#mdzs thoughts
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I love Wen Ning so much because Wei Wuxian could literally say any bullshit and WN would be like “absolutely, I agree 100%!” and Wen Qing would immediately debunk WWX’s bullshit and WN would be like “absolutely, I agree 100%!”
#I love him sm he thinks everyone’s great and just wants to feel included LOL#best bean#mdzs#the untamed#wen ning#wen qing#wei wuxian#wei ying#mo dao zu shi#grandmaster of demonic cultivation#mdzs thoughts#apple babble 🍎#actually me trying to fit in with everyone when I was like 10 years old LMFAO#ghost general
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It will forever be hilarious to me that there are people who wholeheartedly believe Jiang Cheng is the main villain of MDZS desperately trying to murder Wei Wuxian should he get the slightest opportunity... when he is just some guy that shows up late & sleep deprived with resting bitch face, says something funny but a little bit mean, and then either doesn't kill Wei Wuxian or actively tries to sacrifice his own life for Wei Wuxian's every chance he gets
Like the worst thing he can think of actually doing is throwing a teacup and saying "haven't you got anything to say to me?" so scary
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//long rambles ahead!
I think what really lingers with me about MDZS is that it's not a novel with a cathartic ending at all. It's a bittersweet story that leaves you slightly hollow. Yes, it's a beautiful and epic romance. It's a piece of social commentary interwoven with a love story and murder mystery. It's a cautionary tale. But it is also very much a tragedy. It's a story about being too late, second chances, and moving on.
By the time the truth of everything JGY and JGS did comes to light, it's 13 years too late. Everything that mattered has already happened. Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan are long dead. Jin Ling is still an orphan. Wen Ning is dead, and sometime in the future, his death will be permanent. Wen Qing was burned to death at the stake for no fault of her own. Nie Mingjue has already spent ten years in a no-doubt agonizing state of un-death, and Lan Xichen will have to bear the guilt of loving both Nie Mingjue and Jin Guangyao, and by doing so, forsaking them both. Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng's once-close bond is irrevocably broken, and the woman who sowed the seeds of resentment when they were still children will never face the consequences of her vitriol.
People sometimes say MXTX was too hard on the side characters, and only gave the Wangxian a happy ending, but what stuck with me after finishing the story is how… sad things are. Yes, Wangxian finally get the happy ending they've deserved for nearly 20 years - but at the same time, it's not a happy ending where the people who've wronged them get the consequences they deserve.
Wei Wuxian will spend the rest of his life haunted by guilt and loss, over what happened to Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan, over the loss of the Wen remnants. The rest of his years won't even be lived in the body his parents gave him.
Lan Wangji will spend the rest of his years wondering if he'd chosen to stand with Wei Wuxian when it mattered - would his son have had to grow up without his birth family?
Nie Huaisang is left wondering if his brother had been a little less trusting and had never taken Meng Yao in as a Nie deputy, would his brother have died a less wretched death? Would he have been forced to stoop to ruthless machinations and manipulations to seek some semblance of justice?
Wen Ning will have to live with the knowledge that if he'd been a little less kind, if he'd let Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng die that fateful day - his family would still be alive. The Wens would've won the war; Wen Qing might've even succeeded Wen Ruohan.
No one really gets the ending they deserve. MDZS isn't a story where good people get happy endings, and bad people get their dues. Sure, Jin Guangyao's crimes are revealed and he faces the consequences of his actions. But what about the people who stood by and made him into a monster? If anything, the side characters and antagonists who survive get better than they deserve. The real villain of MDZS - society - will never face retribution. Those cultivators who always believed in their own bigotry and righteousness over and over again, will never face justice.
Do you think those cultivators and the public will ever feel any regret for the innocent people they condemned to death in their own prejudice and blind self-righteousness? Do you think the people who gathered at Nightless City to call for Wei Wuxian's death considered for one second that he was the biggest reason they won the war? When the cultivators who sacked the Wen settlement at the Burial Mounds threw the bodies of the Wens into the blood pool, do you think that was a sign of shame?
