A Wire-wrap Of Two Trees Of Valinor, Telperion And Laurelin.

Fu Ling and Chong Zhao: all in one. Part 1 of 2

The relationship of these two is fated, but a viewer understands it only when the drama is over: Chong Zhao was destined to meet Fu Ling, in one way or another, because she was his doom. There is an infinite amount of versions how this story could go if they met as enemies, but it goes another way: a righteous immortal Chong Zhao meets a vicious demoness Fu Ling in the moment she is severely wounded, and, not knowing she is his enemy, out of compassion, saves her (which is ironic).

Bridal carry [1], as an immortal. Being him an immortal, a demon or a deity, he carries her bridal-like, which is a beautiful parallel, joining all the versions of his identity together. Being treated nice for the first time in her demon career and feeling something familiar in Chong Zhao (of course there is something, but it's not what you think, darling 😭), she falls for him, in a very demonic, obsessive way.

She teases him as they meet on the battlefield, but saves him from attacks of her cruel and merciless master. Eventually, her master notices it and orders her to turn her love interest into a demon within a month, or he will be killed, because demon servants need to have only one attachment - their master (😏).

"Hello there! Still don't want to become a demon, huh?" In order to save him from death, she enthusiastically tries to seduce him into becoming a demon (and causally saves him a couple of times more). As a demoness herself, she thinks being alive is more important than staying righteous. Chong Zhao has another opinion on it (and stabs himself in order to destroy a demonic protective token she cast on him to save him once again), which gets a demoness frustrated.

"As far as I'm in hell, I want you to keep me company here".

And maybe Chong Zhao would prefer to die rather than to become a demon, but his treacherous shifu tells him to stay undercover in the demonic den, so Chong Zhao tries to pretend he agrees to stay in hell. But just saying "I agree" is not enough, so the demoness forces him to kill his fellow immortals, promising the others could be free if he kills one, but, of course, she has lied and later kills everyone else of the prisoners.

So she breaks him, and he becomes a demon himself (It's super cruel on her part, but demon's love is ugly and twisted, alas).

She cares for him, so treats him with (twisted) love, but he is not happy about it at first.

It's the most erotic scene in this drama (because goners can afford it). Yet the demoness still looks like someone who is ready to be bedded by a person she is in love with even if he doesn't care about her at all. It obviously pains her. But it is not what you think it is, she just sucks him (the poison) off (of his shoulder) (😏).

And he rejects he after sex. She takes responsibility for his failed mission and endures the punishment that should have been his, so it awakens a good guy (or Stockholm syndrome) inside of the broken demon-like former immortal, so he takes care of her in return.

Bridal carry [2], as a demon. And from now on they start mutually caring for each other.

The deity's huadian on his forehead is to no good... He says, he has taken this blow for her because he doesn't want to owe her, but it looks like there is something else underneath his wish to be even. And this time he deliberately allows her to treat his wounds, it's not as erotic as before, but more intimate.

"I didn't want to owe you". So, it could have been an interesting dynamics: Chong Zhao starts feeling something towards his capturer, who broke his will, forced him to lose his innocence (not in that way, alas), but genuinely cares about him. But the screen writer put the cheat-code out of their sleeve: the demoness Fu Ling turns out to be Chong Zhao's childhood friend Bai Xi, whose memories were erased by the evil demon master of hers, who abducted her 10 years ago. It makes Chong Zhao think that she is a victim of circumstances, just like him, and isn't guilty of any evil deeds she committed the previous 10 years (and she did a lot, her name is widely known in Jianghu, people recognize her as vicious demon general Fu Ling just by throwing a look on her spiritual weapon). OK, it could be his logics because of who he is (the devil god's shell), but the screen writers think it's OK, too, so... But let's return to our couple. Now, as Fu Ling regains her memories and remembers that she was in love with Chong Zhao even as they were children (they were destined to meet, remember?), they run away from the evil demon master and join The Team Main Heroes to have their little nice moments of being together (because why not, if the demoness is not a demoness anymore, right?) before the plot turns into Hell.

