Guardian (镇魂) 01-16
26 Oct 2018 19:51![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
extrapenguinIn a giant fit of procrastination before Yuletide assignments went out, I started watching Guardian!
I'm spoiled for a bunch of stuff just by osmosis, but it's still enjoyable! The CGI is derpy, but at least they have the wisdom to do a lot of the "terrible monster" signaling with sound effects/music and not showing the monster. The minor characters' and extras' acting ranges from workmanlike to way OTT to phoned in, but the main leads are excellent, and I have absolutely zero complaints about Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan. Like, zero.
Let's start with my absolute favorite character, Shen Wei, who is at least 10 000 years old, and is heavily implied to have betrayed his whole nation/race/species just because he fell in love with a Zhao Yunlan in the past. The fact that he is so very super duper obviously in love with Zhao Yunlan, yet restrains himself, is amazing. He's also a protective and wise sort-of-father-figure teacher, i.e. catnip to my id. So much passion, so much desire to protect, and he's stood essentially alone for thousands of years, protecting the human world from Dixingians. He also does that all on the surface, which is probably 24/7 sensory overload hell due to the fact that Dixing is very very dark, unlike the surface. (The black cloak's hood and mask are probably at least partially sunshades.)
The other lead, Zhao Yunlan, is an interesting one. He appears an affable, lovable bad boy archetype on the outside, but so much of that is performance, and he is in reality an observant and smart man who wears a bunch of masks. He's cold inside, and a polar opposite of Shen Wei in that respect: warm cheeriness covering cold competence vs distant politeness covering an intense caring. He is by rights a badass normal, not Dixingian or one of the snakes, plants, or crows, and he simply has a special gun that he has some sort of flashbacks from using. It's also interesting that the position of Special Investigation Department head is hereditary.
Their interactions are amazing, from all the ways Shen Wei intensely stares at Zhao Yunlan and hovers near him to try and help him to the ways Shen Wei is really goddamn terrible at coming up with reasonable explanations for why he is at the scene of the crime/okay despite falling off a roof, and Zhao Yunlan clocking him as Black-Cloaked Envoy, and, all of episode 13. That one was my fave. The trust! Shen Wei figuring out what was going on! Zhao Yunlan being cunning and bringing earplugs with! Other stuff I've enjoyed is the fact that they're basically functioning as a social unit, now: Zhao Yunlan invites his "colleague" Shen Wei along for a dinner hosted by Guo Changcheng's uncle, introduces him very formally to the SID (much after he first collaborated with them...), and requests him to clean the apartment. (Shen Wei likes taking care of Zhao Yunlan, in every manner possible.)
Everyone else, on the other hand ... well, the current villain (Zhu Jiu?) is OTT and WTF is up with his purple hair, really, but it's at the very least serviceable acting, since I think the character is meant to be annoying. He will be a bit too good at escapes if he manages to escape from direct confrontations many more times. The SID team is mostly okay – Zhu Hong is decent, as is Lin Jing, and Chu-ge is both well-cast and an interesting character, since WTF is going on with him and Brother Black-Robe? Wang Zheng and Sang Zan's love affair was the most eyerolly thing ever, and I 100% do not buy that a Sang Zan who could do all that would also be a decent boyfriend, or wish to part from the systems that give him power, but whatever. Da Qing the cat isn't bad, and has the "how did he forget how to speak Cat" mystery going on. Guo Changcheng, on the other hand ... I loathe his character archetype, the acting isn't terribly good, and I just wish he'd get fired so we could get someone actually competent/not brain-meltingly unsuited to it all. Perhaps also a woman on the field team, pretty please.
By episode 16, we've met a mysterious talking obelisk, and Zhao Yunlan is in Dixing. Based on what we've seen so far, I actually disagree a bit with the whole Guardian premise. Dixing is ... not that great a place to live, seemingly; Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei would be better off trying to institute reforms, like school and universal healthcare. Alas, it's not really Zhao Yunlan's place to do so, and Shen Wei ... is regarded as a traitor. He's also only one-third of the power structure, and it's implied that both the Regent/Chancellor and the Lord/Dijun have their own things going on, since the Chancellor is a wily fox who may have tactically lost the book they're looking for, and the Lord of Dixing (who might be able to outvote the other two, idk) seems to be engaged in his own power play against Shen Wei, with the destruction of those documents. They might be in league. (Shen Wei also doesn't quite trust the Dixing judiciary, since he left that mind-controlling girl on the surface, despite the fact that she murdered multiple people, and her powers are quite dangerous if left unchecked.
There's some other stuff going on – at Minister Guo's dinner, why did Shen Wei drop his chopsticks when Minister Guo said "You at the SID fight with monsters every day"? What's up with Zhao Yunlan's dad, and why are they estranged, since dad cares for him enough to send him a morality pet and loyalty-test his subordinates? Why's Chu-ge so indebted to the Black-Cloaked Envoy? Currently at the bit where Zhao Yunlan has just said farewell to the Regent to go look at the book with Old Wu. No spoilers, please.
Fic desires so far: Shen Wei getting a hug, Shen Wei getting his hair ruffled, Zhao Yunlan seeing Shen Wei get injured so Shen Wei has to pretend to be a normal human being who does normal human being stuff like being injured, and then there's some hilarious hurt/comfort where the comfortee isn't actually hurt, but can't tell that, because that'd jeopardize his disguise. Also, Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan raising children together, because Shen Wei at least would be very good at it.
