Reaction Shot: The Untamed S01E02 (or, JIĀNG CHÉNG WHAT HAPPENED!)

[spindizzy]

I am reliably informed by my friends who have seen The Untamed the whole way through that you can actually just skip the first two episodes and then come back to them in like thirty episodes because they're set in a different time period. I can confirm that the show still works if you don't watch the second episode, because guess which potato didn't see the second episode before her friends started the third and just sorta rolled with it!

(It was me, I was that potato.)

• I feel very bad that I can never remember what the introduction to The Untamed sounds like, because my brain has found and replaced all show openings with We Won't Be Falling. I can only explain this as "My useless goblin brain can't remember music, only songs." See also: apparently the Jurassic Park theme is iconic or something, but the only way that I can remember it is to sing "Holy shit, fucking dino-saurs, better run fooooooor your liiiiiiiiiiiiife~!"


• (... I have no idea where I got that from, btw, because I checked the song I THOUGHT it was from and it's not there, so ???????)


• The scenery is so beautiful in this show. Also I refuse to believe that Wèi Wúxiàn got to walk along that shoreline without Little Apple trying to push him in. It is not possible.


• ... I WAS SO SURE THAT IT WAS GOING TO BE THE JUNIORS THERE! I should obviously have realised my mistake when they started complaining, because obviously the Lán Sect would never.


• v, who has been dead for sixteen years: Better put my mask back on so these strangers don't realise that I'm the Yíling Patriarch!


• Thing that I didn't realise: Dafan Mountain is the site of MULTIPLE problems in The Untamed! Not just the one! ... Holy shit they can't have Lán Zhán discover Wèi Wúxiàn is alive yet, it's only episode two, I'm not ready!


• Wait, he has a compass that detects monsters?! That's really cool!


• Wèi Wúxiàn: *SPIT TAKE over people using his compass and calling him their idol*


• It has been two (2) episodes and sixteen years, and I'm still not over the hypocrisy of the Cultivation world, hello.


• Bless this girl helping Wèi Wúxiàn bribe his donkey, that's very kind of her! (Something horrible is going to happen to her and I'll be cross.) But lo, Little Apple gets its name, and Wèi Wúxiàn finally figures out how to bribe a fusspot donkey! Happy ending for everyone!


• I wasn't expecting her to show up there – oh, no, there we go, here is the inevitable possession. I knew something terrible was going to happen to her.


• Me, knowing what the statue of Danfan Mountain looks like: ... Welp.


• I'M SURE THESE NET TRAPS ARE PERFECTLY FINE AND NOTHING IS GOING TO GO WRONG HERE.


• JĪN LÍNG! Oh my god you somehow looks twice as bratty and half as old as I expected, how did that even happen.


• Wèi Wúxiàn, who knows how much spirit nets cost: ... Typical.


• IT NEVER OCCURRED TO ME THAT JĪN LÍNG WOULD BE IN THE JIN CLAN'S COLOURS. OH NO.


• What a little shit.


• Little Apple clearly understands people, it just doesn't care.


• Wèi Wúxiàn: I don't know who this is, but this is bad.
  Me, having read the character label: OH IT IS EVEN WORSE THAN YOU THINK.


• If they're removing all of the references to people being queer, what exactly is Mò Xuányǔ's crime? ... Also seriously my dude, you could have just not worn the mask and then you wouldn't have this problem! How many people are going to know what the Yílíng Patriarch looks like!


• (His voice sounds deeper when he's snarking at Jīn Líng and this is distressing because I like it.)


• "I can see you lack some maternal education." ... Holy fuck, when Wèi Wúxiàn realises who Jīn Líng is he's going to regret that so much.


• Wèi Wúxiàn, you have been here for five minutes and you're already fighting a clan and cramming your feet so far into your mouth that you might never get them out.


• Wèi Wúxiàn: I know that voice.
  Wèi Wúxiàn: I know that sword.
  Wèi Wúxiàn: I know those colours.
  Wèi Wúxiàn: Oh my fucking god I know who you are and I regret my entire life.