Do you think Jiang Cheng will ever regret leading a siege on a small settlement of innocent farmers? Do you think he's haunted by condemning to death the same people whom he owes his life to?
Do you think those people like Yao-zongzhu will ever feel an ounce of remorse for so easily believing rumours and hearsay, and spreading speculation and vitriol about innocent people?
Do you think that unnamed cultivator out there will ever lose a single minute of sleep over smashing in Wen Popo's head?
In the years that follow, Wen Ning will have apologized a hundred times for lives he did not take, crimes he did not commit, because of the name he bears. People, both in-universe, and even readers, will condemn him for actions he could not help, for doing the right thing. But did Jiang Cheng ever apologize for killing his family? Did the Jins ever apologize for their horrific treatment of people in the labour camps?
People will continue to demand that Wei Wuxian apologize for causing the deaths of their friends and family. But how is Wei Wuxian meant to do that? No one ever apologized to him for taking his family away. No one ever apologized for condemning the Wen Remnants to death for crimes they took no part in. The Wens were his family too.
There's so much potential for bitterness and corruption in MDZS. Instead of saving everyone, Wei Wuxian could've stood aside and let the people who tried to kill him die. MDZS could've been a story of succumbing to hatred and grief, but it wasn't. MXTX could've gone on and on about how society wronged the protagonist, but she didn't. The narrative is one of forgiveness and moving beyond past grievances. The story chose to close the story on a positive note. I truly love that aspect of MDZS, where MXTX leaves just enough room for hope and love at the end.
A-Yuan will finally get his closure about the family he lost as a toddler. Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian get their happy ending together after being separated by nearly two decades by war, miscommunication, cruelty, and death.
Wei Wuxian will never regret protecting survivors of an attempted genocide, because it was the right thing to do.
And Wen Ning will still stand in the way and take a fatal blow meant for Jin Ling, despite everything the Jins and Jiang Cheng did to the people he loved.
Because they chose love. Characters like Wei Wuxian and Wen Ning and Lan Wangji have the chance to move on and live a happier life because when they could've succumbed to hurt and fury and resentment, they chose to be kind and do the right thing. Wangxian get their happy ending because they learn to recognize the toxicity of the cultivation society's self-cannibalizing prejudice, and chose to pursue righteousness above personal benefit.
MDZS isn't a story about good people getting good things. Just look at what happened to Xiao Xingchen. There's really nothing satisfying or cathartic about everyone's fates at all. There's no promise about society facing the consequences of their mob mentality or Wangxian actually changing the world together. Even in TGCF, for all its makings of a love story, we get the promise of societal change once Jun Wu is deposed.
It has all the makings to be a tragedy or tale of vengeance of epic proportions - but instead, it's a love story. It's a story about making the best of what you've got, and staying true to yourself and your morals, even if that's sometimes a bitter pill to swallow. It's a story where everything that could go wrong went wrong, but the characters still managed to fight their way to a better ending by choosing kindness. At its core, MDZS is a testament to choosing compassion over cruelty no matter how tragic and hopeless life gets, no matter how long the journey gets. Even though the happy ending is more personal and only applies to the specific characters, even though we don't actually get the promise of their society becoming a better place - we still have the hope that Wei Wuxian's second chance brings. The hope that sometimes, no matter how cruel the world is, some people who deserve it still get their happy endings. That's what makes MDZS such a memorable work of art. That's why it stays with you.
#mdzs#wei wuxian#lan wangji#nie huaisang#jiang cheng#wen ning#musings#Can you tell I really love the narratives MDZS took?#tragedies#mdzs thoughts
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mdzs midnight thoughts
lan wangji does not know that his forehead ribbon truly was askew the second time wei wuxian pointed it out, now does he
as i’ve mentioned before, lan wangji also does not know that wei wuxian had alike scars in his back as a punishment for having saved him
lan sizhui and the rest of the juniors have no idea about the story hanguang-jun and senior wei had together. if they saw the dire situation where they screamed at each other and fought, they’d be really shocked, because: seriously, these two men are so goddamn shamelessly affectionate in a daily basis, how could they ever had conflicts?
