Стихотворение написано мной, музыка - Iday - Moon, анимация -

New moon, would you open the gates

And take me away, away from this night... 

My favorite character from Solo: A Star Wars story

Fu Ling and Chong Zhao: all in one. Part 2 of 2

But all good things come to an end, and the evil demon master (who tried to kill Chong Zhao off so many times, LOL) finds out that Chong Zhao is the shell of the Devil deity he wanted to resurrect all this time, so he accomplishes his mission, and resurrected Devil deity occupies Chong Zhao's body.

"The Deity is back, bitches!" I don't like that the former dweller of deity's shell in this drama is another person, not a part of deity's soul, because I'm against reproducing by budding while having genitals it cuts off deity's potential of broadening their mental horizons: while fusing their main soul with the "mortal" part of it, they could learn something that can be experienced only by mortals/humans. Although I find this plot decision strange, both in the main heroes' as well as in Mo Li's cases, I understand that otherwise it would be probably impossible to kill Mo Li the way he was killed: it would requite to study Mo Li's character and to remove focus from the main heroes to Mo Li's inner processes, and the luxury of it is affordable only for the main characters. The mechanics of interactions between Chong Zhao and Mo Li looks like the one of the different parts of the same consciousness, though. So, Mo Li is back. He regains control over his shell, and the first thing he sees when he wakes up is a lover of his "mortal" consciousness, lying unconscious on the floor. If I would be a deity, who absolutely doesn't care about the previous life of his "mortal" part of the soul, I would overstep her unconscious body and go further, but look what did this deity do:

Bridal carry [3], as a deity. He says that he didn't kill her because it would upset his future wife Bai Shuo (the main heroine, Fu Ling's mortal sister), but the truth is, he doesn't give a damn about Bai Shuo's unhappiness, Fu Ling doesn't matter in their "let's marry or I'll destroy the whole planet" thing. So, there is something else.

"He is still here, in the furthest corner of my mind. I know everything he knows". Btw, the Devil deity Mo Li is absolutely adorable (in a devilish way). He has nothing in common with Chong Zhao: he is charismatic in a way, infinitely bored with his unlimited power and full of crazy thoughts: for example, to kill everyone (but dude, why? you are the most powerful creature in the world anyways, no one is a threat to you!) or to have a forced wedding with a girl who doesn't like him (and, moreover, he doesn't like her either! What a crazy man!).

"You? Will kill me?"

The situation is desperate: Fu Ling is imprisoned in Mo Li's palace, her lover is a tiny part of Mo Li's consciousness now, and Mo Li himself is invincible to the killing attempts of mere humans/demons/whoever. Yet Fu Ling stupidly proceeds attacking him:

"Keep trying to kill me, I like it".

"Why wouldn't you kill immortals and humans for me, as you did it previously, when you were Fu Ling?"

It feels so painfully delicious: she knows her lover is gone, but, at the same time, he is somewhere there, inside of this ethereal, inhuman being. And the deity, in his turn, is slightly interested in her, not romantically, but still. If Mo Li and Chong Zhao were two parts of one consciousness, I would say it is the echoing of Mo Li's other self who loved her. Their feelings could be fused. A deity is too ethereal to fall in love with someone (Xing Yue laughs hysterically at this statement), but his mortal part isn't, so, when Chong Zhao would mingle into Mo Li's soul, he would bring this shade of unfamiliar for deities feelings with him, and it would look like this slightly different attitude towards her.

They look at the starry sky [2], Mo Li x Bai Xi version. "This purple moon won't protect any of them".

"Tomorrow it all will be over".

And now it's time for their story to be over. She was attracted to him since they had met each other for the first time as children, and he was touched by her attitude towards him, too. She wanted to keep him safe when they met each other anew, and he wanted to keep her safe, too. And later, as he became the Devil deity, he didn't plan to kill her either (can't say the same about her, but her attempts were hopeless and her goal was to free her lover's body from being possessed by the deity). But it happened that he did kill her. Unintentionally. She has shielded her sister from his spear with her own body and died.

The next scene is the most powerful moment of this drama for me. A heartless deity doesn't even understand at first what happened to him: a little piece of his consciousness takes over the body for a moment, fueled by the power of his grief over his deceased lover, and the deity starts crying:

And it is here where the destiny plays out: if Fu Ling would stay alive, no one could ever defeat Mo Li, because the only weapon that can kill him is the long lost Divine Bow of Xing Yue deity. And this bow is Fu Ling's soul.

This plot twist was so beautiful! It broke my heart, but, at the same time, left me highly in awe. I like it, when the only reason for a villain to get defeated is his own decisions. The unintentional killing of his lover that allowed his enemies to get the only effective weapon against him is truly marvelous plot decision. She could be the person, who would care about him the most, but became his death. Their fates were intertwined long ago, but it was still up to him: was it "destined to love" or "destined to kill" fate, - and he chose the latter.

