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miyu-hyperfixates · 4 years

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The Untamed and MDZS appreciation and recommendation post

Okay so fair warning to my small amount of followers, this blog will probably be full of MXTX contents starting from now, because I’ve fallen into MXTX’s hell and I don’t see myself climbing out any time soon.

I’m not even kidding in the span of three months, I’ve watched CQL (like 4 times), watched the special edition, watch the MDZS donghua, read the novel, read the manhua, read a fair amount of fics, discovered the SVSSS’s characters through a few crossover fanfics, started to read SVSSS, then TGCF (as well as their respective manhua up to the last translated chapters) and well generally immersed myself into the fandoms. And I LOVE it! And I have so, so many feelings and thoughts about the characters, the plots, the relationships, everything, that I don’t even know where to start!

Okay so for those who don’t know what the hell I’ve talking about. MXTX stands for Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù who is the author of three amazing novels: Mo Dao Zu Shi (MDZS) [also called Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation], The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System (SVSSS) and Tian Guan Ci Fu (TGCF) [Heaven Official’s Blessing]. The Untamed or Chen Qing Ling (CQL) is the chinese drama adaptation of her most well known (as of now) novel MDZS.

I am going to talk about CQL/The Untamed and MDZS (novel version) in this post... But it will probably be followed by posts about TGCF and SVSSS too.

I’ve tried to be pretty vague on several points so that should keep the spoilers at minimum, in case you didn’t watch CQL yet.

[More under the cut]

Okay so as someone of Asian descent who was born and raised in an European country and spent her formative years watching wuxia and xianxia, The Untamed/CQL is the kind of representation that I really didn’t know I needed and I am so, so glad that I gave it a chance. (Big, big thanks to @shit-happens-bitchachos for reblogging so much CQL contents that the frequent presence of it on my dash got me curious enough to start watching it).

Watching The Untamed for the first time feels like coming back to a home that you once thought would be frigid but actually became very warm and welcoming without you noticing because you have been away for so long. And it feels both nostalgic and new, in the best possible way. It’s a wonderful feeling, really.

Where to find it?

You can watch the drama english sub version on Netflix, Viki or Youtube, just typed “The Untamed” and you should find the episodes easily.

To be honest, though I am very thankful for the existence of such platform, I have a slight [read huge] dislike of Netflix’s choice of translation for any Asian movie/tv shows. I mean I’m not going to go off on a debate about official translation vs fan translation, nor westernization and how doing so not only take off a huge layer of subtle/or not so subtle communication but also participate to erase part of the culture. [Because I have opinions about this and I am still very much so cringing about all the “Yanli”s, it is really not the point I’m trying to make right now. ]

So out of the three version, I’d lean more on the Viki version. To be clear though this choice isn’t based on the accuracy of the translation, but strictly on the choice of naming and title convention.

As for the novel, you can find here a complete english translation made by the Exiled Rebels Scanlations group.

The plot

I’m not going to go into detail about the plot, because I’m sure a lot of people out there managed to do so in a way more articulate way that I ever could.

So basically CQL is about Wei Wuxian, aka the Yiling Patriarch. The Yiling Patriarch is like this huge urban legend that everyone warns their children about, except he actually existed. Why such a reputation? Well, in a Cultivation society where people used spiritual energy to fight and exorcise creatures full of resentful energy (such as ghost, ghouls and other things), the Yiling Patriarch is actually the guy who decided that he was going to use resentful energy to fight resentful energy. What he is doing is called “demonic cultivation” and if you want a western equivalent it would be quite close to using necromancy. And if you want an idea of how blasphemous such method of cultivation is deemed, it would be the equivalent of going to a Christian exorcist organization and yelling loud and clear to all the people there that you’re gonna desecrate the tombs of all holy people and use their corpses to fight ghost and other dark creatures.

So the legend/story of the Yiling Patriarch goes as follow: The Yiling Patriarch and his army of corpses were actually quite useful to turn over the tide of a war that shook the foundations of the Cultivation World, annihilating the strongest Sect of the five Great Cultivation Sects (that lorded over the cultivation society). But some time afterwards the Yiling Patriarch revealed his true colors, and killed more than 3000 cultivators (among them his elder sister and her husband - orphaning their one month old son) before finally ended up being killed by his own little brother.

And now sixteen (or thirteen in the novel) years later, Wei Wuxian’s soul got called back because of a dark ritual. The ritual involved giving up their own soul and offering their body to summon up the soul of a dead, evil, person. The soul summoned would have to accomplish the task the summoner wished for, or the soul would be forever destroyed without being able to ever reincarnate. And so, Wei Wuxian woke up in the body of Mo Xuanyu, a young man who was abused by his family and wished for revenge. While trying to work out what he is supposed to do, Wei Wuxian quickly realized that the Mo family is actually being targeted by fierce corpses that are acting way more aggressively than they should. Turns out that it was because of a possessed spirit sword [a cut out arm in the novel].

Afterwards he encounters Lan Wangji, an esteemed cultivator, one of the strongest of his generation, coming from one of the most righteous Cultivation Sect. And the thing is, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji appear to have quite a complicated history that dates back to their teenage years. And CQL/MDZS is not only about how they decided to investigate the mystery of the possessed sword/arm (which ended up digging up a lot of secrets and conspiracy ), but also about Wei Wuxian’s past, starting from when he was 15 and meeting Lan Wangji for the first time.

