#so i know wangxian separating was something they did in cql

[layzeal]

i said 5 months ago i was gonna share my thoughts on this scene and never did, so it's time to dig this out

what did wei wuxian mean by asking shijie "why would someone like another person" and why i.... don't think he's talking about lan wangji (i know-- i know. just bear with me)

or more accurately: an analysis of chapter 71, wwx's thoughts on love, and how mxtx utilizes parallels between past and present!

(Ch 71 of MDZS web revised edition //// ExR translation)

okay let's get straight to the point that's gonna make y'all want to call me a stupid bitch who can't read: i legitimately do not think wwx was talking about lwj in this scene! here's why:

first and foremost, let's remember what the status of wangxian's relationship was at this point after sunshot ended

first, phoenix mountain: a callback to their teen dynamic. wwx's silly and flirty personality is back, he teases lwj by throwing a peony at him then asking to borrow his ribbon. lwj is frustrated, etc. lwj forcefully kisses wwx then gets angry at himself. wwx finds him and gets worried that something happened to him. they walk together and talk in very friendly manner until the xuanli incident happens. by the end they part on good terms

then, yunmeng teahouse: the first scene of this chapter. wwx is feeling quite upbeat about seeing lwj as they had a nice chat last time they met. he does a lil phoenix mountan callback by throwing a peony at him, then asking him to come upstairs and hang out. lwj does but it.... doesnt end well. he's worried about wwx's worsening temper and fears he's starting to show signs of loss of control, and asks him once again to go to gusu with him. that severely sours wwx's mood, to the point of snapping at lwj when lwj implies that he'll regret it in the future. lwj realizes his mistake and they become polite again, but the atmosphere is significantly strained, and wwx even comments that he was presumptious and shouldn't have invited him over, which lwj dissents. wwx parts with a cordial but distant "thank you", and on... not great terms

what i think really makes the above hurt though is that, when wwx comes back to yunmeng and jc asks who he met. wwx answers this:

worse than jin zixuan.....oof. im so sorry hgj

so, it really is quite tragic. wwx had a nice time with lwj in phoenix mountain, and because of that he wanted to try and wash away their bad blood, ask him to hang out, recall some stories of their youth, maybe mend this relationship that became so strained during the war! what happens instead is that... he gets the harsh reminder of what (in his mind) lwj thinks of his cultivation, thinks he's not in control of it, that it's dangerous and he should be locked up. with that, they're all back to square one :(

the thing is, MDZS is quite known for being non-linear and having a humongous amount of flashbacks, and they're all set and positioned at the time they were for a reason! the thing is, as most read the novel once and then proceed to only revisit scenes separately, naturally forgetting about the grand-picture and the scenes that come before and after, we might misremember how some events play out or the state of the character arcs and relationships, and i believe the popular fanon interpretation that "omggg wwx was asking yanli this bc he likes lwj but can't admit this yet!!!! 🙈" is quite of a great example of this

but!! it's not for any bad reason, after all both the Audio Drama and CQL kinda play up this moment with some beautiful background music. this is, in the end, a romance novel! but let's put a pin on that for a bit and analyze what led to this scene, and why WWX came looking for shijie to ask her this

so as you see, the scene right before was wei wuxian and jiang cheng talking about jin zixuan, with jc asking wwx to not pick fights with him anymore since he's the heir of lanling jin. wwx is baffled because up until that point he and jc were trashtalking buddies when it came to jzx, but there's nothing they can do about it if shijie still likes him

that... makes wwx quite speechless, and he goes searching for her to get an answer. in his mind, jzx is still an awful, undeserving person! so why would shijie like him so much?

why would someone like another person?

of course, he's not as shameless to ask shijie right to her face why she likes someone like jzx, esp since she's already well familiar with his poor opinion of him, so he tries getting an "unbiased" answer by making a vague question, which in turn makes shijie think wwx is in love with someone else

now here's the thing: i feel like fandom tends to flanderize wwx when it comes to his unreliable narration, awareness of his own feelings or lan wangji's. we don't have time to get into that now, but if you've followed me for a while you know my thoughts on this

but here, specifically, i do not think wwx is in "denial about his crush" or "waving off because he doesnt want to get caught". his answer feels genuine, and honestly? really sad once you think about it

"I won't like anyone, at least not too much. Wouldn't it be like putting a rein on my own neck?"

this isn't strange once you consider the types of romantic relationships he grew up observing. other than his own parents', which he's mostly forgotten about, a strong love and attatchment sounds more like tying a rope around your neck. even though wwx is a romantic at heart who flirts easily but had been saving his first kiss for 20 years, he's still never felt this type of love for anyone before, and can't imagine putting himself through it

"So, wait... just because WWX said so you think you should believe it? You're telling me the curtains are just blue? If he's not talking about Lan Wangji, then what's the point of this scene?"

glad you asked!

you see, something that MXTX does quite often with the flashback placement in MDZS is contrast the moments where wangxian's relationship was at its best with moments where it was at its worst. As wwx recall these memories, his pre-conceived notions about lwj get challenged and his actions and words get recontextualized! my favorite example is probably the ending of the flashback of wwx's return, to him waking up in the cloud recesses

no i'll never shut up about this flashback placement. my goddd

so, when looking at the "why would someone like another person" scene, i ask you to not look at it by itself, but as a part of the literary work that mdzs is! because, as the wangxian of the past are stuck in this cordial, but strained relationship, do you remember where the wangxian of the present have currently been left at?

if you ask me, there is something incredibly sweet about leaving these characters at their most tender --- when one is finally beginning to not only understand his own feelings, but to suspect that those feelings are requited, in which he's allowing himself to imagine a calm and happy future with him right as they march inside the lion's den --- and meeting them again when they're younger, and strained, and not fully knowing how to communicate that they care for each other, which in turn only hurts them both.

there is something very sweet about seeing wwx who is slowly realizing that he's in love, testing the waters of that, seeing how much he can take, in what ways he can ask for affection, and then seeing him again as he says "i won't ever like someone, at least not so much. wouldnt it be suffocating? wouldn't it be an impediment? wouldnt it be shackling yourself?" because you, like a cheeky grandma, can look at him and think: you don't know yet, but i've seen you then. you will like someone very much, and it won't be restraining. in fact, you'll never feel more free...

and that is the biggest thing, about revisiting this scene after you're done. because you'll look back this 20-something WWX who genuinely believed loving someone to much is like putting a rein around his own neck... and knowing he'll know a love that not only will not feel like a restrain*, but will be there to catch him whenever something does

*okay, except in bed, but that's only a bonus for wwx

#i kinda miss literary analysis class. this is a love letter to my literature teachers #mdzs is a beautiful literary work and deserves to be treated as such! #anyways uhhh. wangxian is poggers #i feel like sometimes in people's attempts to make wx more tropey and traditionally romantic #it makes them lose what actually makes their romance so special #and the brilliance of the flashback placements in mdzs #i already wrote a lot today so no tag essay lmao. enjoy! #modao #lace speaks #do i put this in the tag? ehhhh #demi wwx

[poorlittleyaoyao]

I do love the book but it's harder to get through than the show if you don't care for wangxian just because the focus is that much narrower. The nature of adaptation and also CQL having objectively too many episodes(Guanyin temple did NOT need four eps lol) turns it into an ensemble show with something for everyone. Yanli takes fifty chapters to show up and Wen Qing doesn't make her entrance until chapter 60. I am one of those people who very much do enjoy wangxian both separately and together but I also consider them one of the less interesting storylines and there are relatively few scenes of theirs I reread compared to the rest of the cast.

AGREEEEEED. The show cares so much for the supporting characters and gives such life to them--as adaptations of works with such vast words SHOULD once they've been freed from the constraints of first-person or third-person-limited narration, honestly. Knowing that there's less WQ in the novel is particularly disappointing to me, bc I love her friendship with WWX, and had hoped All WWX All The Time would at least mean more mad scientist friendship time! Alas.

That said. I am going to go on a tangent because ohhhhhhhh my god, Guanyin Temple and its need for editing.

@maester-of-spreadsheets and I have compared Guanyin Temple to Act IV of a Shakespeare play. A lot of Act IVs includes a super intense scene where the characters are in a state of HIGH EMOTION as shit hits the fan and we hurtle towards the climactic action in Act V--Ophelia's mad scene, Richard II's deposition, Brutus and Cassius's breakup fight, Richard III's coercion of Elizabeth Woodville, etc. These scenes are all CERTIFIED BANGERS that hold their plays together.

However. The reason these scenes go so hard is that they're just ONE SCENE. One really long-ass scene, maybe, but "long" here is maybe 20 minutes, bc we can't chug along with the same exact level and type of intensity for much longer than and remain engaged... which is EXACTLY what happens in CQL's iteration of Guanyin Temple. Without Mingjue's corpse busting in like the Kool-Aid man to release the tension in explosive action (the blade spirit does NOT cut it unless "it" is JGY's arm) or Wangxian's confession to release tension with some levity, it's just tearful emotional reckoning after tearful emotional reckoning for THREE ENTIRE HOURS.

And like, I 100% find every plot being rehashed at Guanyin Temple more interesting than anything Wangxian have going, but it's weird to have our protagonists just sitting there spectating other people's emotional implosions for the equivalent of an entire feature-length film. Like, they tried with the curse mark thing and the Second Flautist, but all the plot permits WWX to do is scowl tearfully about these major revelations because JGY's gotta be killed by NHS via LXC.

It had me by the throat when I first watched it because all the information was BRAND NEW and I genuinely didn't know what was going to happen, but on rewatches I just get tired. Individual bits are great on their own, but as one long slog? Noooooo thank you. And the abrupt mood whiplash and confused pacing once the focus returns to Wangxian for good leaves a weird taste in my mouth.

[huigusu]

別勉強 走向到不了的遠方

don’t force it; this is headed somewhere we can’t reach

愛不是對承諾逞強

love is not about enduring commitment

我捨不得讓你  太勉強

i can’t bear to let you force yourself

别勉强 Don’t Force It - 邓紫棋 G.E.M. ft. 周兴哲 Eric

#mdzsnet #mxtxnet #wangxian #lan wangji #wei wuxian #cql #mdzs #the untamed #cqledit #mdzsedit #my edits #so i know wangxian separating was something they did in cql #of course they reunite in the end #just read enough fic on how cql!lwj still had to see wwx leave even though he finally got him back #but you can obviously see how difficult it was #for both of them #lwj doesn't want to hold him back when wwx wants to go 😭 #and that like six second scene xiao zhan does in the second gif?? mesmerising #his ability to convey the myriad of emotions!!! #but i digress #but this is my (or gem and eric chou's) ode to cql!lwj seeing wwx's figure get smaller and smaller in the distance #watching him go once more #and finally turning away to return to gusu; alone #:') #trans by lyrics pinyin but edited #tw blood #tw injury

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

[1/?] Sorry for venting. I just saw some bad takes that gave me a lot of feelings. Personally, JC stresses me out every time he comes on screen, but I don't mind it when JC fans say fan-typical things like how they like JC because he wears purple, or is grumpy, or they think he's hot, or that they ship x*ch*ng because the cql actors have nice jawlines. They're harmless, fun takes, and while I don't agree with some of them, I see where they're coming from

Hello there anon, vent away as that is what my blog is open for as I love/hate on Jiang Cheng as he is in the plot, as well as all of my beef with what has been done to him for the EN side of the fanbase! I am more than fine listening and engaging with the unsavory "unpopular" discussions of his canon behavior and this goes for anyone of course that needs an open play area. I'll try to engage with what you have sent point by point as succinctly as I can.

[2/?] (some of these are obviously crack, and I am a fan of a few problematic faves). But then there are stans that just have to put other characters down to make JC look good. Like, I think some fans take their freedom of interpretation for granted because most of these takes aren't even labeled 'headcanon,' 'ooc,' or 'crack' anymore. Stans feel that their interpretations are valid, and while they are, valid =/= canon, and they're treating these takes as canon, which becomes popular fanon.

I enjoy Jiang Cheng for what he is, however as I had said it took me another reread to get to my stance of him being the negative mirror to Lan Wangji's positive and my comfort with that for the story once I realized what purpose he served. He is only insofar tragic in regards to his circumstances, but it does not absolve him for what he is at his core (no pun, but I can make a very nice metaphor that even with a piece of Wei Wuxian in him he is still forever unable and unwilling to stand by him equally all while stagnating where as Lan Wangji is able to flourish, grow and mature with nothing of import left from Wei Wuxian in a technical sense). As for ships, I am a little dirty Xicheng whore for fun and can say there is a sense of entertainment for me making it work with two people where one is wildly ignorant and the other wildly rabid. But that is outside of what is established as canon in the work and I always try to keep the two strictly separate due to the skew fanon perpetuates.

3/?] And now, it's not clear what part of the fanon references canon JC or the canon events of mdzs. JC is an asshole; I don't like him as a person, but I do think that he's a complex character motivated by many issues (sup, YeeZY), which makes him fascinating to explore. Unfortunately, erasing his culpability also removes his agency. JC should be allowed to be an asshole character who makes his own decisions even if they're the wrong ones. He has made his own tragedy by constantly casting Wei Wuxian as the villain of his life.

Now thanks to you I will be using YeeZY to forever and now to acknowledge Madam Yu (this is your fault for the new tag). From a standing from storytelling I agree that he is complex in the Jianghu for MDZS. Where in the usual political intrigue of Wuxia, he would be the mustache twirling villain that is outright unforgivable in narration, it is by favor of Wei Wuxian's narration that has an early steeping of empathy for him. And he is not meant to be seen as ultimately sympathetic, the work builds up his hate against Wei Wuxian who tries to rationalize it all several times until he is finally unable to. Jiang Cheng is the antithesis to Lan Wangji and the false bait to get attached to in Wei Wuxian's first life. I will make the note their meeting in Yiling is lukewarm between both as they exchange nothing really in terms of conversation and all pleasantries are left in terms of Jiang Yanli for Wei Wuxian. By this point Wei Wuxian has already switched his yearnings of platonically wanting a part of Jiang Cheng's life, to subconscious romantic inclinations about Lan Wangji and the perceived loss of being in the other's life.

The very point of Jiang Cheng as the deconstruction, is that he has no passion in life despite his apparent exploits because he put a shadow to hang over himself as an excuse to say others think he is not good enough. He has no deeper motivations than pure selfishness by the end of the work and is pure frivolity that he has built up losing the meaning of his sect as a tradition. He had his agency (more than anyone I might add in the work due to his social position) that he used to build his reputation as a passive rich sect leader that has little to do with civilian problems.

4/?] And I think a JC, somehow, that realizes that he did something wrong and is working hard to change for the better and gain self-actualization to become that UWU best jiujiu the stans want him to be, who is ready to talk (not yell at) with WWX, apologize to him, and create a better, healthier relationship with him is a much more powerful reconciliation and happy ending than 'everyone is wrong and mean and they all apologize to JC, which magically gets rid of all his issues'.