The Divine Bow in use. To summarize: this story deserved to be the main plot line of some drama, and I see the potential of another ending for it if it would be the main plot line with more screen time for the last character arch. But alas, every main character in China should be bleached till they lose all their moral greyness and complexity, so I should accept my fate and proceed enjoying secondary characters, outliving their deaths, fixing their stories in my Mind Palace and not giving up on hope to see someday a good, heart-wrenching story again. Here is Part 1

Thoughts on Moonlight Mystique

It was my most anticipated drama: demon x goddess relationship is absolutely my jam, Bai Lu is my favorite c-actress and I find Ao Ruipeng super handsome. What could possibly go wrong? Everything 😞 It turned out to be the biggest drama-disappointment ever! I honestly tried to watch it properly, but a plot bunny-like lazy screenwriting, an eye-bleeding color adjustment and theatrical-flat set designs were too much for me. The only things I liked were costumes, make ups and Fu Ling x Chong Zhao pairing.

Ao Ruipeng's looks are amazing, but I couldn't care less about his pristine-white "demon" character, and his main activity throughout the drama was like this (I am a whump lover, but the amount of his attempts to die was too much even for me):

I liked Bai Lu's looks, too, and her character was a little bit more interesting, but still...

But I didn't drop it and even did finish it because of Dai Luwa's and Chang Huasen's characters.

Dai Luwa is sooooooo hot in there! At first, I was just slightly interested by their dynamics because it was almost what I wanted to see of the main characters. But then it turned out to be much more interesting than I thought: a medley of everything that can happen to a pair of characters within the trope "enemies to lovers": Good guy x bad girl? Yeah, sure. Bad guy x bad girl? Yeah, why not? Good guy x good girl? Sure, for variety. Bad guy x good girl? Of course, as soon as you were here from the start precisely for it... It's insanity, but it IS how their relationship unfolds! Relationship of the same two characters! In the same drama! I wish Chinese men stop bleaching main characters to pristine whiteness, so they would remain as interesting and deep as secondary leads... Anyway, I was so impressed by Fu Ling x Chong Zhao dynamics, that it was the first fast-forwarded by me drama that was cut into plenty of GIFs. Two posts about them are coming soon, stay tuned =)

I should say that I absolutely in love with the voice of the actor, who has dubbed Wang Hedi in this drama. Wang Hedi speaks Mandarin with a Sichuan accent, that's why he hasn't got "proper" for Chinese state TV pronounciation and should be dubbed by some actor who has. At the same time, Wang Hedi's voice pitched higher than dubbed actor's one and would be not so harmonious with the image of fearsome lord (it suits better to Xiao Lanhua in Devil's body). So I like the dubbing a lot!

Deep black space and mortal solitude

“Hyunjin loves…. Felix.”

Spending the night on your roof

Spending the night on the roof of one's beloved is an ancient Chinese way to confess one's love. This is it.

How to be a more interesting character than the Main Hero (Pt.2)

Shangjue and his didi (pt.1/2)

Shangjue has a strong bond with his cousin (whom he counts as his brother), but their personalities are very different and it makes their relationship really interesting.

"Of course, you can interrogate Yuanzhi-didi." For Shangjue the rules mean more than his personal attitudes, so, as his beloved didi happens to be a suspect, Shangjue voluntarily hands him over to be locked up in prison and later denies the possibility that he could plant an evidence in order to deflect suspicion from him. He says, that he would avenge didi if he would be unjustified tortured to death by the Main Hero (it means, he thinks it`s possible as a result of imprisonment), but does nothing against rules to protect his didi. And it hurts didi a lot and makes him think that he isn't good enough to be protected by Shangjue, because it is natural for many people to go against the rules in order to help loved ones. But so is the core of Shangjue`s personality: between his personal feelings (for his didi) and the rules of the clan he will definitely choose the second (because he isn`t a person yet, he allows himself to be only a clan function).

His didi Yuanzhi is a full opposite to him. He values Shangjue the most and would definitely do any wicked thing to help him. He is cunning and ruthless, but Shangjue deals with his fierce spirit and teaches him a lot of things, including how to respect elders.

"Elder Yue is someone who you should respect."

Didi is very perceptive to every act of love from Shangjue, as we can see in the scene with the conversation about a spy`s token, and later, in the conversation about Secret Trial of Adulthood, and he is very jealous to everyone who can get attention from Shangjue, too, because of his absolute insecurity in that he can be loved by him and can be his didi instead of deceased one. This little story about them, a paper lantern and a poisoned porridge broke my heart (I thought Yuanzhi died and was very upset during my awaiting for the next episode):

Yuanzhi thinks that Shangjue cherishes the most only those who are not around him anymore, and maybe it`s because of his trauma. He believes he was the reason Shangjue’s mom and brother had died, because he was the last one who came to the shelter’s gate, and Shangjue’s brother got an opportunity to sneak outside and met his doom.

But he is wrong thinking that deceased ones are more important for Shangjue than alive ones. Yuanzhi thinks in an egoistic way, he can`t imagine love can be shared among many people in someone`s heart. Shangjue didn`t stop loving his mom and brother but he also loves his didi as much as he loves them.

"Brother!!!"

"Stand off!!!"

"Blood..."

And we can see it in a flashback, when young Shangjue says that the best thing he could receive is a didi (which is Yuanzhi).

Unfortunately I can add only 30 GIFs per post, so there will be part 2/2. Shangjue. Introduction Shangjue and his didi, Pt. 2 Shangjue and his fiancee

Some characters portraited by Adam Driver