The few things that you’re probably going to feel/think while watching the few first episodes

Confusion I think I’m not even kidding when I say you’re supposed to be in a state of perpetual confusion for the first two episodes... There’s this huge info dump, in the first five minutes of episode 1, then you’ll have to navigate this new world feeling as confused as dead-for-sixteen years Wei Wuxian... You’ll meet dozens of characters and if you can’t remember their names or who they are it’s normal don’t worry. Each character has a birth name (Wei Ying, Lan Zhan) and a courtesy name that (Wuxian, Wangji)... And so if you see Wei Ying or Wei Wuxian just know that it refers to the same person. And to complicate things further some characters also have a title (Yiling Patriarch, Hanguang-Jun) other people might use to refer to them. So really, if you want to understand what is going on, you might want to note the name, title and relationship down... But it’s kinda tedious? I promise it is unnecessary as those characters will all be introduced properly in the flash-back starting at the end of episode 2, and you’ll fully be able to get used to them and keep track of them. Of course, if you managed to remember a few names, once the character is being introduced in the past, you’ll get a “ Oh so at some point, this is going to happen to them” sort foreshadowing/foreknowledge, which is neat, I guess. [I recommend going back to watch the first two episodes, once the flash-back is over, to fully grasp what was going on there].

What the hell am I even watching? Okay so this one might only just be me but I was pretty hooked by the story by episode 3... and then I reached episode 8 and 9 and I kid you not, I went “Oh boy... that’s.... yeah okay... *cover face with hands*”... So I was cringing pretty hard for those two episodes out of second-hand embarrassment at the extras actors acting level... Like woah... It was supposed to be scary and threatening and all but I couldn’t just take them seriously? (You’ll know what I’m talking about when you get there)... That with some plot points made me seriously consider stopping right there.... But thankfully I didn’t. So you really just need to pass the first two episodes [which are really good] and cringe your way through the two most abyssal episodes in the show (in my opinion) and everything will go smoothly afterwards. Though to be fair, it might be explained by the fact that no one expected that CQL would have the highest number of reviews of Chinese drama, nor that it would be the highest earning drama of 2019 and certainly not that it would accumulate 8 billions views on Tennent by May 2020. Where am I going with this? Well it was certainly no Game of thrones in terms of budget... That’s what I’m trying to say. It had a low budget production... and well in a fantasy world where everyone and their grandma use supernatural power to fight each other and demonic creatures, special effects are a must. Choices had had to be made [and while I am very thankful for the aspects they decided to use the money on] the special effects were very touch and go.

Okay but are they going to be together or is this another case of queerbaiting? So if what you’re asking is “will we ever get a kiss, a love confession or definite proof of their relationship?”. The very short answer is “No.” You’ll never see any of those on screen for the very simple and good reason that there are censorship laws in China regarding queer relationship on screen. “So it’s basically queerbaiting?” Again no. CQL was adapted from a BL chinese novel. In the novel there is absolutely no room for doubts that they are together. But because of the censorship the producer teams had to remove all definite and obvious proof of romance, but it also means that they had to be creative and anything in the subtext or subtle areas was a go. Like really they crammed more homoerotic text (like at this point is this even subtext) in the show than in all other kinds of adaptations (including the novel, where we get kissing, sex and eloping). It got the point that contrarily to the novel, donghua and manhua where the whole Cultivation world thought Lan Wangji hated Wei Wuxian and that they couldn’t stand each other,in the show everybody and their dogs knew that the two were very close. Also, while I absolutely hate that those censor law exist and am very disappointed that such homophobic mentality still exist and that we won’t get a full adaptation and explicit of their love story, I must say that because of this my demisexual ass absolutely love the depiction of their love in the show. I mean, when you don’t have the “easy way out” of kissing and sex and so all to show that they is definitively romance material going on here... You have to get creative, you have to convey it with all other gestures... touching, gazing at each other and so on... And it creates such a soft but intense and intimate environment around them...By the way I’m not trying to negate their sexual relationship in the novel (#LetWangxianFreelyExpressTheirSexualLives)... I’m just saying that I’m not sure the producing teams would have gotten to such a length in the show if they could just have adapted the explicit romance scenes. Now if somehow they’d had managed to keep the same level of intense subtext and be able to adapt the romance scenes too, that would have been the best, but well...

The reasons you should still absolutely watch/read it?

The plot

The way all those character journeys and stories are interwoven in such a cohesive picture is nothing short of amazing. And the way that Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji unravel events that happened more than a decade ago piece by piece [or rather body part by body part] is so very well done. And of course half way through, you think that you’ve got the full pictures, and you’re sort of gloating all the while because you see it coming from miles away and how can the cast be that stupid... And well you are not wrong. Watch out for the canary though. The show chose to move a few things in term of timeline (character appearing and events happening way before they were supposed to... )... They also added a few original plot points in the past.... So as a results it feels slightly less cohesive and coherent than in the novel. Anyway I won’t go into details here because I’ve got this super long post planned where I’d detailed all the differences between the novel and the show and why some things worked in my opinion but not other. CQL and MDZS are what a properly balanced plot-driven and character-driven show/novel look like.

