Heartbreaking and Beautiful silent is Not to be Missed.

A year ago, I started on my BL journey and was enjoying the series I was watching. They were fluffy and cute, and it was a nice little bubble to escape the pandemic. I was happy. I was content… Then, Ren Meguro waltzed into my life with his super-cute BL dramedy Kieta Hatsukoi. With his dark eyes, a heart-melting smile, and that deep, beautiful voice. I was like….

So, like any respectable full-grown red-blooded homosexual man, I took an interest in his career (translation: I became a total fan girl). Thanks to Ren, I discovered Snow Man and the magical music of the groups signed to Johnny & Associates.

While I’ve been following his music career, Kieta Hatsukoi and the Takizawa Kabuki ZERO film have been the only actual acting I’ve been able to see. So, when it was announced earlier that he would lead a new drama, silent, I’ve been waiting patiently for it to premiere (translation: I’ve been chomping at the bit because patience was not an attribute the creator deemed necessary to bless me with).

A hetero-drama, silent is a series that follows Tsumugi Aoba (Haruna Kawaguchi), who fell in love with Sou Sakura (Ren Meguro) while they were in high school. While they seemed to click and love one another, Sou, without warning, told her he’d met someone else and that they should break up.

Several years later, Tsumugi runs into Sou only to discover that he’s now a mute who has gone completely deaf, and the voice that she loved so much is not something she’ll ever be able to hear again. But, the diagnosis was also the reason he broke up with her. He’d never met anyone else. He loved her; he just didn’t want her to suffer with him.

Meguro and Kawaguchi in a promotional still from *silent*

Two things about this series. 1.) While I LOVED Meguro’s slightly silly portrayal of the adorably clueless Aida in Kieta Hatsukoi, silent has revealed what a truly talented dramatic actor he really is. 2.) I completely relate to what his Kieta Hatsukoi co-star Michi (who played his interest Aoki) had to say after watching the series’ second episode, “I just had to sit there and bask in my feelings.”

Bonus realization: Ren (affectionally called Meme by his friends and fans) has an adorable chin dimple I never noticed before.

I was also pleasantly surprised to see that the cast included Sato Arata, from IMPACTors (another J&A Group), who recently starred in the High School BL dramedy Takara-Kun & Amagi-Kun – which is also streaming on Viki.

Episode 2 will upload tomorrow, 17 October 2022. Episodes will be uploaded weekly on Mondays for the rest of the series run.

You can see the trailer for silent here.