jiang yanli, jin zixuan, wei wuxian and the wens’ deaths were basically in the same couple of days. none of them actually know that besides wei wuxian. jiang yanli and the wens think they’ve died to save wei wuxian, but in the end it just spared him some more time. he died not long after anyway.
no one despite lan xichen has any idea why lan wangji was so interested in bunnies out of a sudden, right? he just one day appeared with a ton and they just thought, ‘oh yea, it’s hanguang-jun, we’ve got him covered’
if wei wuxian’s mother saw how much her boy tormented lan qiren and the lan clan in general, from what her reputation precedes, she’d possibly smile proudly
everyone still thinks wei wuxian was the preferred ‘son’ instead of jiang cheng. they think he’s got a privileged childhood for living with the jiangs being treated not as a servant, but as part of the family! they dont know everything he’s been through in that goddamn fucking environment!!
perhaps meng yao would’ve been more empathic towards wei wuxian if he actually got to know his tragic backstory in the streets and with the jiangs. maybe if he got to know him better, before the sunshot campaign events. they were treated unfairly in resembling points, weren’t they, after all?
nie huaisang and wen qing would be like brother and sister if they were to know each other. they never did. in fact, wen qing wasn’t spoken about or to enough.
mentioning the public eye again, for them it’s like wei wuxian was the dishonest and devilish son of the two most famous, righteous rogue cultivators of their age. and considering madam lan’s past actions, lan wangji is the son of a murderer. historically ironic.
wei wuxian is part of jin ling’s family three times. one as himself (martial uncle), second as being in the body of mo xuanyu (biologically an uncle) and third as being the husband of lan wangji, lan xichen’s brother, who’s sworn brother with his uncle (a very distant relative, but a relative likewise, especially since being sworn brothers is such an intimate thing there).
the lan disciples simply saw hanguang-jun, the epitome of righteousness and the king of blank expressions, pick a random gay demonic cultivator one day and let him tag along on his adventures only for them to get married later because, yeah, that’s the yiling patriarch, in fact, why nobody told me my idol had a situationship with the biggest badass villain in history??
from somewhere within, mo xuanyu is oddly satisfied for seeing wei wuxian getting a proper revenge for him and a bunch of other stuff, beyond having very gay sex with the hanguang-jun — can you imagine?! he must think that at least his body served for a good cause!!!
#wei wuxian#lan wangji#the untamed#mdzs#mdzs thoughts#mo dao zu shi#cql#mdzs wei wuxian#mdzs lwj#mdzs novel#mxtx mdzs#mxtx#jiang yanli#jiang zixuan#jiang cheng#the founder of diabolism#the grandmaster of demonic cultivation#wangxian#yiling laozu
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one of the things that makes mdzs SUCH a great story is the fact that it's a tragedy with queer protagonists, but their queerness isn't the cause or the center of the tragedy. it's not even related, really. it's a story about love and loss and wrong and right, about what we owe each other and what we owe ourselves, about how you can find joy even amidst chaos and grief; its complexity and tragedy is what makes it so profound and touching. sure, there's 'casual' queerphobia in the story, but with everything else going on, it's not really relevant- wwx's mostly like, 'oh, i like guys? i like lwj? i love lwj? fuck, what if he doesn't love me back? am i being presumptuous to think he returns my feelings? what do I do now?' followed by 'wait, he loves me back??? we're getting married IMMEDIATELY', and that whole attitude is very refreshing because sometimes you just want to read a queer story that isn't about queer suffering but that's still incredibly miserable, and i think we as a queer community deserve it
#mdzs#lwj#wwx#lan wangji#wei wuxian#mdzs thoughts#dan talks#wangxian#obviously the story has its issues but. FFUCK i just want something to break my heart w/o having to read thru queer trauma#ik danmei in theory isnt aimed at queer audiences but compared to like. some of 'made for cisshet women' queer man content ive read in#the past mdzss iss a breath of fresh air. imo most issues lie w the sex scenes and the INSANE lack of lube but.#ill forgive it this once#their dynamic and love story is otherwise great. just dont take it ass sex ed lol ud fucking die#the sex scenes are funny tho. im always cackling and going YOURE GOING TO KILL EACH OTHER GOD SLOW DOWN#also in gen we need to uh. do better w tws bcs theres a LOT of noncon rp in there and i didnt see it mentioned anywhere in the fandom after#hours of being around it. books do tws plssss someones going to run headfirst into there and not have a good time
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Just me thinking about WangXian farming:
WWX: Lan Zhan! Lan Zhan! Look! The carrots are growing! There's potatoes! Look!