The relationships

Of course, Wangxian (Wei Wuxian/Lan Wangji) should absolutely be mentioned. Because throughout the story in the past, you watch as young, wild, ingenious, thinking-out-of-box Wei Wuxian meet an equally young seemingly inflexible, impassive, following 3000+ rules in his daily lives Lan Wangji, you watch how their personality clashes before finally acknowledging each other skills, you watch how they hurt during the war, how quickly they had to grew up, you watch how one of them had to watch the other walking down a quickly crumbling path, being alienated by the world without being able to help, you watch how they lost each other, before finally finding each other again after sixteen/thirteen years. And then you can finally watch how soft they are with each other, how in-sync they are, the trust, the devotion, the willingness to stand by each other against the whole fucking world. And as I already mentioned before, because of the censure law in China, you’ll never can’t and will never get to see Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian say “I love you” to each other on the show. It still manages to convey “I love you” in every other possible way without having them actually say the words. I mean at this point it can’t even be considered subtext... It’s plain text written in bold underlined font that can be read in every single one of their interactions, and sometimes even when the other isn't even there, [It's basically subtitles! Hah! Okay getting out of there].

It helps that the chemistry between the two actors is absolutely mind-blowing. And the acting is nothing short of amazing. If you’ve been in the spn fandom then you might know that Jensen is king of the micro-expressions ... well I’m afraid that he has been dethroned by Wang Yibo (Lan Wangji’s actor) in my mind.

But really, wangxian is not the only relationship worth mentioning in CQL/MDZS. One of the other huge highlight in my opinion is the several siblings dynamics. There are about seven sets of siblings among the whole cast and because shitty, shittier and shittiest parents were apparently the norm for their generation, we get to see the trope of “eldest child basically raised their younger siblings” in five different flavors. Of course the main focus is on Wei Wuxian and his siblings, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t see the sheer care and protectiveness oozing out of the other four sets of siblings. As someone who loves family bonding (and especially found families), I really appreciate the fact that among those sets of siblings, there are some that are related by blood, some who are half-siblings and some who are not related biologically but consider themselves siblings regardless. And while all their relationships are different - because they are different people - they all do share the same love for their siblings. “How far are you willing to go for your siblings?” “How much are you ready to sacrifice for them?” The show answers those two questions in various all throughout the story in a more or less oblique way, and right there lies the motivation behind a lot of the characters’ actions, good or bad. Their relationship with their siblings is actually one of the major driving force of the characters (Wei Wuxian among them). And I love it, because it shows that love comes in a many, many forms.

The overarching themes

“What’s right, what’s wrong? Who’s good, who’s evil? Who’s strong, who’s weak?”

In such an elitist society who will judge you at the drop of a hat (especially if you have the bad taste of coming from a more unfortunate lineage), how can you define the difference between “right” and “wrong”? Wherein the midst and the aftermath of a blood thirsty war, the distinction between “good” and “evil” more often than only lies on where you were born and/or your family name rather than where you actually stood or what you did in the war. This right here is the very huge underlying theme that is being woven throughout the show/novel. Not only are we, the viewer/reader, invited to think/judge for ourselves based on the actions of the characters... But our main character, Wei Wuxian verbalizes those doubts and questions explicitly a few times and implicitly in the stand and choices that he decided to take. And due to Wei Wuxian’s influence, Lan Wangji who is used to follow his 3000+ rules on a daily life basis without ever questioning them, starts to do so. (“Do not befriend evil.”, “Be righteous.” ) What does it mean to be righteous? Must the notion of righteousness always align with general opinion? How do you define the ‘evil’ that you are not supposed to befriend? Is my definition the same as yours? Is my definition the same as the rest of the world? And if it is not the case, does it necessarily means that I’m in the wrong? And the very obvious answer to those questions is “No, there is no visible line between ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, ‘good’ or ‘evil’... Nor is there any universally agreed on way to act in order to fit in one category or the other...” And this answer is illustrated in all the ways those numerous characters are depicted: their love, their hatred, their fear, their pain, their joys, their tears, their motivations, their frustrations, their shortcomings, their hidden or not so hidden agenda, their flaws... All of them are depicted in such an awesome and wholesome human way. They are not fully good or fully bad, they are human, with all that it entails... Main characters and main villains included (or rather, I’d say especially them) [Though the show tended smooth and cover this aspect a little bit more than the novel in my opinion]

“Don't you understand? When you’re standing on their side, you’re the bizarre genius, the miraculous hero, the force of the rebellion, the flower that blooms alone. But the second your voice differs from theirs, you’ve lost your mind, you’ve ignored morality, you’ve walked the crooked path.” (Jiang Cheng)