• THIS IS SO WEIRD TO WATCH AFTER HAVING SEEN JIĀNG CHÉNG IN THE FLASHBACK EPISODES, BECAUSE LOOK AT THIS COLD MOTHERFUCKER. If you'd told me that the Jiāng Chéng we meet in episode three is this guy, I wouldn't have believe you. Or rather, I would have, but with quite a lot of "HOW?!"


• He doesn't even check on Jīn Líng before he starts sneering, how has Jiāng Chéng become his mother like this.


• (Please picture me tabbing over to ask Team Sparkle Rocket WHAT THE FUCK every thirty seconds because that's what's happening right now.)


• Oh fuck, is Jiāng Chéng going to recognise the paper doll, because if he does this jig is UP.


• ... That paper doll doesn't want to go.


• Jiāng Chéng how are you this horrible. How did this happen, how are you encouraging your nephew to commit murdHOLY SHIT IT'S LÁN ZHÀN, WHAT, NO, WHAT, EXPLAIN.


• This episode had better be Wèi Wúxiàn assiduously avoiding Lán Zhàn for the next thirty minutes of its run time because if they do the whole THING with Wēn Níng and Lán Zhàn right now I am straight up going to expire.


• Wèi Wúxiàn: *CONTINUES TO REGRET HIS ENTIRE LIFE*


• I do not trust that light, floaty music that rocks up whenever the Lán Sect does, because I keep expecting it to drop into boss music with no warning.


• Jiāng Chéng looks like saying Lán Zhán's name burns his tongue and the only way to soothe it is with acid politeness. Why is he being Madame Yu's son like this. He survived being her son without being her for so many years, what happened during that flashback.


• ... Is he trying to suggest something about Lán Zhan's travelling around "looking for someone", when Jiāng Chéng is the one who's KNOWN to be specifically searching for the Yílíng Patriarch's body?! And he's asking these questions with such a sneer on his face, like he knows that he's just poking at an open wound with a stick!


• The Juniors trying to defend Lán Zhàn is very sweet! Especially because when aggression doesn't work, pointing out that Jin Líng is blatantly cheating is the immediate fall-back step.


• LÁN SĪZHUĪ CONTINUES TO BE TOO GOOD FOR THESE PEOPLE.


• Lán Zhàn is so unimpressed with literally everything, I love him.


• Jin Líng is a cocky little shit and I genuinely can't tell if he sparks joy or not. Do I blame Jiāng Chéng for this? The Jin family? The ghost of abusive families past?


• LÁN ZHÀN HAS DECLARED THAT JIN LÍNG DOES NOT SPARK JOY AND THIS DELIGHTS ME MAINLY BECAUSE AWWWW, LOOK AT HIM FOLLOWING IN HIS OTHER UNCLE'S FOOTSTEPS.


• ... Oh god Wèi Wúxiàn is his uncle and I have just had a feelings bomb go off in my heart about how many people here have complicated feelings tied up in the children in this scene and I can't. Oh no.


• Lán Sizhui: Don't worry, the spell is not damaging.
  Jiāng Chéng, who spend his time in the Cloud Recesses watching Wèi Wúxiàn being put under the silence spell at least once a day:


• Look at Jīn Líng because a puffy little stormcloud there, that's adorable!


• The face that Jiāng Chéng makes when he hears people yelling for him and that "What's the bad news now?" are excellent.


• LÁN ZHÀN DID YOU JUST DESTROY ALL OF THE NETS BECAUSE JIĀNG CHÉNG WAS BEING A DICK. SERIOUSLY. ALL OF THEM.


• Wèi Wúxiàn: *trying very hard not to cackle in the background*


• Seriously I know that I've watched the flashback episodes and thus know What Lán Zhàn Was Like As A Youth, but seriously he is as much of a little shit as Wèi Wúxiàn, just quieter about it.


