MY DEAREST: VANITY OF VANITIES PART TWO: In Relation to, the Entire Show, although as of writing, only up to Episode 16
aka past me was right 29/10/23
@angelshadows50 I am going to reply to our conversation on the Episode 11+12 recap, here, on my fanwall, partly because of the length this reached , which means therefore also partly because of the new DB commenting default that will put my replies to you out of order, which will be frustrating for me, and confusing for everyone else, and partly because I want to take my time to discuss parts of 13 through 16 as well, both with regards to our prior conversation, but also just in general.
I have thus used our conversation as a springboard and framing device to write a very incensed essay about this show. This is not directed at you personally, this by no means any kind of personal attack, it just happened to be easier to both reply to you and write an essay, at the same time, in the same thing. (You made three points. So I will reply to each, but because of the overall point I want to make, I am going to reply to them somewhat out of order. Lol.)
I feel that my fears that I wrote about in 9+10 have been fulfilled and that this show is taking a direction in its story I neither like, nor enjoy, nor think it objectively shouldโve. I reference that essay a lot below as well, since all of my opinions in it are still extremely relevant, especially my conclusion, so I will link it here: https://www.dramabeans.com/members/sicarius/activity/1476910/
I will finish this show, but I will finish it with liberal use of the ffwd button and a great disappointment, although not much surprise, at how far from grace what couldโve been my favourite drama of the year has fallen.
As such, this is the last thing I will be writing on this show; I no longer care nor feel like I can properly root for any of our characters, except for maybe the Crown Prince and his wife, but since I know how that ends and since they donโt really get enough screen time that’s not nearly enough.
I will therefore, see you all in Goryeo.
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Also, the reason Gil Chae is married is in my view a logical follow-through on her part of her decision to abandon Jang Hyeon โ and the writer did for his female lead what she intended with her superimposition of the GWTW theme in my eyes here too : when the ยซKorean Scarlettยป of the 1600s follows through out of emotional growth and a sense of resposibility as now de facto head of her family she has to marry that protector Goo Won Moo, the ยซAmerican Scarlettยป at the point of marrying Frank did it because she needed a man out of a factual need to โif I remember correctlyโ protect her beloved Tara. So there is a parallel here, I find. Hence there is an internal reason for Gil Chae to marry, and I do not agree that it is ยซtrashyยป or contrived.
1. Why I donโt like her marriage subplot:
I can break this down into 4 subpoints.
1. I donโt like that this show follows GWTW and I donโt think it SHOULD follow GWTW, and I think the writer pulling so much from it is detrimental to her own story, and Iโm not interested in defending writing decisions based on it basically copying GWTW plot point for plot point, since I have ignored that part of the show up to this point, and intend to continue to do so.
2. I disagree with the entire way that her โabandoningโ JH was handled in episodes 9+10 and discussed why in my essay on the recap.
Not because I wanted her to elope with him, but because I think their entire relationship development shouldโve happened completely differently and with no GWTW and with no first husband.
3. I cannot be on board with the OTP if she is married as I cannot and will not support adultery, even if her husband is a nincompoop.
I also do not like, nay, I loathe, how a lot of the scenes between the leads regarding their relationship have been handled and written by the show during the period of her engagement and marriage.
I donโt actually even like that sheโs divorced now tbh. She still canโt remarry because of Joseonโs laws at the time, so it feels like an obstacle between the leads for the sake of being an obstacle between the leads and nothing else, and the romance canโt be properly enjoyed, as anything, even if itโs tragic, if itโs constantly fraught with bullshit. Are we even supposed to enjoy it? (See #3, perhaps we are notโฆ)
4. The line I used about it being โtrashyโ is because I feel like she only got married, really, internal reasoning aside, so that the show can farther push home the spoiled woman trope, which for me as of episode 13+14 and definitely as of 16, is really beginning to feel too heavy handed and almost gratuitous and the show has lost its nuance about such awful historic subject matters: I used trashy because I think being gratuitous is trashy storytelling.
This is a common complaint I have with kdramas, in that in their attempts to criticise something that anyone can see to be wrong (Joseonโs treatment of women, specifically women captured in wars etc.), they become heavy handed and gratuitous, and sometimes even manipulative, which means they cannot properly criticise or provide proper commentary.
This essentially leads me to feeling like her marriage has no Greater Narrative reason to exist.
Nothing that happened in 11-16, or even in my opinion 9-10, truly required her to be married to happen. No conflict, nor attempt at development and no stakes required her to be married. I donโt find it necessary for her to be married for any of the political plot to happen, or for the love line to be well developed, either in angst and tragedy, or otherwise.
You could ALMOST take it as a plot point out of the story entirely and you would basically have the same thing. Or you could easily have enough of the same thing that has happened so far. The only major thing you would have to change for that is the events of 9 and 10, to end up at a similar emotional point. Which I have argued in favour of anyway.
The only thing you WOULDNโT have, is Returning Women plot line, and the additional suffering and judgement Gil Chae has to face by not only being any woman returning, but a returning MARRIED woman. Which just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. If thatโs the only remaining reason to have her be married.
I feel that her marriage arc is being used by the narrative to push this historical criticism and to mimic GWTW, and not because it is the best narrative decision the story couldโve or shouldโve made for these characters and with the themes it established at the beginning. And yes, I think that way, even knowing GCโs position in an historic narrative, and this time period, as well.
I have more to say on this below, though, so keep reading.
Qing envoys constantly went in and out of Hanyang between 1637 and 1645 (until after Ming fell for sure), so why would there not be one checking on the โrepatriationโ of โtheirโ valuable slaves (in their eyes, and in particular if they fled from a royal Qing household) and witnessing the scene between Gil Chae and the elderly worker of her smithy? And it was clearly the Joseon go-between who suggested the kidnapping to him, not his idea at first. He was just worried to retrieve valuable slaves to bed with his employer so as not to get killed or demoted instead. Why is that contrived?
2. Why her capture to Qing felt contrived:
I donโt quite know how to explain how it comes across as contrived in any way more than has already been discussed. But Iโll try.
In terms of storytelling, I found the set up for all of this very broad; too broad.
Gil Chaeโs slave happened to get caught and turned in. And then she argued with him in the square. And then she happened to be overheard and seen by an envoy, who happened to take a liking to her specifically, and decide to capture her specifically, our Leading Lady no less.
Again, itโs not that this didnโt happen, or that it couldnโt have happened, or that it couldnโt have happened to her specifically either.
Itโs that the set up for her being captured feels like it exists ONLY to get her captured, and not because it makes sense for HER to be captured, THEN, and like THAT.
It feels contrived, not because the slavery angle isnโt unrealistic, or even that opportunistic envoys is particularly unrealistic, but because of how it was executed and used by the story.
It just feels like they did it because they needed to get her to Qing, to forward the angst and the leadsโ story somehow, and not because each thing happened as a *natural* narrative flow on effect, even if it can be argued to technically be an historic one.
But even as an historic one, I feel like they shouldโve done a better job of integrating this into the plot and the flow of the action.
Which leads me nicely, into my last section, so I can talk about this exact problem, and others, more.
Dear @sicarius, I said I would elaborate โฆ Before another day starts full-throttle for me here, let me keep my word. My remark was indeed related to your comment 1 in this recap for EP 11 and 12. Like you, I found the first half of EP 11 difficult, but mostly because I could not understand clearly where we were in the timeline (with the flashbacks or fantasies, depending on what it turns out to be) and where it was left off at the end of EP 10. You used expressions such as ยซsuperfluousยป, ยซpoorly set upยป and ยซcheap entertainmentยป. In particular for the ยซslavery sub plotยป you wrote that it was executed ยซ only [to] serve as background morbidity to get Gil Chae to Qing and foreshadow what is to come, rather than having a place in the story or history itselfยป. The writer (and the director) made clear that the prisoner-of-war / slavery topic was indeed a topic very important for the aftermath of the Manchu invasion, and its portrayal was both historically correct as well as an โin my eyesโ intelligent way of (a) commenting socially as writer on a clearly appauling reality of the time and (b) getting Gil Chae to Shenyang and into physical proximity to the male protagonist. Also, Yangban daughters were historically kidnapped and dragged to Qing, that is correct. And for the writer to use it to this effect was not morbid in my view.
3. On Historical Fiction, Slavery, and the Last 6 Episodes of Misery:
I did say it did happen in history, and I made sure not to deny that, so my point about it not “having a place in the story or history itself” is perhaps being misconstrued here. Which is fair because it’s not worded the best lol, thatโs my bad.
I will endeavour to tease out my thinking here a bit more.
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Itโs not that it didnโt happen (it did) and itโs not that it couldnโtโve been used in the show effectively (it couldโve).
My criticism is basically a narrative one, and not actually an historical one, or rather how a narrative interacts with history, and how this narrative interacted with history at the beginning, vs now.
In episodes 4 through 6 the show follows history so closely; its moon phases are almost accurate. You can, if you know the history, figure out even where each of our characters are approximately, on a present-day map, and this would be realistic and accurate to the historical location.
The show timeline, though not 100% accurate to the history one, follows it still extremely closely that events can be anticipated and conflicts can be predicted by the audience, in such a way that the history itself almost is also the story.
It integrates the two almost seamlessly, you feel that the events of the fictional characters and the struggles they face could reasonably be events and struggles and people that really were there (as she mentions in her interview).
But more importantly, also that telling the story of these fictional people in the face of this realism, was worthwhile.
And this I praised as a strength of this show at the beginning.
I think it wouldโve helped firstly, if the show had developed JH in Qing in episodes 7 through 10 differently, and had set up THEN more of not just him being asked to hunt the slaves, but more of the slaves and their treatment itself, and if they had set up RE pleading with him to help save the slaves also then, and then tied that properly in with his character development, and show some kind of intentional shift and change, stemming from GC and his interactions with her, which would put him in a better place character wise, and then would lead in to the second half better.
But what we got instead during 7 through 10, was more of him navigating the court of Qing himself, for himself, and trying to survive, for himself, and encouraging the Prince to survive also. And that was also good. In terms of Prince x JH development, which is what the entire prologue hinged on.