"As we were children, my sister and I often sat like this and looked at the stars". They look at the starry sky [1], Chong Zhao x Bai Xi version. Here is Part 2

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Longreads, meta-analyses, recaps, lists: #SDaboutLBFAD - about c-drama "Love Between Fairy and Devil" #SDaboutMJTY - about c-drama "My Journey to You" #SDaboutFoF - about c-drama "Fangs of Fortune" #SDabout100dmp - about k-drama "100 Days My Prince" #SDaboutMM - about c-drama "Moonlight Mystique" #SDabouttropes - about tropes, favorite types of characters etc. #SDaboutFilms - about Western (non-Asian) movies and series Impressions of stuff: #SDaboutSpirealm - about c-drama "The Spirealm" #SDaboutBlossom - about c-drama "Blossom" #SDaboutTTEOTM - about c-drama "Till the End of the Moon" #SDaboutDerailment - about с-drama "Derailment" #SDaboutONHCT - about tw-drama "Oh no! Here comes trouble" #SDaboutSL - about c-drama "The Legend of Shen Li" #SDaboutDark - about German Netflix series "Dark" #SDaboutSW - about "Star Wars" Reblogs and picspam: #SDaboutpicspam - picspam, collected by me for no fandom topic #SDaboutSKZ - about Stray Kids K-pop band (mostly Lee Felix) #SDaboutMLC - about c-drama "Mysterious Lotus Casebook" #SDaboutMDZS - about c-drama "the Untamed"

My art and handmade stuff: #SDaboutstuff - my handmade, arts and poems #SDaboutTGCF - about "Heaven Official's Blessing" #SDaboutTolkien - about J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Silmarillion"

Happy B'day, Felix!

Recent visually beautiful and generally watchable Russian fantasy movies

(because I start forgetting they exist at all) Ironically, all of them are adaptations of books/comics.

I Am Dragon / Он — дракон (2015) This movie is a very free adaptation of the novel "The Rite" / "Ритуал" by Maryna and Serhiy Dyachenko (Марина и Сергей Дяченко). It's a reinterpreting of an ancient tale about a maiden, a hero and a dragon. I don`t like the novel because it's very postmodern, wracks the typical fairytale plot and hurts my escapist feelings by ugly reality, but the movie is pretty fairytale-ish and nice. Firstly, it is visually beautiful and represent Slavic pseudo-medieval lore the way it should have always been in Slavic fantasy.

Secondly, as a love story between a monster and a maiden, it has got A PLENTY of tropes I'm usually looking for in Chinese dramas, so I understand very well why it was pretty popular in Asia.

Thirdly, when I said it's visually beautiful I wasn't joking. The main hero is played not by an actor, but by a male model, who is shirtless all the time (and sometimes pantless) and has a very fit and good-looking body. It's something unbelievable that someone in Russia made a movie to please women's eyes! Really, it's insane!

The folk-rock band Мельница wrote an insanely beautiful song "Обряд" (The Rite) for this movie (more matched to the book plot, though), but it was never used as OST, which is a shame. The song is about a black sheep girl, who is denied by society and asks a dragon to come for her and to take her away, because the dragon is denied by this world just like her. You can listen to it here. The band also has a song "Змей" (The Wyrm) (based on Lev Gumilev's poem), which is more accurate to the plot of the movie: the wyrm kidnaps maidens to make them its wives, but they are all dying during the flight; at the end of the song a hero-knight is ready to shoot it in order to stop it. Listen to it here.

It ends with HE, which is better than the book's obscure ending, so it is pleasure for me to rewatch it till these days.

Major Grom: Plague Doctor / Майор Гром: Чумной Доктор (2021)

It is an adaptation of Russian comic series "Major Grom" by Bubble comics. I am traditionally not very happy with the source material, but it is very good reworked to be the screen play of this movie.

It's very beautifully made in terms of director's, cameraman's and screenwriter's work, which is a rare thing for Russian movies. Also, the actors are young and handsome, especially the villain, which is a rare thing not only for Russian movies, but for the current Western movies, too. It has got a lot of allusions to Russian reality and a lot of beautiful views of Saint Petersburg, the second capital of Russia and one of the most beautiful Russian cities. And it has got some unusual visual solutions that turn it into a comic it should be.

The plot revolves around a mysterious serial killer (kinda bad Batman), a black sheep police officer and Russian Mark Zuckerberg (kind of). Mark Zuckerberg is the best guy of this movie and I like him a lot! Серёёёёжа! 🧡🧡🧡

This movie wasn't popular in Russia because of political situation in the country by the moment of its release (the both sides found out in there something insulting for them and banned it), but even if it has something like that, I honestly didn't pay attention to it. It's just a nice blockbuster with a tragic and handsome villain. The villain also has got his own BL-drama (in the comics they are really lovers, it`s as obvious as it could be shown in a Russian comic).

By the way, the villain is hot, insane, ruthless, sensitive and suffering. How does he contain all of this character treats in one personality? you may ask. He doesn`t. He has dissociative identity disorder, I would answer.

I don`t know if it works by now, but some time ago you could watch this lovely movie on Netflix.

