Maggie

Chi Cheng asking Wu Suowei to top up his phone account is infuriating on so many levels. Culturally in China, there's a belief that men aren't good with money, and thus any money that comes into the household immediately is given to the wife to manage, and the husband gets an allowance. (This leads to a lot of memes about how guys hide cash from their wives, or comparing allowances with their friends, etc.) Anyway, the point is that this is the most gross and disgustingly wife-coded thing I've ever seen in my life and it makes me so violently angry--even more so because it's LITERALLY LIKE 30 RMB that gets topped up!! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH A FUCKING LATTE COSTS IN CHINA? LIKE 27RMB. THAT MEANS THIS MAN IS LUXURIATING IN BEING DEAD. ASS. BROKE. AND BUGGING HIS BOY WIFE FOR PETTY CASH I COULD PUNCH MY WAY THROUGH A WALL. This is also why Jiang Xiaoshuai was like you absolute fucking cheapskate to Wu Suowei. I assume Chi Cheng can send 6 texts and download one single dick pic of his man with that amount of money.

THE LUNAR NEW YEAR SCENES!! As I told @waldorph in literal impressed horror: I would not bail on a Lunar New Year event with my family, and I am like a top ten Bad Chinese Girl. (I have been part of a conspiracy of silence to lie to my grandmother about my cousin being divorced for literally a decade now.) The fact that both of these fucking clowns ditched their families on what I assume is the most significant reunion dinner of the holiday stretch to go to Wu Suowei and Jiang Xiaoshuai honestly made my heart hurt. For Chi Cheng because his family is so self-evidently the fucking worse. For Guo Chengyu because how much must he ache and worry for Jiang Xiaoshuai to be alone? It's the U.S. equivalent of being alone for Christmas--maybe even sadder, given the social importance of family in China.

Everyone probably already knows about red packets of money given to children and younger generations by more senior generations at new year's--but it reminded me of something that might be interesting to non-Chinese folks: Chinese marriage 财礼 (caili), or literally fortune gifts. It's a common expectation that in order to marry, a man's family must provide the new couple with a house, a car, and a significant quantity of money, and whole ass marriages have fallen apart on the wedding day because of fights over money. It's why (joking, ish) people now worry immediately when they have a son, because it means if they ever want to establish themselves with a family there's a huge bill hanging over everyone's head from birth. Different regions and families handle this with different levels of seriousness, with it being a much more significant issue in more rural areas. In my family, someone attempting to negotiate caili would probably get laughed out of the door, so it's a very your-mileage-may-vary situation. That said, the implications are still there when it comes to a home, a car, a fortune for a safe and happy future--all things that Chi Cheng and I think Guo Chengyu want to offer with opened hands.

Chi Cheng buying Wu Suowei's mom clothes and already just calling her mom killed me at 100 paces dead. The dynamics around this are also different! In the U.S., which is what I'm most familiar with, you wouldn't start calling a partner's parents mom or dad until things were official--in China, the clock starts ticking a lot sooner. Even before official paperwork is signed, in a committed relationship, you would be expected to refer to their parents as mom or dad, and you might already find yourselves financially entangled--as in their family offers to pay for things for you to inducts you into the household, more or less. Everything can get more serious a lot more quickly in Chinese relationships.

This is not culturally relevant, I just want to say that when Guo Chengyu's default reaction to Jiang Xiaoshuai about to throw up was to CUP HIS FUCKING HANDS TO CATCH THE VOMIT I basically transitioned from "all right this scumbag is hot but he's got to earn this" to "someone put Xiaoshuai in the marriage palanquin immediately." Guo Chengyu can cook, he can bake, he is an evidently more reliable corporate heir than his snake frenemy Chi Cheng, and he will catch your puke with his hands. Girl, raw him in a club bathroom.