But if you donโt set up these character moments that happened in 11+12 properly, theyโre going to land wrong, no matter how many flashbacks you try and smooth them over with.
Because the way they bought up the slavery, the torture and the saving of the slaves INSTEAD, and on the back of a month-long hiatus, didnโt feel like it was integrated into history, in the way that early episodes felt woven into it; it felt initially more like a โplot of the weekโ idea, a flashback, disjointed, sub plot to set up future events, but not a subplot that had already been correctly woven in to the story prior, so that it could therefore lead into the coming episodes properly either.
It is in this way that I meant my words about it feeling โout of placeโ, in history or the story.
Itโs not that it, isolated, doesnโt make sense, itโs that in the grander idea of a story, and a story about real history, and in the flow and structure of that narrative, it doesnโt make sense in the way we were given it, especially not in comparison to earlier episodes.
I do not feel it was well written, and this is why it came across as contrived.
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Initially my problems were just these, with episodes 11 and 12 and how they were executed, and then additionally that I was struggling to feel anything the show wanted me to feel, because of this execution, despite the historical events that are the background for the fictional events. But now having caught up, there are greater issues behind this criticism, that apply farther to not just 11+12, or just the next four episodes, but really the show as a whole.
To me, showing the excessive torture of 11+12 was not shown in a way that was truly sympathetic of these events in history, but done in order for you to basically anticipate the horror that Gil Chae would inevitably have to face, and, done in a way that felt much more gratuitous, and intentionally so, than anything previously she had been set up to face.
And then, they continued this, for almost the entirety of 13 and 14 also; this kind of gratuitous constant misery that GC was having to face, in a loop, and it constantly felt that she was only undergoing what she was in order to A. push farther apart her reunion with JH and B. make her suffer for the sake of suffering itself.
I talked about this in my essay at the end of part 1, that essentially this show feels like it has to keep emotionally, or physically, torturing its leads, and therefore its viewers, as @elinor pointed out, in order for them to maintain emotional investment.
But my problem with this is and was, that this constant angst baiting doesnโt feel earned. It didnโt feel earned in 9+10, let alone now, six episodes later, when weโre still doing the same thing. And the reason it doesnโt feel earned is because the show has basically never given us or the leads a single moment of true respite in any of the 16 episodes.
In the beginning the first 6 to 8 episodes, this felt more justified, by the story that we had at that point, that it was in fact being used to lead UP to something. Some kind of release, an internal point of catharsis as it were. And you expected that as the viewer.
But instead, we just got, more angst. That was episode 10.
And now, itโs not even a continued building up of angst anymore, itโs a continued repetition, and this is why it feels contrived, not just the slavery set up in 11+12, but the whole thing:
There were about 6 reunion fake outs between episodes 11 and 14.
6.
Not a single one of these was earnt. They were all done in order to continue to string along the viewerโs emotional investment.
And none of them, NOT ONE OF THEM, not even the one in 14/15 where he takes an arrow for her, had a proper narrative pay off.
The first 4 or so were merely emotional baiting, designed to keep you hooked. But if you do this too many times, when you finally give the audience something, it feels cheap, and fake, like a Cry Wolf Type situation. The Audience doesnโt trust it. And for good reason, as it turns out. Because even the ones that had the beginnings of a payoff after these initial ones, resulted in nothing as well, and every time you hoped for something, it thew the characters back into the fire.
But itโs not just that a natural conflict would arise for this to happen. Instead, the show seems actively intent on writing the characters into the fire, on purpose, and that they can only ever go into the fire.
GC is captured, and they miss each other when the envoy arrives, she has to serve a lesser Royal, and is saved last minute by {plot armour}. She injuries herself to avoid sleeping with the Royal and she is thrown into the slave market. She ESCAPES the slave market, but only to tease us with yet another fake out reunion/ realization, and she is promptly captured again. She is sold again, and misses her husband, and then although we donโt see what happens to her, she is once again back in the slave market, where she dreams of, you guessed it, JH, again, but no, that also is a fake out. Sheโs taken to the square where she sees him, but he not her. Then RE arrives and we get our first reunion of sortsโฆ and at this point the show appears to be building up this constant angst and near miss, in order to make the reunion that much more bittersweet.
But it canโt land properly now after youโve been dragging your audience around for however many episodes, and no matter how good either actor is at crying, soon, they are once again, pulled away from each other, literally this time, and then! reunited, and THEN, suddenly, pulled away from each other YET AGAIN, all within the space of half an episode, or whatever that was, this time, for the sake of a love triangle.
And then, I have said then so many times already, to top it all off, their โfinalโ reunion in this game of cat and mouse, results in, not even a proper reunion, but turns silly, and then before you know it, they are once again parted;
I could not find the first half of episode 15 amusing, because of how downright stupid it was. This man apparently spent 6 months, SIX, in bed, from sowing to harvest, pretending to be unconscious, so that Gil Chae would stay, leading her on emotionally, and for what, some cheap laughs, that arenโt even funny? So, there is no proper return on that reunion either, because it continues to drag it out for the bit, instead of developing anyone or anything properly.
For almost 6 episodes, the audience is dragged around as much as the characters, and this on the back of 10 episodes prior of another kind of constant back and forth-ing.
But where at least the beginning of that felt initially justified, this most certainly does not.
For what! And for why! In the end you are left wondering what the point in being invested in this couple is at all. If their story is even WORTH IT to be invested in, if there is no return of any kind.
The tragedy, as I feared in 9+0 cannot itself be a return either at this point.
Why should I keep watching?
But not only do the events of these episodes seem only intent on torturing the viewers, and the characters, repeatedly, in a self-flagellation loop, theyโre executed to the damage of and at the expense of the plot, the stakes and the character writing, and therefore the rest of the narrative development as well:
A good example of this in the editing and directing of the following.
Which one has more power and has more impact?
The scene of Eun Ae staring at her hands in horror and Gil Chae scrubbing her hands furiously like Lady Macbeth in the freezing cold winter night, death after life? and the scene of the womenโs headscarves floating on the sea and a long shot of a cliff??
or GC and Jong Jong fleeing from captivity, with haphazard scene cuts and incoherent shot framing, driven to the cliffs and then suddenly, rushed and physically seeing ladies jump to their deaths this time, and cut to see GC talk the others down, only to just be caught again (and donโt even get me started on whatever the hell that dialogue delivery and direction was.)??
I will give you a hint. Itโs not the latter.
This too, is disjointed from the story/history thing. It happened in history. We know that. Weโve seen it before. But what struggle is GC undergoing here? What personal character struggle is she facing specifically in this scene of her and JJ running away from the market? There isnโt actually any. There isnโt anything new that we donโt already know or that we havenโt already seen her do and seen her do more convincingly and that hasnโt already been better directed and written.
So, what purpose does this scene with her running and JH missing her and not actually seeing her YET AGAIN (for again, like the fifth fake out in a row) have in the actual story, both its place in history and its role as a story itself?
Nothing.
The only thing I could say is that it farther feeds into the plot once the Khan dies, and places them all in more of a political peril, but this too really only happens also, as I will farther discuss, to be conflict and suffering and separation for the sakes of those concepts alone, and nothing else.
I know that slaves were captured, and recaptured, and recaptured, and suffered badly. I also know that woman felt pushed to suicide to preserve their chastity. And I know that GC has the strength to survive and help others survive no matter what. Do you know how I know that? Because that was plot of episodes 4 through 6.
But I feel none of the stakes or the tension 11 through 16 wants me to feel. Time and time again.
The plot, of the second half of this show, does not feel like a parallel, or a callback. It is merely a static repetition.
Because, in the first six episodes, you felt that the characters were ACTIVE participants in the plot, and in a way that they would either experience ACTIVE development through the plot directly, then and there, or that as a result of what they were experiencing, this would lead to ACTIVE development.
But not only was there no direct pay off for that in the first half either, there is now a repetition of plot points, of conflict points, and of historic points, that donโt even set up anything, let alone go anywhere themselves.
And the characters, instead of being active participants, with active or a hoped-for active development, have become passive at best, and static themselves, at worst.
Instead of Jang Hyun becoming a more compassionate person to more people than those he immediately cares about, specifically Gil Chae, in a way that we see active change, like in my proposed alternative for 7-10 above, we are instead invited to accept this development in a passive way. Id Est, JHโs separation from GC, and his years in Qing, and his years in regret, have led to the desired change, rather than him being active in this change, by choosing it.
Similarly, we are led to accept Gil Chae would threaten the Princess for JH not because of any ACTIVE development between them as a couple at that point, but because of an almost deliberate lack of it?
But in turn, both of these characters also feel STATIC in development at the same time, and the conflicts used in attempt to drive their story, either more static repetition, or contrived, or both.
We know Jang Hyun would die for her. He almost died for her at the beginning, in fact he was nearer to death then than now apparently, if the dream was anything to go by, and we know he probably WILL die for her somehow eventually too: thatโs how this show opened. So, there are no stakes really, in that strange bet between the Princess and JH.
The only difference now is that GC is there to see him do it for her.
Between himself and her, he will always pick her. And even in the manipulative conflict in episode 16, he ultimate still pushes her back to Joseon for her sake, as well as the rest of the slaves, because of the Princessโ not so thinly veiled threats towards GC. But that itself falls back on static development, with them acting again, like they mean nothing to each other, and to let the other go, once again, with no proper communication, and once again lying to each other, like they did in 8, and in 9, and in 10.
JH himself says directly that there is nothing in his heart anymore, but then says GC is wrong when she asks if she is a burden to him, the same kind of bullshit they have been pulling since even episode 5.
Now, itโs not that passive development, canโt work. I suppose there are stories in which it would work best. But I feel that this show does a disservice to its story and its characters by maintaining this passive and static development.
Where are our leads at this point in the show? And why? If I am repeating things myself here itโs because these issues are all linked to each other and all in a way, one in the same.
This constant vicious plot cycle, not only makes you wonder what the point is emotionally, but also apparently whether it even has a point narratively.
Added to this, there are only three times that I can find in the last 6 episodes where this show bothered to try and continue any of the thematic motifs it set up in the first half of the show. And barely tried at that.
