolated, that even this one person who seems to have a grasp of the situation is so far and so many time zones away. “Would my mum really go that far”, she still asks about a person who set up a whole other woman for her to marry instead of Neen while they were still married. Runch goes over to Neen’s house to apologise to the whole family, promising again that she is choosing Neen, but Neen, knowing she would probably give in the moment she opens the door, refuses to come back until Kingkamol has left (“I don’t want to hear your apologies. They’re nothing but words.”) And Runch, being who she is, still thinks she can walk the line somehow.

The flashback is still of a happy moment: this time, their wedding day, Runch happily saying, “And from this day forward, we’ll be each other’s wives forever.” Considering where we are at in the present time, it seems like a dark omen of what’s to come, in spite of their happiness that day. 

Random notes:

In another show, maybe it would be addressed how Runch unfailingly drinks until she’s drunk every time she touches alcohol, but I don’t think it’s going to happen here, it just coincidentally fits in well with the sense that she has depression and should, as said before, see a therapist.

It’s also interesting that Neen’s mum is the one refuting the idea of Runch ever cutting her mother off completely, because I thought that in Runch’s conversation with her dad in the previous episode, that’s exactly the option she deep-down knew she would eventually have to choose before Kingkamol’s miraculous and fake change of mind later on. It doesn’t seem to be unthinkable to her, just deeply uncomfortable and clearly a very last resort.

Kingkamol bringing a picture of herself and Runch and placing it in front of a wedding picture is next-level outrageous, such a clear symbolic act of disrespecting Neen, that it’s hard not to feel some kind of way about Runch not reprimanding her for it.

Director P’Jaew writing perfectly romantic ad copy for Whoop watches with this: “They’re watches. But they’re not meant to tell how much time has passed. Instead they’ll remind me that with every step I take, you’ll always be there with me.” 

In Love Forever – You are my home.

In Love Forever: 1x05.

In Love Forever’s fifth episode, almost halfway through the season, is a good point to think about the nature of apologies, as various forms of them take up the majority of the story here. What is a good apology? What’s a sincere one, one that can be believed? We’ve seen Runch apologise to Neen numerous times – sometimes, I would argue, almost reflexively, as if to ward off an argument that she knows is coming by taking the blame early, to avoid a worse outcome. Those previous apologies were sincere – Runch never wants to hurt Neen – but not really effective, because Runch didn’t know yet what she had to do to change things. Apologising to Neen for her mother’s behaviour again and again is pointless if there are no boundaries in place to keep Kingkamol from hurting her daughter-in-law, and in any case, Runch is apologising on behalf of someone else, someone who doesn’t even accept that she has done something wrong and has no intention of changing her behaviour. At the beginning of the episode, Runch is back to apologising (for her mother) after they return from the argument over Meilin, but this time, things are different: Neen isn’t emotional because she is upset with Runch, she has just witnessed her wife standing up for her, against her mother, with determination and conviction, for the first time. “You already protected me. You did it in front of your mum and everyone” she says, crying, looking vulnerable but also different from their previous fights, where she ultimately knew that nothing would change because Runch was in an impossible position. “It made me so happy that I was speechless”. It’s what she has wanted this whole time: for Runch to make a choice and to choose her (“Today I chose you. I chose our family. You are my home, Neen.”) – and it should change everything. It’s so sad for them that it only works for a little while, because they aren’t up against a rational opponent, but someone utterly determined to do whatever it takes to destroy their love for one another.

Runch puts her change of heart into words in another conversation with Natee, her overseas friend, the next day: she says that she wants to “protect someone for the first time in my life”, like the instinct to choose Neen over her mother outweighs the guilt and gratefulness she has for Kingkamol, and that she won’t divorce Neen. “I won’t go anywhere. I’ll keep staying with her until she chases me away herself”, which is a brave and true statement but also, secretly, a pretty dire prediction of what might happen in the future. The next time they’re at the brink of divorce, it might just be because Neen is the one who suggests it, but Runch at this stage seems so blissed out by the path that has opened to her because she has finally made a choice that it doesn’t yet occur to her what her mother is truly capable of when she’s backed into a corner.

