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BL: Five dogs and one human howled with laughter at The Boy Next Door [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-07-22

All five of my mutts howled throughout The Boy Next Door, a wacky parody of the tropes we all know and love from rom-coms. Okay, they probably weren’t actually howling at the movie but rather were sympathetically howling with me; they don’t really understand laughter so they thought I must be howling and joined in.

But if a film makes me laugh so long and so loudly that it sets off my dogs, it has to be brilliantly funny. So let’s create a new humor rating for movies: on a scale of 1 to 5 dogs, how many started howling?

All of ‘em, Katie, all of ‘em. 17 times during the movie. And this was the second time I’ve watched it.

I do love me some hysterically funny and witty satire and parody. I’m not alone: millions upon millions of fans adore such timeless gems as Airplane!, Galaxy Quest, Naked Gun, and Blazing Saddles and can quote verbatim every joke before the actors deliver it.

There’s another member now in the pantheon of immortal classics of humor: The Boy Next Door. Just as Airplane! spoofed disaster movies and Naked Gun lampooned police dramas, TBND skewers a specific target: romance in film, especially in romantic comedies. It’s a target practically begging to be skewered because every single rom-com absolutely depends on ageless tropes to make the storyline and characters work.

Let’s dive into this more, below the break. See you there!

Our mission statement This regime wants to erase LGBQT people from public life and eliminate access to information, resources, and cultural heritage for our youth. Most LGBQT adolescents never see stories about people like themselves enjoying love and romance. In our current reality, watching a Boys’ Love or Girls’ Love series or movie might be the only means for young people to see models of how their own relationships could start, develop, and successfully grow. It’s also an act of subversion … so watch an episode, share it with others, and resist!

Tropes make the (movie) world go round

Tropes are situations, actions, and character types that are familiar and predictable in film, television, and novels. When we see them, we know what is coming soon because we’ve seen them many times before.

For example, in a comedy, when someone takes a big gulp of water, we almost always know before it happens that the person across from them is going to be drenched in a spit-take.

In an action or suspense film, if we see a nerdy guy with glasses and a pocket protector, we’re pretty sure that he’ll soon be scanning thousands of lines of binary code and miraculously prevent the nuke from being launched. Nobody has to announce to us that he’s a whiz-kid programmer, his appearance informs us of the familiar trope that is coming up.

Romance movies, whether comedic or dramatic, have their own special set of tropes. The screenwriters count on our familiarity with and expectations of these tropes to set the stage for a romance to blossom and grow. You recognize them when you see them.

Meg Ryan, the queen of rom-coms. These two couldn’t stand each other at first but love triumphed in the end

How about the “Enemies-to-Lovers” trope, where two people get off to a bad start with each other but are happily in love before the end credits roll? We all remember Julie Andrews dutifully enduring her first meeting with the brusque and cold baron in The Sound of Music but we knew he’d eventually yield to her charms. And who could forget Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal vowing to never, ever see that noxious creature again in When Harry Met Sally? And yet they did, and Cupid hit bulls-eyes with them both.

Or the “Forced Proximity” trope, where the pair who would prefer to avoid each other are compelled by circumstances to spend a lot of time with each other, practically cheek-by-jowl? It might happen when travel plans offer no other choice — like in The African Queen — or when higher powers order the unlikely couple to while away their hours together — like in The Breakfast Club.

I wrote a story all about the tropes we frequently encounter in Boys’ Love series and movies. Most of them are just as popular in heterosexual rom-coms as they are in BLs. You might like to familiarize yourself with some of them before reading on.

The Boy Next Door masterfully weaves a tale that wends from one classic trope to the next, during fifteen short episodes (compiled into a single video), subjecting our hapless pair to the forces of fate that are conspiring to bring them together time and time again. But there’s a catch — a big catch — as you will see.

About the movie

The Boy Next Door Original title 썸남 ( Handsome Man ) Country South Korea Release Year 2017 Original format 15 episodes averaging 6 minutes each Movie version 1 hr 36 min Original work Webtoon Handsome Man (썸남) by Bae Chul Wan (배철완) Original network Naver TV Cast

Principal cast Role Actor Kyutae Choi Woo Sik Gijae Jang Ki Yong Mina Jang Hee Ryung

The story

The fated pair are two guys, neighbors, who don’t like each other. Yet every episode, they end up locked in an embrace or sharing a bed and they can’t quite believe this is happening to them. Even worse, it’s embarrassing because, as luck would have it, right when they’re in a compromising position, in walks a friend, landlord, or ex-girlfriend and they sheepishly look at each other like “How the hell did this happen to us … again???”

The hook is that they’re both straight so they are really poor candidates for a love match, no matter how much destiny is forcing it upon them.