Another theme that is strongly address here is the matter of “Public Opinion”. Despite (or rather because of) how fickle it is, public opinion, rumors (no matter how unfounded) could so easily ruins your reputation, your standing. And if you loose their favors than all your previous actions (no matter how praised it had been in the past) would be seen with a blackened lens. I remember feeling as frustrated as Wei Wuxian at the lack of logic, the rhetoric employed and the sheer hypocrisy that had been portrayed by the mass. I think that there is one character that can be easily recognized as the pure personification of “Public Opinion”, he is without a doubt meant to be the “voice of the mass, of the bystanders whose opinions shouldn’t really matter but actually does a lot”. I won’t tell who it is, it’s pretty obvious if you watch the show... And I think that we are meant to feel annoyed at such characters. I think we are meant to be as frustrated as that one character who at a mass gathering tried to make a stand, tried to do the right thing, but was quickly shut down with dubious rhetoric and blatant disregard because their voice didn’t carry enough power. And last but not least, the show/novel broaches the issue of how social standing is considered very, very much dependent on your circumstance of birth. Like I said before the cultivation world in CQL/MDZS is inherently elitist. In order to be able to cultivate you must learn the proper techniques and at a quite young age. But it is not something that you could do on your own unless you’re some kind of genius or prodigy. Which means that you must attract the attention of a nearby sects or begs them to take you in as a disciple. It means though that you’ll probably start a little later than the disciples that were born directly within the sect [inner disciples], meaning you’ll probably end being weaker. However even if by some truly dedication and perseverance you manage to the same level as the inner disciples, you’ll still only be seen as an outer disciples, nothing more than cannon fodder in the eyes of society. In all the major sects, there is a distinctive mark, objects that only disciples coming from the sect family line are allowed to carry, as an irrevocable sign of their high standing in society and their inherent privileges. There are some exceptional circumstances though where someone of low birth status might reach this elitist sphere. But no matter how high they reach, how outstanding they are, in some way they will always be reminded (sometimes behind their backs, sometimes subtly, sometimes right in their face) of the stigma of their birth. There are three characters in particular, whose journeys mirror and foil each other a lot. And I think it is very interesting to see this “son of a prostitute” or “son of a servant” or “street rat” or “bastard” advanced through society. They all received very different upbringings, despite all starting more or less at a low point. And I liked that the way they decided to live later on and how they tackle/handle the cultivation world is very much reflected and influenced by their upbringings rather than the circumstances of their birth. It brings up this very strong message that, if they are the way they are it is not because of who their parents are, but rather how the people around them reacted to them. The way they are right now is not the fruit of their birth but a direct consequences of the rejection/acceptance of society. And so when you look at them, you can’t help but see their journeys as a three forking road paths reflecting the other like twisted mirrors. You look at their actions now, then back their different circumstances and you can’t help but think “Ah, that is what might happened if things were different.” [There is a reason that canon-divergence and time travel fix-it are my favorite tropes... my bias is really showing here... haha] And it really, really hammers on the importance of kindness in the face of misery and discrimination. Kindness and acceptance at the right moment, no matter how small can change everything. Sometimes, something even as small as a candy.

The movie sets and props So I mentioned before that the budget of CQL really wasn’t that high and they had to make choices. And I could only applaud their choices, because really, wah! Just look at the main sects locations, the scenery, the backgrounds. It’s so beautiful!! [Had I had any gifing talent I would have included them so that you could get the full mind-blowing experience... so I’ll just send you to @gusucloud blog, where all the gifs and edits are amazing, (Cloud Recesses here and Lotus Pier here) and in this post have my lame-ass screenshots instead.]

The fine details, the workmanship in most of the props in the background, the swords!!! *Incoherent flailing*

[I didn’t manage to get any close-up of the swords... but believe me, they are piece of arts!]

The music

The soundtrack of the show is absolutely amazing and beautiful.

You know how in movies and tv shows couples always seem to have “a song”... like “Oh! Look our song is playing!”... Weeeeeell...

Wangxian do too and it’s literally their song, as in their actors are singing it. You can of course hear it in the ending, but... but! I think the way it was used within the episode was very striking. It’s one of the many ways the producer teams managed to convey the romantic aspect of their relationship. And it was very well done.

Wuji, by Xiao Zhan and Wang Yibo

Wuji, instrumental piano + flute + Zither version

Just imagine, dude just resurrected from his 16 years of deadness and you see him moping at night by playing this beautiful tune with a freaking leaf... just because he saw some cultivators wearing the same uniform as Lan Wangji... So at this point you know that this song might means something but well, you don’t really get it...

The second time you hear this tune, we are on a mountain, and it’s through a bamboo flute that Wei Wuxian used to appease and calm down an agitated corpse [who he apparently knows]... He is luring ‘it’ out to a safe place, so he is playing the song while slowly moving back one step at a time. Then his back suddenly bumps into someone... This person catches his hand. The flute playing abruptly stops and the full instrumental version with piano+flute is suddenly blaring out in the background. And then it’s as if the whole world stops as they gaze at each other, while the music keeps playing. And really, you might fully understand the weight of their gazes, or their history, but you know that it’s there... That’s the moment where you look at them looking at each other, grasping at each other wrist, where you can still hear their song in the background... and can only go “Oh. Oh.” [Then of course a purple ball of pure anger just had to come and interrupt them. Excuse you, they were quickly having a moment there. Kidding aside, It was such a nice scene, it’s hand down one of my favorite scene of the whole show, and the music played a really huge part in my opinion.]

And if it wasn’t enough to hammer it down. The third times will definitively do it. So both of them are fifteen years and meet each other for the first time, when Wei Wuxian goes to study at Lan Wangji’s sect. Of course there first impression of each other is disastrous, what’s with Wei Wuxian insisting to come inside despite having lost his invitation and Lan Wangji clearly stating that no one is allowed without invitation. Of course it doesn’t help that after running back to fetch his lost invitation, Wei Wuxian snuck in after curfew (breaking a protective ward on his way), while smuggling two jar of alcohol. All of the above are forbidden in Cloud Recess, by the way. So our boy just casually broke three rules and then who catch him, right when he is climbing over the wall? Lan Wangji, who’s on patrol, of course. [Like I said, disastrous first impression]...And so after frostily listing all the rules Wei Wuxian broke not even five minutes in , Lan Wangji tries to bring Wei Wuxian to be disciplined. Wei Wuxian, of fucking course, resists. And the two proceed to fight (sword and all).

Cue their song playing as they cross swords on the rooftop of Cloud recesses, under the light of a full moon night.

If that is not a meet-cute I don’t know what it is.

Anyway this song is played many, many more times in the show and I’m not talking about them because I don’t want to spoil anyone.

