among the clouds
Apr. 21st, 2021 10:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ailietWord of Honor! Has been such a delight!
And such a surprise too. I started the first episode out of curiosity, got interested fairly quickly, and was totally locked in by somewhere around episode 3. Of course it varies from the book, but the two leads are so good and have such amazing chemistry that I can't help but appreciate what they've created. I'm also regularly shocked by what they've gotten past the censors. There have been moments when I actually clapped my hands over my mouth in amazement (the hand caress... I'm in awe). The English-subbed episodes are released fairly quickly, but I've found it better to do a total boycott of my usual lurking around social media. My reactions to the show are stronger when I experience everything for the first time in the episode, as opposed to seeing a dozen gifs first- and I'm invested enough that I'll make that small sacrifice.
-I love the opening scene so much! ZZS gets the full villain intro, and I didn’t realize until a rewatch that in the fight scene he does a cheerleader-level standing split, an amped up version of the move he uses repeatedly later on
-Princess Jing’an says that Jiuxiao intended to retire and live with her at Siji Manor, which seems like a definite Thing- both an influence on ZZS’s later actions and a sign of how estranged they were. (Also, that’s one shidi planning a secret return to home and a handful of others taking disciples in secret.)
-I have so many questions about ZZS’s relationships with his sect members. At what point did things start to break down between them? Did he have any anger towards Lao Bi and the elders? These were the people who were meant to help guide him after Qin Huaizhang’s death, and the people who followed along as he created the Window of Heaven. Lao Bi has two lines that stick in my mind: "I have done everything you asked" and "I know you can't help it and I don't blame you", giving a very complicated and contradictory picture of ZZS's power.
-"You'd rather become a cripple than work for me?" I mean, ZZS would rather cripple himself than work for ZZS... And again, there's the estrangement: ZZS hasn't confided in Lao Bi over the last 18 months, and he also hasn't informed him of the work-around for the nails. This line gets a repeat performance by Prince Jin when ZZS requests his leave shortly after.
-The three autumn nails are delightfully nightmarish, but they feel more cohesive with TYK canon, where they're the creation of an arrogant young man determined to create an unstoppable secret organisation for a future emperor.
-My feelings about Prince Jin are complicated, mostly because I liked Helian Yi (or at least, I found how he filled his role in the novel interesting) and that's definitely not him. Part of my brain keeps trying to smush the two characters together and it really doesn't work.
-The differences between ZZS in TYK and SHL come down to three things
-there's a brief history of Chinese bronze mirrors here, which includes this line, "Most bronze mirrors are round – a form that symbolises perfection and bliss."
And such a surprise too. I started the first episode out of curiosity, got interested fairly quickly, and was totally locked in by somewhere around episode 3. Of course it varies from the book, but the two leads are so good and have such amazing chemistry that I can't help but appreciate what they've created. I'm also regularly shocked by what they've gotten past the censors. There have been moments when I actually clapped my hands over my mouth in amazement (the hand caress... I'm in awe). The English-subbed episodes are released fairly quickly, but I've found it better to do a total boycott of my usual lurking around social media. My reactions to the show are stronger when I experience everything for the first time in the episode, as opposed to seeing a dozen gifs first- and I'm invested enough that I'll make that small sacrifice.
-I love the opening scene so much! ZZS gets the full villain intro, and I didn’t realize until a rewatch that in the fight scene he does a cheerleader-level standing split, an amped up version of the move he uses repeatedly later on
-Princess Jing’an says that Jiuxiao intended to retire and live with her at Siji Manor, which seems like a definite Thing- both an influence on ZZS’s later actions and a sign of how estranged they were. (Also, that’s one shidi planning a secret return to home and a handful of others taking disciples in secret.)
-I have so many questions about ZZS’s relationships with his sect members. At what point did things start to break down between them? Did he have any anger towards Lao Bi and the elders? These were the people who were meant to help guide him after Qin Huaizhang’s death, and the people who followed along as he created the Window of Heaven. Lao Bi has two lines that stick in my mind: "I have done everything you asked" and "I know you can't help it and I don't blame you", giving a very complicated and contradictory picture of ZZS's power.
-"You'd rather become a cripple than work for me?" I mean, ZZS would rather cripple himself than work for ZZS... And again, there's the estrangement: ZZS hasn't confided in Lao Bi over the last 18 months, and he also hasn't informed him of the work-around for the nails. This line gets a repeat performance by Prince Jin when ZZS requests his leave shortly after.
-The three autumn nails are delightfully nightmarish, but they feel more cohesive with TYK canon, where they're the creation of an arrogant young man determined to create an unstoppable secret organisation for a future emperor.
-My feelings about Prince Jin are complicated, mostly because I liked Helian Yi (or at least, I found how he filled his role in the novel interesting) and that's definitely not him. Part of my brain keeps trying to smush the two characters together and it really doesn't work.
-The differences between ZZS in TYK and SHL come down to three things
- In SHL, Qin Huaizhang has established (though estranged) relationships with other sects, and his sect has a public presence and known base. In TYK, he's a weird wanderer and his sect is bordering on mythical- no one knows exactly where they are or what they do.
- As above, JW is not HLY. The most impressive thing Helian Yi does in all of TYK happens off the page: he convinces ZZS to work for him. Jin Wang takes advantage of childhood memories and ZZS needing a bulwark against jianghu threats. When it comes to the race for the throne, HLY is obviously the one for the job, and putting him there doesn't number among ZZS's regrets. JW, on the other hand, is a disappointment, and any stability that his rule may have achieved is likely to be short-lived.
- In TYK, ZZS had one shidi and was very sad to lose him. In SHL, this gets multiplied by a factor of [um... rewatch needed}
-there's a brief history of Chinese bronze mirrors here, which includes this line, "Most bronze mirrors are round – a form that symbolises perfection and bliss."