He is forced out of culpability in reconciliation because simply put, his audience do not like the reality that relationships fray and dissolve with no further resolution other than we as adults both need to move on for safety and good health. It is not acceptable in real life and fiction is allowed to place that also in it's thematic relationships. He has a small, small spark of recognition at the end of the main story, however he himself seems to choose to ignore it, as change is hard and he has never taken to that well as was foreshadowed with his dogs and the idea of sharing a space with Wei Wuxian. To write this is an awful lot of work into his psyche which is not a nice place, he is a terrible being and downplaying that to make a sugar sweet person does not work instantaneously. He is the one responsible for the entire fallout with Wei Wuxian and he hysterically realizes that even as he tries to continue to blame Wei Wuxian.

The issue that I have with his current stan culture, is that they already view him as something he is not. They play at bicycle with all of the other protagonists that have positive traits that they strip as they see fit; Good affirming loving to children adult Lan Wangji, Self-sacrificing ultimately did it all for love and care Wei Wuxian, Hard exterior but softened to who they consider an annoyance Wen Qing, Loyal as partners in their exploits on the field and always have each others back Wen Ning. They even take Jin Guangyao's persona of playing damsel and using that as a positive to soften up Jiang Cheng into something he has never been for anyone for ships.

[5/5] Also, making WWX/WN/LWJ apologize just makes them look better than JC. Like, stans supposedly love JC, so they ahouldn't be lazy and work hard to give him actual character development. Again, I'm sorry for spamming your ask. It just really baffles me about where they get these 'hot' takes (All I'm going to say is that JC was ungrateful, and WN had a reason verbally dismantle him).

They see this, but, they will spin it in any way to excuse Jiang Cheng due to the story itself showing that he was in the wrong to everyone he flung accusations at and his hate. No one but him is at fault for his spite as he had gotten his revenge on the ones that had ruined Lotus Pier and killed his parents. His own resentment pitted him against good and well meaning people that he refused to help as he mimicked his mother's words about raising their heads higher out of goodness instead of keeping low and staying self-centered. There is the underlying criticism of taking individual arrogance as self-care at the cost of others. Each point that Wen Ning makes is exactly what Jiang Cheng himself knows as he hated Wei Wuxian for being something he could not be or even wanted to be. Jiang Cheng wants kindness but does not understand that kindness to others needs to be selfless and accept the hurt that can come with that in life. He encompasses the fall from the path of buddhist lifestyle, "The Three Poisons" to Wangxian's "Without Envy" at the stories end.

[6/5] P.S. I'm not saying I want reconciliation fics, but I just feel that if stans want JC to have a happy ending, then I think that he should actively work for it. I think it would be interesting to see what force of nature would push him through a character development because throwing a therapist at him would result in a murder.

"I'm not saying I want reconciliation fics, but I just feel that if stans want JC to have a happy ending, then I think that he should actively work for it."

They do not think he has to work for it, they say his tragedy is enough, while heaping accusations against Wei Wuxian and saying his own are not enough to absolve him. Something Wei Wuxian has never denied and told all present they are allowed to forever hate him for what he had done in the past, but that they need to find a way to live in a life that is always moving on. He learned that grudges do nothing once they are absolved and it leaves you with hate with nothing else to do with it once that object is gone. In terms of reconciliation, I do not ever think that either want anything other than a distant peaceful out of each other's life set up. Jiang Cheng does not need Wei Wuxian in his life to be satisfied and never has since he used him as the handicap to hide behind to stay angry and miserable. Being without that fallback opens the world far more for him to change than him ever interacting like an old friend with Wei Wuxian ever again, if he ever had the guts to do that.

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #jiang cheng #yeah I am using that tag block me if it upsets you #pokes this sorry for the length I tried #listen... only i am his trash queen

[crossdressingdeath]

i think, while cql obviously had no choice but to censor mdzs, they didn't have to make it impossible to read their relationship as romantic through subtext either,

because wangxian's relationship in cql makes no sense. once minute they're soulmates, the next it seems like they're barely more than acquaintances. and then, of course, like i don't need to talk about that rain scene or separating at the end bc we all already know it was Bad and Stupid.

but this just makes it impossible to make any sense of their relationship, in either a romantic or platonic context. cql could have at least given us a cohesive deep soulmate """"friendship"""" and with the subtext that's already there, then as viewers we could at least understand the romantic relationship that was meant to be there, even if everything was censored.

but.... instead they gave us nothing?? there is no substance to cql wangxian at all, just stupid queerbaity-esque scenes that have no real meaning and go no where and don't even make sense in their relationship development.

like they tell us that tying the forehead ribbon to someone means marriage, and then wangxian did that, but afterwards they're still not even friends?? i mean they could have used that subtext at the end to imply actual marriage but instead it just feels like they throw in scenes like that all over the place without any thought at all for what it implies abt wangxian's relationship

i mean it just so obvious that they put no effort or thought into at least conveying something of the source material, like they're just so disrespectful to wangxian??? as if their relationship can be reduced to some nonsense subtext about chickens and bunnies and forehead ribbons and annoyingly drawn out gazes, just sprinkled in throughout the story with no thought whatsoever to even developing a believable friendship between wwx and lwj

and then people have the cheek to say cql wangxian is better and you know they're full of ---- because even just read as friendship... there's nothing to cql wangxian!!! you can't look into their relationship, analyse the interactions between them and what it means for their characters, because none of it makes sense!! no matter how you look at it, there's just no logical coherence to anything that happens in cql. because the writers just?? couldn't be bothered?

i genuinely feel so bad when i see people who are new to the fandom or people who just like cql trying to make sense of the story, and i think, just don't even try??

The thing with CQL is that they wanted to change it so that LWJ and WWX bonded before everything went to shit, which is fair, but then they failed to consider the knock-on effects that change would have. For example, it makes sense that book WWX doesn’t trust LWJ to have his best interests at heart; they aren’t friends. He respects LWJ a great deal and I think does have some romantic feelings towards him even during the Sunshot Campaign, but he has no reason to believe LWJ would prioritize WWX over righteousness and the rules of his sect. Nor does WWX have any reason to tell LWJ the truth about his core and demonic cultivation. Meanwhile in CQL they’re close friends and soulmates; why the fuck wouldn’t WWX trust the guy he says knows him better than anyone else?! Why would he assume that LWJ wanted to take him prisoner, why wouldn’t he tell LWJ about his cultivation? Why would he and everyone else assume LWJ hated him? “Oh, we’re best friends, but clearly he loathes me!” It doesn’t make sense! The writers literally just changed things and made zero attempt to make those changes make sense, this is called Terrible Adaptation Decisions 101. Also LWJ is so much less respectful of WWX’s wishes in CQL; think about how he pulls off WWX’s mask while he’s unconscious (I guess to double-check his identity? I don’t know) even though WWX clearly did not want to tell him who he was while novel LWJ kept the fact that he knew to himself until WWX returned to him of his own free will after they were separated so that he knew WWX wasn’t staying just because LWJ knew who he was. And of course there’s the whole thing where WWX very obviously wants to stay with LWJ and LWJ is basically like “lol you thought” and goes off to do a job he didn’t want, leaving WWX entirely alone in a world that still lowkey wants him dead.

#cql negativity #anon #asks

[esmeraldablazingsky]

I’ve finally hit my limit on the number of bad takes on the Lan parents I can see before I have to lay out all the reasons I disagree, so hello, I’m Blazie, and in this essay I will justify my visceral dislike of the assumption that Qingheng-jun married/imprisoned/had sex with Lan-furen against her will.

    Warning for mentions of rape (in context of Interpretations I Really Hate) and a very, VERY long post below the cut.

    Before I start going off about the finer points of all this, I want to make sure people are on the same page regarding what we actually know about what went down with Qingheng-jun and Lan-furen. What I say is based off the EXR translation of MDZS, for the sake of clarity, and although I don’t think the exact wording should be too important, feel free to let me know if you think I’ve missed an important bit of nuance or something (the whole story is in Chapter 64.)

    The story we get is told by Lan Xichen, and it goes like this: a young Qingheng-jun falls in love at first sight with Lan-furen, who doesn’t return his feelings, and at some point kills one of Qingheng-jun’s teachers over unspecified “grievances.” Although he’s understandably very upset over the murder, Qingheng-jun sneaks Lan-furen back to Cloud Recesses and officially marries her in order to announce to his clan that anyone who wants to hurt her has to go through him.

After that, he locks Lan-furen in one house and himself in another as a form of repentance. Wei Wuxian speculates that this was because “he could neither forgive the one who killed his teacher nor watch the death of the woman who he loved. He could only marry her to protect her life and force himself not to see her.” 

    A central detail of this story that I think people don’t give the import it deserves is that aside from marrying and protecting her, Qingheng-jun’s other option was to let Lan-furen be executed by his clan. His purpose in marrying her wasn’t just for kicks/out of a possessive sort of love, it was so she wouldn’t straight up die. How she felt about this arrangement isn’t stated, but I’ll get into that in a bit. In addition to that, Qingheng-jun and Lan-furen live separately, which was apparently purposeful on Qingheng-jun’s part, and runs counter to the interpretation that he intended to take sexual advantage of Lan-furen.

Though there aren’t many concrete details in Lan Xichen’s retelling, he does specifically inform Wei Wuxian that his mother never complained about remaining in her house. What exactly this signifies is unclear— whether she was simply putting on a brave face for her sons, or whether she was in fact at all content with the situation— but it at the very least serves to further muddy the waters on how she and Qingheng-jun felt about all this. 

Beyond what Lan Xichen and Wei Wuxian are saying out loud, there’s also quite a bit of subtext in this scene, especially in light of later events and revelations, like Lan Xichen’s confession for Lan Wangji at Guanyin Temple. 

So what is Lan Xichen trying to convey with all this? There’s a lot of memes about this scene, most of which err too far on the side of Himbo Airhead Lan Xichen for my liking, but one that I do find amusing emphasizes how Lan Xichen draws parallels between Wangxian and the story of his parents (Lan Xichen: [flute solo] please use your one brain cell to connect the dots.) If Wei Wuxian hadn’t completely lost his memory of Lan Wangji defending him against his own clan elders, one would assume that Lan Xichen’s story would have had a much better chance of hitting home. 

In hindsight and side by side, the parallels are much clearer— Qingheng-jun, “ignoring the objections from his clan… told everyone in the clan that she would be his wife for the rest of his life, that whoever wanted to harm her would have to pass through him first.” Similarly, according to Lan Xichen in Chapter 99, “for [Wei Wuxian,] not only did WangJi talk back to him, he even met with his sword the cultivators from the GusuLan Sect. He heavily injured all thirty-three of the seniors we asked to come.”

In that context, it makes a lot less sense to interpret Qingheng-jun as an aggressor towards Lan-furen, as in Lan Wangji’s case, the narrative clearly establishes that his actions are to secure Wei Wuxian’s safety. The action of Taking Someone Back To Cloud Recesses is— okay, actually, it’s a little more nuanced than I took into account when I started writing that sentence, so let me go a little deeper into Lan Wangji’s actions and how they relate to his father’s, story-wise. 

My intent is not to dive into the terrifying underworld of novel-versus-drama discourse, but simply put, Novel!Lan Wangji as he is written isn’t exactly the poster child for clear consent. (I’m going to entirely leave off the extra chapters for the sake of everyone’s sanity, so I’m just talking about the main body of the novel here.)

He means well, and I’m sure we can agree that he does actually love and want the best for Wei Wuxian, but his lack of communication on this point means that he accidentally gives Wei Wuxian the impression that he wants to imprison and/or punish him in Cloud Recesses at least twice off the top of my head (pre-timeskip, as we know, and post-timeskip immediately after Dafan Mountain when he actually drags Wei Wuxian back to his room.) 

That all likely has something to do with MXTX’s narrative kinks and regular kinks and all that, and can absolutely be taken with many grains of salt. However, these events establish how easy it is to misinterpret the action of Taking Someone Back To Gusu as an attempt to imprison rather than protect them (much to Lan Wangji’s chagrin.)

Failing to communicate his purpose to Wei Wuxian doesn’t mean that Lan Wangji actually had any intent of hurting or caging him— that was just a misinterpretation on Wei Wuxian’s part, and we, as the audience, find that out in due time— but as written in the novel, it can be really uncomfortable to read. Because of that, many people choose to accept CQL canon regarding Lan Wangji’s more possessive actions or mix characterization from different adaptations, which, to be clear, I completely understand and respect. 

However, Qingheng-jun doesn’t get the benefit of the doubt as often, which I frankly find baffling, because nowhere in the text does it state that Lan-furen objected to being taken back to Cloud Recesses, while even Wei Wuxian clearly objected the first few times. In fact, while we’re on this note, I’ll take it a step farther— I find it baffling that people seem to default to an unsympathetic view of Qingheng-jun, because nowhere in the text does it state that he overruled Lan-furen’s wishes in any way. The text doesn’t clarify a lot of things, actually, and that is part of the point. 

The narrators of MDZS are, in many situations, highly unreliable. This is, presumably, very purposeful! MDZS can easily be read as a sharp criticism of reputation and mass judgment and the concept of condemning people without knowing their motives! And I don’t want to sound mean, but guys… did any of us learn anything from that? Here, I’m going to put it in meme format for a second to convey what I mean. 

MDZS: It’s easy to condemn someone as a villain if you don’t know their story or the reasons behind their actions

MDZS: Anyway, here’s a character whose story and reasons behind his actions you know nothing about

Some Parts Of This Fandom: Ah, a villain 

    Memes aside, here’s what I want to point out. It’s entirely possible to assume Qingheng-jun was a bad person who disregarded a woman’s wishes in marrying and confining her when all you have is Lan Xichen’s (actually very neutral, thank you Lan Xichen for being an eminently reasonable and concerned-with-evidence character) account of what happened. It would also be at least that easy to assume Wei Wuxian was just an evil necromancer if he hadn’t un-died and brought his own story to light, or even to believe that Lan Wangji had somehow tamed Wei Wuxian into submission and being a respectable cultivator if you were an average citizen of Fantasy Ancient China with nothing but rumors to operate on. 

    The thing about Qingheng-jun and Lan-furen’s story, then, is that there is nobody left alive who knows the full tale. Nobody knows what they thought about anything, really. Nobody even knows why Lan-furen killed Qingheng-jun’s teacher. Wei Wuxian asks why, and Lan Xichen can’t tell him, but I think the best answer would be something along the lines of I don’t know, Wei Wuxian, why did you kill people? Your guess on the motivations of your own thinly disguised narrative parallel are as good as anyone’s. 

    So, while it’s not technically impossible to assign darker motives to Qingheng-jun, the cautionary tale of MDZS seems to warn against that exact assumption. 

    I’ve refrained from getting too salty on a personal level thus far, but now that I’ve said a lot of the more logical and story-based points of my argument, I will say that at least some of my annoyance with the interpretation of Qingheng-jun as a possessive rapist and Lan-furen as his victim stems from the fact that I just think it’s straight up boring. Where’s the nuance? Aren’t you tired of reducing these characters to the flattest possible versions of themselves? Don’t you just want to add a little flavor? 