Also as an aside, they don’t appear in the show... But there are character songs that have been recorded. Some of them sung by the actual actors and other not. And while all of them are really good, if there is absolutely one that you must listen to, it’s “Bu Wang” by Wang Yibo the actor of Lan Wangji. Make sure to watch the official MV only after watching the whole show (because it’s spoilery) and to activate the cc for the lyrics translation. It’s such a beautiful and painful song; and a very insightful reflection of Lan Wangji’s character. I love it.

Lan Sizhui and A-Yuan

No argument or explanation needed, you’ll see when you get there. I dare you not to like those small fluffy cinnamon rolls!

The Junior Quartet

Okay those ducklings deserve a whole sub-section on their own. Not only because they are all amazing kids but because of what they represent.

What is really great here is that since the story takes place over the span of 16/13 years, you get to see three different generations at various stage of their development. In the past you get to see the parents generation at their sum-up while there child, the following generation [Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji etc] from their teenage years to young adulthood. Then in the present you see the teenagers reaching the age their parents were (more or less, probably slightly younger) and the next generation (the ducklings) about the same age as Wei Wuxian’s generation were at the beginning. And the juxtaposition between the two pictures is just so, so very telling because the differences are glaring.

I’m going to borrow the words from qrbat who wrote this wonderful fanfiction, “tell some storm” on ao3.

The parents generation was a generation of Pride and Greed, it was a generation that lauded standing your ground no matter what and refusing outsider help. They were the generation which raised their children as a “generation of War”. A war that they started and that their children, teenagers, had to fight and end for them. And in comparison the junior generation seems so unexperienced so soft... and that’s a good thing, because it means that those children hadn’t had to experience the hardship of war, hadn’t had to grow up so fast because they basically didn’t have any decent parental figures to help them. Instead of perpetuating the cycle of hate and war started by their elders, the generation of War raised the next generation as a generation of peace, as a “generation of Love” and acceptance.

And it is amazing because the juniors, simply by being who they are, are embodying this message from Wei Wuxian’s generations to their parents “See? This is what it means to parent. I had to sacrifice my childhood and innocence to fight your war and I still managed to raise such amazing and kind children, what was your freaking excuse? I will not be like you. Times are changing and they are changing for the better.”

*Look at length of the post* *snort* Right. Okay, would you believe me, if I told you that in the beginning this post was supposed to be an appreciation post for all three of MXTX’s works and not just MDZS because I was afraid it would be too short? Yup so turned out I had a lot more things to say than I thought. Please feel free to react or just message me about anything MXTX’s fandom related... I am desperately in need of friends to discuss with about MXTX’s stuff!

#mo dao zu shi #mdzs #mdzs appreciation #cql #cql appreciation #the untamed #mxtx #wei wuxian #lan wangji #wangxian #mine

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logun-vakt-maga-lokison · 6 years

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Sorry to bother you, but I have a question about the post you made about it being called polytheism for a reason. How did you get in contact with the Gods/Deities? I've read a lot of how-to posts but none of them make a lot sense to me. I'm mainly asking how you did it, if you don't mind. Thank you for your time! 💖

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thelegendofclarke · 7 years

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Just venting I need to get this out:I firmly believe that there are Key 6, not 5, players in ASOIAF. And Sansa is one of them. GRRM has himself named Sansa as one of his key protagonists (there were 6 in total inc Sansa) and also that Sansa,Arya and Bran's journeys were paramount for him. I know this subject has been done to death &I'm really sorry for imposing on you but yeah to me,based on all this,Sansa is one of the Key 6. (you dont have to post it. Just venting. Thanks for reading)

Hi! Sorry to bother you again. I’m the Key 6 players anon. You don’t have to post my initial ask. I know the whole thing has been done to death. I was just venting and getting it out of my system. I hope I didn;t offend. Thanks for understanding.

Hi Anonny!

Oh gosh please DON’T apologize, you didn’t offend me at all in the slightest! I am just slow af and take forever to answer things and am generally The Worst… But my Ask is always open for venting! Especially venting about people who don’t ~recognize, respect, and appreciate~ the Noble and Poetic Land Mermaid that is Sansa Stark.

Yeah, the Key Players debate does continue to be a kind of ~weird bone of contention~ in the fandom for some reason. I think (and like to hope) that a lot of the time when people talk about or make fanart for the Five Key Players, that they aren’t excluding Sansa or leaving her out maliciously. I think they might just be going off of, or wanting to acknowledge, the five main characters GRRM listed in his original outline for the series in 1993.

But you’re right, I have definitely seen people who insist that Sansa is not a main character or key player in the story, which simply isn’t true. GRRM even identified her as a main character himself in 2016:

I’d thought the whole story could be told in three books, and that it would take me three years to write them, a year per book. That picture was taken just a few weeks after I blew my first (bot not my last, oh no) deadline on the series. Ah, how innocent I was… little did that guy in the picture imagine that he would be spending most of the next two decades in the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros with Tyrion, Daenerys, Arya, Sansa, Jon Snow, Bran, and all the rest. (x)

And even if GRRM’s word alone weren’t enough, Sansa’s character is vastly different from how she was originally planned. In the original outline GRRM basically had the Arya character involved in plot lines that now belong to Arya, Sansa, and Meera Reed (homegirl would have been BUSY AF); and the original Sansa character was basically who we would now identify as Margaery Tyrell if you are looking for a comparison. The original Sansa character ended up marrying Joffrey and bearing him a son and then choosing him over her family and ultimately paying the price. It was always ~super obvious~ to me that GRRM figured out that it just wasn’t going to be logistically possible to have the Arya character do everything she needed to do. I mean she was basically going to have to be in a minimum of two places at once: fleeing North beyond the wall with Bran AND in KL/WF getting entangled in a love triangle with Jon and Tyrion. So he ended up splitting and then modifying Arya’s storylines for the characters we now know as Arya, Sansa, and Meera.