Neen also processes what happened with her friends – and it’s interesting that these two conversations with people outside of the relationship bracket the conflict in this episode. Neen seems so happy, so relieved, that Runch stood up for her for the first time, and she says she realised that when she agreed to the divorce she was just being “snarky”, because sometimes Neen tends to think one thing and says another. One of her friends suggests that she has got her happy ending now, which is definitely not something any character should be saying halfway through the season of a show (but viewed from the escalation that will happen later, Neen’s little smile of hope will break your heart even more).

It should be immediately apparent to Runch how hard this process will be, even if she has now decided for herself how to proceed, when she goes over to her mother’s house to establish the boundaries she wants to put in place to protect her marriage. Kingkamol sees Runch’s presence alone as proof that nothing has changed, that her daughter is still as devoted to her as she wants her to be, and she immediately brings up Meilin again, as if all the things that Runch said to her last night had gone straight over her head (I giggled a bit at the deliberate use of a flashback here – the show uses these replays of scenes we’ve already seen very sparingly, they’re such a staple for GLs, but this one was used specifically to showcase how wild it is that Kingkamol would think she could brush this under the rug and just pick up where she left off). It makes Runch furious enough that she says the most determined words we’ve heard her speak yet: “mind your own business”. It only serves to play into Kingkamol’s perception that Neen is the problem because she has changed her daughter from the devoted, pliable child she used to be, to someone with a whole inner world and life that is now unreachable to her, instead of realising that this is just the nature of children growing up to become their own people. In a last-ditch effort, Runch kneels down in front of her mother to explain that she is grateful for everything that she has given to her, that she will continue to take care of her and her father. Then she pleads with her: “Please, don’t destroy our family, don’t hurt Neen, either with your words or your actions.” She is clearly stating her boundaries, and Kingkamol immediately and furiously crosses them, saying she hates Neen, that she would have prevented the marriage if she had known this would happen. Then she finishes it off by calling Runch “stupid” – again, after Runch, for the first time in her life, found the determination and bravery to stand up to her overbearing mother.
I don’t know if Runch went into this conversation expecting a different outcome or if it only served to confirm for her what she already suspected: that the only way out is a clean break and distance, because her mother will continue to disregard any attempt to protect Neen (it fits that the first time we meet her she is breaking an earlier boundary, when she just turns up at the gate of their house without calling first). Runch’s dad confirms it for her: “she’ll never change, don’t expect her to change, it’s a lost cause”. It’s so hard to hear Runch talk about how she idolised her mother when she was a child, how she was her hero, and how her perception of her has changed now. “I know what I have to do. I just don’t want to do it.” She’s grieving the loss of who she thought her mother was, and she knows that she can’t save her marriage without cutting Kingkamol out of her life.

I don’t think anything the show does could ever really justify Kingkamol’s actions, especially as they become more unhinged in the rest of this episode, but the flashbacks to Runch’s childhood show what she feels she is losing at least: the devotion of a child who thought the world of her, whose entire world turned around her, until she got married. It’s like she put all of her energy and hope and dreams into Runch without realising that Runch would eventually have to go off to live her own life, and now all that is left is a house filled to the brim with memorabilia of her daughter and a husband who doesn’t comprehend her actions. It’s not exactly an unhappy marriage, but an empty one, because Kingkamol has tended to Runch, and is still obsessed with only her, and her husband is kind of just there as a prop. It’s a stark contrast to Runch and Neen’s marriage which is filled with so much devotion, care, desire and love when it is free from Kingkamol’s influence: these two people are habituated to each other, but they don’t provide for each other emotionally. Apart from Runch, Kingkamol’s life is empty, her house is a shrine to a relationship that is broken, her marriage is unfulfilled with a husband who is, emotionally and maybe also physically, frequently far away. There’s a haunting quality to little Runch’s words echoing in Kingkamol’s mind: “I won’t leave you. I’ll always love you more than anyone. I promise.” It’s so obviously a promise that no parent should ever take so seriously to build an entire life on, and yet here the threat of it being broken sends Kingkamol into a spiral.

But back to apologies, with Meilin, who does a whole tour of them, meeting all the standards of a good one: she talks to Runch to clear the air and clarify that she never wanted to mess with her marriage. She goes to Neen, who seems reluctant to show too much of her feelings but also accepts her apology as sincere. Her final meeting with Kingkamol breaks the last straw as far as Kingkamol’s rationality is concerned: Meilin makes it clear as she can that she will not be anyone’s tool, especially not to break up a marriage, destroying any hope that Kingkamol had for this particular plan of attack. While Neen and Runch rebuild their relationship and reconfirm their devotion for each other, Kingkamol goes back to scheming.