    In a slightly more serious phrasing of that criticism, I find that making Lan-furen a helpless prisoner strips her of whatever agency she might otherwise have. To be fair, she’s more or less a non-character in keeping with the general state of the MDZS universe, but making her a damsel in distress only consigns her more deeply to hapless, milquetoast innocence. 

    It’s perfectly valid to enjoy ladies who have done nothing wrong, ever, in their lives, but like… Qin Su is right there, if that’s your ball game. There’s also really no need to make Qingheng-jun someone who doesn’t respect women. Isn’t Jin Guangshan enough for at least one universe? 

    Anyway, ultimately, you do you. I don’t like arguing on the internet, and will just ignore things I don’t agree with (or write an 1800 word vaguepost) like a mature human being. I’m just saying, if it’s a cut and dry tale of imprisonment and assault you’re looking for… you probably don’t want to turn to a woman who committed a murder and a man who loved her enough to forfeit everything to keep her safe. 

#mdzs #qingheng jun #madam lan #lan wangji #wei wuxian #(in a narrative parallels context) #blazie .txt #anyway without further ado here is my.... essay? #rape mention

[morkofday]

2020 – a (content creator) year in review

I decided to make this into a mix of these two games I was (kinda?) tagged into so thank you for @leonzhng and @tiesanjiao ♥ I hope you don’t mind me doing it like this ^^ all the questions were just so interesting that I wanted to try!

(bc of the amount of questions, I’m placing them under a cut so that I don’t flood anyone’s dash) 

Me

(this is the 2020 year in review that hanyi tagged me to ♥ sorry am so late!)

Top 5 Movies you saw this year

wow tbh I didn’t watch many movies this year as I realized yesterday when I was thinking about this for certain reasons. Or at least I feel like I didn’t watch that many? Nothing really stuck with me it seems.

Because of this, I will only mention two: Parasite and The Old Guard. Those were both wonderful in their own ways and I’m very happy I got to watch them both ^^

Top 5 TV shows you watched this year

this one is difficult bc I watched so many (and forgot even more?) but:

The Lost Tomb Reboot (my introduction to DMBJ. this drama stole my heart and helped me through the tough autumn semester!) 

Joy of Life (it’s nuts that this happened during 2020? it feels like it was ages ago)

Kingdom (such a positive surprise and I really hope we get more of this :o I really recommend!)

Detective L (easy, nice aesthetics, amazing costumes. Bai Yu was a delight as Luo Fei)

Sand Sea (I am still baffled by how much I loved this bc I had so many doubts? am happy I did tho)

Bonus: Guardian (bc it has come to stay and the rewatch has been so emotional but so rewarding)

Top 5 songs of 2020

this is a tough one too bc I’ve heard so much new music during 2020 but I will try to put it simply:

Black Swan by BTS (I absolutely adore this song. I listened to it on repeat when it came out at the beginning of the year, I have cried for it a ton, I enjoy every stage I see for it and it’s just a masterpiece. it has also helped a bit with my writing struggles that I’ve felt creeping up on me lately)

Always by By The Coast (an amazing song that always leaves me in my feels. inspires me a lot all the time)

Love me or Leave me by DAY6 (this whole album was a masterpiece and I listened to it on loop for like. two weeks? this was my favorite song on it even if I adored the rest too, especially Zombie)

all of my life by Park Won (listened to this a lot in relation to my xicheng and the wedding I finally got to write for them ;; that’s one good thing that came out of this year tbh)

雨人 by 刘畅 (Liu Chang) (with the Reboot’s ending song, this one is my favorite on that ost. I love Liu Chang’s voice, I loved Liu Sang as a character and as I said, I loved Reboot as a drama. I get super emotional about this ost so I think it defined this year a lot for me)

Top 5 books you read in 2020  

All For The Game -trilogy (listened to these as audiobooks but that counts right?)

The Song of Achilles (as an audiobook too and really adored the reader’s voice)

The Smoke Thieves -series (I really just binge read the two first books in this series and am so excited for the next one!)

Call Down The Hawk (love love love)

Guardian novel (am not very into these novels usually but I was positively surprised this time? it was so cool to finally get the original story and compare it with the drama version)

5 positive things that happened in 2020

joined mdzsnet and met all the amazing ppl there and got to become part of this loving community and :’) I’m so thankful, it’s been a joy

learned more about editing? or started doing it regularly. I still can’t do shit but am having fun learning more all the time and I really hope that maybe the upcoming year I can switch to PS and try out giffing?

went to Halsey’s concert! it was in february so a bit before all the hassle with covid happened over here ;; it was super cool and so nice and I just. I love Halsey

fell into the DMBJ hellhole which am very much enjoying. it’s a great universe and the story is so good and the dramas have been so fun to watch and. it feels like a good continuation to The Untamed somehow haha (also brought me a new friend! you’re amazing ashen!! ♥)

started therapy and it’s been... a journey. but towards something better I think? it’s something I would’ve needed ages ago but it’s better late than never I suppose

My Creations

(this is the other part where ali was being super sweet and mentioned me ♥ thank you for being so awesome!)

1. first creation and most recent creation of 2020: wow it’s been a while since I’ve looked at this horrible creation but here ya go jkdhgk [x]. I’ve come a long way from this (and my xicheng has come a long way from this too). most recent one is this xiaoge edit that I absolutely adore [x]. 

2. one of your favorite creations from 2020: this wwx edit that was part of my agust d2 edit series [x]. I loved to give him blue instead of his typical red. 

3. a new style you tried this year and a gifset edit that uses it: this [x] wwx edit which I don’t know if I like or not but I was playing around with the font and all the effects instead of just normal screenshots + coloring. also I just adore the quote. 

4. a creation to be proud of: I could mention that xiaoge here but in addition, I will also say this wu xie edit for reboot [x]. I managed to capture my vision so well, I was surprised. for cql, this songxiao edit [x]. I loved how it turned out in the end. 

5. a creation that took forever: this wangxian edit [x]. like I’ve said several times, I lost sleep bc of it. I just kept struggling with the third pic and how to place the text there D: 

6. your creation from 2020 that received the most notes: this lwj/wangxian edit [x]. I had many ideas for this edit when I first started making it and I never managed to capture my vision in the way I first intended... the pictures I was supposed to use just never fit quite right sigh. I dunno why it was this one that gained all the notes in the end bc I personally think I have better ones too but am still thankful :’D 

7. a creation you think deserved more notes: as said, dmbj fandom on tumblr is very small so I really want to say the two already mentioned ones (wu xie and xiaoge) and then my pingxie edits [x] [x]. also these wwx edits which I personally am very happy about [x] [x]. and from my agust d2 series, this yun bros one [x].

8. a new fandom you joined and a creation you made for it: really just dmbj this year and I’ve already linked all of my creations for that :’D tho I have plans for another pingxie edit and a liu sang edit! oh and maybe I could mention guardian here with this shen wei [x]. I had so much fun while making it (also the quote just haunted me relentlessly until I gave it a moment). 

9. a creation you made that breaks your heart: this must be my easter islanders (lwj and jc) edit [x] that just. awoke many thoughts in me? I’m going to put a link to the version where you can read my ramblings underneath :’D 

10. a ‘simple’ creation that you really love: my creation for the creator (gif?) challenge that was going around! [x] it was simple and nice to do and I loved the result. also, it was nice to work with jl for a change :’) 

11. a favorite creation created by someone else: oh wow ok so this is going to be rough bc I have so many favorites ;; you can look at this post here [x] to see more! 

but to love my two taggers am going to say these [x / x] [x] [x] [x] [x] by hanyi (I always love your edits, the colors you choose, the thoughts you put into them (and your humor too!). there are so many cool things you’ve done that I just stay in awe of! I adore all of it ;; ♥) and these [x] [x] [x] [x] [x] by ali (I love all of your gifsets so much, they have such pretty colors and such good scenes, and I am thankful every day that you make all the amazing dmbj content, pls never stop ;; I should go through all of your creations properly one day! I noticed you have sand sea stuff too and let me scream?) ^^ ♥

12. your favorite content creators and blogs that you appreciate: this is going to be a huge list and I’ve already made my love heard for some but no hurt in doing it again so @i-am-just-a-kiddo @ashenwren @tiesanjiao @kholran @lzswy @englishbunnyrocks @leonzhng @aheartfullofjolllly @yibobibo @inkblue-black @cross-d-a @bloody-bee-tea @fytheuntamed @mdzsnet @lifegoesmon @creeds-eagle @underaswift-sunrise @sarawatsaraleo @lan-xichens @mylastbraincql @wangxianbunnydoodles @manhasetardis @distantsnows @ohsehuns @minmoyu @linglynz @highwarlockkareena @yiqiie @aowyn @alienwlw @wangxiians @kingbadcat @sassyassassy @tytangfei @lanzhannnn @skzmxtp @leoyunxi @yoonqiful @softjeon @rapbabenamjoon @ronan-adam @miyakuli @pavusdorian @arsuf @brolinskeep @gawincaskeyy and so many others! (sorry for all the random ppl on this list that I’ve never even talked to ^^’ just know that you make my dash a wonderful place! ♥) 

I won’t tag anyone separately here but everyone who’s already been tagged or sees this is free to do this (or link me posts if you’ve done these already!) ♥ have a nice day everyone! 

#tag game #wow this took ages #am sorry am late #thanks for tagging me tho!! #i enjoyed this a lot #about me

[spaceskam]

Hello! For Title Tuesday, how about 33 and wangxian, since I recently fell into this ship and am still swooning and desperate for more! Thank you, love everything you do!

thank you! and thank you for waiting a week too! I’ll add the ao3 link whenever I get the chance to post it over there, I hope you like it!

title tuesday instructions

tags: cql canon, post-canon, a bit of sad and lonely WWX 

33. an uncomfortable month [ao3]

When Wei Wuxian came back to Cloud Recesses, he’d been excited.

He missed Sizhui and Wen Ning and having a reliable place to sleep and bathe, but mainly he missed Lan Zhan. He’d been so excited to hang on him again, to trick him into staying up past curfew by talking for hours and it was simply rude to fall asleep while someone was talking, to catch those moments when he smiled. He missed them together, whatever that meant and in whatever capacity he was allowed to have it in.

However, he hadn’t expected it to be so… weird. Awkward, maybe, was a better word. Lan Zhan was, for the most part, the same, but he was always so busy and so Wei Wuxian had to entertain himself. To make matters worse, apparently, people thought he was the great Hanguang-Jun’s ward. At first it’d been funny, but now it was simply annoying.

“Lan Zhan,” he whined, pouting and squishing his face against Lan Zhan’s arm. He didn’t slow down his pace or even accommodate Wei Wuxian’s affections, so he took the hint and stood up straight. He rolled his shoulders, shaking away that little bud that was beginning to blossom inside him that did nothing but remind him that he was unwanted. He was hoping to get rid of it before he couldn’t ignore it. “Lan Zhan, what did you tell them? I’ve told three separate people that I’m not your ward and not a single one of them believed me.”

“Mn.”

“Mn,” Wei Wuxian mimicked, rolling his eyes, “What does that mean?”

“I have said nothing to anyone about my relationship to Wei Ying,” he said.

“Yeah, including me,” Wei Wuxian grumbled softly. Lan Wangji tilted his head slightly in his direction as if listening and Wei Wuxian managed a laugh, petting his arm. “I’m teasing, Lan Zhan. So, what, do I just let them think that? What if rumors start about my age, though? Aren’t wards much younger?”

“Let them come to their own conclusion,” Lan Zhan said firmly. Wei Wuxian’s face felt warm at the implication. Though, maybe there were no implications and his mind was just a bit naughty.

His mind had definitely been awfully naughty these days.

“So, you won’t mind what they say when I stay in the Jingshi long past curfew?” Wei Wuxian asked. Lan Zhan didn’t answer which meant he didn’t mind. Wei Wuxian leaned closer. “But what will they say if I don’t leave at all?”

Lan Zhan came to a halt, turning to him. Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened a bit, shocked he was getting that much of a reaction. Lan Zhan hadn’t really given him much of a reaction since he came back. It was all very cordial. Plain. Wei Wuxian never overstayed his welcome at the Jingshi because of it, regardless of how much he wanted to take a nap in his bed again. It was much warmer than the guest rooms.

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan said, staring at him. His eyes slowly grazed over his face and then further down and Wei Wuxian felt a bit lightheaded. “Are your rooms not satisfactory?”

“No,” he said. Lan Zhan blinked and then nodded before Wei Wuxian’s brain processed anything at all. “No! I mean, yes, I mean, they’re fine. Fine.”

Lan Zhan took a slow, even breath. “Wei Ying.”

“I suppose I was under the impression that I would be staying in the Jingshi,” Wei Wuxian said slowly, stupidly, but it didn’t matter. He didn’t know how long Lan Zhan planned to let him stay here, but it couldn’t be too much longer. “You know, like we did last time.”

“Wei Ying was here under pressing circumstances last time,” Lan Zhan pointed out, his eyebrows pulled together just enough to show his confusion. It was such a small change from his normal expression that Wei Wuxian barely caught it. “Wei Ying deserves a space of his own for however long he will be here.”

And it was so sweet that Wei Wuxian didn’t have the heart to tell him that he didn’t really mind sharing if it meant sharing with Lan Zhan. In fact, he’d much rather that. If they were in the same room, then they would at least see each other every day without Wei Wuxian having to hunt him down.

But Lan Zhan had been very thoughtful and Wei Wuxian smiled.

“Oh. I suppose I misunderstood,” he said. Lan Zhan blinked slowly and he took a step forward.

“Wei Ying can stay as long as he desires. And he can have whatever he desires. If he wishes to stay in the Jingshi, he is welcome,” Lan Zhan said. Wei Wuxian nodded slowly in understanding, but his cheeks just started to grow warm and he found himself laughing for no reason. It wasn’t funny. He did it anyway.

“Silly Lan Zhan, you don’t want to give me your house! I am just a ward, don’t you remember?” Wei Wuxian laughed. Lan Zhan blinked, but then nodded his head once.

Lan Zhan continued to walk and Wei Wuxian followed as they made their way to the open courtyard where young disciples were practicing sword forms. They were all around 13 or 14 and greeted Lan Zhan with a warm ‘Hanguang-Jun’ and then quickly averted their eyes from Wei Wuxian. They hadn’t done that before he left, even when they knew he was the Yiling Laozu. He put a little more space between him and Lan Zhan, just to be safe.

The days continued on like this, Lan disciples averting their eyes and Lan Zhan just being eerily calm. Not to say he wasn’t always calm, but he seemed almost sedated. Wei Wuxian wasn’t sure how to handle that. He would press his luck and stay later in the Jingshi, but he was never told to leave even as Lan Wangji went about his business to prepare for bed. It was like he didn’t care about anything but work. Wei Wuxian felt like he’d missed a step.

“A-Yuan!” Wei Wuxian called, walking a bit faster than was Lan appropriate to catch up with him. He was the only one who’s behavior made sense. Sweet and righteous and adorable. 

“Wei-qianbei,” Lan Sizhui said warmly, bowing politely. Then he stood up, paused a moment, and went in for a short hug. That was another thing that made sense. He always gave him hugs when no one else was around. Wei Wuxian gave them freely right back.