• Jiāng Chéng: *starts fiddling with his magic whip*
  Lán Zhàn: *watches this without a single fuck to give*


• WOW, he tells Jīn Líng not to come home if he doesn't beat the monster, and Lán Zhàn tells the kids to do their bests but not put themselves in any danger and I just! ONE OF THESE MEN IS A GOOD MENTOR AND IT IS NOT THE PERSON WHO GREW UP WITH A SEMI-FUNCTIONING FAMILY AND THE ABILITY TO EXPRESS HIS EMOTIONS.


• They offer to return the nets! That's so kind! And such a fuck you offer!


• I love that Wéi Wúxiàn spent that entire confrontation behind a tree panicking and praying that no one spotted him, because that might genuinely have been the worst point in time for anyone to recognise him. ... Although as soon as he breathed that sigh of relief I was expecting Lán Zhàn to walk out from behind a tree and shit me up.


• Bless this actor doing so much with that awful mask on.


• Oh no, this reflection of recriminations and guilt is terrible. Oh no. And his happy smile before he remembers that they're not real. ;_;


• Wéi Wúxiàn gets so much of people's backstory from overhearing gossip. Also I retract my statement about him needing the mask, because I saw him lying down to nap without it on and was immediately like "DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH OF A BAD IDEA THAT IS?! ... I want him to get a different mask, is what I'm saying here. If that's the only way people are recognising him as Mò Xuányu, that should probably ALSO go.


• ... He straight up just slapped himself across the face for the way he talked to Jīn Líng. Oh no.


• Hey, the donkey found him! Where's your possessed lady friend, Apple?


• Lán Jingyi and Lán Sizhui are incredibly good cop/bad cop, aren't they?


• That man reads like the ghost of a caretaker, ngl. Like straight-up "I have been here for a hundred years tending these graves and just never noticed that I was dead" levels of ghost-caretaker.


• NO YOU SHOULD NOT, DO NOT VISIT THE DANCING FAIRY STATUE IN THE TEMPLE AT THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN. LÁN SIZHUI YOU STOP THAT RIGHT NOW.


• OF COURSE THE CHILDREN LEAVE BEFORE HE REMEMBERS THE PLOT POINT. OH NO.


• When he said "soul gathering grass" I genuinely expected this to turn into grass trying to eat the donkey's soul, and then I got distracted by "Wait, do donkeys have souls?" so that's how my evening's going.


• ... Why are there so many dead cultivators here OH WAIT FUCK I REMEMBER, GOD DAMMIT BIG BAD.


• Oh, the way that everything receded and moved forward at the same time there is cool! And look at the way that we get introduced to Wen Qing as an important character! And him finally recognising why that dance looked familiar!


• Old man: *immediately disappears because he's a creepy suspicious ghost monster*


• Listen, anyone who isn't a named character is at risk of being eaten, I'm calling it now.


• Does EVERYONE have a magic compass?!


• Ah, the two approaches of rival clans.
  Lán: *talks about its history and how suspicious it is that the temple's empty*
  Jiang: IF THIS IS A WISH-GRANTING TEMPLE THEN I WISH THE MONSTER WOULD SHOW UP TO FIGHT ME RIGHT NOW.


• The statue when it's a prop looks fine! The statue when it's a creature looks like Ray Harryhausen has gotten back up to work again! No I do not take criticism, I am correct in all things.


• Everyone: *immediately draws their swords to fight the stone monster*
  Wèi Wúxiàn: DID ANYONE HEAR ME TELLING YOU ALL TO LEAVE BEFORE THE SOUL-EATING STATUE GETS YOU?


• He is the best senpai and I love and respect him for chasing the children out and asking them to summon the adults despite his own misgivings. Also I don't care how old he's supposed to be right now in canon, he's acting like a middle-aged uncle and I adore him for it.


• I really want every single AU/sequel fic where Wèi Wúxiàn actually gets to be a teacher. He loves telling people things! He finds way for them to reason problems out themselves! He would take them on night hunts and do ridiculous things to make sure that everyone got back safely! The Lán Sect would hate him because he is word-perfect on the letter of the law and gives no fuck about the spirit, but he would get such results!


• ... Listen, every time a narrative goes "This person has phenominal cosmic power and has committed more than a few murders, but they have students to protect now and anyone who messes with the kids is going to die," I lie on the floor and flail weakly because I love that trope.