I'm spoiled for a bunch of stuff just by osmosis, but it's still enjoyable! The CGI is derpy, but at least they have the wisdom to do a lot of the "terrible monster" signaling with sound effects/music and not showing the monster. The minor characters' and extras' acting ranges from workmanlike to way OTT to phoned in, but the main leads are excellent, and I have absolutely zero complaints about Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan. Like, zero.
Let's start with my absolute favorite character, Shen Wei, who is at least 10 000 years old, and is heavily implied to have betrayed his whole nation/race/species just because he fell in love with a Zhao Yunlan in the past. The fact that he is so very super duper obviously in love with Zhao Yunlan, yet restrains himself, is amazing. He's also a protective and wise sort-of-father-figure teacher, i.e. catnip to my id. So much passion, so much desire to protect, and he's stood essentially alone for thousands of years, protecting the human world from Dixingians. He also does that all on the surface, which is probably 24/7 sensory overload hell due to the fact that Dixing is very very dark, unlike the surface. (The black cloak's hood and mask are probably at least partially sunshades.)
The other lead, Zhao Yunlan, is an interesting one. He appears an affable, lovable bad boy archetype on the outside, but so much of that is performance, and he is in reality an observant and smart man who wears a bunch of masks. He's cold inside, and a polar opposite of Shen Wei in that respect: warm cheeriness covering cold competence vs distant politeness covering an intense caring. He is by rights a badass normal, not Dixingian or one of the snakes, plants, or crows, and he simply has a special gun that he has some sort of flashbacks from using. It's also interesting that the position of Special Investigation Department head is hereditary.
Their interactions are amazing, from all the ways Shen Wei intensely stares at Zhao Yunlan and hovers near him to try and help him to the ways Shen Wei is really goddamn terrible at coming up with reasonable explanations for why he is at the scene of the crime/okay despite falling off a roof, and Zhao Yunlan clocking him as Black-Cloaked Envoy, and, all of episode 13. That one was my fave. The trust! Shen Wei figuring out what was going on! Zhao Yunlan being cunning and bringing earplugs with! Other stuff I've enjoyed is the fact that they're basically functioning as a social unit, now: Zhao Yunlan invites his "colleague" Shen Wei along for a dinner hosted by Guo Changcheng's uncle, introduces him very formally to the SID (much after he first collaborated with them...), and requests him to clean the apartment. (Shen Wei likes taking care of Zhao Yunlan, in every manner possible.)
Everyone else, on the other hand ... well, the current villain (Zhu Jiu?) is OTT and WTF is up with his purple hair, really, but it's at the very least serviceable acting, since I think the character is meant to be annoying. He will be a bit too good at escapes if he manages to escape from direct confrontations many more times. The SID team is mostly okay – Zhu Hong is decent, as is Lin Jing, and Chu-ge is both well-cast and an interesting character, since WTF is going on with him and Brother Black-Robe? Wang Zheng and Sang Zan's love affair was the most eyerolly thing ever, and I 100% do not buy that a Sang Zan who could do all that would also be a decent boyfriend, or wish to part from the systems that give him power, but whatever. Da Qing the cat isn't bad, and has the "how did he forget how to speak Cat" mystery going on. Guo Changcheng, on the other hand ... I loathe his character archetype, the acting isn't terribly good, and I just wish he'd get fired so we could get someone actually competent/not brain-meltingly unsuited to it all. Perhaps also a woman on the field team, pretty please.
By episode 16, we've met a mysterious talking obelisk, and Zhao Yunlan is in Dixing. Based on what we've seen so far, I actually disagree a bit with the whole Guardian premise. Dixing is ... not that great a place to live, seemingly; Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei would be better off trying to institute reforms, like school and universal healthcare. Alas, it's not really Zhao Yunlan's place to do so, and Shen Wei ... is regarded as a traitor. He's also only one-third of the power structure, and it's implied that both the Regent/Chancellor and the Lord/Dijun have their own things going on, since the Chancellor is a wily fox who may have tactically lost the book they're looking for, and the Lord of Dixing (who might be able to outvote the other two, idk) seems to be engaged in his own power play against Shen Wei, with the destruction of those documents. They might be in league. (Shen Wei also doesn't quite trust the Dixing judiciary, since he left that mind-controlling girl on the surface, despite the fact that she murdered multiple people, and her powers are quite dangerous if left unchecked.
There's some other stuff going on – at Minister Guo's dinner, why did Shen Wei drop his chopsticks when Minister Guo said "You at the SID fight with monsters every day"? What's up with Zhao Yunlan's dad, and why are they estranged, since dad cares for him enough to send him a morality pet and loyalty-test his subordinates? Why's Chu-ge so indebted to the Black-Cloaked Envoy? Currently at the bit where Zhao Yunlan has just said farewell to the Regent to go look at the book with Old Wu. No spoilers, please.
Fic desires so far: Shen Wei getting a hug, Shen Wei getting his hair ruffled, Zhao Yunlan seeing Shen Wei get injured so Shen Wei has to pretend to be a normal human being who does normal human being stuff like being injured, and then there's some hilarious hurt/comfort where the comfortee isn't actually hurt, but can't tell that, because that'd jeopardize his disguise. Also, Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan raising children together, because Shen Wei at least would be very good at it.