The reconciliation scene is beautiful, visually reminiscent of all those flashbacks of them initially dating, with a care-free atmosphere of two people who feel like they’re falling in love with each other in a new way. They are going for a picnic, Neen rides on the back of Runch’s bike, they’re finally taking the time to have a full conversation instead of distracting themselves from it by falling into bed with each other.

Runch: You asked me who I’d choose between you and my mum. Will you stay by my side?
Neen: So we’re not getting divorced anymore, right?
Runch: No, we’re not.
Neen: We’ve been through a lot. We’ve given each other a chance. We’ve expected things and been let down over and over again. I hope this was the last time. I really want us to be happy together.
Runch: I want us to be happy together too.

It’s honest and direct and a new beginning, but it also comes with the kernel of discomfort from Neen’s warning about hoping that this was the last time: knowing Kingkamol, we can feel that it won’t be. And again the parallels in this show are so well-considered because the next morning, when Runch and Neen are in bed and Runch insists that there is no reason to wait for nighttime before they can have sex while slipping her hand under the cover, she is inadvertently replaying what happened in her dream: she’s wearing the same clothes, she’s taking control, she’s asking for what she wants, and, just like in the dream, a phone call interrupts them. It’s Runch’s dad for a change, but that doesn’t make it any less upsetting when the true extent of Kingkamol’s new unhinged phase is revealed. Her new plan, apparently, is to ruin her own marriage along with her daughter’s: skilfully, she’s baited her hapless husband into kind of saying to give him some space which is enough linguistic room to claim he has thrown her out of the house, as she works herself into a tantrum, packs her bags, and shows up at Runch’s gate unannounced, ready to move in.

It almost doesn’t succeed because Neen manages to stay calm as the antics play out and reasonably suggests that Kingkamol should be having a conversation with her husband, because “married couples should talk when there’s a problem” (a truth she has come to the very hard way). Here we arrive at the final apology of the episode, one that meets neither standard – it is not sincere, nor indicates a change of behaviour to prevent further injury. In a dramatic scene, Kingkamol goes to her knees in front of Neen, begging for her forgiveness, promising to treat her better and stay out of her business, working herself up into such a tantrum that she ends up fainting. Obviously, they can’t turn her away now, and so she moves in. In a second debrief with her friends later (that comes with very different emotions than the first one), Neen reveals that she is well-aware that this is another plot to destroy her marriage, and that she is going to war to prove it to Runch, who fully believes her mother is being genuine. “This isn’t just family drama, this is a war between a wife and a mother-in-law.”

In the flashback scene, we’ve moved to a year ago when Runch proposed to Neen in a beautiful scene set by the seaside, guiding Neen down a trail of seashells and rocks, finally presenting the ring to her in a seashell. I think it’s significant that the proposal itself already holds some sadness within it instead of just being joyful: Runch talks about the heaviness of her life, that she wouldn’t have wanted to keep going if she hadn’t met Neen. I feel like this show won’t have the time to explore what exactly Runch’s life was like before she met Neen but the hints of it are there to flesh out her character. We know from what Runch’s dad said that Kingkamol started her campaign against Neen when they were just dating (but the very structure of the flashbacks – only showing their happy moments – means we haven’t seen Kingkamol appear yet in the past), so it’s probably safe to assume that Neen would have some reservations here, that play out for a microsecond in her face before she says yes. 

Runch: I may not be a perfect woman. I have responsibilities. I have my own world that can feel heavy at times, but if you accept, I want you to be there by my side, in my world, on every good day and every difficult day. Will you marry me? Will you be my wife and my family?

Random notes:

The acting in that first scene is so good: they are both so vulnerable with each other, so soft. Runch is on her knees, kind of offering this determination that she has found, the choice she has made, to fix things, not even realising to start off with that Neen already knows and has just been waiting for this moment. The show hasn’t really made it explicit that Neen went into this whole thing thinking genuinely that Runch had stopped loving here but realised she was wrong through the last few episodes – they never really directly talked about it – but it’s clear that this could be a new beginning for them if only Kingkamol wasn’t this determined to destroy them.