A closing thought about episode 14:

I assume most people picked up on this but the reference to “getting a certificate” is a direct translation and means getting a marriage license. It’s got a little more weight than as just a romantic slang, since gay marriage isn’t legal in China, but China is a society that is heavily incumbent of licenses and registrations and everything has some kind of big red stamp on it. There’s an extra frisson there that made me want to kick my feet in delight.

The morning after breakfast. Jesus Christ. Where to begin. The contents of it are obviously over the top, but they’re also all “healing” and “supplemental,” the kind of spread you set up for a woman in her sitting month (30 days post labor where you aren’t allowed to do any work, lift anything heavy, and just recover) after having a child. Like literally there’s a Chinese internet comment being like fucking Wu Suowei’s milk is going to come in after that breakfast. ALSO Chi Cheng eating okra for breakfast is just so fucking inappropriate given that it’s a “male vitality” supplement and I think we can see from Suowei’s fragile post fuck state that if you supplement the performance any further he’ll die.

Guo Chengyu saying his parents wanted a daughter ABSOLUTELY has to imply his parents would have set up a childhood engagement between him and Chi Cheng, right?? RIGHT???

I assume most people picked up on this but the reference to “getting a certificate” is a direct translation and means getting a marriage license. It’s got a little more weight than as just a romantic slang, since gay marriage isn’t legal in China, but China is a society that is heavily incumbent of licenses and registrations and everything has some kind of big red stamp on it. There’s an extra frisson there that made me want to kick my feet in delight.

The morning after breakfast. Jesus Christ. Where to begin. The contents of it are obviously over the top, but they’re also all “healing” and “supplemental,” the kind of spread you set up for a woman in her sitting month (30 days post labor where you aren’t allowed to do any work, lift anything heavy, and just recover) after having a child. Like literally there’s a Chinese internet comment being like fucking Wu Suowei’s milk is going to come in after that breakfast. ALSO Chi Cheng eating okra for breakfast is just so fucking inappropriate given that it’s a “male vitality” supplement and I think we can see from Suowei’s fragile post fuck state that if you supplement the performance any further he’ll die.

Guo Chengyu saying his parents wanted a daughter ABSOLUTELY has to imply his parents would have set up a childhood engagement between him and Chi Cheng, right?? RIGHT???

This man is the poster boy for bad boy “I care about no one” sex-hell to poundtown classic dark romance male lead. When you start that’s PRECISELY what he is. My man has a room full of snakes for god’s sake, snakes. My Tumblr account from 2018 was less emo than his fuckboy ass

So it works, the idea of him being the usual dark romance male lead archetype works until you reach episode five and realize no.. this guy isn’t the cold-blooded mafia leader top.. this guy is that one dumb character who falls in love within like five days of knowing someone and then draws hearts around their names together

His entire character does a complete 360. Because not only is he not the “I don’t commit” type, he is quite literally the “let’s get married in the course of three days and have seven children and five cats” type. Guys, if you really think about it, he’s basically a masc lesbian.

Anyway, this is what makes him so compelling. He’s 100% in before he even knows there’s a chance to be in and he’s not ashamed of admitting it. Usually, a character of his type will be vehemently trying to hide their feelings but no this guy, no snake daddy will transfer you 200,000 yuan then tell you he can’t bear the thought of you being mad at him and then cuddle you to sleep.

He’s not some brooding, messy asshole. He’s probably been depressed for six years and now for the first time in a while he’s happy. And his happiness is contagious. It’s not something he feels the need to hide.