The Master and Margarita / Мастер и Маргарита (2024) This is a loose adaptation of Russian classical novel "The Master and Margarita" by Mikhail Bulgakov. I genuinely hate this book, but the adaptation reinterprets it, divides it into very interesting layers and makes it understandable and beautiful.

It`s layered, so it will probably be hard to understand what layer are we currently on if you are not familiar with the original story. The first layer is an ugly Soviet reality, the second layer is a plot of the novel that the main hero is writing, a story within a story. The third layer is the insane intertwining of the first two layers. On the reality layer the Master loses his job and freedom because of friend's denunciation and becomes star-crossed lovers with a married woman. On the novel level he meets devil, who visits Moscow by chance, and the devil gives him and his woman opportunity to live their lives being free from everything that usually tortures people IRL. Somewhere among those layers is a little plot about Jesus and Pontius Pilate.

The movie is visually beautiful. Although it feels pretty anti-Soviet, Soviet visuals of the movie are gorgeous. There were used the Stalin-times concepts of Moscow of the Future, the CGI buildings in frame came from the real architecture projects of those times. The Stalin Empire architecture style and views are typical for Moscow (but as I know, ironically, this all was shot in Saint Petersburg). It seems to me that this movie is heavily stuffed with visual allusions to the Western works: devil's escort looks like bunch of Pennywises, Margarita is Enchantress from Suicide Squad I, the scene of blood dripping is from Blade I etc. Usually, when I see it in Russian movies, it feels like plagiarism because I can recognize the reference but there is nothing except for these references . But here we have got the plot, so the allusions work as allusions and don`t irritate me.

The movie is dark, disturbing, uncomfortable. It really makes you feel as if you watch devil and his escort marching around you; they ravage, kill and destroy everything and you can only breathlessly, helplessly and in fear watch them. The German actor playing devil is insanely good. He stole the movie and I understand why it should have been named Woland (the devil's name) instead of the current movie's name. You may want to watch it, because it's very unusual in terms of plot and visuals experience, especially when you are not familiar with the book.

How to be a more interesting character than the Main Hero (Pt.3)

Shangjue and his didi (pt.2/2)

Yuanzhi wants to save Shangjue from any kind of pain so badly, and not only because he feels guilt for brother's loss, but also because he is able to see brother's true personality: Shangjue is an invisible root of Gong tree.

When an assassin and didi have a conversation in the final part of the drama, she says that there are people, in front of whom Shangjue could be vulnerable, but Yanzhi smirks and says that the Martial World won`t allow it. And it happens to be true: he knows that Shangjue’s fiancée is an assassin and he knows that, no matter how much Shangjue is into her, she would not hesitate to kill him if she had a chance, so Shangjue`s soft spot for something (such as a woman he likes) would be his doom. But he needs to look invincible, because the whole clan counts on him and relies on him.

Because Shangjue is a root of Gong clan, everyone sees only thriving and green branches and beautiful flowers (which are wealth, power and secure of Gong clan), but no one sees that it wouldn`t be possible without a root, strong yet hidden under the soil (aka one hardworking man).

I often find the fate of Shangjue's type of heroes very unfair: a person unnoted takes care of everyone and is rewarded at the end only with sufferings and death. But this story is different, because Shangjue has got his didi, who doesn't care about world but eagerly takes care of him while he takes care of anything else. This scene was the second one during the drama that upset me a lot. I spoiled myself some shots of Yuanzhi crying over brother's body and I was sure he would die because he isn't fluffy and spotless enough to stay alive in Chinese drama. Fortunately, he didn't:

It works vice versa, too:

Yuanzhi is, I suppose, coded as someone like Asperger: he is kinda genius, he preferred insects and plants to people as he was a child, he couldn`t understand why people cry and felt uncomfortable with someone`s touching (he slipped out of Shangjue’s grip when Shangjue took his hand). And Shangjue did a great job socializing him.

Being an adolescent, Shangjue hadn`t problems with feeling expression. Things Shangjue taught his didi in a flashback are the opposite to those the Main Hero’s mum taught MH and to those Shangjue believes now. Shangjue told Yuanzhi that a man should cry because in that case someone would understand one's woe and this sympathizing could help to recuperate one's soul, but now he never cries in front of someone. However, Yuanzhi learned his lesson well and isn`t embarrassed to express his feelings freely.