“A-Yuan, could I ask you something? Between you and I, of course,” Wei Wuxian said, trying to keep his voice diplomatic as they continued to walk. It made him smile so big his eyes turned into little crescents. Adorable, truly.

“Yes, Wei-qianbei, anything.”

“Did something happen while I was gone? The Lans have never been exactly fond of me, but viewing me as Hanguang-Jun’s ward and being too awkward to even look my way is definitely new. Did a rumor about me spread? I haven’t heard any,” Wei Wuxian said, tapping his nose thoughtfully. He’d tried to come up with reasons and failed each time. “Even your Hanguang-Jun has been weird.”

“Ah,” Lan Sizhui said, giving a tense little smile and looking away quickly as his cheeks began to burn red. Wei Wuxian stopped walking, putting his hand on his arm.

“A-Yuan,” he said, using the same tone of voice he’d used when he would tell him to spit out whatever he’d shoved in his mouth 16 years ago now. It was enough to make him tilt his head back in Wei Wuxian’s direction.

“Hanguang-Jun just… made it very clear that you were not to be disrespected,” he said carefully. Wei Wuxian’s eyebrows furrowed.

“What does that mean?”

Lan Sizhui pushed his hair off his neck and looked around. Wei Wuxian put his hands on his hips and waited for an explanation. Hanguang-Jun had been acting strange as well. What the hell could he have possibly done?

“Have you been to the Jingshi?” Lan Sizhui asked quietly.

“Of course I have.”

“Then have you not… noticed?”

“Noticed what?” 

Lan Sizhui’s face flushed again and he shyly looked at Wei Wuxian which only furthered his confusion. He went to the Jingshi nearly every day. Had he missed something that obvious?

“Perhaps you should ask Hanguang-Jun. It doesn’t feel like my place to say,” Sizhui said. Wei Wuxian scrunched up his nose and sighed.

“Everything is so difficult around here,” he said, earning a small smile from Sizhui. Wei Wuxian reached out to smooth his forehead ribbon carefully. “Fine, I suppose I’ll ask.”

“Alright, Wei-qianbei.”

“Once I straighten that, we’ll address this Wei-qianbei nonsense. Am I not worthy enough to be your Xian-gege anymore?” Wei Wuxian asked, enjoying the sound of his laughter. That made sense. If A-Yuan was laughing and smiling with him, then things couldn’t be that bad. He was sure of it.

“Alright, Xian-gege.”

Wei Wuxian spent his day as normal as he could, though he was already prepared to pack up if need be. He would ask Lan Zhan what he’d missed and see what he said, but he didn’t want to be in a place where everyone wouldn’t even look his way anymore. It was too uncomfortable.

He didn’t want to leave Lan Zhan and he wouldn’t if he didn’t have to, but it was beginning to feel like he had to.

As the day began to wind to an end and it was around the time that Lan Wangji would be retiring to the Jingshi, Wei Wuxian made a point to beat him there. He let himself in and took a look around, trying to notice if there was anything amiss. Nothing stood out.

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan said as he entered in complete silence. Wei Wuxian spun around to face him, smiling as innocent as he could. 

Lan Zhan eyed him skeptically, not buying it for a moment and yet not calling him out either. It was little things like that that reminded him that Lan Zhan was a grown man now and not a hot-headed teenager. Not that he’d ever admit he was hot-headed, but still.

“Lan Zhan! I was waiting for you, let’s eat,” Wei Wuxian said, coming close and plucking the tray of food out of Lan Zhan’s hands. He brought it to the table and knelt on one side. Lan Zhan was still watching him closely as he placed Bichen on its stand and came closer.

Lan Zhan knelt at the other side of the table and poured tea for the both of them. Wei Wuxian smiled in his gratitude and downed it. They ate in silence which seemed to be an immediate warning flag for Lan Zhan if the way he was staring said anything. Granted, Wei Wuxian never listened to that particular Lan rule before.

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan said softly as their meal ended. It was around the time he usually started moving around the room to prepare for bed. And it was the night he usually took a bath, so typically he would go to the other side of the privacy screen and disrobe while Wei Wuxian talked through his body lighting on fire from the inside. “Is there something wrong?”

“Ah, why would something be wrong?” Wei Wuxian laughed. Really, he just wasn’t quite ready to ask what happened after he left to travel last time. What had made all the Lan disciples look away and spread rumors that he was a ward. He still couldn’t get over that. A ward! How could they possibly think he was a ward? 

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan repeated.

Wei Wuxian sighed and let his shoulders sink a bit, his eyes going anywhere but in Lan Zhan’s direction as he fiddled with his robes. It shouldn’t be so hard to ask.

“Lan Zhan,” he said, “What changed while I was gone? I asked A-Yuan, but, you know, just like his Hanguang-Jun, he’s all too respectful to tell me what is yours to say. So all I ask is what happened to make everyone avoid me. More than they avoided me when they knew I was just the Yiling Laozu which, honestly, is impressive.”

Lan Zhan stared at him for a long moment and Wei Wuxian would’ve thought he was just annoyed by the question if not for the way his ears were slowly burning brighter and brighter with each breath. Wei Wuxian tilted his head.

“Lan-er-gege, what did you do?” Wei Wuxian asked, a bit of teasing in his voice if only to lighten the tension.

“My sect will be ordered to stop avoiding you. I apologize for their lack of respect,” Lan Zhan said. Wei Wuxian rolled his eyes.

“Aiya, Lan Zhan! You know that isn’t it! Now, tell me,” Wei Wuxian said. Lan Zhan took a deep breath and stared at him. Wei Wuxian pushed himself up on his knees and walked on them over to him. He sat down right beside him, their knees nearly touching. “Is it something bad? Would it be easier for me to leave?”

That got his attention and Lan Zhan looked at him quickly, his eyes sharp and determined. They both knew Lan Zhan wouldn’t keep him here if he didn’t want to, but Wei Wuxian felt a rush of warmth at the idea that Lan Zhan would still give a lot to make him want to be here. To feel welcome in his home. That was nice.

“Alright,” Lan Zhan said, his hands clutching his robes, “I had a larger bed constructed.”

“Ah?” Wei Wuxian breathed, eyebrows coming together in confusion. He looked over his shoulder to the bed and, yes, maybe it was a bit larger than when he slept in it last, but it wasn’t that much larger. Just… big enough for two. “You’re… getting married?” Wei Wuxian asked slowly, dread poking at his gut and against those quiet sounds of ‘you’re not welcome, no one wants you here’ pried into his mind.

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan breathed, looking some mix of fond and exasperated. Wei Wuxian could hear his heart in his ears.

“What does a larger bed have to do with me?” he asked. Lan Zhan slowly closed his eyes. Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened when he realized what the Lans were thinking, what they must be assuming he and their brilliant Chief Cultivator were doing in that large bed. “Ah! And they’re calling me a ward? Is that to save their own thoughts? How shameless of them, Lan Zhan.”

“And not shameless of me?” he asked, tilting his head. Wei Wuxian blinked and then nearly melted.

“Oh. Lan Zhan,” he teased, gently pushing his shoulder. Wei Wuxian’s insides were similar to the way he felt when he knew he was naked behind a privacy screen‒entirely on fire to the point he was almost dizzy. “Were your disciples not just assuming, Lan Zhan? Well, that would explain why A-Yuan got so flustered when I asked. Ah! You are shameless. But, don’t worry, shamelessness looks very nice on you.”

Lan Zhan’s smile slowly appeared and that was nice. Similar to A-Yuan’s, if Lan Zhan was smiling then nothing could ever really be wrong.

“Then why would you give me my own quarters? And why would you act so scandalized when I asked why I wasn’t living in the Jingshi? Lan Zhan, you’re terrible at courting!” Wei Wuxian pointed out. However, saying the word courting out loud when he was speaking about the two of them made a little too obvious what was going on and he leaned closer to Lan Zhan to keep his mind busy. “And still your disciples were thinking things that hadn’t even happened yet.”

“Yet?” Lan Zhan asked, ignoring his questions that were honestly rather important. But, well, he could get those answers later he supposed.

“Yet,” Wei Wuxian repeated, eyes scanning his face. He was so handsome. All of those naughty thoughts that Wei Wuxian had shoved away out of respect came back to the surface very quickly. “Lan Zhan.”

When Wei Wuxian found himself sprawled half-naked on the bed within the Jingshi, he didn’t finally notice the size difference.

#wangxian #wangxian fic #wei wuxian #lan wangji #the untamed #my fic #title tuesday #thekissxxx

[jcisthebestfightme]

How to approach fake rumors

Disclaimer: All fake. Fairy put on a wig and acted this all out.

I know I don’t really post about Wangxian but I’m still following all the material about them. It’s just that there’s less to analyze about them because they’re obviously happily married. Recently, the chibi version came out on tencent and these mini episodes really reminds me of the Fake Rumor House material for bjyx so I thought I would write about it. 

For those who don’t know, there are a couple accounts of “fake rumors” for bjyx on Weibo. There are two that are super active right now (post daily), one for bjyx and one for zsww (yes t/b dynamic still is separate in China, discussion for another time.) There are a couple more about them but those accounts are less active. To give you a perspective, other than thee ones for yizhan, there is only 1 other active “fake rumor” account for literally everyone else in the c-ent and k-pop combined and that’s it so we dominate the “fake rumor” market.”

The term “fake rumor” for us started from the 49 “fake rumors” that are actually what fans saw when they visited on set. After most of those “fake rumors” were proven to be true, “fake rumors” started to become very popular in the yizhan community. The way these accounts work is that anyone can put in a story and they put a disclaimer: this is fake, don’t believe this. Most of the time, the stories are made up by fans but some may be “gossip” from people around them, who knows. The challenge is to create the most realistic fake rumor, in an effort to help hide the gossip that people may want to share about them so this can be a safe space for an outlet for those that wanted to say something. This sounds bizarre but again, we’re delulu so welcome to delulu world.

Personally, fake rumors are my guilty pleasure. I don’t usually believe in them but I love the ones from CQL filming period because they may be miny glimpses into their lives, especially ones that look like they were unreleased bts (where is our 299G!) I want to break down the fake rumors in to different types so people can better understand it. And what better way than to use MDZS’s chibi version.

The reasons fake rumors and MDZD Q/Chibi are similar to me:

-They’re very short

-They’re very exaggerated

-The story only contain the 2 main characters (Wangxian) and the lack of everyone else is extremely unrealistic

-You can tell NHS wrote most of these...jkjk

Fake Rumor Type 1: So mundane it’s probably real

These are ones that are super detail in their daily lives. Your biggest takeaway is that they are close. But it’s fun to read about, and even if it’s fake, it doesn’t change anything.

A good example is one I read about gg and dd buying fruit to share when filming CQL. Apparently dd bought a cooler so they can keep the fruit fresh longer and then gg took the cooler home. Is it real? Not sure. Is it sweet? Yes. Does it being fake break bjyx for anyone? No.

Fake Rumor Type 2: Exaggerated Real Events

These are ones that are exaggerated versions of what actually happened. The story may seem strange since it only involve 2 people but the overall arc did happen. It’s like how in the MDZS novel, the whole JZX’s dog thing did happen but the story was less romantic/flirty and tied to Wangxian. The Chibi version here exaggerated the Wangxian dynamic.

A good example is the surf shop rumor. There is a lot of embellished detail about dd on the phone, telling “someone” there is a surprise. Whether that is real or now, we don’t know. But we know the ripple heart is real and skateboarding while drinking beer is also real. 

Fake Rumor Type 3: So fake it’s real

These are ones you read that you’re like “OMG this is so fake, there is no way this is real.” And then a lot later, it’s proven to be true. In this episode, Lan Zhan ate spicy food for WWX because he likes him. If you were to tell me this, I would think it’s super fake. But it’s proven to be true later in the novel. I also really like this episode because it reminds me of Hot-pot-ology where dd starts eating spicy food for gg.

A good example is the original fake news about gg being jealous of the cameraman who talked to dd about motorcycle. The original story seems too exaggerated and we never thought gg would be the jealous type (oops). But lo and behold, the entire story was accurate and we saw it in the 160 min bts.

Fake Rumor Type 4: Fake news based on already known events

These are the most dangerous. Fake news that are based on already released photo or videos. And then after some time, people forgot which one came first and start saying the existence of a couple facts matching up with the photo/video proves the fake news is real. In this episode, it talks about WWX breaking the rules and how LQR had to be okay with it because WWX made up excuses. We know from the actual novel that none of his excuses worked (sitting on the roof to drink alcohol didn’t get him off the hook.) But you can see someone retroactively knowing all the rules WWX broke twist the story into how he was manage to use loopholes to outsmart LQR.

A good example of this is the bts clip where dd keep pointing to his lip/mouth at gg. I’ve read at least 5 different “backstory” of this video, from kissing, to showing gg a scar, to eating garlic and wanting gg to smell. They only get more bizarre as time goes on.

Fake Rumor Type 5: Obviously fake

If it’s too good to be true, it probably is. These are ones with straight-up false information. In this episode, there are many clues that this is completely made up. For example, WWX had his flute here but he shouldn’t have his flute at this stage. 

A good example of a super fake rumor is a recent one about WYB asking to wear skiing outfit in Happy Camp. When the episode aired, it’s obvious that he was wearing it because they were imitating a music video, where his character also wore a ski outfit. The rumor was that he was suppose to wear a blue shirt but he chose to wear the skiing outfit because it reminds him of their ski trip promise. This fake rumor was probably written by an audience member that made up a reason for WYB wearing a ski outfit. There was a similar rumor about Happy Camp that a fan already claim she made it up on the spot.

Overall, fake rumors shouldn’t make or break your belief in yizhan or shape your understanding of them as people. Even when a rumor is “proven to be real”, I wouldn’t get too excited because there is always the possibility of someone who somehow had early access to the information making it up. If it’s proven to be fake, don’t bee too disheartened. It’s suppose to be “fake news” anyways.

#bjyx #yizhan #wangxian #fake rumor house

[eohachu]

2020 Creator Wrap: Favourite Works

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 (or so) favourite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. Tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works.

thank you @theyilinglaozus for tagging me!!

aight so i’ve only been actively creating for less than four months and i haven’t like produced a lot but i found that my the untamed x poetry series features exactly 5 pieces (as of now. i might be working on a 6th 👀), so i’m gonna talk about them here!

1. “He was pointing at the moon but I was looking at his hand.” Richard Siken, Anyway.

ah yes. what would i do without richard siken. a lot of my feelings would remain unnamed, and this edit would have never been made. the first time i saw this scene this line from anyway popped up in my head and wouldn’t leave. my first contribution besides text posts to the cql fandom. the series started out as edited screenshots + the poetry lines, later i started making gifs instead of using screenshots. it doesn’t happen a lot, but i actually really like the way i colored these.

2. “What is a ghost? Something dead that seems to be alive. Something dead that doesn’t know it’s dead.” Richard Siken, Landscape With Fruit Rot and Millipede.

huh, odd. siken again! well, i just think he’s neat. so, originally i had planned to include both wen ning and song lan, but i failed to adjust the coloring (the scenes’ coloring was just too different for my level of skill) so in the end it’s wen ning only. don’t worry, i covered song lan separately in a later work!