Where is the Red String of Fate Faith?!? Where is the dream about her intended husband? Where is the trust they had in each other? Where is the actual repairing of that trust? She finds out he was the one that saved them on the island like THAT? We have four episodes left, and four years before the Crown Prince gets murdered by his father (I think). What and how is JH leading the CP astray in any way that you didnโt better develop in the first half of the Godforsaken show? Where are them becoming better people FOR each other BECAUSE of each other because they met each other and because they are well suited to each other? Your passive leading to regressive development doesnโt frakking count!
Quoting the writer herself here:
She wanted to impose the โhope and beautyโ of GWTW onto this era of Korean history? What hope? What beauty? Where? You are purposefully writing your characters into corners they cannot get out of and for what? โlyricism with tragedyโ? I have barely seen a lick of that in the second half. Did you forget your modus operandi?
Thus, the events of the last 6 episodes both have little to no stakes, and what stakes there are arenโt earnt. There is no true narrative development happening in them either- the character growth feels static, and our leads have reached no farther point in the story or their relationship really. There is no true plot development, instead repetition of previous ideas, with no added impact or meaning, which leaves them static as well.
And for 16 episodes we have been dragged around with our characters emotionally with no reward.
This is all related to why I called the use of the slavery plot in 11+12 originally, but now farther in 13 through 16, โmorbidโ. Because it felt like, after continuous episodes of this^, and 6 of the slavery plot specifically, that the show really only wanted to first, keep out OTP apart, and constantly, and on purpose, and second to make them suffer, for the sake of suffering itself.
Coincidentally, the exact same conclusion I reached about her marriage subplot.
But now it appears to me, that it is actually seeking to justify this, all of this, through history itself instead.
Itโs only justification for this, that I can perceive, other than licentiousness and a misplaced sense of how to maintain investment, is thatโฆ โHistory Sucked; specifically, this point in history. And it sucked a lot.โ (No, shit, Sherlock!)
It feels justified in writing the characters in a perpetual misery loop like this, that they cannot and will not ever get out of, that they are designed to never get out of, even in death, it feels justified in being this kind of constantly breaking down tragedy that I talk about and rejected in 9 and 10, because it wants to make a point about the suffering of the Joseon people under the Joseon ideology, during and after the Qing Invasion of 1639 and the effects of War. It is not interested in any kind of hopeful AND tragic, or poignant tale of romance otherwise, it is not interested in true character, plot or narrative development, and it sure as shit is not interested in any kind of transcending Thematic development, even though it set all of that up in the first 20 minutes.
But I didnโt come here to watch historic torture p0rn. I did not sign up for any kind of โRealisticโ Post War p0rn either.
And so, in an ironic twist, we have come from its integration and following of history being its greatest strength, to its greatest weakness.
Because as much as it would like to claim otherwise, it is NOT justified in doing this:
The Writer has betrayed herself.
Storytelling that is deliberately voyeuristic in order to attempt some kind of pathetic social commentary or historical criticism at the expense of the rest of its identity and purpose as a story, is both morbid and trashy, and contrived and manipulative, and I reject that as good storytelling.
As the โhope and beautyโ of the GWTW era existed entirely in Margaret F*ing Mitchellโs head, Iโd say the writer has succeeded brilliantly in capturing that.
suffer, for the sake of suffering itself
This might as well be the showโs title; โ์ฐ์ธ/Loversโ is misdirection verging on fraud. At this point Iโm watching with the same morbid interest I might take in an extensive scab thatโs just starting to heal.
I mean, of course Iโm watching to see amazing actors acting amazingly even when theyโre fighting their way through a maddeningly circular plot, because an opportunity to see NGM and company tear into roles like these doesnโt come around often, but how long can they keep rising above the preposterous Groundhog Day situations the writer has put them in? Will we see them give up and just phone it in when theyโre doing the same damned scenes with nearly identical dialogue over and over and over? Ironically the repetitiveness and lack of growth or resolution has taken me so far out of the story that Iโm noticing actors doing their work instead of characters being themselves.
The leads are at the mercy of a writer who has (what she thinks is) one good idea and keeps hammering at it without the ability to recognize that itโs become stale and that the angst beats no longer land because (a) we can see them coming a mile away and (b) weโre just numb because weโve been hit on the same spot so often. Spiral up, spiral down, I don’t care anymore but this is a closed loop going nowhere. In a weird way, this is starting to remind me of Extraordinary You where even self-aware characters cannot break free of the unimaginative manwha authorโs endless recycling of characters and plots. Every time they try, they just get dragged back into the frame by the heavy hand of the writer.
I did not realize JH spent six months in bed, pretending he still needed GCโs nursing – I thought it was somewhere between six days and six weeks. And he gets up and unwinds the bandages after all that time and still has those muscles? LOL. Oh well, a moment of fanservice is a respite from pain p()rn. And on the topic of fanservice, the obsessive jealous princess is insultingly unrealistic and out of place in this story and I refuse to engage with that nonsense no matter how much scope it gives NGM for glaring or looking anguished.
Reacting partly to your previous essay: I do wonder how much of my/our collective reaction to this show is shaped by the foundational notion that suffering is redemptive, either before or after death (which is not a part of my religious tradition but permeates my culture) and therefore when suffering neither redeems nor explores lack of redemption, but just IS, that is what renders it meaningless. If the show wants to give us ‘meaningless’ but realistic suffering such as occurred with mind-boggling frequency in Joseon, it should be a documentary. Storytelling needs meaning.
It’s creeving infuriating isn’t it? “”Ironically the repetitiveness and lack of growth or resolution has taken me so far out of the story that Iโm noticing actors doing their work instead of characters being themselves.””
Multiple times this week I could only think “who even is Jang Hyun again” the character writing is that inconsistent. AEJ sobbing when she realises how much he’s done for her was brilliant work but I’m heartless and felt naught because I’m writing and character driven lmao.
Oh the EY comparison is so hilariously and ironically apt considering my reasons for hating that show hahaha bravo. 🤣🤣
I almost mentioned the state of his body but decided it was lesser titbit to the greater issue. And I’m estimating off what I know regarding other crops, but yeah if you plant in the Spring and Harvest in the Autumn then yes that’s about 6 effing months. I almost made a whole separate post just to rip that entire mess out.
💯 to the princess. I eyeroll my way through a lot of this now, can you tell.
“”therefore when suffering neither redeems nor explores lack of redemption, but just IS, that is what renders it meaningless. If the show wants to give us โmeaninglessโ but realistic suffering such as occurred with mind-boggling frequency in Joseon, it should be a documentary. Storytelling needs meaning.””
👏👏👏 Because Suffering itself needs meaning, yeah.
And the Death of Meaning should not be served.
>> As an example on the Capture feeling contrived front:
When the girls went to Ganghwa Island it felt like a logical narrative decision for multiple reasons: it was used similarly for conflict, yes, but it also made sense in that Ganghwa was known to be the safest place and nobody would assume otherwise at the time, and to show the trust between GC and JH and the result of that as well.
Ofc we as the viewer know because of history it was going to be a bad idea, but it’s not Illogical for that to happen within the story or within history.
So it made the plot point exciting and the story and the conflict was running parallel to history.
GC’s capture to Qing instead was merely “Yangban were captured – so she is going to be captured. She needs to get to Qing- so she will be kidnapped to Qing.”
Rather than it being properly integrated as I discuss properly in the essay.
Just wanted to add that example and comparison before I forgot about it again.
If I follow your logic, I could also say about the Ganghwa plot that is was just as illogical: “We have to show what happened on the island because you know, history….. so let’s send them there…but how?…oh, let’s have JH tell GC to go because we can’t think of any reason on how all 4 of them would end up on an island…and promise her that he will save her so he would have a reason to go also….and somehow he finds her dagger all the way in the manchu camp cause that is what manchu soldiers do, they collect daggers found on the beach… and thinks she is dead…but she isn’t….and he decides to go anyway even though he thinks she is dead…but he just happenes to see her in that particular moment in the forest….and he goes on and fights 17 freaking blood drinking soldiers…and she kind of sees him but….doesn’t, because he hides…all to be separated again and again…and more angst and mistrust….
The problem with getting kidnapped is…you don’t know you’re getting kidnapped, it just happens, so I don’t see how she could prepare us or to show anything about the 2 leads because the reason of the kidnapping has nothing to do with them but with the events in the history. So it was a paralel to the history of that moment and had the right to be introduced in the story just as well as the Ganghwa plot.
I guess.
I just felt that Ganghwa made more sense overall because Ganghwa was a place that refugees fled too and JH in trying to keep them safe sent them there too, because he knew that.
They ended up on the island because they needed some place safe from the war. So for me there was more narrative justification link is my argument.
She could always have not used kidnapping????
And I disagree there couldn’t have been a way to set that up smoother.
I don’t mind the dagger cos it’s a thematic motif.
If my example argument doesn’t land, then stick with my intiial one haha.
The kidnapping not having anything to do with them but ONLY history is EXACTLY my point. She’s telling a story too, set in history, not just history.
I’ve already argued my points about narrative interaction with history and the end result of this that the drama ends up at, in the main essay though so I won’t repeat them here.
I lost interest in the couple since a long time now. So in te first part, I liked it because they spend a lot of time separated.
But now, the writer wants to get them back and my issue is that I don’t like the characters when they’re together. I don’t buy their big love for each other. I don’t like how the characters act and the actors to be honest. I don’t like when Ahn Eun-Jin talks with this little voice that must be sounded as noble woman I guess. She’s far more interesting when she slapped the guy in the street.
They finally can spend time together and his first reaction is to lie about the gravity of his wounds… It’s not romantic but childish and stupid…
“…great disappointment, although not much surprise, at how far from grace what couldโve been my favourite drama of the year has fallen.”
Disappointment is putting it mildly.
I didn’t see the point of her getting married. She was financially independent, and since when did she care about her reputation and being an old maid? Just because women were suppressed in that era doesn’t mean they were helpless. The crown princess is an example of women using their talents and willpower to survive, whether in Qing or Joseon.
Although the acting is excellent and the history fascinating, the sense of magic and hope I felt in part 1 vanished.
