Okay, for once I thought of something when I was in a place to write it down. One thing that's been bothering me in the episodes since the Sunshot Campaign: every time there's been a public debate of any kind regarding Wei Wuxian's words or actions, when Lan Wangji takes his side, people immediately dismiss (or are suspicious of) his opinion, because he's known to be such good friends with Wei Wuxian. In the novel, everyone thought they hated each other. It was such a widespread rumor that even Wen Qing was aware of it, and after Lan Wangji's visit to the Burial Mounds, she even commented on it. Obviously, the rumor had no way of surfacing in the show, since the Sunshot Campaign was too short (and Wei Wuxian too inactive) for them to have countless public arguments about his demonic cultivation. But without that rumor, without all those arguments, the opening of the battle that will become the Nightless City Massacre makes no sense, because why would Wei Wuxian (let alone the audience!) believe his steadfast best friend is suddenly trying to kill him? Of course, in the novel we knew Lan Wangji wasn't trying to kill him, because that was one of the rare moments we were told what he was thinking, and so the reader knew he was actually trying to destroy Chenqing, thinking that it was an evil instrument that was corrupting the man he loves. In the drama, we're not told that and their relationship is almost perfect (except they're not allowed to act on their feelings) so...I mean, they put that opening attack in the opening credits, it's one of the Netflix thumbnails, and the art design painting for it is the cover of the art book (at least for the English version anyway), but when we actually get to that moment, it's been entirely undermined by everything that's led up to it.
Or. Well, I won't get to it until the next episode after this one, so...🤷🏻♀️
I guess I just wanted to write that down while I remembered it.
Oh. But I need to keep that in mind in the early stages of my fic: they never got any reputation for disliking each other in this version of canon, so no one should be surprised when they're seen together. (After the Sunshot Campaign is over in my fic, they're kind of forced to come out about their relationship due to something being overheard when all the allies are gathered in Nightless City for the victory celebration. (Following the show's lead there...) So obviously at that point people should only be surprised to see them apart. 🤣)
Also, I think I may have decided another detail to work into my fic's setting. Given the way the show seems to prefer having people pay with chunks of "silver" instead of coinage, I'm thinking maybe they decided that in the setting for the show, the empire just outright died, and there is no mundane government anymore. According to the art book, they drew on the Jin and Wei periods for visual design. The Jin Dynasty in question (did I already post about this?) was the one founded at the end of the Three Kingdoms period that we Westerners are familiar with from the Dynasty Warriors games. (Among various other pop culture IPs, many most of which are also Japanese in origin. 😰) Then there was a period called the Sixteen Kingdoms, in which small kingdoms rose and fell at the drop of a metaphorical hat. That was followed by the Wei Dynasty, which also fell in disarray after a while, leading to the Northern and Southern period (in which Thousand Autumns is set). Anyway, I'm thinking that the lack of coinage--and the constant massive battles without any sign of imperial authority coming around to find out why people are slaughtering each other in such numbers--makes it plausible that the drama is set in such an alternate history that the government itself just failed entirely, and thus the cultivation clans are as close to government as there is in the area, which would explain why Wen Ruohan was able to exert such crazy amounts of power. Given that in my fic I actually had the other clans dividing up the Wen Clan's territory after the Sunshot Campaign as if they were literal warlords, I think I'm just going to make that an official part of the AU setting, that the clans are actually ruling the land, even if they don't specifically talk about it that way.
I think.
I dunno. I'm still on the fence about that, I guess.
And yet it sorta makes things make more sense, in a way? (Though I do have some places where they talk about what normal armies and rulers of men do, so...does that make it more or less plausible that they're actually running the country? Hmmm....not sure who to ask for advice on that...)
Actually, that might make a really interesting fic in and of itself: the failure of the normal governments and the early clan leaders (who we only know the names of two of, Wen Mao and Lan An) stepping up to protect the people in the absence of any imperial court. Maybe they'd even have to put down some warlords who were trying to become new kings and were crushing the people in the process. Unfortunately, it would require a level of historical research that would be difficult to pull off without being able to speak Chinese. Or at least having access to a really well-stocked university library system. (As I am supposed to be researching Late Bronze Age Babylon right now for book four of the Atalanta and Ariadne series, I really should not even attempt to research such a fic. I guess I'll either put it on the list of "fics I'd like to write someday" or maybe I should look and see if anyone else has already written such a fic.)
Anyway. Incomprehensible nonsense, rambling and spoilers follow.
Before even starting this episode, I have decided to watch the remainder of the flashback--three episodes total--today in one big, weepy block. I am hopeful that I won't need to take notes on episode 32 at all, and that I won't need to take any notes on episode 33 until it's back in the present. (I'm not sure how much of episode 33 is in the past and how much is in the present, but I think it's probably at least half in the present?)