Each new plant is a wonder. Not because he has never grown anything before, but because it's so much easier than in Burial Mounds. And because I believe that WWX is the sort of man to get excited about plants! And dewy eyed about babies of any sort. Every new day would bring some awe or wonder or delight.
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MDZS thoughts 1
The images spread around painting WWX as a horrifically ugly man weren’t actually used as a way for the cultivation world to spread fear about the YP, but rather based off of family portrait drawings that A-Yuan scribbled on spare talisman paper (unfortunately he wasn’t very good) labeled Xian-gege. (Yes, WWX did hang it up on the wall).
During the raid of the demon slaughtering cave, it became pretty clear that the drawings were useless as far as weapons go so an errant threw it away and the paper made its way to a small town pretty far from cultivation news. The person that picked it up thought it must be a self portrait and the rest is history.
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While re-reading TGCF and having a hard time motivating myself to read arc 2...
I think what's hard about reading arcs 2 and 4 for me are that XL isn't matured yet and is thus still very hubric and flawed. And for whatever reason, it's very hard for me to sit and read through this young, spoiled, pure person getting completely shredded apart before he can sift through the mutilated pieces to regain who he is at his core and be able to walk forward with that. It's just painful to watch this person be so young, so untouched by the tragedies of the world, and so sure of himself step onto the pinnacle of the world only have have everything ripped out from under him and have his entire life and everything he knows be eviscerated when he's just trying to do his best. Was he a little too naive and overly sure of himself and thus make very consequential mistakes in his youthful arrogance? Yeah. But he came from a good place and his good intentions got completely warped until they were turned on him.
Idk I'm starting to lose the thread here... But this brings on a different thought...
It's also interesting to note how this parallels with WWX's situation too. Both WWX and XL were extremely talented and very confident and prideful in their abilities. They both set out to try and rectify a situation with good intentions which got warped and those warped intentions and actions were then used to villify them. Both their lives were completely upended. They both died (WWX literally, XL figuratively). They then both reappear more matured and grounded and more than a little traumatized but with more generous and open outlooks on life. I'm just saying... There's a trend here...
But also getting back to my original point... Why is TGCF arcs 2 & 4 so hard for me to get through? 😭
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You know the best indicator that from the moment Wei Wuxian left Lotus Pier to protect the Wens that he knew regardless of what was happening that he’d never go back?
He has Suibian with him in the cave. The sword he can’t use. Because it’s one of the few things that’s his and when he made his choice to stand by the Wens, he picked everything up that mattered to him and left.
Just food for thought.
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MDZS ENDING SPOILERS
Thinking of how Lan Xichen had to be the version of Lan Wangji that looked his 'Wei Ying' in the eye and killed him. It's not easy being the parallel character to your own brother, knowing he gets his happy ending but you cannot. It broke him. Especially when you realise, if he could control the situation, Lan Xichen would never kill Jin Guangyao. He'd rather punish him in a way that would keep him alive. He would forgive Jin Guangyao again and again and again no matter how many crimes he committed. It just wasn't meant to be. The fact that he used his own hands and weapon to end it all. The fact that he wanted to end right there too.
The fact that Wei Wuxian looked at his own parallel character and chose to end his life because he knew they could not live with that pain. (TT) (But mostly because his parallel character was a piece of shit. Yes, I'm talking about Xue Yang).
Jin Guangyao being Wei Wuxian's third parallel character. The one that didn't take the insults or hate lying down. The one who actually tried to do something about the corrupt system, accidentally became the corrupt system 😅, but hey the Cultivation world didn't seem to be suffering for it, just his unfortunate enemies.