I remember clearly that she dreamed a lot about meeting her future husband. And that she even dreamed in episode 4 to be rescued by him. And to almost getting married in the first episodes. And so on and so on with her first “love”. Yes, she didn’t care about what people thought of her as long as she got what she wanted. She wanted a marriage to a noble dude, she got it and paid for it. Well, almost. And she was not that independent, she relied on her husband help and she probably felt that she owned him a lot for his help.
I don’t know if a married crown princess and all the advantages and protection that comes with that title is a fitting example. She was, after all, just a mere country daughter of a school.
Yes, he helped her, and she swallowed her pride and accepted it because she didnโt want to starve to death or her family.
They became business partners when she changed the forge into a successful business. The only thing he did was give her permission to use his family forge, and she did all the work. He was able to earn money from her ideas and hard work. She married him because she thought Jang Hyun was dead.
I agree that the crown princess has advantages, but as a mere country daughter (as you put it), her experience and talents helped feed and free some of her people.
How can common people not relate to that?
I thought that I made my point of why she did care about her reputation and being an old maid. And how much she wanted to get married. That’s why she got married, to secure her and her loved ones future. I don’t think those times allowed for a woman to be financially independent, as you put it. She was the one that clinged to that era’s morals and traditions. JH, on the other hand, didn’t and that is why she refused him even though she felt otherwise. I am sure some do not embrace the fact that here we have a FL not being the “feminist” we are used to in the recent dramas, but one that adheres to the rules of “patriarchy”. She doesn’t even question it. It is because of his love that she finds the courage to even ask for divorce. For me is one of the reasons I watched the show because is so uncommon in dramas these days.
“Just because women were suppressed in that era doesnโt mean they were helpless. The crown princess is an example of women using their talents and willpower to survive, whether in Qing or Joseon.”
Sure, but the crown princess was married, LOL. Without her husband’s position she would not have had those accomplishments. How can common people relate to that? That she, unlike others, in fact did her job of protecting “her” people? Maybe. Maybe that is why GC married also, because she had a very good example that she could relate to. But then you don’t like the fact that GC got married…It just doesn’t make sense to me what you are trying to say.
You’d be surprised when you do research you’d find women in this era who were financially independent. Some were born from poor families or slaves in the gibang, etc.
“Sure, but the crown princess was married, LOL. Without her husband’s position, she would not have had those accomplishments.”
Are you for real?
Married or not, women looked up to her as the future mother of the nation. She was a complete woman with talents before she married the Crown Prince. She was put in a situation where she could utilize her abilities and show her love for her people, even with the drama diminishing her accomplishments. She is being shoved to the side so GC can be the one to get her hands dirty. (Historically, it was her idea to do farming to make money to buy their people who were sold in the slave market and send them home. She worked on the farm with her people and more.)
I can’t articulate my point correctly regarding GC’s marriage, so that’s on me. You can laugh at me for that.
@kiara
I thought that women could not own properties at that time, hence my statement. How could they have been truly independent in that era? I am not saying that they were not capable if allowed, because they were just as capable as women in our times.
You said that GC should have taken an example from her. In your words:
“Just because women were suppressed in that era doesnโt mean they were helpless. The crown princess is an example of women using their talents and willpower to survive, whether in Qing or Joseon.”
Well, the crown princess was not that helpless. Nor suppressed, for that matter, because she was allowed to mingle in state affairs by her husband. Again, I am not saying that she was not a capable woman, but those were the times. She was not put in that position on her own, her husband was and she made the best of it. You gave her as an example for SINGLE women at that time to follow, that statement I have an issue with.
I am sorry to say but I do not share your enthusiasm for the couple since they did come from a privileged position. Sure, I see them in a better light than most, but I am not infatuated with them like you all are. Yes, they helped the captured people from Qing but they still came to be in that position in a country that suppresed most of its people back in Joseon. And I certainly do not see in good light his opening to foreigners influence as something positive and I see it as being a tool for quiet foreign invasion and economic pludgering later on. I very much support change that comes from within a country, that is real change. And I certainly do not share the introduction of foreign values and religion in another country, by force or by other clever means because that also introduces the economic control of that country later on.
And we did not know what they could truly would have accomplished once they took the throne, the compromises they would have had to make. The country was still ruled by the crazy fractions and they failed their first true test by not gather enough support or enough protection from the Qing.
Have you heard of Gim Man-deok? Read her story. She didn’t have to own a property to be independent.
Do we only relate to people like us?
I have a hard time explaining my thoughts in my 3rd language, and I’m tired. Maybe I’ll revisit your post later because you do have a lot of valid things to share, and I’m being defensive, too.
@kiara
I didn’t know about Gim Man-deok so I googled her and I could only find her wiki page in english, most were in korean, from which I found out that:
“She managed to achieve her position in Jeju thanks to the island’s egalitarian and matrifocal culture, where women had greater economic and social independence than the rest of the country, whose Neo-Confucian ideology enforced strong female repression.”
I don’t know if it is true since is wiki and I have no knowledge why in Jeju island women had more freedom. But my argument still stands when it comes to 17th century mainland Joseon, unless you meant that GC should have gone to Jeju island and be an independent single woman there at the end of 18th century.
But thanks for letting me know about Gim Man-deok, she was indeed a remarkable woman. I’ll see if I could find more info about her life and watch the drama about her.
Yes, we know. And the dream is still happening, she is almost at the beach where he has been waiting for her. He has always loved her, she had to do a lot of “running” to come to that conclusion.
But I was making another point to Kiara, the one that she always wanted to be a married woman and not an old maid.
About her marriage plot…
That is the whole story. A married woman finds love and hope after being captive and abandoned by her husband. It said so in all the synopsis, we just chose to ignore it.
Then we’re back to my first “essay” after 9+10 and how I think the writing of the show itself in the first half set up for something different from this professed plot and synopsis.
I also have a habit of thinking that just because a show thinks it should do something, doesn’t mean it actually should for the best story or for its characters. ๐
@sicarius
I am sorry that you see the show this way for some time now. For me it has many parallels with the world I grew up in and it has different meanings that I care and relate with.
You can be “back” to that essay, I certainly am not (and I do not belong in “the audience” you have been talking about in the second one, also). The first half set up the characters and the backstory for the main one. That you don’t like the main story, I understand. But to not get it at all, not so much, more so because I do enjoy how you write.
I “get” the main story you speak about fine.
I just don’t think it’s objectively good story telling, and I disagree that, whatever you think is the main story, should’ve been the main story, is all I guess.
But perhaps you can clarify more about what you mean here.
@sicarius
The marriage. You called it a subplot, something that was not needed among many, many other things. You wrote that “their entire relationship development shouldโve happened completely differently and with no GWTW and with no first husband”. The marriage is the whole point of the story, whether you like it or not, and is the point from which everything flows. And it didn’t follow GWTW in this aspect, the beginning did to hook us for the marriage and for what’s to come. And not the marriage per se, but the fact that she is/was a married woman and how she recovered and found love and hope in those cruel times, even if only for a short time if JH will end up dead, after being abandoned for reasons that she had no control of. You say that her capture is contrived and it was only to drive GC to JH. But if the marriage and the love she has even after her abandoment are the center point of the story, then I beg to differ. I can even say that the reason JH was sent to S city in the story to begin with is because GC was suppose to come there eventually to be abandoned and not the other way around.
I could go more in depth but time is not on my side. And there is really no need for because if you don’t get the marriage thing and think about it as a subplot still at episode 16 then you don’t get what this story is about.
I think the story should’ve been, imperatively, objectively, NOT the one we got.
I’ve written two essays to try and explain why. If you don’t get ME by that point, and think I still don’t get you (or the story apparently), that is what it is, but oh well. Thanks for participating in this thread anyway. 🖤
“Quoting the writer herself here:
She wanted to impose the โhope and beautyโ of GWTW onto this era of Korean history? What hope? What beauty? Where? ”
Hope that a lot of those women not only survived but found love. Hope that there were, even in those times, men like JH ( and Rhett Butler ) that went against the current and loved and cherished women considered “tainted” by society. And that is beautiful.
What hope can I take from the love story when it only intent on torturing them despite this? It doesn’t seem like it is really telling their love story but rather their failed love story. Their hope in love has transcended nothing so far.
And what beauty can I find in JH’s character when they refuse to develop him or his committment properly or provide him with coherent growth?
That IS beautiful, I agree, and I like that he has always stood up against that, yes, but the story has to be more than just saying that.
The execution should echo the message.
I don’t think it has achieved either of these things in a way that is truly satisfying narratively and right now only seems intent on killing any true hope it might pretend to profess.
I don’t think it is transcending is tragedy and I take issue with that.
Or for that matter, what hope in love do they actually have? The show hasn’t developed that, it’s spent 16 episodes of them walking round in circles lying to each other, even by the end of the stint in Qing; there is, as I have said, no true return.
If they made any progress at all it is both incoherent, and back to square one by the end of 16.
“In the end you are left wondering what the point in being invested in this couple is at all.”
Well said.
I too am feeling very, very fatigued of being “dragged” through the “angst, misery, pain p–n” and “continued repetitionย loop- with no pay off” whatsoever.ย We have watched over 16 hours without one honest conversation or any straightforward communication between our leads. I’m resigned to the fact that this is not first and foremost a romance. I only wish it had been clearer from the start then my expectationsย would not have been so high.ย
As much as I love watching both lead actors, maybe this would have been better as 16 episodes to get rid of a lot of frustrating crap that has deviated from the tighter first half of the show.ย
Third time trying to post for an apparently inappropriate word ๐
Hwaiting.
But the start had 3 intros, and two of them were literally all this imagery about the ROMANCE. I don’t think it’s entirely our fault for expecting different and more of this show.
Yes, p0rn is apparently now an IW, I had to search through almost all of my 4500 words to find the offending thing when first posting this lmao.
