The Light Inside the Darkness

The Thai BL KinnPorsche the series has ended, and with its finale, a bittersweet hole has been left in many viewers’ hearts. From the blurred lines the characters were born from to the blurred lines they grew into, this series exceeded expectations.

And the most beautiful thing about it is how it portrayed the power of light inside the darkness.

From the very beginning of the series, despite the humor, violence, sex, questionable actions, and chaos a mafia story brings to the screen, there has been a thread of humanity that was never lost. And much of that has to do with the gray area the story takes place inside of. All of humanity exists inside the blurred lines between good and evil. There is darkness inside of everyone, and nowhere is this more obvious than in a world where loyalty and love are as strong as distrust and deceit. Where secrets are buried, and nothing is as it seems.

A drama is powerful when it gets people talking, and KinnPorsche got people talking. Every episode started a discussion, whether it be a specific character under fire by the fandom or a plot line viewers attempted to dissect. And it all played out in a mass of trending hashtags that continued to trend even when it wasn’t airing.

And it’s all because we were given a dark drama shining with light.

Every single character in KinnPorsche exists inside the gray area, whether they started inside of it or were later brought into it. Even characters that come across as harmless and warmhearted, such as Arm and Pol, are still tainted by the gray. They are, after all, bodyguards who kill for the Main family. They have blood on their hands. At some point, each character messes up.

I found it both interesting and amusing that every week there was always a character that managed to upset the fandom, whether it was Kinn, Vegas, Porsche, Kim, or even Chay. A character can’t get much cleaner than Chay, yet he still managed to be hated for making bad decisions people felt went against what Porsche wanted for him despite knowing he didn’t choose what happened to him. This shows that the gray area they all exist in leaves no one untouched. None of them are perfect, even the ones who seem like they are.

When you step back and look at the bigger picture that is KinnPorsche, this series’s entire plot centers around love and pain. Around darkness with a hint of redemption. Around relationships that hurt and heal. Time loves Tae, but he also hurts Tae. Porsche loves Chay, but he also hurts Chay. Kinn Loves Porsche, but he also hurts Porsche. Kim loves Chay, but he also hurts Chay. Vegas loves Pete, but he also hurts Pete. Pete loves Vegas, but he also hurts Vegas. The cycle continues in a never-ending circle. Everyone in this drama loves someone or something but also manages to hurt them in one way, shape, or form.

No one is entirely trustworthy.

Nowhere is this more obvious than in the moment when Porsche hands Pete over to Vegas in exchange for Vegas’ help. As much as Porsche loves Pete, his priority is his family and the truth. It has been Porsche’s endgame since the beginning. Viewers love him because of his loyalty to his brother and his parents, but no one honestly asks themselves what loyalty and love can lead people to do. No one realized until that moment that what makes a character great can make him as much an anti-hero as a hero.

KinnPorsche is full of anti-heroes. It is full of characters with good intentions who would do anything for their families but who step beyond the bounds of right and wrong to do so. And it does it using superb cinematography, soul-rending music, and artistically shot sex scenes and action sequences.

Skin speaks inside KinnPorsche, and it does so with the same light-tinged darkness that touches everything in this series.

I wrote a previous piece about the way sex is used to convey unspoken conversation and emotions inside KinnPorsche. Every love scene is meant to be sexy, but each is also meant to tell an intimate story bonding the couples and forming alliances inside a gray world. And none of them are unnecessary.

In particular, there was a lot of talk about the pool scene between Kinn and Porsche in episode 13. Fans were divided. Some praised it, and others felt let down by it. Some felt the intensity of the episode it takes place in dampened the excitement behind the sex, but in truth, it was carefully placed to fit the narrative. Not only was it the perfect follow-up to the emotional moment shared between Kinn and Porsche at the cemetery, it brought the episode down from the VegasPete high and led up to the heartbreaking choice Porsche makes in leaving.

Each week, there was always a character or scene many felt the need to tear down, and while that could be frustrating for some, it is this need to break something down that makes KinnPorsche the dramatic masterpiece it is. What makes KinnPorsche great is that NONE of the characters are perfect and that the gray situation they’re all in is dragging them down. Every character is a literal train wreck waiting to happen, and viewers sit at the train station waiting to see which character derails before the end. There isn’t a single character that can be fully defended or fully torn to pieces.

There isn’t a single character that isn’t flawed, but all of them contain a spark of light.

And that’s the mark I felt this show was meant to make. No matter how dark something seems, there is always light inside that darkness. There is always a spark of humanity. Even villains are human. Even the villains have a shot at redemption, whether they choose that path or not. The world is a big place full of flawed people who walk through life affected by or affecting those they come in contact with. The world is full of smiles people wear, human masks that hide much deeper thoughts and intentions. The world is full of people who talk about other people, who spend each day trying to break down the people they know into people they think they relate to but probably don’t in the grand scheme of things. The world is full of people who say they’re open-minded, caring, and forgiving but often say or do something to disprove that.

The world is full of people like Porsche who hand others over in the name of family. The world is full of people like Vegas who lash out at others because they’ve been hurt by someone else. The world is full of people like Kinn who hide a soft heart behind a mask of indifference. The world is full of people like Pete with bright personalities hiding a darkness they don’t know how to channel. The world is full of people like Chay, who wants to be what everyone else wants them to be but somehow manages to fall just short of being that. The world is full of people like Tankhun with empathetic personalities who hide their phobias behind expressive actions.

The world is full of people with hearts, minds, and actions that mimic the darkest and lightest characters in KinnPorsche.

And that’s why we found ourselves questioning them every week, defending, challenging, and accusing them. Because, in reality, we also question ourselves.

And that’s KinnPorsche’s power.

Dramas that get people talking are the ones people remember, and none of us will forget KinnPorsche anytime soon. We’ll be waiting with bated breaths for the next season and searching as we did this season for the light we hope we find inside each dark character. And I hope that includes more of each couple’s story and a deeper look into some of the characters that didn’t get explored in season one, such as Time, Tae, and Tem.

I hope that includes more love confessions and apologies. Because in KinnPorsche there were a lot of “I’m Sorry’s.” And nothing defines light inside darkness like “I’m sorry.” The characters’ darkness in this series often centered around their actions. Their “I’m sorry’s” were the light inside of that.

For a drama hiding its light inside complicated, gray characters, check out KinnPorsche on iQiyi.