Calling all fans of excellent reality TV: Netflix is making history (and providing a much-needed breath of fresh air) with its new Japanese dating series The Boyfriend. Dubbed Japan's first-ever same-sex dating show, The Boyfriend, which premiered on July 9 and airs weekly, brings a group of queer men together for a month-long stay in a beach house in Tateyama, Chiba Prefecture, Japan. While living together in a space called "the Green Room" and running a mint-green coffee truck, the participants are set to make deep friendships—and maybe something more.
Netflix viewers know that the streaming giant usually goes for chaotic, jaw-dropping melodrama when it comes to its romantic series and dating hits. (See this summer's Perfect Match season 2, long-running favorites like Too Hot to Handle and Love Is Blind, which is now onto its seventh season, and even to a lesser extent the Korean reality series Single's Inferno.) The Boyfriend sets itself apart from the rest of the reality landscape thanks to its earnest, slice-of-life authenticity. It's a show where the most dramatic moments can come from the cast members' response to anonymous love letters, or seeing how a bit of phone snooping (yes, the cast gets to keep their phones!) can throw off a budding connection. Think Terrace House levels of coziness and intimacy. (One of Terrace Houses' hosts, Yoshimi Tokui, even shows up on The Boyfriend's panel, where he's joined by Megumi, Chiaki Horan, Thelma Aoyama, and Durian Lollobrigida.)