It’s just a prop, but the Foundations of Weaving book that Runch brings to their picnic date made me think that maybe Neen’s question about what kind of life Runch envisions for herself, to be truly happy, would look a lot simpler than the one she has currently, and we can only hope that one day she gets to live it. Also, talking about props on this show, Kingkamol’s shrine to Runch is truly magnificently detailed (all the cards she’s ever written to her mother!), even if it just takes up a few seconds of actual screen time. 

Kingkamol moving in is played for laughs to start off with and the scene of Runch and Neen watching a horror film together, already freaked out (I love that Runch is the wussier one between them), to then have Kingkamol appear at their door in a black face mask to add to the horrors, is very, very funny: but it takes a lot of suspension of disbelief that Neen would be the one ending up sharing a bed with her mother-in-law. I’ll allow it if only for how funny Neen is when she pretends to sleep-talk where she gets to say all the things that propriety would normally forbid her, already set in her agenda to prove that Kingkamol is faking it all (“You think you can fool me by being nice”). Also Orm seems like she’s having an absolute blast in the scene. 

In Love Forever - Can I be yours forever?

In Love Forever: 1x04.

I’m just confirming that it’s not a dream. […] Waking up to see your face just makes me so happy.

If you hadn’t watched the previous episodes, if you didn’t know that Runch and Neen had together decided to get divorced, with a four-month waiting period imposed by Neen’s dad, you’d be forgiven for thinking that they are actually currently reliving their honeymoon. They are sharing a bed again, they have been sleeping together for three consecutive nights, as Runch reminds Neen, proudly smiling, neither of them even mentions the divorce that is looming over their heads, as if they’ve both forgotten about it. And “forgotten” is apt here, I think, because as in love as they are here, trapped in their shared marital glow, they’ve also clearly not spoken about if any of these developments affect their decision about the divorce. In Love Forever makes it clear what they have been doing instead of talking, which is very much the source of all their problems, but it’s hard not to fall into their little bubble – which they’ve managed to sustain somehow, since leaving the garden house – and believe that their love can outlast whatever challenges they’re about to face. Runch’s words, “my girl, my wife, mine”, Neen’s question, “Can I be yours forever” – it all sounds like renewed vows rather than an ending, with the “forever” doing all the heavy lifting for the conversation they are not having about whether or not they still believe in it. It would be infuriating, if it weren’t also so lovely, with all the stakes becoming obvious: this is what they are bound to lose, and it would scar them both irreparably.

The ticking time bomb that falls right into the other centre of Runch’s life shouldn’t be a surprise to her: of course Meilin would pop up here too, and it’s almost worse because she has the wide-eyed naivete of someone who isn’t deliberately setting out to ruin a marriage, but to instead get closer to her childhood crush and idol (who she believes, for all intents and purposes, to be single). She’s been hired by Neen’s uncle, who knows her studies advisor, and Runch has been tasked with training her – but of course the fact that they already know each other means that from the outside, the way they interact could be misinterpreted (and Meilin’s love-struck gaze doesn’t help). Att sees an opportunity to spread more malicious gossip in the office, where it falls on fertile ground (it’s funny that the coworkers immediately agree that Meilin has a crush on Runch, while I’m not really certain if Runch realises – again, she strikes me as the kind of person who’d be ignorant about, or at the very least wouldn’t take it seriously). When Meilin goes so far as to openly share with Att of all people that they’ve known each other since childhood, a clear plan starts to take shape in his mind.