On this episode, I need to pay strong attention to how the location for the Qiongqi Path Ambush looks, since I have a major plot point take place on Qiongqi Path, near the work camp, but not actually in it, so it might well be closer to where the ambush takes place in canon. (I think I'll have to call it Qiongqi Way for the fic, since that's what the Netflix subtitles consistently say. Which I guess is fine. Technically it was called Qiongqi Road at first in the novel, I believe, and then when the Jin Clan couldn't rewrite everyone's name for the place, it just got demoted from Road to Way. Again, if I recall correctly.) Beyond that, though, I want to try to take as few notes as possible, so that I can get through all three episodes as quickly as possible, so I can hopefully still have a bit of my day to do things that won't make me cry. (It's a testament to how much I love these characters (and how delightful the cast playing them are) that I can love this story and show so much despite how miserable so many parts of it make me.)
Wait. The end of the previous episode, Lan Wangji was asked to deliver the invitation, but now some random Jin delivered it! 😡 Don't tease us like that, show! (Though, really, if he did deliver it, it's implausible that he wouldn't come back to accompany Wei Wuxian on the trip to Lanling. Heck, it's implausible that he doesn't come back to accompany him regardless. In the novel, one can assume that he didn't realize Wei Wuxian would really go, or even that he might not have heard the rumor he was invited in the first place, as the rumor might not have traveled that far.) Ugh, they had him write the letter but not deliver it in person? That's even worse. And even less plausible, in my opinion. I get that they included him in the scene in the previous episode to make sure to keep his presence alive and make it clear that he's still fighting for his beloved Wei Ying in any way he can, but...I feel like this was not really the best way to do it.
And why am I writing all this down?
Ugh. Stop it, me!
Okay, this is interesting. (Ugh, I'm doing it again.) So, now we're at the scene where Wei Wuxian is buying a charm to put on his (doomed) gift for baby Jin Ling. The store's name is labeled "Lingbao Pavilion" (in the official translation of the novel, it was named in such a way that it sounded like it was in Lanling, so I suspect this is proof of my theory that the name of the store was a mistake on the translator's part (seeing as volume 4 of Thousand Autumns in a couple of places interchanged the names Yuwen Yong, Yuwen Yun and Yuwen Song, this is not implausible)), and unlike in the novel, where the patrons are exclusively gossiping about the full-month celebration and the rumors that Wei Wuxian will be attending, here the patrons are already gossiping about the pushback against the Jin Clan's Watchtower Plan. They're calling it lookouts rather than watchtower, but...it's clearly the same thing. This is surprising to me, since in the novel Jin Guangyao didn't start pushing that plan until after he had murdered his father and taken over running the Jin Clan. (I can't recall if it said he had already had that plan and his father had rejected it, or if he never proposed it until after he was clan leader. I can believe it either way, tbh.)
Of course, they do eventually get around to the original gossip from the novel. But this time, despite that his mode of dress is obviously well known (given that the con men in the earlier episodes were all wearing black with red accents and red ribbons tied around their topknots), he's just wearing his normal clothes. In the novel, he had taken his notoriety into account, so when he went into this posh store, he was dressed all in white, so no one would suspect who he was.
Huh. I wonder why they changed the present from a silver bell inscribed with a lotus to a set of carved beads? Hmm. Maybe they thought it was too improbable that Wei Wuxian would have access to that much silver?
OMG, why am I doing this. Stop!
Hmm. Doesn't really fit what I had in my head as Qiongqi Path. I mean, I guess it kinda does, but also very much not? I had it as more of a full-on ravine. I also had descriptions of all the Wen Clan's murals carved on the walls of the ravine (which is what the people in the work camp were supposed to be removing) but there's not much of the cliff face there that would even accept such carvings. Hngh. Not sure what to do about that, either.
I don't see any carvings so far (they're hesitating, sensing the ambush awaiting them but not sure what, precisely, they're sensing) either. And yet there was art in the art book specifically about the carvings. Maybe they decided not to implement them because that was an unnecessary expense? Hmmmmm.....that leaves me even less sure what to do. I'd rather not have to scrap what I wrote about it, since it's so rare for me to write anything even vaguely descriptive...
That one enormous rock that Wen Ning set in front of Wei Wuxian as a shield was clearly a piece of former masonry or something--it had carving on it, but we didn't get a really good, long look at it--so I guess they're still going with the "there used to be Wen Clan-glorifying carvings here" thing, but just not calling much attention to it? (Just like they didn't explain why Wen Ning ripped that red and yellow thread off from around his neck...)