3. “Never, dear one, did we speak of it. Everything was said in glances, half-spoken sentences. How could I have said to you what I was scarcely able to think...” Christa Wolf, Cassandra: A Novel and Four Essays.

my most ‘successful’ post as of now, and the first one where i used gifs instead of screenshots. this quote just screamed wangxian for me and apparently a lot of you agree. i had to choose between beifangshan and ep 42 the-idea-of-a-single-log-bridge etc etc, but i ended up with beifangshan bc it fitted the tragedy of the poetry line much more and i wanted to save the ep 42 scene for a poem that fits better. i am once again quite satisfied with the coloring.

4. “When one is alone and lonely, the body gladly lingers in the wind or the rain, or splashes into the cold river, or pushes through the ice crusted snow. Anything that touches.” Mary Oliver, Leaving Blossoms Along the Way.

listen. this one. i don’t hate it, but i don’t love it either. i didn’t get the coloring to be similar and if i’d do it now i’d probably choose different scenes for it. i’ve seen some veeery good coloring of the qiongqi scene and i’m like. how?? y’all really need to give gif makers more credit. their (our) job is not easy i tell ya.

5. “no / threads left holding / me, I flake apart / layer by / layer down / quietly to the bone, my skull / unfolds to an astounded flower / regrowing the body, learning / speech again takes / days and days longer / each time / too much of / this is fatal” Margaret Atwood, Their Attitudes Differ.

another candidate for possible remaking. i like the scenes i chose but i’m not 100% satisfied with the coloring. but i LOVE the quote for song lan! when i read it for the first time it hit me like lightning: after he’s freed from xue yang’s nails he breaks down first, then has to get used to having a body that follows his will again, then has to learn new means of communication (i imagine there was no need for that as long as he was under xue yang’s spell), but in the end he has lost so much that cannot be retrieved. sigh. the song lan feels are Real tonight.

i really enjoyed making this content and you know what. the best responses are ALWAYS the ones that go like ‘ugghhhh’ and ‘ohmygod’ like yes that’s what i’m here for. thank you for your attention.

tagging: @shuang-hua @gaywenqings @lanzhansmiles @baixue-temple @weiwuxcian and literally anyone who wants to do this! tag me if you want!

#[wow i'm really Feeling it tonight skjfhsdj] #[sometimes all you need is a good bath! and afterwards you might be motivated to write paragraphs on end!] #[anyway i really enjoyed this] #tag game #kimmie tag #about #fandom stuff #r.txt

[razberryyum]

The Untamed/陈情令 Rewatch, Episode 10, Part 1 of 2

(spoilers for everything MDZS/Untamed)

[covers MDZS chapters 29, 30 and 48…again, only kinda because things happen differently in the drama...I guess that’s why they call it an adaptation….]

WangXian meter: 🐰🐰🐰+ 🐰🐰🐰+ 🐰🐰🐰🐰+ 🐰🐰🐰+ 🐰🐰+ 🐰🐰+ 🐰+ 🐰🐰+🐰🐰🐰🐰+🐰

(Each WangXian scene automatically gets one 🐰 even if they’re just thinking of each other; one scene can earn up to five 🐰 depending on intensity of WangXian-ness. Each scene is separated by an “+”)

When I first watched this scene where Wei Ying was equating himself and Lan Zhan to Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen, I simply thought Wei Ying was just being flirty and adorable and didn’t attribute much significance to it beyond that, but now, after all that’s happened, it’s become so much more meaningful, especially to Lan Zhan, that not only do I love the moment so much more, but it also makes me feel that much sadder for Lan Zhan because of the almost careless way Wei Ying made the association.  Originally I think he did it as a means to gain Lan Zhan’s favor because Wei Ying sincerely wanted to be his friend and break through that cool exterior that Lan Zhan put up all the time. The romantic in me would like to think it’s also because Wei Ying was also starting to crush on him, butat the same time, realistically, I really don’t think Wei Ying in this point in time was even aware of his true feelings yet so while I don’t doubt his sincerity, his intentions were probably more simplistically platonic.  However, in contrast, for Lan Zhan, who was already “falling” for Wei Ying, the idea automatically embedded itself into his mind, so naturally he began to see Song Lan and XXC’s partnership as a goal in life.  Not only did the two cultivators embody their ideal of living without regrets while helping people, but growing up in a highly regulated environment, Lan Zhan probably also envied their freedom to live freely as they wanted.  

I really appreciate how Team CQL steadily lays down the bricks early on for the foundation of not only Wei Ying and Lan Zhan’s relationship but also for Lan Zhan’s character development so certain moments can build upon each other over time. This scene is a prime example of that: even though Lan Zhan didn’t react much to Wei Ying’s words at first, later on, as they were bidding farewell to Song Lan and XXC, the wistful expression on his face as he watched them leave followed by the deliberate way he looked at Wei Ying, again with that same expression, was a pretty good indication of just how much of what Wei Ying said earlier actually resonated with him.  

As time went on and he started to question the principles of his own sect and the cultivation world, I can only imagine how much more he longed to live the life that Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen did, with Wei Ying by his side. Therefore, when everything went so horribly wrong for the two cultivators, it’s no surprise that Lan Zhan took it to heart since it no doubt reminded him of happened to him and Wei Ying.  

Staring Contest

I just love all the many little times the two of them make eye contact, especially since, again, we went from Lan Zhan not even wanting to look at Wei Ying to this, where he almost can’t stop himself from looking his way. Again, brick building. Love it.  

You’re on your own, bro

Wei Ying instinctively protecting Lan Zhan from Xue Yang’s poisonous powder wasn’t surprising, but what did surprise me a little was the fact that he completely left poor Jiang Cheng to fend for himself. Didn’t even attempt to reach out to pull him back. If Jiang Cheng was keeping track of all the times Wei Ying was choosing Lan Zhan over him—and he probably was—that would definitely make his list (along with the aforementioned moment since it did sound like Wei Ying was giving up his place in Lotus Pier to go cultivate with Lan Zhan).  

SongXiao

When I first watched this episode, I remember thinking, “wait, they’re a couple too? How many gay couples are there in this show??” Seeing the way Song Lan swept down to protect XXC, how they called each other by their first names and referred to each other as good/close friends, naturally made me wonder if there was more to their relationship than meets the eye.  Of course the official MDZS answer is no, WangXian is the only gay couple in the story, but obviously Team CQL either didn’t get that memo or decided to ignore it so they can ship to their hearts’ content, or supply enough fodder to let us ship to our heart’s content. Whatever the reason, bless them for giving us these precious morsels which were unique to the drama since by the time we met the two of them in the novel, their lives had already gone to hell.  

I spend most of my time lamenting the suffering that WangXian had to go through before they were finally able to get their happy ending but truth of the matter is Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen probably suffered much more, especially since their ending was so much worse. Because they are called dao zhangs, I have to assume they live as Daoist priests and therefore have the vow of celibacy imposed on them as well, so whatever feelings they have for each other can only be emotionally consummated through chaste companionship and never through carnal fulfillment of any kind. Basically, unlike Wei Ying and Lan Zhan, everydaying could never be an option for them because of their lifestyle and beliefs. Being of much higher cultivation mindset (or so I assume since they’re much more revered), just being able to enjoy each other’s company was probably more than enough for them, and yet, even that they were denied. It’s like, they’re asking for so little and yet they are deprived of that in the most absolute way possible. So now, seeing the image of them walking away together, only fills me with immense sadness for them—I actually got a little teary-eyed over it tonight—knowing they will never be able to even enjoy something as simple as walking side by side with each other like that ever again.

Xue Yang

For how much I feel for SongXiao, again, I really should HATE Xue Yang, but dammit this evil monster is so damn hard to hate. If he was Lucifer in human form, my soul would be totally screwed. Every time I see Xue Yang again I can’t help but like him and want to see even more to him. Wang Haoxuan is very easy on the eyes, so that helps a lot, but it’s not just his looks, it’s also his very effective performance. He just looks like he’s having so much fun and by osmosis Xue Yang becomes fun to watch as well; it’s almost as if his joy at murder and mayhem is infectious. Everything he does works for me, like, I even got delicious excitement chills from just how he appears on the scene at the Yue Yang Chang sect...

...like some kind of sexy, malicious gargoyle of doom. The only other time I felt the same way is when Wei Ying first appeared as the Yiling Patriarch when he returned from the Burial Mounds. I said before that Xue Yang constantly has this DTF aura about him that makes him shippable with just about anyone and everyone, which makes this moment one of my favorites because I think his sexy evil energy was at maximum output while Wei Ying was feeling him down. It’s almost unfair how alluring he is, like all the time. I know his detractors absolutely don’t feel that way, and honestly, I envy being able to so resolutely dislike him.  

XueXiao

Considering all the pain and suffering he caused Xiao Xingchen I sometimes think Xue Yang doesn’t deserve to even be shipped with such a pure angel, but the two actors have such good chemistry it’s hard to resist. I mean, when Xue Yang said that to XXC, I seriously couldn’t wait until they met again and I was hoping we would get to see their future interactions (again, this was when I hadn’t read the novel yet and didn’t know what horrifying things were in store). And I felt this way even though I was already fully supporting SongXiao. I seriously don’t want to know what would have happened if Xue Yang had more interactions with Wei Ying; my WangXian-devoted heart is too afraid to even go there.

To be continued in Part 2...posted

#The Untamed #陈情令 #spoilers #WangXian #Untamed rewatch #Mo Dao Zu Shi #CQL #MDZS #魔道祖师 #Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation #SongXiao #XueXiao #Wei Ying Wei Wuxian #Lan Zhan Lan Wangji #Song Lan #Xiao Xingchen #Xue Yang #Jiang Cheng

[zhuhongs]

Here’s my long ass review of TGCF that literally no one asked for it i have opinions and I have no one to tell them too so i must write them out and post them. (also part of this is abt the mdzs novel bc i can’t not compare them and I have a lot of thoughts abt that too)

This is very very long so it’s going under a read more. Spoilers ahead!!

Okay so first off this book was a fucking behemoth i can’t believe i read all of that (minus the extras) in under a week.. what the fuck. I definetly got reading fatigue halfway thru book 3.

I’m gonna separate my thoughts into sections bc i  have a few points that don’t all relate

firstly, overall writing and organization:

I said it earlier but tgcf is a lot more structurally sound than mdzs imo. My biggest criticism of the MDZS novel (minus the bad sex scenes, homophobia, and general I hate mxtxness of it) was the way the flashbacks were presented. 

Like OH MY GOD they were presented so badly. I hated that the flashback was told intermittently and only when one of the characters invoked the past. For example, when WWX meets Jiang Cheng and a second time, Jin Ling distracts JC to release “Mo Xuanyu” bc he saved his life in the Nie Ancestral hall earlier. WWX then proceeds to be the self sacrificing dude he is and take away Jin Ling’s curse and put it on himself. When he escapes and returns to LWJ, LWJ offers to carry him.

 If you watched CQL, you know exactly what LWJ is referring to when he says smth to the effect of “You once offered to carry me too, remember.” HOWEVER in the novel you don’t know what he’s talking about. This is because the flashback wasn’t been revealed to you yet. The next chapter goes to tell the flashback. I think that this takes away all of the emotional depth away from the scene. But in CQL, having the flashback already be known, you make the connection on your own and are like “awww wangji remembers that.. even 16 years later.“ Its a lot sweeter bc you know what the two have gone thru. At this point in the MDZS novel its barely the 30th chapter or so and you have no real idea what wangxian have been thru together or what reasons wangji has for loving wwx. You just think, well obviously they like each other bc this is a danmei novel and they are the two leads, ofc they have to like each other. But in cql, you learn through watching them that they’re in love. It’s not just like”well they have to be!! its a bl!!”

Okay that was a rlly long side tangent but it makes me so angry. So what did any of that have to do with TGCF?? well tgcf doesn’t have this issue. In fact, i believe that it gains a lot from having the flashback withheld from the reader. 

I really liked how the flashbacks were contained to books 2 and 4 respectively because it adds a layer of mystery. Hua Cheng is a very secretive man so it makes sense for us to not know everything about him upfront. The way that the author teases and hints little things at you make you want to know more, making it all the more satisfying when the truth is revealed. Because in a way you Know that Hua Cheng meets Xie Lian before and you know that he’s the child XL saved during the God Pleasing Ceremony but you don’t know all the details. Like obviously since Hua Cheng is a ghost you know that he’s died and it was likely for Xie Lian or Xian le’s sake but you probably never expected that he actually died twice. Once on the battle field and second when he took the human face disease. I think the difference between these flashbacks and the flashbacks in MDZS result from the length. In TGCF you get two long concise flashbacks that make sense to be placed where they are. Book 2 because you already have a feel and hint at what the characters have been through and book 4 because the White No Face appears again so then you learn how he and Xie Lian met before. It wouldn’t make sense to place book 2 any earlier bc there is no emotional impact. And it doesn’t make sense to place book 4 earlier because you don’t know what the white no face’s deal is so it’d be confusing. In MDZS, you get numerous short flashbacks happening alongside the main story and it makes it hard to piece together the timeline in a way that feels satisfying. Ik a lot of ppl grill cql for having a confusing intro episode and having a rlly long flashback but its much better than the mdzs novel. However the mdzs donghua handles the flashback in the most concise way imo.

Overall i think the way the story is structured is very good and is a step up from mdzs. Also the horror aspects of tgcf are rlly enjoyable and honestly i think mxtx should just write short horror stories at this point. like enough long ass novels chock full of fetishization. just write some fun horror with no romance and call it a day.. pls

Side Characters:

okay so straight up, i think the side characters arent used as well as they were in mdzs bc mxtx wanted to focus on hualian and didn’t want to give the side characters as much focus. This is a weaker point of the novel.

I’ll get into it more below but i think hua cheng was done dirty as a character by having him rlly only care abt xie lian. Since he doesn;t have any real relationships with others outside of xie lian this takes away from having more depth in the side characters. They’re really only related as far as xie lian’s relationship with them. Though thankfully xie lian gets rather close with a few officials and the ones we get to see more of are rlly interesting. I especially loved the reconciliation of mu qing, feng xin, and xie lian at the end of book 5. honestly their relationship was one my favorites and i’m glad they finally said what they had to say to each other after 800 fucking years. Also Shi Qingxuan is a delight. we stan sqx in this house.

The characters i wish we had seen more of were yushi huang (although she didnt rlly want to be there, good for her), Quan Yizhen and Yin Yu. I very much wish yizhen and yin yus story happened earlier on and we had more time with them. It felt strange to have their subplot occur towards the end and it was sort of out of place but i liked them a lot!! i wish there was more to it. and that there was a reconcilation but mxtx hates happy shidi’s doesnt she, (glares at novel jc). Also man yin yu did NOT have to die like that i’m sad.