The fallout is delayed for a bit, with Runch coming home to a romantically lit up home and Neen surprising her. I think that there’s is a clear difference between how the two of them are handling the situation in this episode: Runch, reassured by their newly discovered closeness, has more or less returned to what she normally does, without any changes in her actions, while Neen is making a deliberate effort to be more open and supportive after finding out that Runch struggles at work. Runch has kept her struggles a secret because she didn’t want to burden Neen, or was eager to uphold the image she had of her in her mind, but now she is experiencing what it means to share the burden with a supportive wife – my guess would be that Runch has always been the one to tend towards big gestures, but here Neen goes all out with the candles and the wine and the outfit, all of it tastefully arranged around their wedding photo, which should have been a prompt for a conversation (that is cut short by Runch taking off Neen’s clothes right there in the kitchen, a predictable outcome and maybe exactly what Neen expected but still, it’s a conversation they don’t have, continuing not to address the elephant in the room). It does subtly connect to Runch’s dream in the first episode – the part of their relationship where they fall into each other like this again and again is easy and comes naturally, “don’t talk”, but neither of them manages to approach the hard part.
I think Neen’s growth and change shows again when Att initially approaches her with the rumours, proudly showing off a picture he’s secretly taken that could easily be interpreted as Runch sitting a bit closer than she has to to someone who is just a new colleague. Instead of getting furious immediately, but maybe also concerned about what it would mean to show how upset she is in front of someone that she knows has been torturing Runch, she gives her wife the opportunity to explain – and if Runch felt more secure in herself and in her relationship, if her default position wasn’t to always try to manage situations herself to “protect” Neen (or to protect their precarious relationships from what she thinks Neen’s reaction would be), it would be a good moment to just come clean about everything in one go: that she has known Meilin since childhood, that this is the same woman her mother has been inviting over to meet with Runch. Instead, she only shares what she has to, deliberately controlling the conversation – an attempt doomed to fail because Neen already knows more than Runch is saying here (because Att told her they’ve known each other since childhood). By keeping secrets deliberately, she is causing suspicions that Neen would have otherwise never had (of all the problems they’ve had in their marriage, unfaithfulness wouldn’t even have entered her mind, I think). Neen is behaving more maturely, giving Runch the benefit of the doubt, allowing her to explain herself, but Runch is falling back into the old pattern that has caused the rift in their relationship. It opens everything up to misinterpretation and doubt, and combines catastrophically with Att’s intent to ruin Runch’s life (even though not even he could have orchestrated the perfect moment deliberately – Neen walking in as Meilin faints into Runch’s arms, a moment that obviously looks so bad that Runch immediately knows where her mind would go).

Runch: I didn’t want you to worry so I didn’t tell you.
Neen: So you decided what to tell or not to tell me? I always trusted you, but today you made me feel like you have a secret you don’t tell me about. I s there anything else you haven’t told me?
Runch: No. There’s absolutely nothing else.

Neen asks her so directly, giving her every opportunity to explain the full extent of the situation here, and Runch does not take it, in spite of the fact that Neen is so clearly only asking for honesty here so they can solve the situation together. Runch is so desperate to preserve the happiness and peace they’ve managed to find over the last few days that she doesn’t even realise how she’s dooming them – there’s no way that Neen won’t find out that this is the same woman Kingkamol wants as a new daughter-in-law. Runch is once again choosing to leave the bomb ticking for a later explosion – in her defence, she has limited resources to deal with anything right now, and she’s addressing things as they occur, but it’s hard to excuse her behaviour when it’s so clear already how it will blow up in her face, and how much it will hurt Neen when it does, in spite of her stated intention to spare her feelings. How can they reconcile when Runch’s insecurities keep putting everything in peril, when her lack of trust in herself translates into lack in trust in their relationship, in Neen?

The final reveal of what Runch has been keeping from Neen comes quickly: Kingkamol once again fakes being sick to get her daughter to meet up with Meilin (who has agreed to the meeting to address the fact that Runch has been married this whole time). Neen comes with her – both to support, I think, but also because it means that Runch can’t keep whatever is happening secret anymore. Before they arrive, Kingkamol has a truly insane conversation with Meilin about how in spite of her daughter being married, the marriage is failing, the marriage is soon going to end in divorce, to keep her on the line somehow, which is the exact moment when Runch and a very fired up Neen walk in – because how dare Kingkamol talk about divorce when she doesn’t even know yet that they are actually getting divorced, when she is actively lying to Meilin because she is recruiting her as her daughter’s mistress. You can see in Runch’s face that her house of cards is falling down, and they end up having a fight: Neen very clearly telling Runch that she is upset because Runch didn’t come clean when she was asked directly about it, and Runch adding to the damage by insisting that her mother wouldn’t do what they have just witnessed her doing very clearly (I think it’s also interesting that Neen knows Runch doesn’t have any feelings for Meilin but also instantly clocked that Meilin has feelings for Runch).

Neen: Your mum told that girl that we’re getting divorced, even when…. Well, we are getting divorced for real. But your mum doesn’t know that.
Runch: No one could ever replace you, Neen.

