So I was watching Guardian, as you do, and decided that since none of the episodes had titles* it would be a good idea for me to make a quick word doc of what happens in each episode so I could go back and rewatch things at my leisure.
And then it… morphed. And grew. And got a little sarcastic.
SPOILERY MCSPOILERS BENEATH THE CUT
*It turns out the episodes do have titles, I just didn’t know it, and they are AMAZING TITLES, and you can find them here.
This list is epic poetry of singular beauty and I adore it:
“Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei use a hostage negotiation as an opportunity to discuss Dixing educational reform“
“Chu and Guo have to huddle together for warmth because this is Due South 1994″
“Shen Wei being swoony tied to a pillar.“
“The lollipop that launched 10,000 years of pining”
“Lin Jing wonders why it’s suddenly raining professors”
I love this show, you guys. So much. SO much.
Tag: guardian
Today’s Guardian-related breakdown:
In the drama, Young Shen Wei’s face is so expressive that he wears a mask so his enemies won’t know how scared he is.
By the time we meet him as Professor Shen, he has so much control he doesn’t need one.
During a bank robbery you’re surprised when the criminals seem to recognize you and retreat in fear. Only later do you learn that your high school sweet-heart now runs a global crime syndicate and has you placed on a “No Harm” list. You decide to pay them a visit after all these years.
“You’re…turning yourself in,” Zhao Yunlan repeats, staring at the guy who shot him in the arm during last week’s bank robbery.
“Yes,” the man says earnestly. And then, in a rush, “I am so sorry for firing at you, Chief Zhao! I swear I didn’t mean to injure you! I’m a terrible shot! I didn’t think I would hit you! You have to believe me!”
Da Qing blinks at the man, incredulous. “So you came back to Dragon City to turn yourself in, even though you already fled the country, because you felt guilty?”
The man nods vigorously. “Yes! That’s the only reason! There are no other reasons!”
“Yeah, because that does not sound suspicious at all,” Zhao Yunlan mutters. “What happened to your face?” he asks, eyeing the bruises. He’s pretty sure the man had also been limping when Chu Shuzhi brought him into the interrogation room.
“Nothing! No-one hit me or threatened to kill me slowly if I didn’t come back!” the man says in a hurry, and then winces. “Please don’t ask me any more questions, and just lock me up, I am begging you.”
Zhao Yunlan eyes him for a long moment.
Although it doesn’t happen very often, this isn’t the first time something like that has happened. It is, however, the first time they’ve managed to bag someone so loose-lipped. There’s no reason why Yunlan can’t make good use of this situation and fish for some answers.
“Does this have anything to do with…the Black Cloaked Envoy?”
The man’s face turns pale. “I’ve already learnt my lesson, Chief Zhao. I will never forget your face, and I will never, ever, ever mess around in your jurisdiction again.” He drops to his knees. “Please don’t make him kill me,” he whispers, terrified.
Guardian Fic, Chapter 1/?
With a Twist of the Kaleidoscope by Naye
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences (for now…)
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Shěn Wēi/Zhào Yúnlán
Characters: Shěn Wēi, Zhào Yúnlán, Dà Qìng, Yè Zūn, The SID Team
Additional Tags: Established Relationship, Angst with a Happy Ending, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, (…yeah the established relationship comes before the pining and slow burn), Mind Manipulation, Hurt/Comfort, Alternate Universe – Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe – Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Overthinking Guardian canon, Good thing fic has an unlimited f/x budget, word count: 50k-100k
Summary:
Ye Zun tries a different tactic to defeat his brother, that may tear apart everything Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan have worked to build between them.
“Trust me,” Zhao Yunlan says.
Shen Wei actually huffs at him, as if he is being so patently ridiculous that fear-tinged fury would be too dignified an answer. “How can I trust you?”
***
And so it begins… The final line here was the third #fictober18 prompt, and quite derailed my participation in that particular project. Because apparently you can’t just write a nice angsty scene with no explanation or resolution and leave it at that?
“But @xparrot ,” I tried to argue. “If I do that I’m going to end up writing a fix-it for the entire show!”
Somehow that wasn’t a persuasive enough argument not to write, and here I am, over 60k words deep
and ready to drag everyone down with me. And how is it going? Well, good enough to win such praise as “you managed to make this at least 80% less stupid than it is in the show!”
[Guardian ficlet] On the superiority of cats
A thing that is now happening: arguing tiny points of characterization – actually, not even that, just a random background details? – by ficlet. Here’s my contribution, and @xparrot had better post hers soon because it is adorable and breaks my heart. (I am maybe even willing to concede the point because it’s so good!)
“Hey Da Qing, it says here that cats can’t see color,” Yunlan says, frowning.
“They can’t.”
“But you can!”
“Yashou see color.”
“Oh. Okay. Well – do you know why cats like to knead things with their paws? It says that perhaps, um. Yeah, they don’t really know?”
“It feels good,” Da Qing says with a sniff. “Why else would you do it?”
“Mm, I don’t know. It says cats rub their faces on things to make them smell like them…?”
“And it feels good when things smell like you. Right?”
