“Wedding Plan” ended its series run with unexpected results for all the characters. The series was helmed by Mame, who wrote it based on one of her romance novels of the same name. The mysterious circumstances surrounding Lom (Sunny Wannarat) and Yiwa (Aya Orapan)’s wedding remain the centerpiece for the drama.

Their wedding planner, Nuea (Pak Naphat) ironically is left in the dark as the two young rich adults follow a plan 13 years in making. For better or worse, assisted by Yiwa’s close friend, Marine (Kate Sasisarun) as well as by Nuea’s coworkers at the wedding planner company. The comedic responses to the silly antics of all characters involved in this show is well acted and the conflicts they create felt real in the moments they created.

Spoilers From This Point

The series draws on real life prejudices and hints at the present situation homosexuals in Thailand face, unlike Lakorns, which show the abusive and vitriol hatred, characters who are gay deal with. “Wedding Plan” is another of Mame’s lighter in tone stories. That being said, it doesn’t shy away from the reality the four queer characters are facing.

It’s easy to create a lighter tone, but the ugly reality is ever present beneath the veneer of silliness and comedy. For Nuea, who believes the growing romance with an engaged man is shameful, and wrong. He doesn’t ever ignore that, punishing himself in various ways. Yiwa, whose close friend is actually her long-term girlfriend and the catalyst for the wedding plan. Her mother is the fictionally typical Thai mother, controlling to the point of stifling with very old-fashioned views on what love is and isn’t, versus who should and who shouldn’t experience it.

Something that occurs when her mother’s busy body friends try to “Out” Yiwa just for gossip’s sake. The scrunched up faces and snide comments alone are enough to make the viewer understand the scrutiny Yiwa has endured. Ironically, her character gets far less screen time than Lom, which I felt was a shame because Yiwa and Marine being in the closet (for Yiwa’s sake) could have been a much more interesting storyline, if we had gotten to see it. But instead we got to see the pair in glimpses as a side couple to Lom & Nuea. It wasn’t exactly bad as everything in the series is handled with enough depth to give you an idea of each character and what their motivations are. The intended purpose of showing how homophobia affects them is because they are women, and the effect is more emotional when we watch Marine getting slapped than it would be if it was Nuea. As the show went on; we see the ladies bear the major brunt of it.

On the other hand, the introduction of the mothers as side characters, intent on seeing their vision of their children’s happiness come into reality (speaks volumes about what the two of them endured up up to this point), which is why the wedding plan exists. Lom and Yiwa have been friends since childhood and hid their homosexuality from the world. The plan was to get married but not actually live together. They would live as next-door neighbors to keep up appearances. Because Lom can’t tell Nuea the truth, he instead uses wedding planning as a pretense to spend time with him. As the two grew closer, even having sex and sharing their feelings; Yiwa and Marine contend with the unfairness of the situation. Mame’s script doesn’t mince words as the characters express the duress they are under as they play along with the farce of “Playing House” that Lom is orchestrating.

He doesn’t anticipate the duress that he points towards Nuea. Nuea has old-fashioned values of moral standing and feeling shame over the fact that he was sleeping with an engaged man he leaves the city. He returns to his hometown to rebuild his sense of self. Sunny’s acting as Lom, awakening to an empty bed, was amazing. Hearing his voice go from teasing to desperate as he searched the home for the man he spent the night with was one of the best moments of the series, in my opinion. A large portion of the show is entitlement, and that I felt was more of a conflict if there was one. The light-hearted tone didn’t really allow for a real one in my view. We watch Lom exude his will over Yiwa and Nuea as the controller of the wedding. Yiwa assures Marine that the time they spend participating in the wedding plan is worth it. But honestly, the two seem to be where the conflict exists as their inability to come out puts the ones they love in such situations.

As the show moves onto the finale episodes, we see Lom come clean about his feelings for Nuea to the coworkers at the wedding planning company. He needs to know where Nuea is and they have the information. The cuteness of the scenes involving Nuea’s coworkers is endearing, but the show begins to rely heavily on that lighter tone. It’s as if it’s asking the viewer to suspend disbelief on how a normal person would react to the knowledge. So following this line of logic, the seven people involved in the wedding planning become fully supportive of the man who has fooled them for half the series. No one was angry, no one said “hey I spent countless hours doing what you wanted!” And that’s okay because this is a BL. (If it was a Korean show on Netflix, someone would have gotten slapped). Instead, the fairy tale reunion of Nuea and Lom happens with all of Nuea’s family putting in their two cents.

Here is my one complaint with the show, that too many scenarios were fast forwarded. The two episodes where Lom spends time working with the family working in their orchard should have been a few more episodes, allowing the viewer time to breathe. Instead, the show condenses the ending in the final three episodes, easily concluding it with Lom’s mother accepting the obvious that her son is dating Nuea. Yiwa and Marine fled to England where they get married. And Yiwa’s mother disappears from the plot.

“Wedding Plan” for what it was is a good show. Fun and light-hearted with enough cuteness to work in favor of a deeper storytelling and substance like its predecessor “Love in the Air”. This was a cupcake of a series, complete with a happy ending.

Rating- 4.5 out of 5 (as a cupcake can’t be a satisfying meal, but it is good for a distraction)

Streaming on- IQIYI/Me Mindy YouTube Channel