Whoa. Okay. Stop. Just stop.
I didn't mind that there are some Yao Clan disciples among the three hundred archers there to kill Wei Wuxian. (Though they should all be Jins.)
But there are some Lan Clan disciples there!
See? Dressed in white, with forehead ribbons.
If not for the ribbons, that'd be fine: they could be from the Su Clan. But Su Minshan didn't go that far in copying his former clan. At least, he sure didn't copy the forehead ribbon thing in the novel. I guess it's possible he did in the show? But it doesn't make much sense. Unless those are Su Clan disciples and Su Minshan just ordered them to put on those headbands in order to weaken Wei Wuxian's resolve to fight back if he thinks his bestie has sent men to kill him? Huh. I guess I could buy that. (Well, okay, no. I can buy that Jin Guangyao had some Su Clan men put on forehead ribbons as a psychological attack on Wei Wuxian. Su Minshan isn't that smart.)
Um.
Jin Zixuan seems to have just plain flown there.
Like, without using his sword. It's in its sheath in his hand as he just gently floats down out of the sky.
Uh.
I did not know they could do that in this show.
😰
I, um. I'll be pretending that didn't happen.
They actually were Lan Clan disciples, accompanying Jin Zixun on Jin Guangyao's orders. That....that is sickening. On so many levels. (I guess it's so that Wen Ning will still have killed some Lans and members of other clans without having to go berserk after turning himself in. Which admittedly made so little sense to me in the novel that I had headcanoned it as he him not having gone berserk and the Jin Clan having murdered all those disciples of other clans so they couldn't report that the Jins had decided to keep Wen Ning alive as their own tool instead of destroying him. Only then when I reread I noticed he apologized to Lan Wangji for killing them, so I he had to have really gone berserk after all.)
Okay. Stopping. Stopping. Stopping.
Hmm. In the novel, I'm sure it's described as Wen Qing putting the acupuncture needle in the side of his neck to paralyze him. In this, it's more on the shoulder. Well, sort of partway between the...I should get a screen shot.
The problem with this is that I had her using that technique as a self-defense measure in the days immediately following the end of the Sunshot Campaign, when a bunch of drunk Jins tried to kill her. Getting one in the side of the neck was mildly believable. Getting him there is not. Also he's not as promptly paralyzed as I thought; he's able to turn to face her before losing control over his limbs. Which, admittedly, is more realistic. Maybe I need to change it to one of those Bufotoxin Needles so he just falls asleep no matter where she jabs him. That'd work just as well for that scene. (There are a couple other times I have her paralyze someone that need to be paralysis, but in those cases, this location will work just fine. Though I will need to remember that they have to be careful in getting him laid in bed, so the needle doesn't get jabbed in further.)
I wonder if it's not the location, but just that the needle is coated in something? The way it was described in the novel, it sounded like it was the location, but as translated in the subtitles, it sounds like it was coated in some kind of toxin that caused that temporary paralysis. The problem with that, though, is that it suggests she was planning on doing this. Hmmm....
After they've gotten through their argument about who should turn themselves over to the Jin Clan, Wen Qing made her index fingernail glow, then flicked it against Wei Wuxian's forehead, which seems to have forced him into an open-eyed unconsciousness? No, he's conscious. It just sapped his strength, maybe? If I knew what she did, it would be useful for my fic, but without knowing, I don't see how I can use it. Maybe it was gradually sending him to sleep? He seems to be asleep by the time she's done talking.
Okay. One painful episode down, one and however much more to go.
Though actually, one line of Wei Wuxian's in the argument with Wen Qing (the last argument anyone will ever get to have with her! 😭) did at least potentially explain that scene where Lan Wangji is kneeling outside what I think is his uncle's house after his return from the Burial Mounds. He may have been specifically asking to be punished for his actions, as he himself perceives them to have been wrong in some way. (And, actually, there was something wrong about his actions, in that he did nothing to save those people from the predicament they were in. He saw that they were harmless, and intended nothing but to live in peace, but he didn't do anything to clear up the misunderstanding everyone else had about them. But whatever he was considering himself to have done wrong, that wasn't it. It was probably either for "befriending evil" or for lust. Well, in the novel it would have been for lust, anyway. 😅 The drama version of Lan Wangji seems to be a bit less horny all around, despite that the drama version of Wei Wuxian is supremely gorgeous.)
Hopefully, I will not need or want to take notes on the next episode at all.
Though I think I better wait to start it until after lunch. I don't want to be eating while watching something that painful, and it's less than a quarter 'til.
No comments:
Post a Comment