Yunlan giggles. “Da Qing. Humans can’t smell stuff like that!”
“Really?! But I thought that’s why you kept stealing my blanket! Because you wanted it to smell more like you.”
“Da Qing. We only have one blanket. It’s not your blanket.”
“I put my smell on it the night we got it from Mrs Wang!”
“How was I supposed to know?!”
Da Qing huffs. “Your sense of smell really is pathetic.”
“That’s because I only have… Let’s see. What did they say? Oh yeah. Five million smell-things. Um. Those.”
“And cats?” Da Qing asks, smug.
“Up to – 80 million?! Wow. That’s a lot.”
Da Qing preens. “Cats really are superior in every way,” he says.
“You sleep on average sixteen hours a day,” Yunlan retorts.
“See,” Da Qing says. “Superior.”
I have finished watching Guardian and sweet damn. You were right about everything! Their relationship is so compelling that I watched 40 episodes of trash plot and it was WORTH IT.
I know, I know!!! Isn’t it just? It reminds me of fanning on shows in the ‘90s, there is so much ridiculous dumb chaff to skim through and forget – but the character stuff is SO good. And there’s so much of it, too, just, their faces, in like any scene they’re together…
(If you’re not on it already, the novel is definitely worth checking out; the plot’s better, the side characters are more appealing, and Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan are arguably even more in love…though it would be an argument, because, as mentioned, their faces~~~)
(also if like me you don’t read Chinese, the translation is ongoing, which means you’ll have to wait, but it also means it isn’t over yet~)
On Chinese Names
I know other writers have already beat this poor horse to death*, but it still really jars me when I see just “Zhao” or “Shen” used to refer to the main characters in Guardian. I’ve been thinking about why that is, and I had a thought:
A shout-out to the kind-hearted readers and writers laying this kind of stuff out for those of us unfamiliar with Chinese naming conventions; you may have saved a WIP today.
Thank you for this. I feel that even when writing in English, we should use the full name as the Chinese do, just as basic respect for their culture. It’s not that hard to get used to once you realize that’s the way the Chinese people do it.
I hope I don’t get a lot of hate for this, but I’ve always liked it when the names were translated. I might be wrong, but I always understood that the names had meanings, and when a Chinese-speaking person heard the name – when Zhao Yun Lan hears the name Shen Wei – it has a meaning for them, even a symbolism, a meaning Zhao Yun Lan can riff on. English speakers lose that aspect of the names when they’re not translated. The names become mere sounds.
Fair enough. Heck, all names once had meanings. We’ve lost that in Western culture, it seems, choosing names more for the way they sound than for what they mean. I love knowing what a name means.
I always appreciate the stories that work in the details about name meanings one way or another. But I don’t mind the untranslated names. It’s such an interplay…I’m thinking of the way ZYL changes Shen Wei’s name; I feel like you need sound and meaning both present for that to work.
Do explain names! Here’s another bit of information: chinese introductions also introduce meanings, to make clear which characters are used, because there are so many other characters that sound the same. We come up with lines for them, usually based on a 成語, and/or famous ancient people, and usually complimentary。 For example, if ZYL wasn’t raised in a barn *coughs*, he would have introduced himself as：
趙雲瀾， 趙雲， 像那個名將， 力挽狂瀾的瀾。
Zhao Yunlan, Zhao Yun, like the general, and “lan” from the words for “turning the tide.”
Bonus: if Zhu Hong is here, she would have added, 不是瀾倒波隨的瀾嗎？(Don’t you mean “lan” from the words for “going with the flow”?) /bc he’s often described as “choosing the path of least resistance.Oooooh, I like ZYL’s introduction and Zhu Hong’s side commentary. Headcanon accepted!
沈巍 / Shen Wei – What’s in a name?
So I tagged in that other post #I could go on and on about Shen Wei’s name, and so why not.
This is the exchange between Kunlun and Shen Wei, the first time they meet. (chapter 77, so mildly spoilerish. The more spoilery part, I hid under a cut.)
“You can’t speak? Impossible.” Kunlun Jun drapes shapelessly onto the large boulder, lifting a brow. “Got a name? What are you called?”
“… Wei.”
“Which Wei?”
“…Mountain ghost.”
“Mountain ghost?” Kunlun Jun stretches out over the boulder, lifting a brow, “Appropriate, but a bit weak. Look at this world: mountains and oceans joining one to the next, towering peaks linking in an unending chain. Why not add a few more strokes, make a Wei.”[TN. 嵬, what the ghost king introduced himself as, means “rocky terrain.” 嵬 is written with the radical ‘mountain’ on top of ‘ghost’. 巍 means ‘towering’ and keeps both of the radicals of 嵬]
Now let’s move on to 沈 / Shen, for a moment.
[fic] 镇魂 | Guardian: This heart I gave you to hold is still beating – naye
Words: 1041
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV)
Rating: G
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Shěn Wēi/Zhào Yúnlán
Additional Tags: Vignette, Missing Scene, Established Relationship, Comfort, fictober18
[fic] 镇魂 | Guardian: This heart I gave you to hold is still beating – naye
Lady Karasu 