That little pause after “even when” is maybe one of the most heartbreaking moments in In Love Forever so far: it could contain so much. Even when we’re so in love, even when we’ve been fixing the relationship – but it remains unsaid, as Neen realises that they are still getting divorced, haven’t actually talked about not getting divorced, and are once again in the emotional place where a divorce seems like the better option, in spite of her trying so hard to fix things, in spite of her just having spent the last few days falling in love again with Runch. It’s like she wakes up from the daze that started at the garden house in that moment, coming back to reality. “This isn’t what lovers do to protect each other”, she says to Runch, even though she can’t come up with what exactly Runch has to do to fix it (“You’ll have to prove it”). And they’re back to sleeping in separate rooms.

The things that Runch attempts to do to fix things – the things that kind of worked in the past – fail. She makes breakfast and Neen refuses it. She tries to seduce Neen, and Neen, wobbly but determined, manages to walk away from it, even though it’s clearly a struggle to do so. They end up having to spend together because of Neen’s dad – another conveniently timed moment where the facade needs to be kept up for the public. Neen exerts a small amount of revenge on Runch by picking the most provocative outfit she can find, a backless dress, knowing that Runch will jealously note every single person who looks at her wife (“don’t play games with me”), but not even Neen can escape the appeal of Runch deciding not to answer another phone call from her mother (who for once genuinely needs help after falling in her home) and instead dancing with her wife.

Runch: Every couple is bound to have misunderstandings. What matters is whether they will still hold each other’s hands.

I think there’s a sense here that it has taken Runch this long to realise that she has to change something about the way she approaches the core issue in their relationship: her mother, that the other gestures aren’t enough, that in spite of them existing in their little bubble for a few nights, what she has to do to genuinely save the relationship is choose Neen over her mother and defend her marriage against what Kingkamol is trying to do to it. They leave the party after Neen picks up a phone call from Meilin on Runch’s phone about what happened to Kingkamol, and in the fight that ensues, Runch ends up standing up for Neen, telling her mother firmly that she does not have the right to speak to Neen like this (“It is because of you that Runch is rebelling against me”), that she has no right to replace her and make her feel less – and then they hold hands, with Runch following her own statement that this is what matters.

Runch: I married her. She is my family. You have to respect my decision. Mum, I won’t let anyone hurt my wife’s feelings. No one. Not even you, mum. Let’s go home.

It’s so significant that she is choosing to stand up for Neen in a moment where her mother is genuinely hurt, instead of softening to her, and Neen realises what it means. But we’ve seen that Kingkamol will never stop trying.

In the flashback, Runch and Neen, maybe about a year into dating, are spending time at a beach house, but it is incessantly raining outside. Neen is frustrated and sad to see her plans destroyed, but Runch suggests they could just spend their days and nights in the room, doing “something that won’t make you feel bored”. Maybe it’s the first time they say “I love you”. How long can they stay like this before Kingkamol starts interfering? 

Random notes:

Runch is having a bad episode here (truly human-disastering all over it), but Meilin is also having a very bad not good week: Att ends up being the person to tell her that Runch is already married, and she knows immediately that Kingkamol has been manipulating her feelings in such a cruel and deliberate way. The pathetic conversation they end up having later where Kingkamol explains that Runch is about to get divorced anyway is just the nail in the coffin, and yet she somehow still shows up when Kingkamol needs her.

File under surprising things you don’t expect people to say who are about to get divorced: “I love you more and more every day.” There isn’t an explicit recognition here that Runch never asked to get divorced because she fell out of love because that would mean talking about the divorce but do we think that Neen fully understands at this point, and it’s why she’s showing so much patience in this episode? 

Neen is really compelling in this episode because she doesn’t really explode until the little moment after Kingkamol’s fall: she’s contained and quietly sad for most of it, through all the little betrayals. I really like the small moment when they’re having lunch together after the fainting episode and both comment that they’ve lost weight, acknowledging the toll it’s taken on both of them, still trying to care for each other (Neen keeps showing up and gives Runch so many chances to fully explain, but she never takes the opportunity).

Kingkamol voices her precise concerns about the marriage here, about how Runch will have a better life if she divorces because she is so inferior to Neen, because she wants Runch to be admired for her own successes – all of this with meek interjections from her husband, who isn’t equipped to intervene in any meaningful way (he does give an accurate prediction of the future though: “Runch doesn’t talk much. She tolerates everything. But if one day she can’t take it anymore, she’ll run away so far you’ll never see her again.”) All of these ideas are clearly things she taught Runch to think as she raised her: that she must be successful on her own, at all costs, but also that her success means Kingkamol’s success as a mother. It’s just so unfortunate for Runch that she’s now existing at work with someone who feeds into these ideas, while it’s so clear from everything that Neen does that she doesn’t consider herself superior at all, and just considers whatever she has as something they share in equally (in short, Runch needs therapy). 