Just all of Wei Wuxian's parallel characters choosing death over living in a world where they are not loved by their Lan Wangji.
Then there's Lan Xichen. The final Lan Wangji. The forever mourner. Waiting for someone who will never come back.
#lan xichen angst#poor lan xichen#lan xichen deserves a break#lan xichen deserved so much better#mdzs#mo dao su zhi#mo dao zu shi#mdzs thoughts#wei wuxian#lan wangji#jin guangyao#xue yang#xiao xingchen#xiyao#wangxian#xuexiao#cue all the sad songs in existence for the wangxian parallels#and every other side character in this show
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Just had an ‘accidental time travel’ thought where Jin Ling and Lan Sizhui suddenly wake up in present-day China but find out it’s only them who got sent to the future
and while LSZ keeps calm and lowkey gets excited about all the new things around him, JL straight up has a mental breakdown in public and all everyone sees is some weird kid dressed in ancient clothes, strapped up with a bow and sword and curled up in a ball in the middle of the street while screaming and sobbing for his “jiujiu”
#LSZ fluttering around trying to comfort him while also trying to tell everyone around them that he’s fine#everything’s fine nothing to see here folks ajdhaAHDVAJD#mdzs#the untamed#jin ling#lan sizhui#zhuiling#mo dao zu shi#mdzs modern au#mdzs headcanons#mdzs thoughts#apple babble 🍎#fic ideas#mayhaps#jin rulan#lan yuan#a yuan#mdzs juniors#I think they would find Jingyi eating street food chicken in a back alley eventually#bc let’s face it we can’t leave Jingyi out of this he’d be way too funny in this situation lmaoooo#OMG WAIT ADDING ANOTHER TAG THOUGHT#JL manically shooting off his flairs but instead of JC the cops show up ajshahAJDHAJHD#poor LSZ is losing his mind like P L S STOP#flares**** not going back to fix that lmaooo
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Hot Take Time #2309209 (edit: actually this isn't a hot take it's lukewarm at best. it's a room temperature take) but I really don't understand the argument "mo dao and gui dao are different and therefore everything WWX does is completely fine!"
Like, yes, it's a difference that plays into the public discourse vs. real truth themes of the novel to a degree, and I of course absolutely appreciate all the explanations and meta around the nuances and differences. But like. What he actually does with it is... still not good whether it's mo dao or gui dao? And there are many very significant reasons that gui dao is still not great? (Which I won't get into here because there are other people far more qualified with cultural/genre knowledge who have written about it way better than I ever could anyway)
Like y'know. The several hundred people he tortured to death, the thousands of desecrated graves, the mini-harem of pet zombie girls he kept after the war for purely entertainment purposes...? Like, those behaviors aren't inherent to the method (well, except the method sort of uniquely facilitating the keeping of pet ghosts), but they're not... good...? (Note: 'morally good' is completely different than 'fun & sexy, having a great time torture-bonding with shidi, etc'.)
I just cannot agree that keeping a little harem of pet ghost girls nor anything that happened with the Wens is being "gentle with the dead, empathetic and respectful". Even WWX thinks his past self was kinda cringe with it and went way too far!
I do think there's meant to be a significant amount of ambiguity about what elements of his downward spiral are caused by the corrosive nature of his method vs. the trauma of the Burial Mounds and his own, internal, homebrewed mental crisis. The alcoholism, rapidly shifting moods, anger and inability to control his temper, before and after the war. How much of it is Wei Wuxian and how much of it is the impact of the resentful energy he's using, and the use/proximity of the Yin Hu Fu?
I do think there's a reason why there's just as much brutality carried out by characters using orthodox cultivation methods. But in the end, his behavior was a problem, and the novel hints that the methods were impacting his mental state, and it was overlooked because of his usefulness to the war effort, but it did significantly damage his credibility leading up to the parts where he is in the right, which is also part of the point of the story. And you know. The subject of Jiang Cheng's whole 'the flower that blooms alone' monologue in the cave.