Also, honestly.. i don’t think qi rong added to the story whatsoever and i have no clue why he and guzi were there. qi rong just pissed me off the whole time and added literally nothing.

going back to yushi huang, i’d like to say for the millionth time that i hate how mxtx uses any of her female characters. like we get it.. u hate women being useful... im still pressed but what i want to say has been said many times before so ill leave it at that.

Hualian:

I really really did like hualian at the end. They had a truly epic love story and it was so beautiful, especially when hua cheng repeated his words as wuming to xie lian as he started to disappear. But, I said it once and i’ll say it again. I don’t think Hualian is a super healthy relationship. As fiction its fine (i firmly believe fiction impacts reality but let me finish), i guess bc literally nothing about their situation can be replicated irl and none of it ended up containing manipulation or abuse or anything bad but there was a potential for it to and i’m really glad it didnt go that route.

Hualian is a highly idealized and romanticized relationship full of some truly troubling feelings of self worth. While its “beautiful” in a way that hc really was xls most devoted believer, it wasnt healthy for him to live for xl like this. Nor was it healthy for xl to feel so unworthy of hua chengs love.  

Hua Cheng’s devotion to Xie Lian is a little too extreme and it bothers me. When the truth was revealed abt the Temple of 10,000 Gods I had the same reaction as Mu Qing and Feng Xin. I was like... HEY WHAT THE FUCKK that’s a little uh... thats NOT HEALTHY,, dianxia PLEASE say smth. But ofc Xie Lian didn’t say fucking anything and and i was so pissed. Like the whole thing of Hua Cheng living his life solely for XIe Lian is really kinda fucked up and not romantic. I was holding out hope that at some point XIe Lian would sit him down and be like “Hey! I love you and i’m really grateful that all these years you’ve still believed in me when no one else did. But you can’t just live your life for my sake. You deserve love from many other other people and deserve to have a life and happiness outside of me. I still want to spend the rest of my life with you, but you need to not only think of me.” or something to that effect

It bothers me that after Xie Lian learns the truth he doesn’t once reassure Hua Cheng that he didn’t have to make Xie Lian his reason for existence. Like.. idk i just think that’s rlly kinda unhealthy. Like I understand why Hua Cheng is so deeply devoted to Xie Lian-- he saved his life twice and was the only one to ever show him kindness and he’s seen xie lian suffer a fate worse than death multiple times. I get that he wants to protect him and make his life easier, but to not let anyone else into his life and spend 800 years looking for xie lian is just overkill. Like if the whole 10k statues thing never happened i’d be 100 percent fine with hualin but the whole devotion to that extent... uhhh yea.. no that put a bad taste in my mouth. Obsession should not be romanticised. I don’t think any reader of tgcf is going out and deciding to live like hua cheng obviously but still.

Also Side note, the whole 100 swords scene.. bro i felt for hua cheng, the way he screamed seeing that, i don’t blame him. I was so horrified reading that chapter. i don’t think i’ve been so horrified by a piece of media like that in a while. Poor fucking xie lian.. oh my god. I understand the intense reaction he had and how seeing that prompted such a degree of loyalty but still.. 10k statues?? the cave that mu qing and feng xin saw... thats a little too much obssession... like please.. dial it back.. im begging u.

I was talking to mary (liviahyes) and she said smth abt how Hua Cheng doesn’t have a character outside of xie lian. And she’s right, he kinda doesn’t. If Xie Lian didn’t exist neither would Hua Cheng. I get that that counds kinda romantic but in practice i don’t think its a good things. Especially because Xie Lian has a story outside of Hua Cheng, hehas goals, he has friends, he has something. Hua Cheng said it-- his only dream is Xie Lian. Which is romantic but very very unbalanced. 

THAT BEING SAID, i still rly liked their relationship and i think theyre cute they just have issues they need to work through. I mean they have time but yea. It wasn’t perfect but eh. overall i’m bitter bc they couldve been THAT COUPLE but theyre so many bad implications as mentioned above and i.. smh. They still have amazing moments. Like the lantern scene, the alter scene, the “what matters is you, not the state of you”, the end when hua cheng helps release the shackles on xie lian, the scene where hua cheng disappears, the way xie lian waited for him, like they were so close to being THAT COUPLE but then mxtx and her fujo ass just had to make it uncomfortable like that. i’m so bitter. Like the reason why i wrote out all of this is bc this novel could’ve been great but so many little things added up and made the experience far more sour than it shouldve been.

MXTX did hua cheng SO DIRTY by not giving him a character much outside of loving xie lian and being good at everything. Like when I first learned abt how Hua Cheng beat 33 heavenly officials at what they excel in best i was like WHO IS THIS LEGEND but honestly.. he rlly doesn’t have any motivations outside of helping xie lian and I wish he had more to him . Like if we had more situations like the one where hua cheng dug out his own eye to save the group of mortals on mount tong’lu then he’d have been a much more well rounded character. Honestly, that’s rlly the only instance where he seems to have taken xie lians ideals to heart. I wish we had more of that bc that scene was so cool. i wish it hadn’t been revealled so late and there was more than one occasion where he defends others (minus xie lian ofc) without anything for himself to gain that.

To contrast hualian with wangxian, i think wangxian work so well bc at their core, they have the same life goals and same ideas about people and the world. Where in hualian, xie lian has core principles and morals and hua cheng is just like, anything for xie lian. SMH they couldve been great but overall i think hualian falls flat for me because of my own fear of dating someone who doesn’t have a life outside of dating me. Moreso, my parents had this sort of unbalanced relationship towards the end of their marriage and it ended very badly and yea, i just can’t whole heartedly love relationships that in any way resemble this, even if it ends differently. that’s a personal thing tho.

I don’t think Hua Cheng has ANY bad intentions towards Xie Lian or ever will. I don’t think he’s ever manipulated xl or tried to force him to love him. But again, it’s my own personal feelings that makes me feel kinda.. ehh conflicted abt hualian. There was potential but again.. fujoshis ruin everything... smh. Overall i think the way it ended redeemed the issues it had but still there were issues and i really wish xie lian like,, reassured hua cheng about living his life freely at some point but whatever. 

IN CONCLUSION

TGCF had the potential to be better than mdzs, it rlly did but it was bogged down by the authors own toxic mentalities abt love, and mlm relationships, and treating women like ppl and it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I enjoyed this book, truly i did (otherwise i wouldn’t have stuck through and read 750k words of it) but there are some flaws that cannot be glossed over. I hope that tgcf when it does get adapted, goes through the same miracle that cql did and makes the characters more like ppl and less like tropes but i doubt it. Also i highly doubt that a live action tgcf is feasible given the supernatural aspects of the series but we shall see. I’m excited for the donghua when it eventual comes out but i will continue to be critical of the novel bc..well.. you see why. idk if i’d reccommend this book tbh bc like yes i would, no i would... well.. </3. yea. overall, it sure was something that i enjoyed in spades. especially the last 5 chapters. I generally liked it but had many issues with it at the same time, but honestly, yea thats the standard fair for a mxtx novel. 

#text heavy #'like rlly fucking text heavy #tgcf #tgcf lb #and with that... the lb is over #i dont think i'll read the extra but who knows #also i reread this twice looking for missing words and typos so i HOPE its coherant #anyways if u read this.. bless u and feel free to ask me anything abt what i've said #i legit just finished it and i havent thought back on everything so im v willing to hear different standpoints

[kikotsukino]

CQL ENDING SPOILERS - OVERALL THOUGHTS

I don’t even know where to begin to be honest, there’s so many things I want to say, and yes this will contain spoilers, so read on if you don’t mind spoilers.

For one, I do enjoy this as an adaptation side of things, and I am very grateful that they stayed true to the novel on the most part, even when there are scenes that have changed, scenes opted out but really, in the overall, I do think they really did their best to give us so much and passing through all this censorship, so this is still well done to them. I love the casts on my end, especially Xiao Zhan and Wang Yibo who played as my favourite character as well as OTP in this series. 

Ofcourse, there are pros and cons in this live-action.

Pros:

For example, some pros are, Jiang Cheng’s character for me, and I felt like I need to really mention it, since I am not a fan of him in the novel (that doesn’t mean I hate him, but I just didn’t really like him until the end when he changed). In the live-action, I love how he shows me that he cares for Wei Ying more than what I am shown in the novel. I love how he doesn’t hate ‘All Wen’s’, because this excludes Wen Qing, and this is why I actually find that ship interesting because it makes Jiang Cheng a better character to me, even though it was shoved under the rug, but well, it’s to be expected.

Wangxian bond in this live-action which was started in their past, I really, really love/adore their bond, to the point they referred to each other as soulmates, even without the kiss, I never really minded, because the live-action was able to show us something more special that you don’t really need physical to show their love for each other. I love how Wei Ying welcomes Lan Zhan to help him, I love how Wei Ying shows me that he actually cares about what Lan Zhan thinks about him, and whether he trusts him or not, these are all positive to me.

Jiang Cheng and Wei Ying brotherly relationship doesn’t seem to end on a bitter note the way the novel has it, so that’s a positive to me.

That whole reunion between Wei Ying and Sizhui, when Sizhui remembered was really sweet/touching, I really love how they added additional scenes and how Sizhui just clung to Wei Ying’s legs like before, that was really sweet, and lol, Wei Ying was embarrassed for teaching a child how to disguise a porn book (haha!) Anyways, that whole scene was adorable.

Cons:

I didn’t like how they made that freaking SuShe out-did Wei Ying’s powers at the Nightless Day, and another time was when Wen Ning lost controlled, which ended up killing Jin Zixuan, honestly, when I learned that it was SuShe (through the help of Jin GuangYao), I seriously just swore, like what the actual f*ck, how dare he!!!! I wouldn’t have been bitter if it was Jin GuangYao or Xue Yang alone who did it, but SuShe? That lowly b*stard?!

See, this is the thing I didn’t like in the live-action is they really, really tamed down Wei Ying’s powers, Wei Ying in the novel, is supposed to be more talented, more stronger than this, there should be NO one aside from him who started this path, because he is the FOUNDER! NOT some stupid Wen’s NOT that stupid SuShe!

Another negative I didn’t like is, they changed the reason behind Lan Zhan’s discipline whips (which I have made a post about this previously, so I won’t touch on that again), it just didn’t impact and touched me the same way as the novel. In the novel, I was really touched, but in the live-action, I just felt “oh... Ok.... with a sense of disappointment”, Ok, I know why Lan Zhan protected Burial Mounds, but I love the reason in the novel better...

Moving forward, the ending. The actual ending. I don’t know how to feel about this. When Wei Ying bid farewell to Wen Ning and Sizhui, because they now have their own paths to walk on, it was sad, but Wei Ying respected their decision. In the novel, I remember Wei Ying this scene very clearly, which I’ll just quote for you:

It was the first time in all these years that Wen Ning made his own decision and stopped walking the same path he walked. Wei WuXian guessed that perhaps he had something he wanted to do out of his own will.

It was what he hoped all this time. Each to their own path. But now that they day really came, watching Wen Ning and Lan SiZhui’s figures walk slowly, slowly away until they finally disappeared, he felt somewhat dejected.

Lan WangJi was now the only one who stood by his side. Luckily, Lan WangJi was also the only one he wished to have by his side.

In the Live-Action, I do feel that Wei Ying wished for Lan Zhan to stay by his side, so when Lan Zhan showed he didn’t have that intention, this whole scene was just heart breaking...

Yes, Wei Ying was teary eye here, dammit, but he is being understanding, so he respected Lan Zhan’s decisions in the end... Personally, I’m glad Wei Ying at least never thought of separating with Lan Zhan because he was thinking they will continue to travel together like this forever, but Lan Zhan’s decisions when he wanted to walk separate paths really, really hurted me on a personal level, I felt so heart-broken in that scene, just like Wei Ying, but he was being understanding so... I am trying to be understanding too, and it’s not like I am not, but I just DON’T understand this... This isn’t about him abandoning his dreams, I’m not saying he have to abandon his dreams, but honestly, both Wei Ying and Lan Zhan made that promise when they made that lantern together, and their ideals don’t clash, so why can’t they just do this together? Travel together? How does this affect censorship? Can two people not travel together? I’m not asking them to do anything more like in the novel. So really, I felt like the moment Lan Zhan made that decision (i.e. them walking separate paths), I just can’t really treat this as canon Lan Zhan anymore, but more as an AU version to his character...

Finally, I am really confused how the whole scene was played out at the top of the mountain. When Wei Ying and Lan Zhan bid their farewell on the mountain, they both walked their own path, yet, a while later you hear Wei Ying played the flute (their ‘Wangxian’ song) on top of the mountain, and then Lan Zhan heard the song, but he continued walking down his own path, then the scene got switch back to Wei Ying playing the flute on the mountain, so is there like a time-skip here? OR did Lan Zhan actually turned around afterwards and decided to go to where Wei Ying is? Like how they handled this whole scene was confusing and incoherent, because the ending when we heard someone said “Wei Ying”, I’m sure that was Lan Zhan, because (1) only Lan Zhan ever calls him by that name, (2) That is clearly his voice and (3) Wei Ying smile, I think he was happy to see Lan Zhan again, and his smile doesn’t lie... BUT the question here is.... Did Lan Zhan actually abandon his decision when they said their farewell? Does this fit his character at all? I just don’t like how they handle Lan Zhan’s character here, because from a non-wangxian standpoint, Lan Zhan isn’t indecisive to me, what he decides, he will stick with it. So this is why when they have that scene played out like this, I rather they have a time-skip because at least I can just take it that Lan Zhan did what he had to attend to and then he will be freed of all this so he can go find Wei Ying on his end... But with how that whole scene played out, it really makes me feel insecure, because I don’t know if this is really real... But I will have to take this as real, because I want to believe in this happy ending, since my heart needs it....

Honestly, all I asked for is for them to give me this ending:

And then, zoomed out:

And then ofcourse their message:

So in conclusion, I will give this series a 7/10.... If they give me more of a solid ending, it would be an 8/10, but too bad.

I DON’T hate this ending, it is at least a bit satisfying than having no one call out ‘Wei Ying’ at all... But I rather have an ending that is more solid and fulfilling than a very open ending, but at least in the end, Wangxian remained strong to the end, so that’s a pro in this live-action for me...

“Until next time huh?” Hopefully, I can get some Wangxian scenes in the Side Stories which they confirmed they have filmed, because I seriously need it after this ending....

#mo dao zu shi #chen qing ling #The Untamed #cql spoilers #wangxian

[razberryyum]

My Two Cents on the Ending of The Untamed/陈情令

From chapter 111 of MDZS (novel translation by Exiled Rebels Scanlations):

“It was what he hoped all this time. Each to their own path. But now that the day really came, watching Wen Ning and Lan SiZhui’s figures walk slowly, slowly away until they finally disappeared, he felt somewhat dejected.

Lan WangJi was now the only one who stood by his side. Luckily, Lan WangJi was also the only one he wished to have by his side.”

(spoilers for novel, episode 50 and ending of Guardian, Eternal Love, I Will Never Let You Go, and Story of Minglan)

If I’m going to be honest, part of me wishes the show had ended with that scene above. That would have been, imho, a PERFECT ending because it would have been an obvious one. We wouldn’t have to think any further about if they actually did reunite at the end, if that white glimmer in Wei Wuxian’s eyes is indeed the figure of Lan Wangji, etc etc.  