Hi, @sicarius, I am seeing your post this morning. It’s always good to have something to take as starting point for a commentary, so I do not feel insulted or anything of that sort. I want to study your argumentation in detail, which will take a while (currently my day life is extremely full). Thanks for the thoughtful and lengthy commentary.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 28, 2023 at 11:06 PM
MY DEAREST: VANITY OF VANITIES
PART TWO: In Relation to, the Entire Show, although as of writing, only up to Episode 16
aka past me was right 29/10/23
@angelshadows50 I am going to reply to our conversation on the Episode 11+12 recap, here, on my fanwall, partly because of the length this reached , which means therefore also partly because of the new DB commenting default that will put my replies to you out of order, which will be frustrating for me, and confusing for everyone else, and partly because I want to take my time to discuss parts of 13 through 16 as well, both with regards to our prior conversation, but also just in general.
I have thus used our conversation as a springboard and framing device to write a very incensed essay about this show. This is not directed at you personally, this by no means any kind of personal attack, it just happened to be easier to both reply to you and write an essay, at the same time, in the same thing. (You made three points. So I will reply to each, but because of the overall point I want to make, I am going to reply to them somewhat out of order. Lol.)
I feel that my fears that I wrote about in 9+10 have been fulfilled and that this show is taking a direction in its story I neither like, nor enjoy, nor think it objectively shouldโve. I reference that essay a lot below as well, since all of my opinions in it are still extremely relevant, especially my conclusion, so I will link it here:
https://www.dramabeans.com/members/sicarius/activity/1476910/
I will finish this show, but I will finish it with liberal use of the ffwd button and a great disappointment, although not much surprise, at how far from grace what couldโve been my favourite drama of the year has fallen.
As such, this is the last thing I will be writing on this show; I no longer care nor feel like I can properly root for any of our characters, except for maybe the Crown Prince and his wife, but since I know how that ends and since they donโt really get enough screen time that’s not nearly enough.
I will therefore, see you all in Goryeo.
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1. Why I donโt like her marriage subplot:
I can break this down into 4 subpoints.
1. I donโt like that this show follows GWTW and I donโt think it SHOULD follow GWTW, and I think the writer pulling so much from it is detrimental to her own story, and Iโm not interested in defending writing decisions based on it basically copying GWTW plot point for plot point, since I have ignored that part of the show up to this point, and intend to continue to do so.
2. I disagree with the entire way that her โabandoningโ JH was handled in episodes 9+10 and discussed why in my essay on the recap.
Not because I wanted her to elope with him, but because I think their entire relationship development shouldโve happened completely differently and with no GWTW and with no first husband.
3. I cannot be on board with the OTP if she is married as I cannot and will not support adultery, even if her husband is a nincompoop.
I also do not like, nay, I loathe, how a lot of the scenes between the leads regarding their relationship have been handled and written by the show during the period of her engagement and marriage.
I donโt actually even like that sheโs divorced now tbh. She still canโt remarry because of Joseonโs laws at the time, so it feels like an obstacle between the leads for the sake of being an obstacle between the leads and nothing else, and the romance canโt be properly enjoyed, as anything, even if itโs tragic, if itโs constantly fraught with bullshit. Are we even supposed to enjoy it? (See #3, perhaps we are notโฆ)
4. The line I used about it being โtrashyโ is because I feel like she only got married, really, internal reasoning aside, so that the show can farther push home the spoiled woman trope, which for me as of episode 13+14 and definitely as of 16, is really beginning to feel too heavy handed and almost gratuitous and the show has lost its nuance about such awful historic subject matters: I used trashy because I think being gratuitous is trashy storytelling.
This is a common complaint I have with kdramas, in that in their attempts to criticise something that anyone can see to be wrong (Joseonโs treatment of women, specifically women captured in wars etc.), they become heavy handed and gratuitous, and sometimes even manipulative, which means they cannot properly criticise or provide proper commentary.
This essentially leads me to feeling like her marriage has no Greater Narrative reason to exist.
Nothing that happened in 11-16, or even in my opinion 9-10, truly required her to be married to happen. No conflict, nor attempt at development and no stakes required her to be married. I donโt find it necessary for her to be married for any of the political plot to happen, or for the love line to be well developed, either in angst and tragedy, or otherwise.
You could ALMOST take it as a plot point out of the story entirely and you would basically have the same thing. Or you could easily have enough of the same thing that has happened so far. The only major thing you would have to change for that is the events of 9 and 10, to end up at a similar emotional point. Which I have argued in favour of anyway.
The only thing you WOULDNโT have, is Returning Women plot line, and the additional suffering and judgement Gil Chae has to face by not only being any woman returning, but a returning MARRIED woman. Which just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. If thatโs the only remaining reason to have her be married.
I feel that her marriage arc is being used by the narrative to push this historical criticism and to mimic GWTW, and not because it is the best narrative decision the story couldโve or shouldโve made for these characters and with the themes it established at the beginning. And yes, I think that way, even knowing GCโs position in an historic narrative, and this time period, as well.
I have more to say on this below, though, so keep reading.
2. Why her capture to Qing felt contrived:
I donโt quite know how to explain how it comes across as contrived in any way more than has already been discussed. But Iโll try.
In terms of storytelling, I found the set up for all of this very broad; too broad.
Gil Chaeโs slave happened to get caught and turned in. And then she argued with him in the square. And then she happened to be overheard and seen by an envoy, who happened to take a liking to her specifically, and decide to capture her specifically, our Leading Lady no less.
Again, itโs not that this didnโt happen, or that it couldnโt have happened, or that it couldnโt have happened to her specifically either.
Itโs that the set up for her being captured feels like it exists ONLY to get her captured, and not because it makes sense for HER to be captured, THEN, and like THAT.
It feels contrived, not because the slavery angle isnโt unrealistic, or even that opportunistic envoys is particularly unrealistic, but because of how it was executed and used by the story.
It just feels like they did it because they needed to get her to Qing, to forward the angst and the leadsโ story somehow, and not because each thing happened as a *natural* narrative flow on effect, even if it can be argued to technically be an historic one.
But even as an historic one, I feel like they shouldโve done a better job of integrating this into the plot and the flow of the action.
Which leads me nicely, into my last section, so I can talk about this exact problem, and others, more.
3. On Historical Fiction, Slavery, and the Last 6 Episodes of Misery:
I did say it did happen in history, and I made sure not to deny that, so my point about it not “having a place in the story or history itself” is perhaps being misconstrued here. Which is fair because it’s not worded the best lol, thatโs my bad.
I will endeavour to tease out my thinking here a bit more.
.
.
Itโs not that it didnโt happen (it did) and itโs not that it couldnโtโve been used in the show effectively (it couldโve).
My criticism is basically a narrative one, and not actually an historical one, or rather how a narrative interacts with history, and how this narrative interacted with history at the beginning, vs now.
In episodes 4 through 6 the show follows history so closely; its moon phases are almost accurate. You can, if you know the history, figure out even where each of our characters are approximately, on a present-day map, and this would be realistic and accurate to the historical location.
The show timeline, though not 100% accurate to the history one, follows it still extremely closely that events can be anticipated and conflicts can be predicted by the audience, in such a way that the history itself almost is also the story.
It integrates the two almost seamlessly, you feel that the events of the fictional characters and the struggles they face could reasonably be events and struggles and people that really were there (as she mentions in her interview).
But more importantly, also that telling the story of these fictional people in the face of this realism, was worthwhile.
And this I praised as a strength of this show at the beginning.
I think it wouldโve helped firstly, if the show had developed JH in Qing in episodes 7 through 10 differently, and had set up THEN more of not just him being asked to hunt the slaves, but more of the slaves and their treatment itself, and if they had set up RE pleading with him to help save the slaves also then, and then tied that properly in with his character development, and show some kind of intentional shift and change, stemming from GC and his interactions with her, which would put him in a better place character wise, and then would lead in to the second half better.
But what we got instead during 7 through 10, was more of him navigating the court of Qing himself, for himself, and trying to survive, for himself, and encouraging the Prince to survive also. And that was also good. In terms of Prince x JH development, which is what the entire prologue hinged on.
But if you donโt set up these character moments that happened in 11+12 properly, theyโre going to land wrong, no matter how many flashbacks you try and smooth them over with.
Because the way they bought up the slavery, the torture and the saving of the slaves INSTEAD, and on the back of a month-long hiatus, didnโt feel like it was integrated into history, in the way that early episodes felt woven into it; it felt initially more like a โplot of the weekโ idea, a flashback, disjointed, sub plot to set up future events, but not a subplot that had already been correctly woven in to the story prior, so that it could therefore lead into the coming episodes properly either.
It is in this way that I meant my words about it feeling โout of placeโ, in history or the story.
Itโs not that it, isolated, doesnโt make sense, itโs that in the grander idea of a story, and a story about real history, and in the flow and structure of that narrative, it doesnโt make sense in the way we were given it, especially not in comparison to earlier episodes.
I do not feel it was well written, and this is why it came across as contrived.
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Initially my problems were just these, with episodes 11 and 12 and how they were executed, and then additionally that I was struggling to feel anything the show wanted me to feel, because of this execution, despite the historical events that are the background for the fictional events. But now having caught up, there are greater issues behind this criticism, that apply farther to not just 11+12, or just the next four episodes, but really the show as a whole.
To me, showing the excessive torture of 11+12 was not shown in a way that was truly sympathetic of these events in history, but done in order for you to basically anticipate the horror that Gil Chae would inevitably have to face, and, done in a way that felt much more gratuitous, and intentionally so, than anything previously she had been set up to face.
And then, they continued this, for almost the entirety of 13 and 14 also; this kind of gratuitous constant misery that GC was having to face, in a loop, and it constantly felt that she was only undergoing what she was in order to A. push farther apart her reunion with JH and B. make her suffer for the sake of suffering itself.
I talked about this in my essay at the end of part 1, that essentially this show feels like it has to keep emotionally, or physically, torturing its leads, and therefore its viewers, as @elinor pointed out, in order for them to maintain emotional investment.
But my problem with this is and was, that this constant angst baiting doesnโt feel earned. It didnโt feel earned in 9+10, let alone now, six episodes later, when weโre still doing the same thing. And the reason it doesnโt feel earned is because the show has basically never given us or the leads a single moment of true respite in any of the 16 episodes.
In the beginning the first 6 to 8 episodes, this felt more justified, by the story that we had at that point, that it was in fact being used to lead UP to something. Some kind of release, an internal point of catharsis as it were. And you expected that as the viewer.