The Sansy Pants as we now know (and love) her does start out a lot like the original Sansa, with dreams of marrying the prince and having his babies ect. She also does play a big part in what some people see as the betrayal and downfall of her family. But unlike the Sansa in the original outline, our Sansa learns. Her observations and inner dialogue become more and more keen and shrewd and move further and further away from the romantic fantasies and naivety that characterized her original POV. The romantic and fanciful AGoT!Sansa does make appearances throughout the series as Sansa wistfully, and sometimes resentfully, recalls the girl she used to be. But AGoT!Sansa’s memory is consistently suppressed and rejected in favor of a sharper, smarter, more cunning, and more guarded perspective (She hasn’t left her romanticism behind completely though as we know, just like she hasn’t forgotten her true identity. She is still Sansa Stark; “Lord Eddard’s daughter and Lady Catelyn’s, the blood of Winterfell”).

If anything, this proves to me she’s going to be a Key Player and central to the story’s endgame. Like her siblings Sansa has lived through extreme atrocities and incredible adversity and come out the other side stronger and smarter, but still kind an noble. And like Bran has been honing his supernatural abilities and Arya has been honing her physical abilities, Sansa has been honing her own intellectual abilities. Her growing political savvy and transition from Pawn to Player is incredibly similar to Bran’s growing confidence in his magical abilities. Just like Bran is gradually becoming one of the central characters for the magical endgame of the series, Sansa is transitioning into her role as a key player in the pragmatic and political endgame of the series.

And going along with that, I think another reason people have a hard time believing that Sansa is going to be a Key Player is because she isn’t magical. All the other five Key Players (Bran, Arya, Jon, Dany, and Tyrion) have some sort of magical ability that’s central to their arc. Whether it’s dragon riding or blood magic or warging or being brought back from the dead, they all have some sort of magical skill and/or experience. There is, of course, the fact that Sansa could have been a warg or a skin changer, but her ability to do so essentially died with Lady. But honestly I think that’s kind of beside the point…

In the end I don’t think it matters that Sansa doesn’t have any significant magical abilities, because I don’t think GRRM is trying to write a story solely about magic where the magical storylines and characters are the only important ones. I think he is more writing a story that is set in a world where magic exists. ASoIaF isn’t divided into magical storylines vs. political storylines, the two co-exist and are of equal importance. Whether you want to view ASoIaF as a political world where there’s magic or a magical world where there’s politics, it still stands to reason that the lives of the characters are going to be affected by both. Just like the magically inclined Dany is driven by royal aspirations and entangled in political endeavors, the politically savvy Sansa does interact with and has been affected by magic.

Both these things occur simply based on the fact that both exist and are pervasive over arching themes in the universe GRRM has created. Even though Sansa doesn’t have any obvious magical skills like Arya and Jon, she has interacted with magic and it has been a prevalent theme in her arc. Here are just a few examples:

The name Sansa actually means “invocation and charm” in Sanskrit. And while yes, this could just be a play on words with Sansa’s power to charm others, it gets brought up again in he advices Petyr gives her to seduce Harry the Heir: “Charm him. Entrance him. Bewitch him.” Seduction is described here like a spell.

The Ghost of High Heart Prophecy- “I dreamt a wolf howling in the rain, but no one heard his grief. I dreamt such a clangor I thought my head might burst, drums and horns and pipes and screams, but the saddest sound was the little bells. I dreamt of a maid at a feast with purple serpents in her hair, venom dripping from their fangs. And later I dreamt that maid again, slaying a savage giant in a castle built of snow.” The bolded part is pretty clearly speaking of Sansa at Joffrey’s wedding. The purple serpents in her hair with blood dripping from their veins is referring to the silver hair net with purple amethysts given to Sansa by the Tyrells which they used to smuggle poison into the wedding feast. The “serpents in her hair” also really strongly parallels the myth of Medusa, who could turn men to stone with just one look.

The smallfolk also talk about Sansa and the Purple Wedding in terms of magic and legend when telling the story to Arya and The Hound: “The northern girl. Winterfell’s daughter. We heard she killed the king with a spell, and afterward changed into a wolf with big leather wings like a bat, and flew out a tower window.” (Arya XII, ASoS) Not only do they say Sansa preforms a spell, but also that she skin-changes into a bat-wolf, all references to the dark arts.

The remaining direwolves often think of think of “the sister they had lost”, which is obviously Lady. And it’s significant that because Sansa lost Lady, her brothers can’t track her the way they do their other siblings. This indicates that there is in fact a magical bond/connection between each Stark and their wolf allowing them to connect with and track each other as a pack, and that with Lady’s death Sansa’s magical connection was severed.

GRRM has also explicitly stated that all the Stark children have warging abilities: “[On whether the trait of being a warg ran in the Stark family] I don’t know if I want to get into genetics - this is fantasy, not scifi… I don’t think this is necessarily a ‘Stark’ ability, though all the children have it to one extent or another. They also realize it to one extent or another.’

Her presence in Bran’s dream in AGoT (Bran III) where she is surrounded by shadows, each representing characters she has and possibly will interact with (The Hound, Jaime Lannister, and possibly Robert Strong)- “One shadow was dark as ash, with the terrible face of a hound. Another was armored like the sun, golden and beautiful. Over them both loomed a giant in armor made of stone, but when he opened his visor, there was nothing inside but darkness and thick black blood.”

