HIStory: Stay Away From Me – Series Review & Episode Guide

Feng He is an ordinary university student who lives in an apartment unit by himself. One day, he learns that his younger stepbrother will be moving in with him, as requested by his parents. Feng He soon discovers his new stepbrother is Cheng Ching, a famous celebrity with many adoring fans.

Both stepbrothers aren't used to their living arrangement at first. Feng He has a serious personality and prefers to spend his time studying for school. Cheng Ching is more relaxed, but comes across as privileged and doesn't like doing chores. The two of them don't get along at first due to their personality differences. Over time, they eventually settle into a comfortable routine and get used to each other's eccentricities.

Cheng Ching is introduced to Meng Meng, Feng He's childhood best friend. Meng Meng is a hardcore BL fangirl who writes fanfiction and fantasizes about guys in her spare time. Thanks to her overactive imagination, Meng Meng immediately pairs Cheng Ching and Feng He together as a BL couple. Even if their actual relationship is quite different, reality won't stop Meng Meng from playing matchmaker between the two stepbrothers.

The HIStory franchise released three separate installments in its first season. Both HIStory: My Hero and HIStory: Obsessed had innovative premises that showed lots of ambition, even if their stories weren't executed perfectly. In contrast, HIStory: Stay Away From Me offered a more familiar concept, focusing on a stepbrother romance with a slight celebrity twist. Compared to those other HIStory series, the simplicity of this drama might either feel relaxing or too mundane, depending on your perspective.

HIStory: Stay Away From Me is a low-key series, featuring a small cast, a straightforward plot, and a streamlined romance. Once the two main characters start living together, you can already guess how the rest of their relationship goes. The love story carries out as expected, progressing in a linear trajectory while we cycle through the typical BL moments. Conflict arises near the end, but the tension is mild and nothing will cause you too much stress.

If the review sounds a little tepid so far, that's because HIStory: Stay Away From Me doesn't inspire strong feelings in me. As every scene unfolds predictably, there's a lack of buzz and excitement. Nothing stands out in a surprisingly good or offensively bad way. It meets the standard criteria for a BL drama in terms of storytelling, acting, and production values. However, it doesn't exceed any expectations. If we look at the glass as half-full, the consistency is commendable. If we perceive the glass as half-empty, then its mediocrity feels unacceptable.

With a tiny cast and a tidy story, there aren't many diversions in HIStory: Stay Away From Me. As a result, it focuses on fleshing out the main characters. You get a clear sense of who Feng He and Cheng Ching are as individuals. You understand their personalities, discover their aspirations, and observe their evolving relationship dynamics. While their characterizations aren't that complex, HIStory: Stay Away From Me does a competent job developing the two leads.

The romance is safe and modest. Even though the characters get along, their bond doesn't feel passionate and seems platonic instead. I hate to say it, but they resemble stepbrothers a lot more than lovers. Oddly, the characters share more intimacy in Meng Meng's imagination than what transpires between them in reality. As corny as those scenes are, her outlandish BL fantasies excite me more than the watered-down relationship that actually takes place.

HIStory: Stay Away From Me has a pleasant conclusion that won't come with many surprises. When I completed this series, my reaction was a casual indifference. As a BL fan, I want to be excited by a story that gets my heart thumping and my adrenaline flowing. Instead, HIStory: Stay Away From Me is pretty mediocre and doesn't rise above the middle of the pack. The drama is like the equivalent of a shoulder shrug, leaving me with a brief moment of nonchalance and then I'll forget about it.