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Cdrama: Lost You Forever (2023)

YaoJing happy life #lostyouforever #dengwei #yangzi

Watch this video on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/NkRhMrF4ij8

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Cdrama: Lost You Forever (2023)

Indeed a fox is full of tricks #yangzi #dengwei #lostyouforever

Watch this video on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/L4CpbB3F1Og

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Of course she's brushing his hair, of course!!!!! But once again, yet another gender reversal thing, because normally it's emperors or generals or whoever in dramas that fixate on their concubines' hair. (But also, you have no idea how delicious I find it that she finds him so purely physically yummy despite his being scarred and "flawed" and how this is something he needs so much actually for his self-worth.)

And he wakes up to her singing to him aaaaa!

It gets me so much the way he closes his eyes when she looks over because he's clearly terrified she will vanish if he gives any sign. And so she only realizes he's awake when the servant drops the tray and the way she turns and her hairbrush drops aaaaa!!!!

Seriously, he keeps looking at her as if she is about to vanish and also that is A+ acting job!!!!

Her reaction. SCREAMING!!!!!

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The bit where she feeds him medicine made with her own blood omg!

The way she puts her finger on his chin to make sure his mouth is open enough mmm.

I have combusted.

My heart is just melting and melting...

This is some time later and it cracks me up that she sneaks into his bedroom to sleep there in secret. AWWWWW

She really does have a serious fetish for his hair. I bet once they are together together, she has him parade around in nothing but his hair like a guy lady godiva. Heh.

That is so domestic awwww the way she fusses. My late grandma would approve!

It's so realistic that even with this mountain of proof that he will always put her above everything, she still cannot fully trust it, her trauma is basically present forever.

But - and that is the huge epic thing - she still can't fully believe it, because she is incapable of such belief no matter what - but despite that she decides to risk it anyway. And that is huge.

And that is why nobody else can really end up with her - Jing is so devoted and self-abnegating and so exclusively hers that it is frankly insane and codependent and just unique, and he still cannot fully overcome her insecurity. I don't see how anyone else less obsessed can ever have a chance.

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Vamp Boy totally knows who he is and is engaging in delightful pettiness...

I love when Jing catches it midair. Mmmm. Whenever he shows a bit of an edge, I cheer. (Not too much edge or he'd not be good for her.)

The contrast of his saying he's OK with his being jealous and bleeding is delicious!!!

Yesssss, show those claws, boy!

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When 17 comes to save her, I may have screamed a little…

The way she begs for him!

He has a certain straightforwardness of someone who’s been so traumatized complexity has been driven out of him and this is a fictional type I adore (see again Colourful Bone.) He’s also, as we find out later in the ep, a nine-tailed fox (Yeon says hi!) and that might have something to do with it.

The way he freaks out over her back (as he should, Xianxia Phantom is a sadistic SOB) and she tries to reassure him…

Bwahahah this would be a very different drama and the censors would never release it. Just ask Tan Jianci, he should know. (Eff you, censors, he was a perfect Gu Yun for me!!!!)

If 17 could murder that dude right then and there, he would.

Heeeee! Be kind to the lest fortunate, you may accidentally rescue a god! How very NK Jemisin of her.

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He is 100% a Jesus x Disney Princess hybrid, look at him bringing the flowers Vamp Boy just froze back to life.

Also, this was glorious:

God, Seventeen, you are so cool! (Also, I am not forgetting that Vamp Boy was all "I am peeved FL didn't go with me, let her get tortured. But then he's consistently a dumpster fire who never pretends otherwise, unlike hypocrite cousin so I can't even complain because it's not like I or any character, FL included, expect anything else.)

PS This was awesome!!!

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I am honestly melting.

He honestly is the sweetest. His problems would be solved if he wasn’t so kind but it would be worse for him because the only way she fell for him is because he IS that kind so…worthwhile trade-off for him. (If he was any harder female-coded btw, then…then nothing, it’s impossible to go harder.)

I love that she knows him and accepts him the way he is - it’s not even because of love - she generally accepts everyone the way they are and the only issue for her is how to treat them in light of that info.

Heh!

He is so good at bootlicking :P

I love that he lays it all out - about his arranged engagement and how he’s never met her before and how he plans to break it off (love those deity lifespans btw, he’s all “I only need 15years” ahahah sorry!)

The way it cuts from that to Vamp Boy is poetic cinema (tm.)

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This sequence is insane!!!! (Also, I love that she consistently calls him 17 now.)

The way she yanks at his chain! Also, man who is still terrified of when he was tortured and chained, totally offered himself up to that for her. Mmmm

Did I mention her leg is broken and she’s still freaking out over him?

And feeding him her blood. She and Orchid need to hang out.

Ohhh the way she hovers.

I love that she admits that! In a way, it’s very fairy tale, enchanted princess making her suitors pass tests.

She was stroking his hair and now she touches the blood on his face and wipes it with her sleeve aaaaa!!!

I love how the typical gender dynamic is reversed with them - she is the damaged cynical one afraid to open her heart and he’s the warm loving one who gets her to do it by his devotion.

AAAAAA scream screammy scream scream!

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Trust her to come up with painting with poisons as a way to trap a traitor in his household, but also once again, he’s doing the artistic things and she’s doing the scheming, the reversal of typical roles.

