HISSHI

oyasumi punpun

Because it does all the things every other confession scene does, but it also does so much more.

For starters, from Chu Wanning’s perspective, this is simultaneously the best and also most embarrassing moment of his life. Like, his long time crush just told him he likes him back, and that he’s the most beautiful person in the world (not that he believes him of course). But also Chu Wanning is mortified because now he basically admitted to being the mushy little guy that he’s tried his entire life to pretend not to be.

In essence, he’s just so flustered that he might explode.

And then you get to Mo Ran.

And at first, he acts exactly how you expect. He’s thrilled, he’s ecstatic, this is everything he’s ever wanted and more.

Then he takes two steps away from the moment and suddenly everything cracks. Because he’s gotten everything he’s ever wanted, and now he realizes what that means.

He could have had this before.

Because if Chu Wanning has loved him since before the ghost marriage, then that means that he also did in their past life. And this is so much worse then just when he realized that Chu Wanning had always been looking out for him, because this was all there before and Mo Ran then proceeded to treat him terribly.

Some of the few biggest complaints about the poppy war trilogy is its lazy world building, its clear copy and paste of Chinese history and lastly the most agitating review of the book is its "unnecessary violence". But heres the thing, if you pick up this specific trilogy for what the internet has labeled it, which is "enemies to lovers", "dark academia" or its "young adult fantasy" then I respectfully ask you to drop the book. Because the poppy war trilogy is about none of those things, and I would recommend you to read actual fantasy books like the Wheel of Time.

Rf kuang writes about the effects of colonialism, imperialism, racism and genocide on a young girl. The entire 3 books explores her psychology as a person who has seen terrible things. She shows what actions someone in that position would potentially take in response to everything that is going on around her. The only reason rf kuang wrote this book in a fantasy setting is to make it more palatable to the readers, despite its violence and heavy topics.

I find that most people who criticize this book for its violence tend to be white or some form of westernized. Sorry for saying this, but I am actually not really sorry. The violence in the book was necessary. The crimes of Golyn Niss are necessary, not only to remember what the Japanese had done to Chinese but also to view its effects on the characters in the book and to properly depict the inherit violence of colonialism.