what are your thoughts on fixed couples?
hi nonnie 🤗
thank you for bringing up a topic i'm equally passionate when talking about but is also one that gets me very easily frustrated when talking about for so many reasons, that could turn fill pages of essays with specific koojins as case studies. but i guess to avoid unleashing unsolicited angry rambling, i'll try my best to keep this ask as short as humanly possible for me.
DISCLAIMER: for this ask i'll just be discussing "branded pairings" in the sense that two actors are paired up long term for purposes of promotions and being acting partners in series most likely to prominently feature a relationship between two said actors. i apologise in advance if there are any generalisations or assumptions made throughout this post. these are just my personal incoherent thoughts and feelings on it.
in the simplest terms, i personally am not a fan of branded pairings. the pros and cons of branded pairings have been debated to death before in the Thai BL subreddit since its their favorite bi-weekly topic.
Every two weeks, someone will post complain about/ asking if or when fixed pairings will end or that they would love to see actor A of couple AB works with actor X of couple XY for example. Most replies shall be either to share similar sentiments or otherwise it'd be to tell OP to leave or stop following actors A, B, X, Y; or that OP have to accept that branded pairing system because that's the actors' choices and that's just thai culture; or gaslighting OP that they're being controlling of actors' freedom of choices.
I think everyone who's been following branded pairings for a long time could tell that not all Thai branded pairings are going to last as long as the pillar ones like GMMTV's TayNew, OffGun; not all branded pairings are going to go from koojin -> koojing like NadechYaya, MarkKim, TerMai; not all branded pairings are going to move on to new partner yet remain close friends with their former ones like MaxTul, DrakeFrank... and even when they do remain close colleagues, sometimes shows that had such massive growth in such a short period can build a such a crazy cp fanbase that affect future works of the actors (OhmNanon).
I understand that "branded pairings" can serve as means of generating income for the actors or the ratings/popularity to the producers/channels or simply the audience to the art/work that the directors/writers/creative staff want to create. But the prejudices, the implications and the pressure that it put on the same key players mentioned above are the downsides which outweigh the benefits.
I don't like using this comparison at all because it'll be completely lopsided but... here me out... if we compare Inn Sarin's French in Memoir Of Rati with Ice Natara's Chinese in Mad Unicorn knowing that both actors started from scratch/zero for their respective languages, it's clear as day who has the time to put in more effort for language practice and who doesn't. And this is in NO WAY an offense to Inn's French because he did great within his abilities and you can't really compare Ice "guy who disappear for a whole year to prepare for one role" Natara vs Inn "CEO of multiple pastry businesses" Sarin.
I honestly don't know where I was going with that but perhaps my point was that with branded pairings having to constantly output work/series to sustain their pairing's popularity, a lot of the times a work may suffer in quality (I'm immensely enjoying Memoir Of Rati at the moment so that statement is NOT referring to MOR but for other works of various networks and channels) due to lack of time preparation for the other actors or just simply lazy writing =))))))))
However, my biggest beef with branded pairings lies within their CP fans and this is the external factor that they pretty much can't control. Some couples can go all out with the fan service and still isn't that popular, some couples make clear that they're just friends and can still grow a deeply toxic fanbase... essentially, fandom is impossible to control and you have solo fans of actors clashing with CP fans of a pairing like all the time. It's not uncommon to see 'fans' who refuse to watch anything from their faves that isn't a QL work or denying/putting down the chemistry between one half of the pairing if they work with another person.
So mainly because of fandom politics, I find myself being very hesitant to start/continue watching a series with branded pairings. In a way, one could say that I'm rather biased against branded pairings (UpPoom better wow me with Love Of Silom or else 🙄🙄🙄🙄) but frankly, I'm just a 'career fan'* who constantly hopes my faves have an interesting and diverse filmography filled with great works, working with different actors in different genres and networks and formats.
* 事业粉 [shì yè fěn] – “career fan.” A fan whose primary interest lies in the professional work of their celebrity.
I'm answering this ask with my eyes half closed at 4:30 AM so please sincerely forgive me if all of this ends up sounding like one incoherent word salad.
TLDR: i don't like branded pairings or fixed couples because these pairings breed insufferable/toxic fans that can easily poison my enjoyment of an actor's works and the pressure that this system/koojin culture put on the "branded pairing" actors is immeasurable and often directly impacts/limits the choices of scripts/opportunities that they get.
To quote EP 5 of Taste which features a storyline involving two actors in a branded pairing.
[...] Life doesn't reward someone just because they've worked hard. Audience don't pay for tickets just because the actors are dedicated, but because they want to be entertained [...] "Art" requires more than just passion. Dedication is not everything. There has to be an awaited audience to keep the artists motivated and continue creating art.
So all in all, I understand why the "branded pairing" system exists but I personally feel like the system treats them like commodities selling "kwam-y" or "BL feels" rather than actors selling "acting skills".