I found this scene very weird (if not taking into account that the flower is obviously a red herring): the Main Hero and Shangjue both fancy girls, while didi fancies a magic flower. But later, as I finished the drama, I understood: didi fancies Shangjue the most. The unique and almost extinct flower isn`t some treasure for him, it matters only that this flower can save Shangjue`s life and increase his inner powers. The previous one was taken away from Shangjue, and Shangjue allowed it to happen, because his needs didn`t matter to him compared to prosperity of his clan. (Later, as we know, it was spent in vain by a villain, which made me feel terribly sorry for Shangjue). But his didi values him enough to try to take care of him once more (and for this time he has planted more than one, in order something would end up in Shangjue’s hands even if clansmen would need this flower, too. How smart of his!). And I like that his love is not in vain – Shangjue loves him, too, and believes him in any situation, and that warms my heart. I love their relationship a lot.

And the most vivid feeling that he freely demonstrates is a jealousy towards Shangjue’s fiancée (btw, I like that Shangjue understands it and pardons his tantrums):

"Go ahead, tell me what's on your mind." *opens his mouth to start talking* "Well, rather don`t. I can see it on your face." *smiles*

So, in the part 4 I will talk about Shangjue and her. Shangjue. Introduction Shangjue and his didi, Pt. 1 Shangjue and his fiancee

Swooning over a secondary character (again), Pt. 2/3

The evil vice-prime minister promised Moo-yeon (aka Yoon Sok-ha) that he can be relieved from his servitude and safely reunite with his sister if he fulfills the last and the most difficult task: to kills the Crown Prince. But Moo-yeon failed to do it during the organized by Kim Cha-eon attack and is forced now to finish this task by his own means.

Eventually, Moo-yeon finds the prince amnesiac and, moreover, wedded to Moo-yeon's sister, who happened to hide all this time in a nearby village as a peasant.

His sister seem to genuinely like the amnesiac prince, so, after some moral sufferings, Moo-yeon dares to deceive Kim Cha-eon making him believe the Crown Prince is dead. And then he gets his long-longed freedom.

And he could live freely and happily ever after with his sister (and her husband) if not for one thing.

Namely: he has an affair with the Crown Princess (the Crown Prince's wife and also Kim Cha-eon's daughter, whom he threated with the blade as he was a kid). Going out of Kim Cha-eon's mansion, Moo-yeon accidentally hears that his lover is pregnant, so he also decides to bid farewell to her before finding his sister and disappearing with her for good.

His lover, Kim So-Hye, is a very miserable woman, too. Her father used her from her childhood on to reach his political goals and arranged her marriage with the Crown Prince who hated her from the bottom of his heart as a daughter of the murderer of his childhood love Yoon Yi-seo (which is VERY ironic). She was very lonely in the palace so she couldn`t stand her lover leaving her, too, and hired one of father's assassins to hurt Moo-yeon and make him stay (even if only for the time of his recovering).

The Crown Prince never ever got laid with his wife, so she is obviously pregnant by someone else and Kim Cha-eon tried to kill the prince in order to cover for his daughter (because adultery of the princess should be punished by death of the whole cheater's family). He told her to kill the biological father of her child by herself in order to eliminate the witness, believing it was one of a noblemen of the palace. Later he learned she killed a son of an official and felt relieved. But the situation over Moo-yeon being shot in order to prevent him from leaving makes Kim Cha-eon rethink the adultery of his daughter. And from now on he starts being suspicious of Moo-yeon.

Meanwhile, there are rumors spreading that the Crown Prince is alive and it forces severely wounded Moo-yeon to try to make him disappear for good (because if Kim Cha-eon learns that Moo-yeon lied to him, the little liar won`t be able to escape and reunite with his sister). But he predictably fails and stays lying on the ground, unconscientious and bleeding.

Fortunately, he has good subordinates who find him and bring him back. The Crown Princess is very anxious, she never wanted to hurt him so seriously, so she takes a good care for him.

But the situation over the Crown Prince's fake death becomes more and more dangerous, Moo-yeon‘s life and freedom as well as his sister's is hung by a thread, so his subordinates help him to run away.

He sends back to his lover a bracelet she once gifted him and bids his farewell to her, planning to start a new life with his sister far away from Jeoson. Unlike the Crown Prince, who hated Kim So-hye for who her father is, Moo-yeon is in love with her even despite her being a daughter of his father's murderer. But he understands that their relationship is doomed as far as she is a nobility and (an unloved, but still) Crown Prince's wife and he is a mere slave of her father, unable to protect even himself. So he thinks it`ll be better for them to just forget each other. (And he is so goddamn right! But love is love. *sighs*)

Here is Part 1 Here is Part 3

to defeat monsters: become the greater monster | m.a.w

The portrait of my colleague Andrey

Meet Sima, a biblical Seraph. I proud of this handmade angel because everything from concept art and chose of materials to building was made by myself and the result is perfectly nice.

Стихотворение написано мной, музыка - iday - moon, анимация - сделанные и оживлённые мной пикселизированные коллажи. English version is available here.