Now before I say anything further, for the record, I am freaking GRATEFUL we got the ending we got…especially the original Tencent version. Even though the WeTV version is a little more questionable, fact remains things could have been so much worse. I mean, God, imagine if we were left with THIS as the last image we ever see of The Untamed.

Or this:

The fact that Team 陈情令 took it one step further and gave us Lan Zhan’s “Wei Ying” followed by WWX’s glorious, teary-eyed smile is already a straight-up miracle. But, because I’m a lazy ass by nature, I wish I could have shut off my brain and just be spoon-fed a definitive ending that would have left me completely satiated, and that’s really the only reason why I wish they had ended the show at the scene where WWX and LWJ sad their goodbyes to Wen Ning and Lan Sizhui. Plus, there’s just something a little more satisfying about seeing our two leads together as a couple on screen one last time.  A teeny tiny bitter part of me knows that had WangXian been a m/f couple, we would’ve undoubtedly gotten that last shot of them together, much like we did for the main couple in shows like Eternal Love or I Will Never Let You Go or Story of Ming Lan or basically any other c-dramas with happy endings and a hetero couple at its core (which is like, what 99% of the c-dramas anyway? And sorry for spoiling those shows). But I know, censorship, I understand, so I should stop beating that dead horse and just be glad what we got. I mean, I’m still suffering from PTSD due to Guardian’s ending so trust me when I say I am entirely thankful.  

After all, from a thematic point of view, it’s not like the ending doesn’t make sense; it actually does. The idea of both WWX and LWJ living clear of conscience has been reiterated time and again throughout the show, so the fact that LWJ would decide to abide by his duties instead of going off and having fun with WWX does indeed go along with the values established for him. In fact, one might say that during the 16 years of WWX’s absence, he was probably acting the most out of character since he seemed to have more or less shirked his duties as Gusulan Sect’s esteemed Hanguan-Jun. As Jiang Cheng mentioned in the second episode, LWJ has spent most of the past 16 years time just wandering the world, looking for someone, which of course we know who. Even Jin Guangyao mentioned that he never attended any of the big cultivation meetings. So for the past decade and a half Lan Zhan’s really been just living his own life, off on his own quest, and probably leaving all the major responsibilities of his sect to his brother and uncle. Now that WWX is back and the main villain is conquered, I can see how his guilt at abandoning his duties might have finally caught up with him and he realizes he might have some amends to make. After all, his uncle’s old and constantly spitting up blood, and his brother—dear poor Xichen who just makes my heart HURT when I think about him—is definitely in no condition to become Chief Cultivator. I thought about Jiang Cheng briefly, but he’s probably in the same unstable emotional state as Lan Xichen at this point. Hell, Lan XiChen, Jiang Cheng and Jin Ling should probably all sign up for some intense group therapy; can’t imagine how they could even function otherwise considering the emotional battering they just went through.  

Anyway, getting back to the role of Chief Cultivator, in the novel, it was implied that Nie Huaisang was gunning for that position, but honestly, I actually thought that was a bit odd in the book because even though we know he’s the mastermind behind everything, it’s hard to imagine that he would want to step up to the plate and be in the limelight instead of staying in the shadows as he has been doing. I actually think the drama’s change to his ending made more sense.  Not to mention, since most of the cultivation world has known him as the know-nothing coward, if he were to suddenly do a 180 and become this strong, intelligent, assertive person, wouldn’t people be pretty suspicious of him as a person and be too wary to follow him? For better or worse, LWJ IS indeed the best candidate for that position at this specific moment in time. The scene at Lotus Pier where the other sects found out about Jin Guangyao’s heinous activities was illuminating in more ways than one since it also showed how wishy-washy and easily influenced the majority of the other sects were. Those guys are a bunch of dumbasses who need to be led, otherwise, if left to their own devices, the cultivation world would be in total chaos.  

I also appreciated the fact that even though WWX looked downright heart-broken when he realized LWJ wasn’t going to explore the world with him (yet), it seems like he had actually stayed with Lan Zhan until he became Chief Cultivator, which probably didn’t happen overnight. I’m assuming this based on WWX’s wardrobe change from their scene with Sizhui and Wen Ning. I think it’s sweet that despite his disappointment, he still stayed with him for a bit.

The logic part of their parting holds water, but it’s the emotional part that I’m not entirely sold on. I mean, what the show is essentially trying to tell me is that a man who looks at Wei Ying like this:

And this…

And this….

…would actually be ok with being separated from him? Again? Yeah. Right. Siubian.

Just the thought of Wei Ying having no one to protect him now from all the scary fluffy puppies of the world is probably enough to keep Lan Zhan up at nights. In terms of the bond between WWX and LWJ as it was established in the show—not even getting into how they are in the novel because then the notion of them separating would be downright ridiculous—it is pretty hard to accept that LWJ would be ok being away from Wei Ying. Even if the call of duty is loud, the siren song of WangXian has to eventually overpower everything else. The question is when, of course, and even though Wei Ying goes through yet another wardrobe change by the last scene, I can’t imagine that much time passed…I would like to think no more than just a year or two. At a certain point, LXC, being the generous, loving, understanding older brother that he always is, would probably realize how much LWJ misses WWX and offer to take over the Chief Cultivator role from him. But big bro does need time to emotionally recover so I think a year or two is a fair timespan. It’s not enough time for LXC to heal completely of course, God knows a decade probably would still not be enough for that, but a year or two probably would allow him to at least be able to pretend to be fine enough to function somewhat normally again. Ugh. Again, poor big bro.

Actually, if I think about it, one thing good about Wei Ying and Lan Zhan being separated for a short time is that this time around, WWX can be the one missing and pining after LWJ instead.  I can easily imagine him making detailed mental notes of every place he has visited and everything he’s done that is fun for when he finally reunites with Lan Zhan, he can take him through all of his journeys so that they can then experience together what he had to experience alone during their time apart.  

I also like that when Wei Ying hears his name being called, he actually looks shocked…

…which clearly indicates he never expected Lan Zhan to appear at all, which means they didn’t plan this reunion, that Lan Zhan just magically found Wei Ying again. That is seriously so romantic. I’m sure Lan Zhan kept tabs on Wei Ying’s whereabouts all the time, I refuse to believe that he wouldn’t at least do that, but still, that hilltop looked pretty out there in the wilderness so it’s truly beautiful that he still managed to pinpoint where Wei Ying was to surprise him. Or maybe the energy he shared with Wei Ying acts as a sort of GPS now so he can always easily find the other man no matter where he is? That’s romantic too.  

So at the end of the day, I feel pretty satisfied and content. Since I fell in love with the show, I’ve literally been on pins and needles worrying about how the show will end, if Team CQL would somehow lose their minds and just screw everything up or be forced to screw everything up because of censorship. I can finally breathe easy now…well, somewhat…there’s still movies to worry about, but I’m just a worrywart by nature. With their splendid track record so far, I’m sure Team CQL will continue to deliver and make us happy in terms of WangXian.

“After we went to travel the world together everything was spread into the world as ‘rumors say’”.- from WWX’ character song 曲尽陈情 (“Songs end with Chen Qing”)

“With you by my side, I hope you’ve been well since the last time we’ve met”.  -from LWJ’s character song 不忘 (“Won’t Forget”).

#The Untamed #陈情令 #CQL #WangXian #Episode 50 spoilers #Ending Spoilers #Mo Dao Zu Shi #MDZS

[razberryyum]

The Guanyin Temple Event: another essay

(spoilers for episode 47 - 50 and the novel. All novel excerpts taken from the wonderful translations provided by Team Exiled Rebels Scanlations)

I didn’t read the Mo Dao Zu Shi novel until I was about a dozen episodes into The Untamed, but once I did, there were two events that I was most looking forward to seeing depicted on-screen: the Phoenix Mountain Hunt and the climax at the Guanyin Temple. The main reason for my heightened anticipation was because they were both critical and awesome events in the novel and also because I couldn’t wait to see how Team CQL was going to work around the blatant WangXian-ness present in them. Since I already wrote at length about the Phoenix Mountain Hunt, I won’t delve into that topic again, but suffice it to say I was quite pleased at what the drama team came up with in place of the blindfolded make-out session between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian.  

For the Guanyin Temple event, I knew Team CQL had their work cut out for them because it wasn’t just a kiss they had to work around, but a whole ton of WangXian moments since that’s pretty much when Wei Wuxian, our completely awesome and lovable but dense AF protagonist, finally finds out that Lan Wangji has been in love with him for like…forever…and they acknowledge their feelings for each other (in front of family and foes no less). From the moment WWX finds out about Lan Zhan’s love for him until the end of the Guanyin Temple incident, it’s so loaded with WangXian cuteness that I almost died laughing while reading those passages: for me, at times their lovey-doveyness actually crossed into cringe-territory. Not that they didn’t earn the right to be completely corney, mushy puppies in love, but I still had to cover my eyes, shake my head and turn away in embarrassment a few times. I mean, I was literally suffering from a diabetic attack during some of those scenes.  

Of course I didn’t expect mushiness to that level in the show…there’s still censorship to consider after all…but I was hoping for a ghost of what happened in the novel so that once again the spirit of their love confession can still be captured on the show. Or at the very least, I was hoping for some Easter eggs that would let us know that the production team understands our pain and wishes they could’ve given us all the WangXian love too.  

Unfortunately, there didn’t seem to be any of that. In fact, with much regret, I have to say that in terms of WangXian quotient, I was a rather disappointed in CQL’s adaptation of the Guanyin Temple event.  

It almost felt like in the end, Team CQL couldn’t really come up with anything to replace the abundance of WangXian love we were given in the novel, so they chose to just completely avoid any hints of it altogether. If I’m going to be honest, LWJ even seemed grumpy most of the time. I don’t blame Wang Yibo’s performance for this at all (I will never blame him for anything LWJ…he has given us such an amazing LWJ that he is blameless forever in my book. Same goes for Xiao Zhan and his WWX), I’m sure that’s the direction he was given, which makes me really scratch my head in perplexity. To jump ahead a little, a good example of this is during the scene where LWJ is protecting WWX from Fairy. In the novel, we had this exchange during that moment: (from chapter 101):

Wei WuXian, “Hug me!”

Lan WangJi, “I am hugging you!”

Wei WuXian, again, “Hug me tight!”

Lan WangJi, also, “I am hugging you tight!”

Whereas in the drama, we didn’t really have any dialogue and Lan Zhan didn’t even look too pleased about having to protect Wei Ying from the fluffy puppy. In fact, I was actually a bit bummed when he raised his arm to protect WWX: they started out with Wei Ying clinging to Lan Zhan’s body but raising his arm like that actually caused Wei Ying to move away from him, making their interaction less intimate.

Then there was that pivotal moment in the courtyard of the temple in the beginning, where WWX was being held hostage by Jin Guangyao and his guqin string: that was a scene I was especially looking forward to since that’s when Wei Ying blurts out the line that he’s always wanted to sleep with LWJ, which pretty much sets off his confession of love and devotion afterwards. I was extremely curious what dialogue Team CQL would put in place of something as blatant as that. I was hoping for something along the lines of “no matter what, you will always be my 知己” from WWX, which would’ve served as another callback to what they said on Phoenix Mountain and what they were thinking about during that snowy evening on Cloud Recesses. Just something poignant yet meaningful to capture all the love WWX has for Lan Zhan. Sadly, all we got was forgiveness from WWX about what happened during Nightless City, which, as heartfelt as the words were uttered (WWX saying it all teary-eyed got me all teary-eyed as well), they still felt almost a little unnecessary at that point. Especially since we already got that pardon when Lan Zhan was drunk and Wei Ying was telling him all of it was not his fault. Sure, Lan Zhan’s sober this time around and I did sense all the emotions in their expressions, but in terms of what was actually being said, as a replacement for “Lan Zhan! Lan WangJi! HanGuang-Jun! Back then, I-I really wanted to sleep with you!”? I’m sorry, it fell wayyyy short.  

I also didn’t like the fact that once they were inside the temple, sitting side by side, the dialogue was changed to the following:

Where’s the love in that?? Again, it’s not like I was expecting anything hot and heavy like it was in the book (from chapter 100):

Wei WuXian couldn’t let out another sound. Amidst the darkness, Lan WangJi had already embraced him tightly, stopping him with his lips.

Lan WangJi’s breaths were short and disordered. His hoarse voice whispered beside Wei WuXian’s ear, “… fancy you…”

Wei WuXian hugged him tight, “Yes!”

Lan WangJi, “… love you, want you…”

Wei WuXian raised his voice, “Yes!”

Lan WangJi, “Cannot leave you… do not want anyone but you… it cannot be anyone but you!”

But maybe just a little more affection?  In the book, there was so much love going on between WWX and LWJ at Guanyin Temple that even Jin Guangyao was nice enough to step aside and give them some alone time to talk out their feelings. Big bro Lan Xichen and Jin Ling also made sure to sit away from them so that they could hug and kiss it out. The show actually kept the seating arrangement intact, which I guess was meant as a nod to the fans, but I would’ve rather they kept the sentiments instead.  

Not that Guanyin Temple was completely devoid of WangXian moments, thankfully, we did get the following little touches:

But if you read the novel, I have to believe you’d agree with me just a bit that all of that was hardly comparable to the source material. I don’t know if Team CQL decided to change things this way so that the ending with LWJ deciding to separate from WWX (although temporarily) would make more sense, or if the censorship monster finally got to them; either way, I wish they had been just a little more…creative and generous, I guess? It pains me to say that since it sounds like I’m being rather ungrateful—they have given us so much already—but Guanyin Temple was just so important to WWX and LWJ’s relationship, I can’t help but wish it was…better? At least in terms of WangXian.  

Not to mention, strangely, there seemed to be more technical problems with the Guanyin Temple episodes than with any other consecutive batch of eps prior to them. The issues ran the gamut of bad production choices: awkward pacing (I love Wen Ning and it was cool seeming him possessed by Baxia, but it felt like it took him at least half an hour to get from the courtyard to actually inside the damn temple), very obvious editing errors (one moment WWX has his hand on LWJ’s hand, the next he doesn’t, and then he does again), clunky scene transitions, bad sound editing/mixing (why are we hearing the flute on top of Wei Ying’s whistling and the melodies aren’t even the same?), and if I’m going to be honest, the fight choreography and scene set up were kind of mediocre too.  It felt like only the actors were bringing their A-game during those scenes while the production team was already getting ready for the wrap party since the show was going to be over soon. I mean, look at this, where the hell was A-Yao running off to?  

Why couldn’t they show his death? It was so much better and creepier in the novel. Or is he even dead? Did they keep that open-ended too just in case they want to bring him back for the movie? And will LXC even get his sword back???

I know I sound rather negative, and I actually debated for a while on even sharing my feelings because I hate being so critical of this show that gave me so much joy for the most part. I also didn’t want to bum anyone out with my criticisms, however, even though I love, I can never love blindly, so I just have to get all the griping out of my system.  