In Love Forever - When it comes to you, I’ll always remember.

In Love Forever: 1x03.

 

This is by far the sweetest, most romantic episode of In Love Forever yet, and it’s fascinating how the sweetness comes from how the majority of the episode kind of mirrors the flashbacks scenes that have been unfolding as their own little story after the main part of the episode finishes. It’s still Runch and Neen after their shared decision to go through with the divorce, it should still have all the bitterness of a couple that still deeply loves one another (even if Neen has no certainty about Runch’s love – I would say she does by the end of the episode) being forced into divorce by an outside influence outside their control. And yet, for most of it, the two main characters feel like they’ve entered a protective bubble far removed from their normal circumstances where their love can exist without the outside pressure that Runch’s mum exerts on their relationship. In Neen’s grandparents’ house in the countryside, with their phones out of reach, living a life that is different from their normal routines, it becomes obvious that they love each other but that they are deeply in love – and a year into their marriage, three years into officially being together, can still surprise each other with things they didn’t previously know, that make them even more in love.

Talking about bitterness – with all the fluff, all the happiness that carries the episode – it almost fades by the end of it, but it is difficult not to sometimes still feel it in the back of your throat, like an unexploded bomb quietly ticking away underneath. This is true especially with how the episode begins, and there’s something about Runch here, leading up to their trip, that shows pretty clearly already that this happiness won’t last. A character that constantly falls back into ignoring problems because they are too big to solve or would require radical decisions they’re not ready to make can be frustrating to watch, even if all of her actions come from either love or devotion to her mother. I’m torn about whether I believe that she knows exactly what her mother is trying to do the moment she walks into her house and finds her sitting there with Meilin, or if she is naive about Kingkamol’s motives, not realising the great lengths she will go to to rid herself of Neen, still maintaining an image of her in her head that sees her mother as protective but not vicious. She must realise, the moment she walks in and finds her almost jittery with excitement, that she has been lured home as a ploy (proving Neen’s immediate reaction upon receiving her message, “I bet the old hag is faking it”, true), that her mother does not in fact require her to take her to the hospital, and her high blood pressure, if anything, is due to finally having come up with a plot that will truly hurt Neen in a way that sticks. It’s the whole way the scene unfolds: the excited introduction of Meilin as the childhood friend who used to play with her (long enough ago that Runch doesn’t seem to remember her very vividly, while she has left such a big impression on the younger woman), the attempts to connect them through their shared careers (which Meilin has chosen because of Runch, because Runch is her idol among other things), Meilin’s wide-eyed excitement at seeing her and the way she receives her career guidance, and her phone number. Runch does strike me as the kind of person that would be unaware of someone having a crush on her – I think if Neen hadn’t been so forward and clear about her intentions, Runch would have been very much in the dark and never made the first move – but she should be able to read her mother well enough to see what she is planning. She’s also very well aware how jealous Neen is – remember her reaction at the coffee shop, and that was just a friendly interaction with a regular barista – and knows to keep Meilin’s whole existence a secret up to the point where she has to explain it. It’s kind of defensible based on the fact that from Runch’s perspective, she’s just helping an old childhood friend get settled in her career and she knows that bringing it up would upset both Neen and the very, very brief period of peace they’ve achieved since Neen managed to take full revenge on Kingkamol, but it’s also the actions of someone who has spent a lot of energy and effort on controlling what information Neen has about her life (remember how long she kept her struggles at work a secret).

 