Maggy’s Prophecy- Sansa is also potentially the “younger and more beautiful” queen in Maggy the Frog’s prophecy about Cersei. And while she might not ~actually~ end up being the younger and more beautiful queen, Cersei believes she could. This is significant because it shapes Sansa and Cersei relationship and fuels Cersei’s hatred of Sansa from the first time they meet. It’s the same reason Cersei hates Margaery, they are a threat not only to “all she holds dear” but also to her power.

SO tl;dr Sansa Stark is ~important af~ and DEFINITELY a Key Player in ASoIaF. I know you already knew this haha, but just take comfort in the fact that there is a gd mountain of evidence against anyone who claims differently. So they can just sit there in their Wrongness and be Wrong :)

#thank you for the question anon!#i hope this helped :)#asoiaf for ts #got for ts #sansa stark #george r.r. martin #IN THIS HOUSE WE LOVE AND APPRECIATE SANSA STARK #alys answers #scheduled*#my queue has turned to porcelain to ivory to steel #anonymous #alys meta

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mittensmorgul · 7 years

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A very random question but in your opinion, what's the difference between plot-drive and character-driven stories?

I’ve been staring at this message in my inbox for days now, and on top of being a long-debated question regarding writing in general, I think it’s also incredibly relevant to the structure of Supernatural specifically. And because of that I’ve been half excited about and yet half dreading trying to answer this.

Not dreading in a bad way, but dreading because I know this is gonna turn into some kind of patented Mittens Uses Too Many Words To Say The Thing sort of post. Because I have FEELINGS about this. :P

Let’s start with the basics, and I’ll explain why this is a much debated thing. Seriously, just google “plot vs character driven writing” and each link you click will offer a different assessment of what this means. I mean, just speaking about Romance novels as a specific, some people would characterize them as “plot driven” and others as “character driven,” depending on your understanding of what is meant by those terms. It’s… confusing.

Because a character driven story is one which obviously HAS a plot which advances throughout the story, but it’s the character’s emotions and choices and personal growth that DRIVE the plot forward.

A plot driven story is one in which the character may also experience emotional growth and make choices and everything, but in reaction to an external plot that draws the character along in its wake.

All stories incorporate both character and plot development (hopefully! or otherwise why would we bother reading them. This reminds me of my favorite English teacher who taught a class called Literature of Changing Times. I think I’ve mentioned her before *waves hi at Mrs. Proenza if you’re out there reading this. You are awesome, btw*. First day of class when we were going over the reading list, she said, “Ha! Jokes on the admins for approving this class, because ALL literature is about changing times, and this just gives me an excuse to teach y’all my favorite books!”

That was an awesome class, because it was obvious how much she loved every book we studied, and it definitely carried through in OUR enthusiasm for the subject. She basically was the one who taught me how to be passionate about stories.)

So yes, all writing will have elements of a plot moving forward, and characters who are hopefully relatable and whose motivations we understand and/or sympathize with, and sometimes it’s hard to tell if a story is more driven by the external plot or the internal character motivations because both seem important.

Now, specifically relating to Supernatural. Taken as a whole, the series has used both character driven AND plot driven stories, sometimes simultaneously. I’ve heard one description in an old meta ages and ages ago that SPN was actually telling us two different stories based on whether you were looking at it through Sam’s perspective or Dean’s.

Short tangent to explain: Sam’s story has largely been plot driven, and that meta I mentioned above compared it to the traditional story structure of the Horror genre. An external force acts on a character, the character is forced to react, make choices based on those outside influences, and thus growth and change happens for the character. Dean’s story (aside from during the MoC arc, when Dean was literally acted on by an outside force) has largely been character driven, similar to a character in a traditional Fantasy genre story where the character is the one who goes chasing after the plot, and his emotions and choices drive that plot forward.

But it’s more complicated than that, because of course it is. :P

Obviously that’s reducing things to their absolute simplest form, but Sam’s narrative began when an outside force literally acted on him, with Azazel dripping demon blood in his mouth. That obviously drove the plot forward, setting up everything that’s happened in the entire series in the opening scenes of the pilot episode.

But Dean’s story really begins (again, in the pilot episode) because he has an emotional need for Sam to help him find their father. That ALSO drives the action of the story forward, because without Dean’s internal motivation, the rest of the plot wouldn’t have happened, either.

Using the Carver Era (s8-11), you can really see the difference between a character driven narrative and a plot driven one. See by my personal bias in the following description if you can tell which style of storytelling I personally prefer:

Early s8 began with a HUGE dose of character driven plots. Dean comes back from Purgatory without Cas and is basically pining or in mourning. Sam’s been on an extended vacation playing house with Amelia. Dean’s internal drive to “fix the plot,” i.e. find and save Kevin, drives the early part of the season while Sam feels a little resentful of being dragged away from his “normal” life.

Then Cas miraculously turns up, they find Kevin, and suddenly they’re learning about other tablets that exist in the world. In a plot-driven world, they would’ve sought out the tablets and probably destroyed them. They wouldn’t start making these huge universe-altering decisions based on the information they learn from Kevin Tran, Prophet of Chuck.