On the bright side, despite being disappointed by the WangXian quotient and the technical shortcomings of these eps, I was quite pleased by some of the changes Team CQL made from the novel which, imho, I thought were actual improvements from the source material (sorry, MXTX-laozi!). First of all, I really appreciated the closure we got between Jiang Cheng and Wei Ying. I LOVED that the two Yunmeng brothers got to talk things out and really reconciled. I especially loved this look JC had as he watched WWX play his flute:

As if he was both proud and relieved that WWX found a way to be strong again even without his golden core. We didn’t get such a sweet moment in the book. There actually wasn’t much interaction between them after Wei Ying told JC to just forget about the past; in fact, there seemed to still be some residual bad feelings which made me think the Yunmeng brothers weren’t really ever going to be ok again.  WWX definitely didn’t wipe away JC’s tears or even touch him. That affectionate exchange we were given in the drama was just so precious and needed after all the pain both of them have been through, and it made me feel so much happier and reassured about their relationship. I’m glad that in both versions JC didn’t tell WWX what actually happened the day he was taken by the Wen Sect: it would’ve been just yet another heartache to burden Wei Ying who obviously was ready to move on with his new life. That little consideration made me love Jiang Cheng so much more.  

Another improvement was the resolution between Lan Xichen and Jin Guangyao. I tried really hard not to ship big bro and A-Yao, but dammit, the show pretty much forced me to, especially towards the end with their last scenes together.  Before I say anything else, I must really commend Liu Haikuan and Zhu Zanjin, the actors who brought LXC and JGY to life respectively: they really delivered during their scenes in Guanyin Temple. Zhu Zanjin is always on the verge of overacting and sometimes actually crosses the line, but all of his choices really worked for me within those scenes. I completely felt the hurt and anger from JGY when he thought LXC never trusted him, just as much as I felt the same emotions from LXC when his A-Yao revealed his true colors.  They made my heart hurt for both of them and wish for a happy ending for them, which is just crazy because JGY is not a good person. As WWX pointed out, JGY really is a lot like Xue Yang, but he probably didn’t realize just how alike they are: they’re both technically monsters but still somehow capable of love…or a twisted form of it at least that passed for normal for them. One of my favorite pieces of dialogue in the entire novel was actually JGY’s (chapter 108):

“In this life, I’ve lied countless times, killed countless times. Like you said, I killed my father, my brother, my wife, my son, my teacher, my friend—of all the evil in the world, what haven’t I done?!” He took in a breath, rasping, “But I’ve never even thought of harming you!”

That moved me so much, and I actually teared up when JGY uttered basically those same words in the show because I believed he meant them, it wasn’t just a ploy to manipulate LXC again. And then, at the very last minute when JGY was about to pull LXC into the coffin so that the two of them could die together, in the book, JGY just suddenly pushed LXC away. I loved that in the show, we are shown LXC’s acceptance to the fate JGY intended for them…

…and that is why he pushes his second brother away. It was enough for him to know LXC didn’t regard him the same way that Nie Mingjue did after all, that he did genuinely care for JGY all these years. Although JGY probably didn’t deserve such satisfaction before his death considering all the people he‘s killed and harmed (except for Jin Guangshan…that asshole deserved everything he got…I’d count that as a PLUS on JGY’s karma scale, even if that was his dad), I still couldn‘t help feeling a bit happy that he attained it. I can‘t help it, JGY reminds me of a Puss-in-boots half of the time.

Finally, as heart-breaking as it was, I appreciated how much more affected Wei Ying was by the revelation that he had just been an unwitting pawn and victim in JGY’s schemes all this time. In the novel, the truth seemed to mostly rolled off his back, probably because he was too busy cuddling with LWJ to even care anymore, but in The Untamed, WWX seemed downright devastated. I have to say, Xiao Zhan really has mastered the laughing-while-crying combo-hit so damn well that he never fails to make my eyes well up every time he delivers that killer move.  

I really felt his pain and anger at how much he suffered because of what JGY and Su She did, and how wronged he was by them, even if JGY tried to partially lay the blame on him and Jiang Cheng. What made JGY’s words especially hurtful was the modicum of truth to them, because WWX was being incendiary and arrogant during that time, and JC really didn’t have his back at all. He definitely never stood up for him like Shijie did at Phoenix Mountain. Again, I should hate JGY for hurting them with such painful truths and hell, I should hate him solely for all that he has done to WWX, whether it was purposeful or happenstance, but I simply don’t. I might feel differently if Wei Ying wasn’t given a second chance at life and happiness, but thankfully he was and that does make all difference in the world. I don’t even hate Su She…I just think he’s really pathetic and I’m glad he died the way he did.

So, do all of these positive factors balance out what I thought were definite missteps in the drama’s version of what happened at Guanyin Temple? If we had another 10 episodes of Wei Ying and Lan Zhan interactions to look forward to, the answer would probably be yes. OR, if we were given a bona fide, neat as a bow, unquestionably happy ending for them, the answer would also be yes. However, because this was the last couple of episodes we would ever get in the series before its conclusion and the ending was not quite as neat as I wish it would’ve been, then the answer is, sadly, no. I feel we were simply deprived too much of WangXian–I think they spent half the time just spectating at what was going on–and therefore for me, the execution of the Guanyin Temple events by Team CQL unfortunately leaned more on the side of being a disappointment overall.  

Thank you once again for reading my second thesis. I have no idea if I will ever be able to earn my doctorate in MDZS/The Untamed, but I will continue to work hard at it. At the very least, I hope all this blabbering has granted me the privilege of being a somewhat worthy disciple-in-training.  

#The Untamed #陈情令 #CQL #WangXian #Guanyin Temple #spoilers #Mo Dao Zu Shi #MDZS #Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation #Wei Ying Wei Wuxian #Lan Zhan Lan Wangji #Lan Xichen #Jin Guangyao #XiYao #Jiang Cheng #Yunmeng bros #Wen Ning #Jin Ling #Fairy #Su She #long post

[razberryyum]

The Untamed and The Living Dead movie Thoughts

SPOILERS AHEAD!

If you haven’t watched the movie, it’s best not to proceed cuz you will be spoiled.  

OR, if you have already watched the movie and love it completely, AND you stan Yu Bin and will not put up with any criticism about his performance, it’s also best not to proceed cuz you’ll most likely be annoyed/upset with me. Let’s just agree to disagree right now and move on with our separate happy lives.  

Overall Rating for The Living Dead: 3 Lil Apples out of 10

Yeah, I know that’s pretty harsh…I waffled between 3, 4 and 5, but I had to settle on a 3 in the end because I don’t think I’ll ever rewatch this movie and there were just so many problems I had with it, that I realized I can’t say I liked the movie much at all.  

Before I go on, let me first address the big white elephant in the room: no, WangXian does NOT cameo in The Living Dead nor are they even mentioned in any capacity that would assure us they are still together and happy in the movie’s timeline. At one point Wen Ning does mention them in the same sentence, but only in relationship to himself (that they saved him) and the past. For those of us desperate for confirmation of WangXian happily ever afterness in the world of CQL (“us” meaning me only most likely), we get no assurance whatsover. This is especially disappointing since the movie apparently take place years later after the events of The Untamed so it’s really sad that we have no idea if they are together. Of course in the world of the novel, we know they are absolutely together, happily married, everydaying everyday, but it would’ve been nice if we were given some tiny morsel of comfort for WangXian of The Untamed.  

Not only does Lan Zhan not make an appearance, he’s only mentioned by Wen Ning once, as I indicated above. As for Wei Ying, he’s mentioned a few times and he kiiiiinda makes a cameo…but honestly, I wish they didn’t even attempt that cameo cuz it was so bad. It’s basically the backview of some extra dressed as Wei Ying and dubbed over by someone else that’s not Lu Zhixing-laoshi. Or if it is, the dub was so bad that it didn’t even sound like him anymore.

That’s actually one of my main problems with the movie: the dubbing or sound mixing just sucked. Every time there was dialogue it sounded very obviously that it was on a different track. I didn’t even feel like the characters were saying the words because their voices sounded detached from them. Whereas in The Untamed, I sometimes would completely forget that with the exception of Nie Huaisang, everyone’s line reads were performed by voice actor because the voices were blended so well within the scenes. I don’t know the technical terms of all this dubbing stuff so hopefully I’m making some sense.

Another big problem was the CGI. Holy crap was it bad. It was so bad at no point was I able to immerse myself into the action scenes…I didn’t feel anyone was in danger because they were being attacked by a bunch of obvious and bad CGI. One of the worse scenes that they showed THREE times was when the sister (Xiao Qing) being burned up in CGI flames. First of all her acting was horrendous (why was she covering her ears while she’s being burned alive??) and then the fake fire just made me groan out loud. I didn’t even want to look it was so embarrassingly bad.  

I’m trying to figure out when they shot this movie…in order for them to be able to release the movie so soon after the show, the filming had to overlap with The Untamed’s filming, right? So I guess budget was still tight, probably even tighter than the main show, since CQL probably didn’t start actually seeing the money it made from ads, etc until towards the end. Either way, it feels like they didn’t put much money into this movie, especially not the effects. And if I’m going to be honest, I think they probably just had their second…nay…probably third unit direct it. Or at least, they had their third unit decide on some of the casting cuz some of the performances were…OOF. One thing I really appreciated about The Untamed is that even with most of the background actors, there was hardly a glaringly bad performance. I’ve said before the worse really was the actor who played Wen Ruohan, which is a shame cuz he’s more than an extra, but overall all the performances by the supporting characters ranged from decent to strong with hardly a weak link. Here, in this movie, I would say most of the performances from the new cast members were very mediocre. In fact, the only truly consistently good performances from beginning to end was Zheng Fanxing (Sizhui) and that cute little girl in the beginning:

I was kind of sad when she got killed off cuz she was adorable and definitely a MUCH better actor that the dude who played her older brother…at no point was I remotely convinced he was scared so on the other hand I was happy he died. But I thought she was going to burn to death or something because it didn’t seem like a good idea to have her hide in a wooden cupboard with a lite stove…that was so stupid and weird. Btw, what the hell was with that cat screeching sound effect?? Sounded like someone was throwing a cat, but like WHY?  

As for the three new players introduced for this movie—Gao Han as Xiao Yi, Wang Yifei as Xiao Qing and He Longlong as Zhou Zishu—I’ve never seen their work before, and nothing about their performances in this movie makes me interested in what they will do in the future. To be fair, Gao Han tried…you can totally tell he was trying REALLY hard in some of his scenes, but for the most part, he either overacted or strangely enough, underacted. He was just really inconsistent. I know Zhou Zishu was supposed to be a red herring so the fact that he started out looking sketchy AF was supposed to be a ruse since our narrator was entirely untrustworthy, but even in the context of that false narration, he was really bad. As for the sister played by Wang Yifei…just look at her performance as she’s being burned up again.  

By the way, I’m gonna say this now: if Wei Ying and Lan Zhan don’t even get to share a fucking real hug between them throughout the entirety of The Untamed, then I don’t think some generally unimportant-in-the-greater-scheme-of-things couple should be allowed to freaking KISS in anything related to the world of CQL.

I understand it’s all about the censorship, etc etc, but if any hetero couple deserved to share an onscreen kiss, it would’ve been Shijie and Jin Zixuan, and since even they were deprived of that, then these two nobodies should not have been granted this privilege. Seriously, fuck whoever decided to stick that moment in the movie. That’s just fucking unfair and really annoyed me. There better not be any more of that kind of nonsense in the Nie brothers‘ movie.  

The last I’ll say about performances is that sadly, I felt as if there was something off about Yu Bin’s. I totally understand that this is a different Wen Ning than the one we saw in the show—he’s older, more mature, since God knows how many years have passed already—so I don’t mind that he’s more serious. But at the same time, he was just so uneven that I couldn’t get behind his performance at all. He was always one key off, if that makes any sense, so it almost felt like someone else was playing Wen Ning entirely, someone who is completely unfamiliar with that character. And his work in the…whatever fuck that place was…Yin Metal purgatory?? (and for those who are familiar with Guardian, that place was giving me bad flashbacks to Dixing)…was kind of cringey overall.  

I wanted to love seeing Wen Ning be a badass wise uncle, so I actually feel really sad that I couldn’t enjoy his performance in general. However, what I absolutely did enjoy was seeing uncle and nephew bonding and working together…  

…just wish those moments weren’t marred by all that bad CGI.  

Wen Ning’s new look gave me pause though: not that I didn’t appreciate the whole metal look, but I kind of couldn’t figure out why Wen Ning added the chains back to his ensemble when he got rid of them back in The Untamed already.

I mean, if the black veins on his neck don’t attract attention, walking around wearing heavy, clangy chains sure would probably alarm people as well, I think.  

Last thing on Wen Ning: again, not that I didn’t appreciate his newfound ability to hulk out, but yikes, that whole effect was ruined by yet again bad CGI AND a really goofy score. Sounded like something they “borrowed” from Naruto.

Except for that one piece of music, I did like the score for the rest of the movie, especially in the opening credits since it definitely evoked a sense of creepiness. The images in the credits were good too. I can easily imagine that being the OP creds to a horror anthology.  

As for the story, I was fine with it. I liked that they related the family to Nightless City because apparently they are the ones who helped make Nightless City nightless? Here I thought it was the surrounding lava but I guess there were lanterns lighting the place up that I just somehow missed completely.  I liked the plot twist with Xiao Yi and his “sister”…although I did guess there was some incesty thing going on in the beginning…just didn’t think I would be right and wrong at the same time. I thought they would relate their relationship back to Wen Ning and Wen Qing somehow, considering the sisters shared the same name…this was before the “incest” part was confirmed of course…but they never really did so having Wen Qing share the same name as Xiao Qing felt like an oddity in the end. It’s also odd how they used the same phonetically sounding last name of “Xiao” since of course I immediately thought of Xiao Zhan (different characters). Like, couldn’t they come up with completely different names? Overall, the plot wasn’t bad, as mysteries go, at first I couldn’t figure out why the Yin Metal all of a sudden had all these new powers and why the metal wielder, Zhou Zishu, would become a ghost puppet himself, but with the plot twist, all of that was explained so I was fine with it. The last shot of “Xiao Yi” in the Yin Metal purgatory made me guffaw; yeah, that didn’t look suggestive AT ALL. 

The Living Dead actually makes me look forward even more to the next movie, The Fatal Journey. I’m hoping that since it’s potentially about the Nie brother’s past and Jin Guangyao, that perhaps there will be less need for CGI as it will focus more on just dialogue and story-telling. Not to mention, again, apologies to Yu Bin fans, but those three actors are generally stronger performers, so with them at the helm, I’m expecting/hoping for greater things.    

Since I’ve been mostly negative, I wanted to leave on at least one positive note: Sizhui is still an adorable puppy. His dads, wherever they are, whatever they’re doing during the movie, must be so proud of him. 

#The Untamed #陈情令 #CQL #The Living Dead movie #Wen Ning #Lan Sizhui #Mo Dao Zu Shi #魔道祖师 #WangXian