You’ll notice how easily chi cheng laughs and smiles, those are not coveted things like other male leads of his kind. He’s just happy and there is no Thou Shalt Noteth Know I Haveth Feelingeth melodrama surrounding it

Another thing is the fact that he cares about other people. The cold male leads archetype only cares about his partner and no one else. They’re incapable of forming connections with those around them . I know some people find this compelling but I’m not one of them. Ofcourse, Chi Cheng cares about Suowei more than anyone else but isn’t it nice he also really cares about Guo Chengyu? He still cares about his parents and their well being? That he loves his nephew? That he has a great relationship with Gangzi? That more than anything he wants a family and he wants Wu Suowei to be the center of that family

This is a male leads capable of emotions and nuance. He cares about a lot of people, he smiles and laughs whenever he wants to and he actually has other colours than black in his closet. Chi Cheng isn’t a well written fetish, he feels like a human being with vulnerability and space to grow. He is a part of Wu Suowei’s story that can’t be replaced with a wooden log like most male leads because his actions are so central to his personality

Chi Cheng? Dark romance— he wants me/he wants me not in the most elaborate game of push and pull while he gets seduced into deflowering the innocent maiden he can’t make himself defile but the innocent maiden is actually a scheming mastermind and it’s completely okay cause he’s INTO it (no one told him the sexual frustration would be this bad though)

Wu Suowei? He’s in his own revenge The Glory TM kdrama in which he’s playing 3D chess while everyone plays 2D checkers but it’s useless because he’s actually the fluffy romance character who acts as comic relief so all his scheming is actually just the loud mistress wanting backrubs

Jiang Xiaoshuai? This poor man thinks he’s the side character/crowd gossiping mill for exposition in a slice of life, sometimes interesting, three-part series. Then Guo Chengyu shows up in his life like a garbage truck at three am and matched his freak all the way to freakity ladsville

Then Guo Chengyu— this man genuinely believes he’s the plot mastermind character in a mystery trash novel who has everyone figured out to their core. He thinks he’s driving the plot. He sometimes sits in his living room and smokes ominously while pretending he’s controlling everything. It’s a lie. He’s lying to himself. He’s actually the most innocent out of all four of them.

Wang Shuo??? BRO this man is in a psychosexual mindfuck romance thriller of his own making. He thinks he’s being fed the wrong pills to make him crazy. Not a single person has been honest to him since the day he was born and if life is an MCQ exam then he’s never ticked a correct answer. The worst part? Hes not even wrong

Wang Zhen..? Idk man, bro thinks he’s in addicted or some shit…

He was ready to confess. He was ready to clear the air. He was ready to fucking move in the right direction. He was so adamant about it too. He was not going to let Khem go to bed another night thinking his love was unreciprocated.

I love that he firstly apologized, and then explained his train of thought for pulling away, and I love that he just finally admitted that he had feelings for Khem. I especially love that he also said, "And you have feelings for me too right?" Like he was not beating around the bush. The lines of communication were wide open.

And also just wanted to scream some more about the eye contact Paran has been giving Khem since he decided he was ready to be together with him. Mans had been avoiding eye contact or even looking at Khem for 6.5 eps straight. That whole thing with Pong and Prim really kicked his ass into gear and Granny's advice really solidified things for Paran.

I just loved to see Paran hold Khem's gaze with those big warm brown eyes. His eyes held the same kind of warmth a hug holds. I loved to see him connect with Khem in that way.

With every smile Khem sent Paran in ep 8 Paran was there to receive it. And honestly I'm sure Paran was relieved to be able to drop his guard and let Khem in. I can't imagine how much energy it takes to purposefully ignore someone you're naturally gravitating towards, especially a spiritually powerful person like Paran who uses his energy constantly.

We also just got to see him joke with Khem and tease him and just be lighthearted and flirtatious with him.

But in his process of becoming more vulnerable and transparent for Khem he also has allowed himself to be less aware of their surroundings because he's working on giving himself to Khem and I'm just worried about how things are going to backfire (they're already starting).

That being said; KHEM YOU SEE GHOSTS ON THE REGULAR! WHEN SOMEONE SHOWS UP WITH A GUST OF WIND AND DOESN’T REMEMBER BASIC THINGS THEY TOLD YOU, USE STRANGER DANGER LOGIC! COME ON BRO! HOW DICK DRUNK WERE YOU!?!?