At the Moment

At the Moment

TV-MA

Urban romance is back in Taiwan in this sweet, yet cathartic pandemic-era Netflix anthology

7.4

TV Show

Taiwan
Mandarin
Drama
2023
FEMALE DIRECTOR, LIEN YI-CHI
Austin Lin, Berant Zhu, Derek Chang

TLDR

So cute.

What it's about

Netflix presents an anthology of ten unique love stories in various cities of Taiwan that sparked during the pandemic.

The take

With the worldwide pandemic, there were less and less opportunities for a potential meet-cute when everyone was encouraged to stay home. At the Moment finds those rare moments where love was still able to bloom. It plays with so many of the familiar cheesy romantic tropes, but always with a twist, never playing the tropes straight out. Being an anthology, it doesn’t stick with one couple, so it doesn’t develop really in-depth dynamics, but each episode feels self-contained yet part and parcel of the quarantine experience. Ultimately, At the Moment feels like a little sweet treat for romance fans after a long period of self-isolation.

What stands out

With ten different stories directed by five separate directors, At the Moment doesn’t have one cohesive style. All the episodes are obviously urban romance stories hitting around the hour mark, but that’s the only obvious commonality, as each episode varies by tone, themes, and approach. This allows for the directors breathing room for their directorial style, and it’s lovely to see the variety of Taiwan’s storytelling, but the stories’ selection feels like part of a whole because of the work of screenwriter Tu Cheng-che and executive producer Nick Tai. The stories feel different enough, but it feels like the various aspects of loneliness and frustration of quarantine are all covered here. It makes for a sweet, yet cathartic romance series whose parts all work together.

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