But instead, we just got, more angst. That was episode 10.
And now, itโs not even a continued building up of angst anymore, itโs a continued repetition, and this is why it feels contrived, not just the slavery set up in 11+12, but the whole thing:
There were about 6 reunion fake outs between episodes 11 and 14.
6.
Not a single one of these was earnt. They were all done in order to continue to string along the viewerโs emotional investment.
And none of them, NOT ONE OF THEM, not even the one in 14/15 where he takes an arrow for her, had a proper narrative pay off.
The first 4 or so were merely emotional baiting, designed to keep you hooked. But if you do this too many times, when you finally give the audience something, it feels cheap, and fake, like a Cry Wolf Type situation. The Audience doesnโt trust it. And for good reason, as it turns out. Because even the ones that had the beginnings of a payoff after these initial ones, resulted in nothing as well, and every time you hoped for something, it thew the characters back into the fire.
But itโs not just that a natural conflict would arise for this to happen. Instead, the show seems actively intent on writing the characters into the fire, on purpose, and that they can only ever go into the fire.
GC is captured, and they miss each other when the envoy arrives, she has to serve a lesser Royal, and is saved last minute by {plot armour}. She injuries herself to avoid sleeping with the Royal and she is thrown into the slave market. She ESCAPES the slave market, but only to tease us with yet another fake out reunion/ realization, and she is promptly captured again. She is sold again, and misses her husband, and then although we donโt see what happens to her, she is once again back in the slave market, where she dreams of, you guessed it, JH, again, but no, that also is a fake out. Sheโs taken to the square where she sees him, but he not her. Then RE arrives and we get our first reunion of sortsโฆ and at this point the show appears to be building up this constant angst and near miss, in order to make the reunion that much more bittersweet.
But it canโt land properly now after youโve been dragging your audience around for however many episodes, and no matter how good either actor is at crying, soon, they are once again, pulled away from each other, literally this time, and then! reunited, and THEN, suddenly, pulled away from each other YET AGAIN, all within the space of half an episode, or whatever that was, this time, for the sake of a love triangle.
And then, I have said then so many times already, to top it all off, their โfinalโ reunion in this game of cat and mouse, results in, not even a proper reunion, but turns silly, and then before you know it, they are once again parted;
I could not find the first half of episode 15 amusing, because of how downright stupid it was. This man apparently spent 6 months, SIX, in bed, from sowing to harvest, pretending to be unconscious, so that Gil Chae would stay, leading her on emotionally, and for what, some cheap laughs, that arenโt even funny? So, there is no proper return on that reunion either, because it continues to drag it out for the bit, instead of developing anyone or anything properly.
For almost 6 episodes, the audience is dragged around as much as the characters, and this on the back of 10 episodes prior of another kind of constant back and forth-ing.
But where at least the beginning of that felt initially justified, this most certainly does not.
For what! And for why! In the end you are left wondering what the point in being invested in this couple is at all. If their story is even WORTH IT to be invested in, if there is no return of any kind.
The tragedy, as I feared in 9+0 cannot itself be a return either at this point.
Why should I keep watching?
But not only do the events of these episodes seem only intent on torturing the viewers, and the characters, repeatedly, in a self-flagellation loop, theyโre executed to the damage of and at the expense of the plot, the stakes and the character writing, and therefore the rest of the narrative development as well:
A good example of this in the editing and directing of the following.
Which one has more power and has more impact?
The scene of Eun Ae staring at her hands in horror and Gil Chae scrubbing her hands furiously like Lady Macbeth in the freezing cold winter night, death after life? and the scene of the womenโs headscarves floating on the sea and a long shot of a cliff??
or GC and Jong Jong fleeing from captivity, with haphazard scene cuts and incoherent shot framing, driven to the cliffs and then suddenly, rushed and physically seeing ladies jump to their deaths this time, and cut to see GC talk the others down, only to just be caught again (and donโt even get me started on whatever the hell that dialogue delivery and direction was.)??
I will give you a hint. Itโs not the latter.
This too, is disjointed from the story/history thing. It happened in history. We know that. Weโve seen it before. But what struggle is GC undergoing here? What personal character struggle is she facing specifically in this scene of her and JJ running away from the market? There isnโt actually any. There isnโt anything new that we donโt already know or that we havenโt already seen her do and seen her do more convincingly and that hasnโt already been better directed and written.
So, what purpose does this scene with her running and JH missing her and not actually seeing her YET AGAIN (for again, like the fifth fake out in a row) have in the actual story, both its place in history and its role as a story itself?
Nothing.
The only thing I could say is that it farther feeds into the plot once the Khan dies, and places them all in more of a political peril, but this too really only happens also, as I will farther discuss, to be conflict and suffering and separation for the sakes of those concepts alone, and nothing else.
I know that slaves were captured, and recaptured, and recaptured, and suffered badly. I also know that woman felt pushed to suicide to preserve their chastity. And I know that GC has the strength to survive and help others survive no matter what. Do you know how I know that? Because that was plot of episodes 4 through 6.
But I feel none of the stakes or the tension 11 through 16 wants me to feel. Time and time again.
The plot, of the second half of this show, does not feel like a parallel, or a callback. It is merely a static repetition.
Because, in the first six episodes, you felt that the characters were ACTIVE participants in the plot, and in a way that they would either experience ACTIVE development through the plot directly, then and there, or that as a result of what they were experiencing, this would lead to ACTIVE development.
But not only was there no direct pay off for that in the first half either, there is now a repetition of plot points, of conflict points, and of historic points, that donโt even set up anything, let alone go anywhere themselves.
And the characters, instead of being active participants, with active or a hoped-for active development, have become passive at best, and static themselves, at worst.
Instead of Jang Hyun becoming a more compassionate person to more people than those he immediately cares about, specifically Gil Chae, in a way that we see active change, like in my proposed alternative for 7-10 above, we are instead invited to accept this development in a passive way. Id Est, JHโs separation from GC, and his years in Qing, and his years in regret, have led to the desired change, rather than him being active in this change, by choosing it.
Similarly, we are led to accept Gil Chae would threaten the Princess for JH not because of any ACTIVE development between them as a couple at that point, but because of an almost deliberate lack of it?
But in turn, both of these characters also feel STATIC in development at the same time, and the conflicts used in attempt to drive their story, either more static repetition, or contrived, or both.
We know Jang Hyun would die for her. He almost died for her at the beginning, in fact he was nearer to death then than now apparently, if the dream was anything to go by, and we know he probably WILL die for her somehow eventually too: thatโs how this show opened. So, there are no stakes really, in that strange bet between the Princess and JH.
The only difference now is that GC is there to see him do it for her.
Between himself and her, he will always pick her. And even in the manipulative conflict in episode 16, he ultimate still pushes her back to Joseon for her sake, as well as the rest of the slaves, because of the Princessโ not so thinly veiled threats towards GC. But that itself falls back on static development, with them acting again, like they mean nothing to each other, and to let the other go, once again, with no proper communication, and once again lying to each other, like they did in 8, and in 9, and in 10.
JH himself says directly that there is nothing in his heart anymore, but then says GC is wrong when she asks if she is a burden to him, the same kind of bullshit they have been pulling since even episode 5.
Now, itโs not that passive development, canโt work. I suppose there are stories in which it would work best. But I feel that this show does a disservice to its story and its characters by maintaining this passive and static development.
Where are our leads at this point in the show? And why? If I am repeating things myself here itโs because these issues are all linked to each other and all in a way, one in the same.
This constant vicious plot cycle, not only makes you wonder what the point is emotionally, but also apparently whether it even has a point narratively.
Added to this, there are only three times that I can find in the last 6 episodes where this show bothered to try and continue any of the thematic motifs it set up in the first half of the show. And barely tried at that.
Where is the Red String of
FateFaith?!? Where is the dream about her intended husband? Where is the trust they had in each other? Where is the actual repairing of that trust? She finds out he was the one that saved them on the island like THAT? We have four episodes left, and four years before the Crown Prince gets murdered by his father (I think). What and how is JH leading the CP astray in any way that you didnโt better develop in the first half of the Godforsaken show? Where are them becoming better people FOR each other BECAUSE of each other because they met each other and because they are well suited to each other? Your passive leading to regressive development doesnโt frakking count!Quoting the writer herself here:
She wanted to impose the โhope and beautyโ of GWTW onto this era of Korean history? What hope? What beauty? Where? You are purposefully writing your characters into corners they cannot get out of and for what? โlyricism with tragedyโ? I have barely seen a lick of that in the second half. Did you forget your modus operandi?
Thus, the events of the last 6 episodes both have little to no stakes, and what stakes there are arenโt earnt. There is no true narrative development happening in them either- the character growth feels static, and our leads have reached no farther point in the story or their relationship really. There is no true plot development, instead repetition of previous ideas, with no added impact or meaning, which leaves them static as well.
And for 16 episodes we have been dragged around with our characters emotionally with no reward.
This is all related to why I called the use of the slavery plot in 11+12 originally, but now farther in 13 through 16, โmorbidโ. Because it felt like, after continuous episodes of this^, and 6 of the slavery plot specifically, that the show really only wanted to first, keep out OTP apart, and constantly, and on purpose, and second to make them suffer, for the sake of suffering itself.
Coincidentally, the exact same conclusion I reached about her marriage subplot.
But now it appears to me, that it is actually seeking to justify this, all of this, through history itself instead.
Itโs only justification for this, that I can perceive, other than licentiousness and a misplaced sense of how to maintain investment, is thatโฆ โHistory Sucked; specifically, this point in history. And it sucked a lot.โ (No, shit, Sherlock!)
It feels justified in writing the characters in a perpetual misery loop like this, that they cannot and will not ever get out of, that they are designed to never get out of, even in death, it feels justified in being this kind of constantly breaking down tragedy that I talk about and rejected in 9 and 10, because it wants to make a point about the suffering of the Joseon people under the Joseon ideology, during and after the Qing Invasion of 1639 and the effects of War. It is not interested in any kind of hopeful AND tragic, or poignant tale of romance otherwise, it is not interested in true character, plot or narrative development, and it sure as shit is not interested in any kind of transcending Thematic development, even though it set all of that up in the first 20 minutes.
