3-Soul arc and it's infinite number of tiny details and inconsistencies that may or may not have a deeper meaning, strike: I lost count. But the newest catch of the day is this fun post:
https://www.tumblr.com/notgoodwithcomingupwithusernames/796099986931793920/im-damn-fucking-near-losing-my-mind-like-it-is?
and perhaps I'm obsessed with the unreliable narrating going on. Perhaps I'm cackling over Yang Cheng picturing Shang Chao as trying to defend himself, does it add more or less guilt? To you, who hesitated (which I ngl, I never fully believed him because did he hesitate or was it just shock that slowed him down and he overthought it into calling it hesitation to make himself more guilty.) He breaks out into a lightning run once he processes what's going on so, ehh. And the addition of the gloves he wasn't wearing? What does that signify, having taken on more of your burden? Also amazing contrast with Shang De who imagines Shang Chao as more helpless than Yang Cheng did, while the truth is a tragic neutrality.
The interesting thing about the 3-soul arc is that it's the one arc in the series that incorporates multiple perspectives of the same event from different people in the same arc. While we can see that the show recaps and goes over the same events such as Ah sheng's death or nuonuo's stalking with 2 or more different character perspectives those usually occur in separate arcs compared to the 3-soul arc where we see MULTIPLE POV'S IN ONE ARC!!!
There are so many inconsistencies when it specifically comes to shang chao's death, and honestly, there are just as many interpretations to what is true and what isn't.
The link you post here refers to the pov of episode 7 (in the beginning) being another yang cheng perspective but from the way the scene plays out and how straight after the scene we see xia qing, I feel more confident saying that its xia qing's pov of what happend that night.
It's so much more tragic that we actually got yang cheng, xia qing, and shang de's perspectives and how they're all so inconsistent compared to the 3D, which is the most consistent one.
Xia Qing's pov focuses on a dark inverted world where the only bright thing that comes to focus is shang chao's blood, the fresh loss haunting her mind alongside the heart-rending sobs that accompany shang chao's death. The blood in her pov is concentrated and covers her, Yang cheng and shang chao almost as if both her and yang cheng share the guilt and burden of shang chao's death almost as if THEY failed in saving shang chao.
Yang Cheng's pov focuses on what happens before shang chao gets shot. We see Yang cheng watching as shang chao tries to 'protect' himself, but he is already too late. To yang cheng, shang chao looked at him in his final moments, making eye contact with him as he knew he hesitated. We see Yang cheng watching as shang chao's body drops to the ground after he gets shot. We see Yang cheng removing the mask from shang chao but never looking clearly at shang chao face because he never got to do that when he was alive. We see that in yang cheng's pov the blood only covers him and shang chao leaving xia qing as an innocent vicitm someone who has no fault in this tragic situation as he pins the blame on to himself and later on to E-soul and MG.
Shang de's pov depicts shang chao as scared, alone, and actively in pain. It is a pov that contradicts all the others that we have seen and shows us shang de's true feelings, how he never really cared for yang cheng and xia qing and blames them for shang chao's death. While the blood is a significant component in both yang cheng and xia qing's pov, shang de's pov is filled with it. Pools of blood drip from shang chao. In this pov, he has a bloody nose and a bloody mouth, something that he doesn't have in the OG or any other pov's. In this pov, we have an aerial perspective zooming into shang chao as if he is simply just a small child who was knocked over and broken never to come alive again.
I don't think shang de ever got the heart to look at his son's dead body, and if he did, it definitely wasn't for long. Shang de's pov seems to be a combination of yang cheng's in terms of the colouring of the scenes, how dark it really is, and the overall atmosphere and xia qing with how much blood and rain there is. I can imagine that he simply pieced together both of their perspectives and excluded them from it just to get this view of his dead son. It's a heartbreaking view, indeed.
Yang cheng imagining shang chao trying to defend himself in his final moments definitely added more guilt in the whole scenario because he knew that shang chao never wanted to die and he knew that he never wanted shang chao to die but he still did and none of them had the power to do anything meaningful. Even after yang cheng became the new E-soul and got his abilities, he still couldn't be fast enough or strong enough to protect those he cared for. He was still a coward and a jealous child who hesitated and brought on deviation, killing his friend, one of his only friends. Shang chao trying to protect himself probably haunts yang cheng even if it isn't true. I mean, we see it haunt yang cheng in episode 7. It's partially the whole reason why he says that he will never hesitate again during his fight with OG E-soul.
Whether yang cheng did hesitate or not has been a longstanding fandom debate that I have seen and I think there are valid points to both sides but I honestly don't think that Yang cheng hesitated and if he did its not in the way people think.
There are two interpretations that I really lean towards when it comes to this whole agruement.
1) Yang cheng didn't hesitate. He fully realises the situation at had AFTER Xia Qing, and it's in that same episode in which he loses A LOT of trust value decreasing his power. Furthermore, he is still quite inexperienced when it comes to using his powers so he isn't going to be THAT fast or not fast enough to outrun a bullet that's so close to its target in the first place. Yang cheng is an unreliable narrator, so he believes that he hesitated because of these factors.
2) Yang cheng did hesitate, but it's not his fault (or I can't find it in me to blame him). While the factors from the 1st interpretations still apply as legitimate reasons as to why yang cheng wasn't able to save shang chao. There is another key interpretation to talk about. In yang cheng's pov, in episode 7, we get a focus on yang cheng's feet. He recognises the situation after Xia Qing calls Shang chao's name in this pov (which doesn't match with the 3D) and then starts to run to try and do something, anything to help but during his sprint there is a second where the electric blue of his powers fade and he runs at his normal human speed until he his powers are back again and now he is too late and shang chao's dead. Yang cheng didn't hesitate physically, and neither did he hesitate intentionally. However, a major component of E-soul's power is mental stability. Yang cheng's power is revealed to break in times of mental breakdown, and that's exactly what happened. At the most needed and crucial moment, Yang cheng succumbed to the mental pressure, and his powers gave out, but EVEN WITH THAT, HE DIDN'S STOP RUNNING. HE STILL RAN KNOWING HIS POWER WAS SOMEWHAT GIVING OUT ON HIM!!!!
In the 3D, we don't actually ever see Yang cheng lose his electric blue, and we don't hear xia qing Call shang chao's name which is ANOTHER inconsistency with these two pov's and honestly, the unreliable nature of this all makes it so that EITHER interpretation could genuinely be true.
The shang chao wearing yang cheng's intended glove never appears in the 3D even as we see him open the warehouse door. It is never there, and I honestly believe that he never wore it, but one thing is that ALL pov's we see (shang de, yang cheng and Xia qing) BELIEVE that shang chao died wearing the glove. I think it's interesting to interpret it as yang cheng's guilt blurring his and the other two's pov when it comes to shang chao taking upon a burden greater than him, being killed in yang cheng's place, becoming E-soul and someone other than his father's connections led to his death and him supposedly wearing the glove is a metaphorical way to show this.