Kyutae and Gijae smoking. Smoking may be bad for your emotional health if it leads to wacky predicaments and ridiculous situations

Kyutae and Gijae both smoke and they go out to the open hallway outside their apartments to indulge, where they meet for the first time. They awkwardly make conversation and, out of politeness, say that sometime they should get a drink together. When they finally do, it’s obvious that they have little in common. They don’t find each other interesting and, in fact, dislike each other and hope they can avoid each other in the future.

But the universe has other plans for them.

Each episode demonstrates a classic romance trope by putting the boys smack into the middle of it. It’s very cleverly done; the writers found unexpected ways to bring about the situations for two people who are not a romantic couple.

Gijae and Kyutae enjoying domestic bliss, as erroneously imagined by their friend Mina

Not only are the actions and reactions of Kyutae and Gijae funny, the people around them double the fun. They make mistaken assumptions about the relationship between the guys and we totally understand it because what they see really does look like a full-blown romance, if you saw it at exactly the right moment from the right angle.

Those reactions and comments to the lads could easily slide into mocking about gayness … and writers of lesser talent would probably go there. Here, we (LGBQT+ people) are never the object of the jokes; instead, we laugh about how easily appearances can be misconstrued. This movie could be renamed “Wait, It’s Not How It Looks!” The humor is the misunderstandings and the absurd cascade of events that precipitate them, not because it’s comical that two guys appear to be boyfriends.

Mina thinks the guys just can’t resist each other because she’s seen this too many times

In fact, the movie is gay-positive. Two other guys, who have witnessed what appears to them to be Kyutae and Gijae openly showing their love for each other, are inspired so much that they enter into a romantic relationship and publicly come out as gay and proud. Kyutae congratulates them for it (but with a word of caution, for reasons that will be clear when you watch). They’re portrayed as a sweet couple, finally feeling free to be themselves and find happiness together.

And by the time the movie ends, we’re left wondering if our two lads could possibly have a future together after all. Those romance tropes are practically invincible, you know — in the movies, they work every time!

The players

You might recognize one or more faces in this movie. Choi Woo Sik (Kyutae) starred in Parasite, which won the Oscar for Best Picture five years ago. Jang Ki Yong (Gijae) is also an experienced and respected actor with a couple of dozen movies and TV shows in his body of work.

Joy (Park), who appears as herself, is famous as both a soloist and as one of the leads of the K-pop group Red Velvet. Kim Hee Jun, who also appears as herself, is well known to fans of K-drama, having starred in dozens of series and movies.

All of the cast did an excellent job, even those who had small roles. The two leads were brilliant, perfectly capturing and portraying their respective characters. Kyutae is easily flustered and meticulous while Gijae is an unperturbable slob. Think of them as Asia’s own Oscar and Felix from The Odd Couple.

Mina, in a scary bad mood and wreathed in black CGI smoke, might murder the boys if she ever discovers what they did

Jang Hee Ryung, who played their mutual best friend Mina, was outstanding as she cycled among lighthearted, drunk, furious, supportive, depressed, flirty, shocked, and just about every other state you can think of. I would imagine it’s a dream role for an actress: “You want me to play every human emotion? And with physical comedy? Sign me up!”

As the credits roll, we get a few minutes of “behind the scenes” coverage of their filming. There is a lot of laughter and it seems clear that the cast and crew had as much fun making the series/movie as we had watching it.

Conclusion

Not only is this movie insanely funny and well crafted, it’s perfect if you don’t have a large block of time to commit to watching something. Episodes are clearly defined so you can spend just 5-10 minutes to watch one, then get back to work after you stop laughing. Warning: don’t watch this in your cubicle unless your boss is cool because you will laugh out loud. A lot.

Episode 4, in particular, might be hazardous to your health. I almost fell out of my chair multiple times during it, laughing really hard while twisting around, futilely trying to convince the dogs that everything is fine and they don’t need to howl like banshees … which made me laugh even more, which made them howl more, rinse and repeat.

In my humble opinion, The Boy Next Door ranks right up there with the great comedy classics that I mentioned at the top of this story. Its appeal will endure because its comedic target will endure; romance tropes — such as “The Stumble and Catch” — have been around at least as far back as Shakespeare and there’s no indication their popularity will wane in the future. They are the foundation for movies like this, comedies of errors.

Let’s see. I had five howlers every time and there were 17 incidents. So that gives us:

5 howling dogs X 17 laugh riots = 85 points

And that means TBND made me laugh myself silly, over and over again. We all need some relief from the grinding angst of the terrible timeline we’re living in. So don’t miss this one, it will be the funniest thing you watch all year.

You’ll likely end up howling yourself.

Coming up …

Krotor’s story next Tuesday will cover With You Always, a deeply moving look at how love endures. Watch this short film on Youtube this week via the link in our viewing calendar below.

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