But I didnโt come here to watch historic torture p0rn. I did not sign up for any kind of โRealisticโ Post War p0rn either.
And so, in an ironic twist, we have come from its integration and following of history being its greatest strength, to its greatest weakness.
Because as much as it would like to claim otherwise, it is NOT justified in doing this:
The Writer has betrayed herself.
Storytelling that is deliberately voyeuristic in order to attempt some kind of pathetic social commentary or historical criticism at the expense of the rest of its identity and purpose as a story, is both morbid and trashy, and contrived and manipulative, and I reject that as good storytelling.
.
.
.
word count (body of essay only): 4551
Elinor is trapped in the timeslip
October 29, 2023 at 12:48 AM
APPLAUSE
As the โhope and beautyโ of the GWTW era existed entirely in Margaret F*ing Mitchellโs head, Iโd say the writer has succeeded brilliantly in capturing that.
This might as well be the showโs title; โ์ฐ์ธ/Loversโ is misdirection verging on fraud. At this point Iโm watching with the same morbid interest I might take in an extensive scab thatโs just starting to heal.
I mean, of course Iโm watching to see amazing actors acting amazingly even when theyโre fighting their way through a maddeningly circular plot, because an opportunity to see NGM and company tear into roles like these doesnโt come around often, but how long can they keep rising above the preposterous Groundhog Day situations the writer has put them in? Will we see them give up and just phone it in when theyโre doing the same damned scenes with nearly identical dialogue over and over and over? Ironically the repetitiveness and lack of growth or resolution has taken me so far out of the story that Iโm noticing actors doing their work instead of characters being themselves.
The leads are at the mercy of a writer who has (what she thinks is) one good idea and keeps hammering at it without the ability to recognize that itโs become stale and that the angst beats no longer land because (a) we can see them coming a mile away and (b) weโre just numb because weโve been hit on the same spot so often. Spiral up, spiral down, I don’t care anymore but this is a closed loop going nowhere. In a weird way, this is starting to remind me of Extraordinary You where even self-aware characters cannot break free of the unimaginative manwha authorโs endless recycling of characters and plots. Every time they try, they just get dragged back into the frame by the heavy hand of the writer.
I did not realize JH spent six months in bed, pretending he still needed GCโs nursing – I thought it was somewhere between six days and six weeks. And he gets up and unwinds the bandages after all that time and still has those muscles? LOL. Oh well, a moment of fanservice is a respite from pain p()rn. And on the topic of fanservice, the obsessive jealous princess is insultingly unrealistic and out of place in this story and I refuse to engage with that nonsense no matter how much scope it gives NGM for glaring or looking anguished.
Reacting partly to your previous essay: I do wonder how much of my/our collective reaction to this show is shaped by the foundational notion that suffering is redemptive, either before or after death (which is not a part of my religious tradition but permeates my culture) and therefore when suffering neither redeems nor explores lack of redemption, but just IS, that is what renders it meaningless. If the show wants to give us ‘meaningless’ but realistic suffering such as occurred with mind-boggling frequency in Joseon, it should be a documentary. Storytelling needs meaning.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 1:27 AM
*snorts* Thank you.
It’s creeving infuriating isn’t it? “”Ironically the repetitiveness and lack of growth or resolution has taken me so far out of the story that Iโm noticing actors doing their work instead of characters being themselves.””
Multiple times this week I could only think “who even is Jang Hyun again” the character writing is that inconsistent. AEJ sobbing when she realises how much he’s done for her was brilliant work but I’m heartless and felt naught because I’m writing and character driven lmao.
Oh the EY comparison is so hilariously and ironically apt considering my reasons for hating that show hahaha bravo. 🤣🤣
I almost mentioned the state of his body but decided it was lesser titbit to the greater issue. And I’m estimating off what I know regarding other crops, but yeah if you plant in the Spring and Harvest in the Autumn then yes that’s about 6 effing months. I almost made a whole separate post just to rip that entire mess out.
💯 to the princess. I eyeroll my way through a lot of this now, can you tell.
“”therefore when suffering neither redeems nor explores lack of redemption, but just IS, that is what renders it meaningless. If the show wants to give us โmeaninglessโ but realistic suffering such as occurred with mind-boggling frequency in Joseon, it should be a documentary. Storytelling needs meaning.””
👏👏👏 Because Suffering itself needs meaning, yeah.
And the Death of Meaning should not be served.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 1:27 AM
>> As an example on the Capture feeling contrived front:
When the girls went to Ganghwa Island it felt like a logical narrative decision for multiple reasons: it was used similarly for conflict, yes, but it also made sense in that Ganghwa was known to be the safest place and nobody would assume otherwise at the time, and to show the trust between GC and JH and the result of that as well.
Ofc we as the viewer know because of history it was going to be a bad idea, but it’s not Illogical for that to happen within the story or within history.
So it made the plot point exciting and the story and the conflict was running parallel to history.
GC’s capture to Qing instead was merely “Yangban were captured – so she is going to be captured. She needs to get to Qing- so she will be kidnapped to Qing.”
Rather than it being properly integrated as I discuss properly in the essay.
Just wanted to add that example and comparison before I forgot about it again.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 29, 2023 at 4:58 AM
If I follow your logic, I could also say about the Ganghwa plot that is was just as illogical: “We have to show what happened on the island because you know, history….. so let’s send them there…but how?…oh, let’s have JH tell GC to go because we can’t think of any reason on how all 4 of them would end up on an island…and promise her that he will save her so he would have a reason to go also….and somehow he finds her dagger all the way in the manchu camp cause that is what manchu soldiers do, they collect daggers found on the beach… and thinks she is dead…but she isn’t….and he decides to go anyway even though he thinks she is dead…but he just happenes to see her in that particular moment in the forest….and he goes on and fights 17 freaking blood drinking soldiers…and she kind of sees him but….doesn’t, because he hides…all to be separated again and again…and more angst and mistrust….
The problem with getting kidnapped is…you don’t know you’re getting kidnapped, it just happens, so I don’t see how she could prepare us or to show anything about the 2 leads because the reason of the kidnapping has nothing to do with them but with the events in the history. So it was a paralel to the history of that moment and had the right to be introduced in the story just as well as the Ganghwa plot.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 10:51 AM
I guess.
I just felt that Ganghwa made more sense overall because Ganghwa was a place that refugees fled too and JH in trying to keep them safe sent them there too, because he knew that.
They ended up on the island because they needed some place safe from the war. So for me there was more narrative justification link is my argument.
She could always have not used kidnapping????
And I disagree there couldn’t have been a way to set that up smoother.
I don’t mind the dagger cos it’s a thematic motif.
If my example argument doesn’t land, then stick with my intiial one haha.
The kidnapping not having anything to do with them but ONLY history is EXACTLY my point. She’s telling a story too, set in history, not just history.
I’ve already argued my points about narrative interaction with history and the end result of this that the drama ends up at, in the main essay though so I won’t repeat them here.
Kurama
October 29, 2023 at 4:13 AM
I lost interest in the couple since a long time now. So in te first part, I liked it because they spend a lot of time separated.
But now, the writer wants to get them back and my issue is that I don’t like the characters when they’re together. I don’t buy their big love for each other. I don’t like how the characters act and the actors to be honest. I don’t like when Ahn Eun-Jin talks with this little voice that must be sounded as noble woman I guess. She’s far more interesting when she slapped the guy in the street.
They finally can spend time together and his first reaction is to lie about the gravity of his wounds… It’s not romantic but childish and stupid…
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 11:02 AM
I didn’t really feel the same way you did say the beginning as you know, because I genuinely hoped then in the potential I could see in the story.
But now I comisserate with you mich more lmao.
Childish and Stupid and Ridiculous 💯💯. Neither that or the “sexy” kiss scene was romantic to me.
kiara
October 29, 2023 at 7:33 AM
“…great disappointment, although not much surprise, at how far from grace what couldโve been my favourite drama of the year has fallen.”
Disappointment is putting it mildly.
I didn’t see the point of her getting married. She was financially independent, and since when did she care about her reputation and being an old maid? Just because women were suppressed in that era doesn’t mean they were helpless. The crown princess is an example of women using their talents and willpower to survive, whether in Qing or Joseon.
Although the acting is excellent and the history fascinating, the sense of magic and hope I felt in part 1 vanished.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 29, 2023 at 9:11 AM
I remember clearly that she dreamed a lot about meeting her future husband. And that she even dreamed in episode 4 to be rescued by him. And to almost getting married in the first episodes. And so on and so on with her first “love”. Yes, she didn’t care about what people thought of her as long as she got what she wanted. She wanted a marriage to a noble dude, she got it and paid for it. Well, almost. And she was not that independent, she relied on her husband help and she probably felt that she owned him a lot for his help.
I don’t know if a married crown princess and all the advantages and protection that comes with that title is a fitting example. She was, after all, just a mere country daughter of a school.
kiara
October 29, 2023 at 10:52 AM
Comment was deleted
kiara
October 29, 2023 at 10:54 AM
*sigh* I didnโt think to copy my reply since it was not an essay, but it disappeared.
@Kodra
Yes, he helped her, and she swallowed her pride and accepted it because she didnโt want to starve to death or her family.
They became business partners when she changed the forge into a successful business. The only thing he did was give her permission to use his family forge, and she did all the work. He was able to earn money from her ideas and hard work. She married him because she thought Jang Hyun was dead.
I agree that the crown princess has advantages, but as a mere country daughter (as you put it), her experience and talents helped feed and free some of her people.
How can common people not relate to that?
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 29, 2023 at 7:27 PM
I thought that I made my point of why she did care about her reputation and being an old maid. And how much she wanted to get married. That’s why she got married, to secure her and her loved ones future. I don’t think those times allowed for a woman to be financially independent, as you put it. She was the one that clinged to that era’s morals and traditions. JH, on the other hand, didn’t and that is why she refused him even though she felt otherwise. I am sure some do not embrace the fact that here we have a FL not being the “feminist” we are used to in the recent dramas, but one that adheres to the rules of “patriarchy”. She doesn’t even question it. It is because of his love that she finds the courage to even ask for divorce. For me is one of the reasons I watched the show because is so uncommon in dramas these days.