I looooove the way she looks at him here. It’s not just safety that moves her, it’s desire too. 

Poison accidentally gets on him and he collapses on her lips. Heeeee what is this, Hanadan? Mmmmm!

Her faaaace! Her alight face!

Of course she’s on top asap. There hasn’t been a cdrama man more desperate to be a sub to his love since Sifeng.

This is the foundation of their relationship and it’s honestly probably not healthy per se, but it works to heal them so go for it!

She tells him this:

And his response:

Oh darlings!!!! Darlings, darlings, darlings!

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OK, so they dropped all nine (!!!) remaining episodes in a heap AND this week is insanely busy for me, so I am going to savor what's left slowly since who even knows if/when second season will air. This said, I did peek at a couple of scenes and am in heaven.

Because here is XY, coming to find Jing once she's back to life, before she even went to find cousin and he's basically like sleeping beauty/snow white, in a magic coma after he basically attempted to die so as not to live without her, and his servants have actually just pronounced him dead enough to get ready for his funeral. MMMM

Their explanation is the best - the most fairytale maiden thing ever! He's literally dying of a broken heart aaaaa!

Her reaction to this is epic because I think it's her last barrier about him crumbling; she is so paranoid/desperate not to be ever left and to be the most important person and so she seeks proof that she's chosen over and over and she gets it over and over but this is basically the ultimate proof - he doesn't just choose her in life, he chooses her in death.

She is a black hole of neediness due to her severe trauma but luckily he's a black hole of wanting to dissolve himself in her due to his own severe trauma and - I dunno, I am just a huge sucker for the trope of two people whose damage fits together.

YESSSSSS

She is going to feed her blood to revive the man who is dying because of not wanting to live without her and aaaaaaa your otp could never! (Probably because they are mentally healthier but still...:P)

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Soooo, this convo. Goes very much sideways in the best way.

Because he clearly tells her about FFYY reaction on seeing him shirtless and I just die from XY’s genuinely puzzled reaction as to why any woman would have an issue with his scars when he’s clearly so cool and scars are a nonissue - it’s exactly this attitude that he honestly so needs and that first drew him to her and honestly tailored to address his identity/worth issues (ie is he even anything without perfection or his name) the way his attitude towards her is tailored to address her issues.

When he asks her that if he didn’t have his title, his name, his clothes:

His brother may not have succeeded in killing him (if that was his goal which I am not sure tbh), but he certainly succeeded in breaking him on a basic level, even if not to such a degree as to make him non functional. I mean, remove the name, title, money etc, you still have a really good and smart man. But he clearly has serious issues about it and does not see it at all.

Hahahahaha ILY XY!

I keep screaming therapy!!!! at the screen and they can’t hear me. Like, he’s so sweet, so nice, so helpful, so smiling, that you kind of put in the back of your mind how damaged he must be from his trauma and then it comes and whacks you in the face.

Awwwwww

They are so good for each other’s issues OMG! Tailor made!

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I swear to God, every time they switch to Jing’s narrative, it becomes some sort of cross between Gaskell and Bronte and I am here for it!

I loved the Frightful Fiancee showing up and life draining out of Jing’s eyes (because he’s terrified every time will be too much for XY and she will end it) but also XY is jealous, awwwww! The thing is, she is only truly in any measure a young woman around and because of Jing and this includes being jealous and vulnerable. I kinda love it.

Oblivious friend toasts to the “happy couple” and I love that he refuses to drink and when evil fiancee says she will drink for him, fights her for the cup. I think he’s gonna embroider a banner, “I don’t want you” and carry it around.

He’s so fed up he gets up to leave and she’s clutching. Good Lord, lady, come on!

Afterwards:

He literally shoves her off. At Jing level of niceness and manners, it’s equivalent of punching her in the face while calling her a dozen filthy words. Heh.

The more it goes on, the clearer the female-coding on his character becomes. Not just that all his issues are family rivalry related inner house stuff or that he’s the nice one winning the jaded/damaged OTP through devotion and niceness but even here with the fiancee. The narrative of someone who does not want the arranged partner who keeps chasing them is usually given to women; who also cannot directly tell the other party to fuck off and have to politely navigate while giving public hints and perhaps in private being clearer, but still bound to be polite and not go beyond certain boundaries set by arbitrary society however dumb they may be.

His lines are 100% what a FL would say and navigate.

This said, I continue to be impressed how he doesn’t come across as in the least feminine. It’s quite a balancing act. But so much of this narrative is so well done. Just like her three suitors are reflections of parts of XY’s self and future potential paths. They all went through varieties of trauma and if Cang Xuan is a reflection of her potential darkest path and the damage of her damage, the Vamp Boy is her mirror - he is very much where she is now or at least in the beginning of the story, if it makes sense, and 17 is embodiment of hope that you can go through horror and emerge into hope - choosing him is ultimately choosing the possibility of her best self. I love that so much.

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TTEOTM Costume Count: Deng Wei Edition

Deng Wei's costumes (18 costumes in total + 4 armours/capes)

Xiao Lin - 7 costumes + 3 armors/capes

Sangyou - 2 costumes

Gongye Jiwu - 9 costumes + 1 cape

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2023.07.08 ° Deng Wei x Hello Saturday Special Episode for Lost You Forever (长相思)