The Untamed rewatch: episode 1
Sep. 29th, 2020 03:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenayYesterday, for many complicated reasons, I decided that I was allowed to start an Untamed rewatch and so I settled in with episode 1 again. It was a Good Decision.
Spoilers for all the episodes abound.
OMG, this plays so differently now that I've seen the entire show! I love it!
The opening actually manages to be *more* heart-wrenching, knowing what I do and having seen that scene in full. Also, it was really cleverly edited because it told me what I needed to know at that point in the show, but it was also totally misleading about how that scene actually played out in full. And also, now that I know LWJ and how he usually behaves, watching him show that emotion is pretty damn impactful.
And then, the resurrection. Which I won't lie, was confusing as hell the first time around. And this time it made so much more sense, which made it a lot more emotional. Oh, show.
That scene with the juniors in the storytelling house made very little sense to me the first time around, except as a framing device for us seeing WWX's death scene as the opening of the episode, with a little bit of explanation narrated on top. Now, though? That was totally NHS in the background, pushing the storyteller along with that story, and I know why he's there and why he's doing it.
Just like I know why he's there towards the end of the episode, paying for the person who resurrected WWX.
He was encouraging the juniors to have WWX in their minds already when the time came for the whole Mo Manor mess, so they'd start making the right connections.
All we need to see is his sleeves and his fan and you *know* it's NHS and it's brilliant. I hadn't twigged to that at all in my first watch, but why would I? He was just this figure in the background then and I didn't know who he was or why I should care. But now I can see he was right there from the beginning, the show had always been pointing at him, and it's brilliant.
Also, now that I have watched the entire show a lot of things about what WWX is doing make much more sense. And seeing Sizhui and his care for "Young Master Mo" makes me a little teary. Our little radish! Immediately caring and showing respect for a man everyone else is calling a weird lunatic. He's the best boy ever.
He's even introduced as Lan Yuan on the text, but that didn't mean anything to me when I first watched. It's only later, when he's reintroduced and I knew A-Yuan, that seeing him introduced as Lan Yuan/Lan Sizhui made me think "maybe he's....". But I didn't realise he'd been introduced this way in episode 1.
Yes, show, I see what you did there. You put all the clues right there in episode 1 and they only make sense when you've watched it all. Which makes me suspect a rewatch will be very rewarding!
Last note has to go to LWJ/Yibo. When I first watched this, I had no idea who LWJ was or who Wang Yibo was. I'd like to register a complaint at how fucking talented this man is, because the LWJ in this episode is completely believable as man in his thirties who has seen a lot of shit and grieved for a long time, a man who has raised a son and mourned his Wei Ying without stopping for sixteen years.
And he's played by a kid who was maybe twenty at the time? Yes. That's pretty amazing.
Xiao Zhan is also amazing as WWX and you do get the feeling of his having aged when he's playing post-flashback WWX compared to Cloud Recesses WWX and Yilling Patriarch WWX, absolutely. Post-flashback WWX has a tiredness at times that young WWX didn't have. They are both fantastic at playing the various ages of their characters and making you buy into it.
But Wang Yibo was so young and relatively inexperienced. And also a total gremlin in real life. How did he do this?
Anyway, yes, rewatching was an excellent idea and helped a lot on a rather awful day.
Spoilers for all the episodes abound.
OMG, this plays so differently now that I've seen the entire show! I love it!
The opening actually manages to be *more* heart-wrenching, knowing what I do and having seen that scene in full. Also, it was really cleverly edited because it told me what I needed to know at that point in the show, but it was also totally misleading about how that scene actually played out in full. And also, now that I know LWJ and how he usually behaves, watching him show that emotion is pretty damn impactful.
And then, the resurrection. Which I won't lie, was confusing as hell the first time around. And this time it made so much more sense, which made it a lot more emotional. Oh, show.
That scene with the juniors in the storytelling house made very little sense to me the first time around, except as a framing device for us seeing WWX's death scene as the opening of the episode, with a little bit of explanation narrated on top. Now, though? That was totally NHS in the background, pushing the storyteller along with that story, and I know why he's there and why he's doing it.
Just like I know why he's there towards the end of the episode, paying for the person who resurrected WWX.
He was encouraging the juniors to have WWX in their minds already when the time came for the whole Mo Manor mess, so they'd start making the right connections.
All we need to see is his sleeves and his fan and you *know* it's NHS and it's brilliant. I hadn't twigged to that at all in my first watch, but why would I? He was just this figure in the background then and I didn't know who he was or why I should care. But now I can see he was right there from the beginning, the show had always been pointing at him, and it's brilliant.
Also, now that I have watched the entire show a lot of things about what WWX is doing make much more sense. And seeing Sizhui and his care for "Young Master Mo" makes me a little teary. Our little radish! Immediately caring and showing respect for a man everyone else is calling a weird lunatic. He's the best boy ever.
He's even introduced as Lan Yuan on the text, but that didn't mean anything to me when I first watched. It's only later, when he's reintroduced and I knew A-Yuan, that seeing him introduced as Lan Yuan/Lan Sizhui made me think "maybe he's....". But I didn't realise he'd been introduced this way in episode 1.
Yes, show, I see what you did there. You put all the clues right there in episode 1 and they only make sense when you've watched it all. Which makes me suspect a rewatch will be very rewarding!
Last note has to go to LWJ/Yibo. When I first watched this, I had no idea who LWJ was or who Wang Yibo was. I'd like to register a complaint at how fucking talented this man is, because the LWJ in this episode is completely believable as man in his thirties who has seen a lot of shit and grieved for a long time, a man who has raised a son and mourned his Wei Ying without stopping for sixteen years.
And he's played by a kid who was maybe twenty at the time? Yes. That's pretty amazing.
Xiao Zhan is also amazing as WWX and you do get the feeling of his having aged when he's playing post-flashback WWX compared to Cloud Recesses WWX and Yilling Patriarch WWX, absolutely. Post-flashback WWX has a tiredness at times that young WWX didn't have. They are both fantastic at playing the various ages of their characters and making you buy into it.
But Wang Yibo was so young and relatively inexperienced. And also a total gremlin in real life. How did he do this?
Anyway, yes, rewatching was an excellent idea and helped a lot on a rather awful day.
no subject
Date: 2020-09-29 04:43 pm (UTC)Amazing!!!!
I could ramble on but my provincial government decided to close all public libraries but let the stores, malls, gym open starting tomorrow midnight because of Covid when all libraries only have the stacks available and all transactions are done behind plexi.
Men who never entered public libraries are stupid
no subject
Date: 2020-09-30 08:53 pm (UTC)Rewatching episode 1 is so rewarded :D
no subject
Date: 2020-09-29 04:52 pm (UTC)The two leads are so talented though, yes! I'm blown away by how well they portray the different ages and experiences they go through and I'm glad they kept xiao Zhan as WWX/MXY.
no subject
Date: 2020-09-30 08:59 pm (UTC)Honestly, both leads are so good, and I can't believe we got so lucky with them. How did XZ manage to portray goofball ray of sunshine teenage WWX and post-Yiling Patriarch WWX so well? HOW?
Yes, keeping him for both WWX and MXY was a very good decision. I might not have ended up loving WWX quite so much if he'd changed actors/faces part way through? Maybe I would have, but it was sure easier with the same actor throughout.