Anyway. 'He's using gui dao not mo dao and there's a difference' is super not the same thing as 'Wei Wuxian is morally justified in every action'?
Anyway this book is a lot more fun to me when you approach it from 'look what absolutely insane things these boys will do when they go absolutely feral for each other, it's so cool' with a side of 'look how fucked up he is now, that's hot' and not, like, trying to somehow figure out how to make pet ghost girls into a moral ideal.
So much of the story, for me, is about what desperate, wild lengths a person will go to for survival and revenge when pushed, and then what do you do after? When the danger is past and the revenge is done, what then? How do you come back from that?
#mdzs thoughts#I am a wei wuxian enjoyer#but it feels like I enjoy a different wei wuxian than these people#which is fine... I guess...#people on the internet out here just. having different opinions than me. ugh.#mostly joking but I just find it weird because to me these takes also significantly ruin the cool factor
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We do just need a whole comedy version of MDZS.
Mianmian's "husband" is just Wen Qing in a mustache.
A lot of people faking their death to get out of awkward/bad situations.
Qin Su fakes her death to escape her husband and only Jiang Cheng is in on the plan except they are both terrible actors but everyone is too polite to say anything.
Jin Guangyao keeps setting up elaborate schemes to kill Nie Mingjue but Nie Mingjue keeps surviving them in very cartoonish, deus ex machina ways. Nie Huaisang finally catches on and paints Nie Mingjue to look like a fierce corpse after one particularly close call in order to give Jin Guangyao a final scare at Guanyin Temple.
Jin Guangyao stabs Wen Ruohan in a way that absolutely wouldn't kill him so Wen Ruohan thinks it's just a silly thing and pretends to die very dramatically. Half-dead Nie Mingjue is like "....." while Jin Guangyao thinks he honestly suceeded and starts celebrating. Wen Ruohan lies there quietly because he isn't sure what to make of this.
Wen Ruohan just kind of chilling in the back with a coffee and sunglasses in almost every scene but no one realizes its him.
Jiang Yanli faking her injury and death to get Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian to bond over her. She goes on an extended vacation with Jin Zixuan afterwards.
Except her plan kind of backfires though when Wei Wuxian fakes his own death at the First Burial Siege to get out of Jiang Cheng yelling at him.
The Wen Remnants just put on purple robes and say they are Yunmeng Jiang cultivators when the siege reaches the top of the Burial Mounds and everyone just believes them.
Wen Ruohan and Wei Wuxian sitting in the back drinking coffee with their sunglasses on while everything unfolds.
Jin Guangyao actually getting killed at Guanyin Temple but no one believes him at first because people don't die in this story.
#found this in my drafts and LOL WHEN DID I WRITE THIS#has to have been over a year ago#i want this tho like desperately#past me sneaking some chengsu in there a+#mdzs thoughts#comedy au#au
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one of the things that hurt me most in mdzs is the fact that lan wangji defended wei wuxian, helped him throughout all the events after his reincarnation, fought for and protected his beloved all the while thinking wei wuxian had rejected and yelled at his confession prior to his death.
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Thinking so hard about figure skating AU MDZS….
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ik theres like. assorted disc horse on whether or not jc and wwx consider each other brothers, bc they dont explicitly state it and their interactions are pretty antagonistic during the cr flashbacks, but like. if anything the way they interact should ABSOLUTELY be proof they do. as someone in jyl's place in a family w 2 younger brothers i can assure u that wwx and jc's whole "i hate u SO MUCH also here do u want my golden core" shtick is WAY more believable a sibling relationship than the boys' whole "i will out loud express my love and protection for my older sister" thing
#yunmeng trio#yunmeng siblings#mdzs thoughts#mdzs#mdzs really is a perfect example of all those 'u can tell when a writer is an only child' posts but like. on both sides of the spectrum#anyways. i dont rly watch cql. BUT.#the way they acted out the 'u ate all the pork from shijies soup >:(' 'too fucking bad lol' scene is SO FUNNY i think abt it every day#the sillies of all time....#*looking at my drafts full of assorted and very long mdzs analyses* yeah this is the safest thing referencing jc i could post
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