• Wèi Wúxiàn: ... Shit, I forgot that I wasn't supposed to be competent.


• Well, this is absolutely a showdown in the café, RIP those staff members.


• HOW DO YOU KNOW SHE'S WEAK? FUCK OFF.


• Look at him giving the kids enough to clues to draw their own conclusions!


• God dammit Jīn Líng.


• ... No, wait, I take it back, he wasn't the one being chased by monsters.


• I TAKE BACK MY TAKING IT BACK, HE HAS THE OPPORTUNITY TO CALL THE ADULTS AND DECIDES NOT TO BECAUSE HIS SHITTY UNCLE TOLD HIM TO BEAT THE MONSTER OR NOT COME BACK AT ALL.


• Wèi Wúxiàn stealing a sword is hot. No I do not take constructive criticism.


• I'm very irked that Jīn Líng is actually competent. Like, it's GOOD that he's competent! But also he's a little shit and I'm annoyed that I like him.


• The CGI! Is so bad!


• HOW DID YOU WHITTLE A FLUTE WITH A SWORD


• Everyone who doesn't know what Wèi Wúxiàn is up to: Really dude?! Right now?!


• Heeeeey I recognise that shot from the opening credits.


• WĒN NÍNG!


• HOLY FUCK I WASN'T EXPECTING WĒN NÍNG'S CORPSE GENERAL LOOK TO BE SO GOOD?!?!?!


• Wēn Níng: *is too pretty to give a single fuck*


• Wèi Wúxiàn: THIS IS NOT WHAT I PLANNED FOR TODAY


• Cultivators: It's okay! The Yílíng Patriarch isn't here!
  Yílíng Patriarch:


• I AM DISAPPOINTED IN ALL OF YOU GOING FOR WĒN NÍNG. HE IS A BEAUTIFUL SUNSHINE WHO DESERVES BETTER.


• Jīn Líng: HANG ON A MINUTE I KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON HERE


• I love those chain weapons he has, and the way that Wèi Wúxiàn's clothes are billowing.


• HOLY SHIT IT'S THIS SONG! THAT MANAGED TO BE SIGNIFICANT AND MEMORABLE ENOUGH THAT I RECOGNISED IT! THIS IS AN ACHIEVEMENT.


• LÁN ZHÀN AND WĒI WÚXIÁN HAVE MET AND I WAS RIGHT THAT I WASN'T READY. LOOK AT THAT, LOOK AT LÁN ZHÀN GRABBING HIM AND NOT LETTING GO EVEN WHEN WĒI WÚXIÁN STARTS PLAYING AGAIN. LOOK AT WĒI WÚXIÁN GRABBING HOLD OF HIS WRIST AS WELL.


• FUCK'S SAKE JIĀNG CHÉNG YOU CAN'T JUST ATTACK PEOPLE IN THE FUCKING ROAD.


• "People say you killed him yourself." WOW. Straight for the heart there. Oh my god.


• ... Did he literally just pass out to avoid answering any questions.


• LOOK AT THESE BEAUTIFUL HAPPY NERDS, OH MY GOD, HOW I AM EXPECTED TO DEAL WITH HOW MUCH THEY LOVE AND TEASE EACH OTHER WHEN I KNOW HOW HORRIBLE EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE FOR THEM. I AM WEAK.


• Jiāng Chéng: *tries to be a responsbile adult*
  Wèi Wúxiàn: *immediately steals Jiāng Yànlí*


• "He will definitely make trouble at the Cloud Recesses." Jiāng Chéng has no idea how right he is.


• ... I can't believe that they got "Lán Zhàn will fight anyone to protect Wèi Wúxiàn" into the second episode. How could they do this, this is terrible, my poor heart can't take this.


• I went from watching this episode for the reaction shot straight to watching 19 and 20 with the group and now my heart hurts because LOOK AT THESE PRECIOUS BABIES FROM THE TIME THAT THEY WERE HAPPY, LOOK AT THEM. AND LOOK AT WHERE THEY END UP. ;_______________________;