The whole Trials storyline begins as a character-driven story. It’s their united motivations (Sam and Dean), their internal desire to accomplish this thing, that gets the ball rolling. And Dean intends to be the one to carry this burden of the trials, until fate hands that burden to Sam. Once again, outside forces have turned the course of the story. So Sam is the one who again must react TO the plot. Dean spends most of the rest of s8 reacting to Sam’s reactions, supporting him through the trials, but also emotionally attaching himself to Castiel’s story.

Cas spent most of s8 in a similar narrative position to Sam, except he didn’t even realize it. He believed he was acting on his own emotional choices much of the time (turning off Angel Radio, deciding to be a hunter, and then deciding to reconnect in order to answer prayers– we see him healing a baby and generally trying to do good in the world). Yet all along, he’s being acted on by outside forces and is literally being mind-controlled. So he believed he was driving his own plot, when behind the scenes his plot was being driven for him.

At the beginning of s9, Sam is again put into a situation much like Cas’s during s8 where he BELIEVES he’s in charge of his story, while unbeknownst to him he’s actually got an angel in the driver’s seat. Sam’s being dragged along by that plot again. But it was Dean’s internal motivation that directly put him in that situation.

Finally it’s Dean’s turn to make a choice that leads to a self-sacrifice he believes is the only way to regain control of the plot (Abaddon! Must! Die!), and takes on the Mark of Cain without reading the fine print. Thus begins what we BELIEVE is an internally motivated story for Dean, because for A FREAKING YEAR the show was telling us through parallels and the narrative itself that the Mark was a curse and what we were seeing was a change INTERNAL TO DEAN. Heck, it literally turned him into a demon. He wasn’t POSSESSED by the demon, it wasn’t an outside force acting on him, it was his very own most internal soul that had been transformed.

And then round about 10.15 the narrative pulled a 180, yanked the rug out from under a year’s worth of narrative buildup of an intensely INTERNALIZED (i.e. CHARACTER DRIVEN) story for Dean and said WHOOPSIE NOPE IT’S ACTUALLY AN OUTSIDE FORCE CONTROLLING DEAN! You thought he was actually growing as a character but nope we’re taking this one step below Fuckhands McMike territory and blaming EVERYTHING that’s happened on this big scary Dark external force! The plot basically pantsed us all.

Suddenly, after two and a half years of mostly character-driven storytelling, everything shifts and everyone’s chasing after the plot again. Dean loses ALL control over the thing inside him as he’s hopelessly dragged off by the Darkness.

And then in 10.23, Dean wrests control back over his own story by literally killing Death, while Sam and Cas have set events in motion that free Dean from the Mark of Cain and release it into the world at large instead.

Now obviously a huge portion of s11 is plot driven– their reactions to having released the Darkness and their scramble to fix what they broke as it spreads across the land. But even from the start of the season, the narrative gradually shifts into a nice balance between plot and character driven stories, where the two really begin to merge together (even on a subtextual meta level).

Another interesting aspect of Supernatural is the two types of episodes– the Mytharc (which are largely plot-driven) and the MotW (which are usually one-off monster hunts with an internal plot driven structure– MUST SOLVE THE CASE AND SAVE THE PEOPLE AND KILL THE THING!– but are generally propelled by a spurt of introspection and character growth. These are the episodes where they aren’t just acting and reacting to the Big Plot Things, but actually experience growth and change themselves).

And this is why I LOVE s12. It’s almost entirely character driven, even with the overarching plots. The main focus isn’t so much the motives of the Bad Guys and our Intrepid Heroes trying to save the world from them. It’s about the characters own personal emotional growth, how their choices affect the narrative (and yes, even Sam’s choice to work with the MoL is really a CHOICE and not something he was compelled by the plot to choose. His personal internal desires led him to that choice, and are now leading him AWAY from that choice, but it’s still been a real choice for him. Same with Cas and the choices he’s been making, and even CROWLEY, in choosing not to lock up Lucifer properly (or just kill him already ffs).

Dean is at the center of all of this, acting as that strange force of balance he’d achieved in 11.23. He’s not so much driving the story with his emotional choices, but sitting at a weird central axis while the story takes place all around him. He’s pulling a string here and there and waiting to see what budges.

I LOVE THIS. It’s glorious chaos, and I feel like Dean, sitting all zen-like in the middle of a huge unraveling sweater.

Okay, I confess. I don’t necessarily prefer one style of storytelling over the other (though I am a Dean girl, so I guess I probably do prefer a character driven story… and even Cas’s story has long been about his acquisition and proper application of Free Will, learning about humanity and making choices for himself, so while he’s experienced huge swaths of character development and growth it’s not entirely been character driven growth…). And I adore Supernatural’s complicated blend of the two.

I just really hated the bait and switch of late s10. You know that gif of Bart Simpson where he’s playing the video frame by frame and says something like, “you can pinpoint the exact second his heart rips in half?” Yeah. it’s like in 10.15 there’s a record scratch and suddenly we’re watching the freaking Stynes grab the plot by the short and curlies and yanking it in an entirely unforeseen direction. Like, out of left field. Like they picked up Baby off a coastal highway and plonked her down in a muddy field to spin her wheels, jarring. That’s what they did with the narrative.

After 10.23, once the plot had been suitably yanked around where they wanted it, the narrative structure AND the plot itself became about finding another way, a better way, a balanced and unified way. And since then it’s largely stayed on track.

How did I turn a simple question into this? It’s who I am as a person. I hope that’s okay. :P

#posts about writing stuff #this is how stories work #and sometimes how they DON'T work #narrative structure #writing is hard #that's my general tag #carver era #I am SO GLAD that Dabb favors a more character driven approach though #kajuned

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