Human Resource

In the middle of Human Resource, Fren (Prapamonton Eiamchan, in a singular performance) and her husband are deciding whether they are willing to pay a non-refundable, half-a-million baht deposit to reserve a spot at an international school for their unborn child. The husband is enthusiastic about it: he is already planning the precise ways in which their hustling for the future of their child will guarantee success, outlining that the rest of their lives will be dedicated solely to ensuring that this child will climb the social ladder higher than they managed to do. Fren is a lot more cautious – she was already hesitant to tell him about being pregnant in the first place, before an accident revealed it regardless, and she is now faced with having to make a decision about a future she can’t even imagine in her head. Instead, she is thinking about the pressure of raising someone to be “good” – all the choices, all the work, that goes into making a good person, in the unspoken context of a world that is increasingly more violent, chaotic, exerting pressure on everyone trying to survive in it. It captures the central themes of the film, how the hustle of survival – or in this case, the hustle of someone who is middle-class not to fall behind, to keep her place. When her husband talks about his negative experiences of going to a public school, when they visit Fren’s mother, who seems to lead a simple life as a shop-keeper and is suffering from constant pain in her leg, they are making clear what the stakes of not keeping up are. It’s the inherent struggle of the (in this case, newly minted) middle-class: memories of their parents lack of options haunt them, falling behind is a vivid possibility, but the option of climbing higher on the social ladder is dangled like a just-out-of-reach carrot to keep the wheels turning. This sense of precarity is translated into a constant sense of unease, of un-mooredness, along with the destabilising sense that society is collapsing around the characters, with news about violence, predictions about future catastrophes, filtering in through the news.

The dichotomy of “being a good person” and “surviving in a capitalistic hellscape” is at the centre of the film. Fren works as a recruiter in HR, feeding desperate people who cannot turn down a job even when it comes with a requirement to work six days a week and face an intolerable boss who frequently throws things at his underlings when he is frustrated (or resorts to quiet, psychological terror, openly exerting his power especially when he is in the wrong) into the machine, knowing what toll it will take on them because she is living with the burden of it every day. There is an empty workstation in the office reminding her every day what it means, morally, to recruit: the woman who used to sit there has disappeared, her mother hasn’t heard from her for days, and the film eventually reveals that she has committed suicide after quietly bearing the burden for too long. The spectre of the consequences haunt Fren throughout the film, as does the deadline of finding someone to replace the employee so that things can continue as usual. If she weren’t pregnant, if her husband didn’t have such grand plans for their child, perhaps she could quit, but through how she and her colleague speak about the potential hires, it becomes clear that the job market is tight enough that it would be difficult to find a new job – and she doesn’t have rich parents to fall back on, or a financial cushion to make this clearly necessary decision. What does it mean for a society when it becomes impossible to make a moral decision, to be a good person? 

Fren’s inability to act and how trapped she is in her situation is contrasted with how her husband adapts to the circumstances of their life. He is a product rep for bulletproof vests, and chasing an expensive contract with the police force that is putting him in contact with very powerful men. Fren seems morally cautious about his involvement, as he is quite literally profiting from an increase in violence, from the uncertainty that is haunting her, to the extent where he is hounding down the most blood-thirsty, captivating news story to make his sales pitch stronger. At the same time, he is in a constant battle against the motorcycle riders who disregard the one-way-street leading to their apartment building: he might not have real, actual power anywhere else in his life, but he tries to regain it by enforcing the road rules they disregard to his inconvenience, in a process that first puts Fren in physical danger, and then, at the end of the film, leads him to an actual act of violence that he commits because he knows that he now has the kind of highly-placed friends in the police force that will mean he is protected against consequences. This is the kind of corruption, the lack of consequences for the well-connected to the detriment of everyone else, that is the cause for both her woes at work and the chaos in society in general, but the film hasn’t really left her with any way out – she is trapped by circumstance. 

Phanakngan Mai (Prod Rap Wai Phicharana), 2025, directed by Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit, starring Prapamonton Eiamchan, Paopetch Charoensook, Pimmada Chaisakaoen, Chanakan Rattana-Udom.

Das Lied zum Sonntag

Warpaint - Elephants (on Exquisite Corpse)

 

 

In the dark we are waiting for you
With your dying need for their attention
Hold on tight now, we won't let you fall

Reading List: June.

Non-Fiction: 

 

Eric Jay Dolin: The Wreck of the Mentor. 

 

Fiction: 

 

Benny P. Peterson: The Maidenheads.

Isabel J. Kim: The Sublimation. 

Lisa See: Daughters of the Sun and Moon. 

Jules Ohman: Body Grammar. 

 

Films: 

 

Namibia no Sabaku (2024, Yōko Yamanaka).

Bunnylovr (2025, Katarina Zhu). 

Summer's Camera (2025, Divine Sung). 

Samâ firumu ni notte (2020, Sōshi Matsumoto).

Yuyeolui eumagaelbeom (2019, Jung Ji-woo). 

Gespenster (2005, Christian Petzold). 

 

Shows: 

 

For All Mankind, Season Five. 

This Is Not a Murder Mystery, Season One.