“Just because women were suppressed in that era doesnโt mean they were helpless. The crown princess is an example of women using their talents and willpower to survive, whether in Qing or Joseon.”
Sure, but the crown princess was married, LOL. Without her husband’s position she would not have had those accomplishments. How can common people relate to that? That she, unlike others, in fact did her job of protecting “her” people? Maybe. Maybe that is why GC married also, because she had a very good example that she could relate to. But then you don’t like the fact that GC got married…It just doesn’t make sense to me what you are trying to say.
kiara
October 30, 2023 at 12:35 AM
You’d be surprised when you do research you’d find women in this era who were financially independent. Some were born from poor families or slaves in the gibang, etc.
“Sure, but the crown princess was married, LOL. Without her husband’s position, she would not have had those accomplishments.”
Are you for real?
Married or not, women looked up to her as the future mother of the nation. She was a complete woman with talents before she married the Crown Prince. She was put in a situation where she could utilize her abilities and show her love for her people, even with the drama diminishing her accomplishments. She is being shoved to the side so GC can be the one to get her hands dirty. (Historically, it was her idea to do farming to make money to buy their people who were sold in the slave market and send them home. She worked on the farm with her people and more.)
I can’t articulate my point correctly regarding GC’s marriage, so that’s on me. You can laugh at me for that.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 30, 2023 at 4:54 AM
@kiara
I thought that women could not own properties at that time, hence my statement. How could they have been truly independent in that era? I am not saying that they were not capable if allowed, because they were just as capable as women in our times.
You said that GC should have taken an example from her. In your words:
“Just because women were suppressed in that era doesnโt mean they were helpless. The crown princess is an example of women using their talents and willpower to survive, whether in Qing or Joseon.”
Well, the crown princess was not that helpless. Nor suppressed, for that matter, because she was allowed to mingle in state affairs by her husband. Again, I am not saying that she was not a capable woman, but those were the times. She was not put in that position on her own, her husband was and she made the best of it. You gave her as an example for SINGLE women at that time to follow, that statement I have an issue with.
I am sorry to say but I do not share your enthusiasm for the couple since they did come from a privileged position. Sure, I see them in a better light than most, but I am not infatuated with them like you all are. Yes, they helped the captured people from Qing but they still came to be in that position in a country that suppresed most of its people back in Joseon. And I certainly do not see in good light his opening to foreigners influence as something positive and I see it as being a tool for quiet foreign invasion and economic pludgering later on. I very much support change that comes from within a country, that is real change. And I certainly do not share the introduction of foreign values and religion in another country, by force or by other clever means because that also introduces the economic control of that country later on.
And we did not know what they could truly would have accomplished once they took the throne, the compromises they would have had to make. The country was still ruled by the crazy fractions and they failed their first true test by not gather enough support or enough protection from the Qing.
kiara
October 30, 2023 at 6:17 PM
Have you heard of Gim Man-deok? Read her story. She didn’t have to own a property to be independent.
Do we only relate to people like us?
I have a hard time explaining my thoughts in my 3rd language, and I’m tired. Maybe I’ll revisit your post later because you do have a lot of valid things to share, and I’m being defensive, too.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 30, 2023 at 9:14 PM
@kiara
I didn’t know about Gim Man-deok so I googled her and I could only find her wiki page in english, most were in korean, from which I found out that:
“She managed to achieve her position in Jeju thanks to the island’s egalitarian and matrifocal culture, where women had greater economic and social independence than the rest of the country, whose Neo-Confucian ideology enforced strong female repression.”
I don’t know if it is true since is wiki and I have no knowledge why in Jeju island women had more freedom. But my argument still stands when it comes to 17th century mainland Joseon, unless you meant that GC should have gone to Jeju island and be an independent single woman there at the end of 18th century.
But thanks for letting me know about Gim Man-deok, she was indeed a remarkable woman. I’ll see if I could find more info about her life and watch the drama about her.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 10:59 AM
But the point of the Husband Dream is that it is Jang Hyun… See my second subpoint about her marriage plot.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 29, 2023 at 7:35 PM
Yes, we know. And the dream is still happening, she is almost at the beach where he has been waiting for her. He has always loved her, she had to do a lot of “running” to come to that conclusion.
But I was making another point to Kiara, the one that she always wanted to be a married woman and not an old maid.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 29, 2023 at 7:48 PM
About her marriage plot…
That is the whole story. A married woman finds love and hope after being captive and abandoned by her husband. It said so in all the synopsis, we just chose to ignore it.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
November 1, 2023 at 2:08 PM
Then we’re back to my first “essay” after 9+10 and how I think the writing of the show itself in the first half set up for something different from this professed plot and synopsis.
I also have a habit of thinking that just because a show thinks it should do something, doesn’t mean it actually should for the best story or for its characters. ๐
Kodra aka Qanon something
November 2, 2023 at 5:43 PM
@sicarius
I am sorry that you see the show this way for some time now. For me it has many parallels with the world I grew up in and it has different meanings that I care and relate with.
You can be “back” to that essay, I certainly am not (and I do not belong in “the audience” you have been talking about in the second one, also). The first half set up the characters and the backstory for the main one. That you don’t like the main story, I understand. But to not get it at all, not so much, more so because I do enjoy how you write.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
November 2, 2023 at 8:07 PM
Thank you!
I “get” the main story you speak about fine.
I just don’t think it’s objectively good story telling, and I disagree that, whatever you think is the main story, should’ve been the main story, is all I guess.
But perhaps you can clarify more about what you mean here.
Kodra aka Qanon something
November 3, 2023 at 3:14 AM
@sicarius
The marriage. You called it a subplot, something that was not needed among many, many other things. You wrote that “their entire relationship development shouldโve happened completely differently and with no GWTW and with no first husband”. The marriage is the whole point of the story, whether you like it or not, and is the point from which everything flows. And it didn’t follow GWTW in this aspect, the beginning did to hook us for the marriage and for what’s to come. And not the marriage per se, but the fact that she is/was a married woman and how she recovered and found love and hope in those cruel times, even if only for a short time if JH will end up dead, after being abandoned for reasons that she had no control of. You say that her capture is contrived and it was only to drive GC to JH. But if the marriage and the love she has even after her abandoment are the center point of the story, then I beg to differ. I can even say that the reason JH was sent to S city in the story to begin with is because GC was suppose to come there eventually to be abandoned and not the other way around.
I could go more in depth but time is not on my side. And there is really no need for because if you don’t get the marriage thing and think about it as a subplot still at episode 16 then you don’t get what this story is about.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
November 5, 2023 at 6:05 PM
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๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
November 5, 2023 at 6:46 PM
I think we’re going round in circles.
I think the story should’ve been, imperatively, objectively, NOT the one we got.
I’ve written two essays to try and explain why. If you don’t get ME by that point, and think I still don’t get you (or the story apparently), that is what it is, but oh well. Thanks for participating in this thread anyway. 🖤
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 11:05 AM
I saved my vitriol for the essay ๐
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 5:13 PM
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๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 5:23 PM
Lol woops I was two years off in my timeline; we only have two years now before the Prince dies not 4, but oh well.
Kodra aka Qanon something
October 29, 2023 at 8:17 AM
“Quoting the writer herself here:
She wanted to impose the โhope and beautyโ of GWTW onto this era of Korean history? What hope? What beauty? Where? ”
Hope that a lot of those women not only survived but found love. Hope that there were, even in those times, men like JH ( and Rhett Butler ) that went against the current and loved and cherished women considered “tainted” by society. And that is beautiful.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 10:57 AM
What hope can I take from the love story when it only intent on torturing them despite this? It doesn’t seem like it is really telling their love story but rather their failed love story. Their hope in love has transcended nothing so far.
And what beauty can I find in JH’s character when they refuse to develop him or his committment properly or provide him with coherent growth?
That IS beautiful, I agree, and I like that he has always stood up against that, yes, but the story has to be more than just saying that.
The execution should echo the message.
I don’t think it has achieved either of these things in a way that is truly satisfying narratively and right now only seems intent on killing any true hope it might pretend to profess.
I don’t think it is transcending is tragedy and I take issue with that.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 11:15 AM
Or for that matter, what hope in love do they actually have? The show hasn’t developed that, it’s spent 16 episodes of them walking round in circles lying to each other, even by the end of the stint in Qing; there is, as I have said, no true return.
If they made any progress at all it is both incoherent, and back to square one by the end of 16.
“In the end you are left wondering what the point in being invested in this couple is at all.”
Mrs Buckwheat
October 29, 2023 at 5:50 PM
Well said.
I too am feeling very, very fatigued of being “dragged” through the “angst, misery, pain p–n” and “continued repetitionย loop- with no pay off” whatsoever.ย We have watched over 16 hours without one honest conversation or any straightforward communication between our leads. I’m resigned to the fact that this is not first and foremost a romance. I only wish it had been clearer from the start then my expectationsย would not have been so high.ย
As much as I love watching both lead actors, maybe this would have been better as 16 episodes to get rid of a lot of frustrating crap that has deviated from the tighter first half of the show.ย
Third time trying to post for an apparently inappropriate word ๐
Hwaiting.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 29, 2023 at 5:59 PM
But the start had 3 intros, and two of them were literally all this imagery about the ROMANCE. I don’t think it’s entirely our fault for expecting different and more of this show.
Yes, p0rn is apparently now an IW, I had to search through almost all of my 4500 words to find the offending thing when first posting this lmao.
angelshadows50
October 30, 2023 at 2:06 AM
Hi, @sicarius, I am seeing your post this morning. It’s always good to have something to take as starting point for a commentary, so I do not feel insulted or anything of that sort. I want to study your argumentation in detail, which will take a while (currently my day life is extremely full). Thanks for the thoughtful and lengthy commentary.
๐๐โ Sicarius The Queen of Melonia โ ๐๐
October 30, 2023 at 2:40 AM
Hello! Thank you and No worries! Take your time! I’m probably gonna take a break from dB later this week anyway, kinda commented out haha
angelshadows50
October 30, 2023 at 9:44 AM
Commented out … ! very good expression ๐