This face is just so raw. Those who are cursing and hating on sun wukong over the recent season 3 finale need to recognize that this guy wasn't acting out of selfishness or looking to sacrifice anyone. I think it's clear he doesn't actually know what he's doing with the LBD and training MK, but it's on his shoulders to take down the witch or lose MK and the world. His "vacation" and this trip to collect the rings were a desperate course of action to take her down, even if it leaves him battered and kills him. He clearly loves MK and is looking to protect him and his group, and you can bet he had the best intentions by keeping the Mei secret, but unfortunately, things got out of hand. And now keep in mind that he is now racing to fight LBD by himself, despite being weakened and definitely scared. But he's rattled, MK literally rushed into death-inducing fire not two minutes previously and he just now seeing how his teaching method was pretty much trauma and physical injury-inducing. Like he said, he won't drag the kid into any more of his fights, even though he has no chance of victory now. He made a bad call, but he was doing his best. Keep in mind, despite the tension and conflict with Nedzu, the guy is still rushing to stop him from being hurt and captured by a crazy demon witch. So, try to not jump into the Hate Sun Wukong crowd, please.
I WANNA TALK ABOUT MACAQUE FACE IN “Time to Be Warriors”
We need to talk about this scene right here (LMK SEASON 3 SPECIAL “TIME TO BE WARRIORS” SPOILERS)
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“Stop! You keep playing at being this bad guy. Acting like your in it for you! But I know, deep, deep down, you're not that guy.”
The look on Macaque face caught my eye. Even if it was quick, this scene tells us a lot about Macaque.
Because this is the first time someone called him out on his “bad guy” persona. Someone doesn't see him as a villain. And as someone as young and impressionable as MK, I don't find it hard to believe that that speech didn't strike Macaque in the heart or at least opened his eye (hehe get it cause he's blind-*slap* sorry, sorry!). This time, someone believes he can actually be a warrior again instead of the villain in the story. In Sandy, Tang, Mei, Pigsy, and the sun to his moon, Wukong, he is a villain to them.
But not to MK. So for the first time, in perhaps centuries, someone actually saw through his mask. In MK eyes, he is a warrior. A broken one that could be redeemed.
Sun Wukong’s lawyer being the only person to know what Wukong wants at the end of his training with Qi Xiaotian. They have to. Wukong goes to them to draft up his will, after all.
That’s what all those emails are about. The lawyer saw “Monkie Kid” and went “Oh fuck.” They’re sending him links to therapy, how to recognize trauma and depression, self help stuff. Qi Xiaotian and Nezha meet them in S4 and they go “I THOUGHT HE WAS JUST GOING TO WRITE HIS NAME, NOT SET HIMSELF ON FIRE!”
Nezha: “...what?”
Lawyer: “You don’t know?”
Nezha: “Know what?”
Lawyer: “Wukong is planning on writing his name in the Book of the Dead once Qi Xiaotian’s training is complete.”
Sun Wukong is so afraid of the Lady Bone Demon that he would let himself be consumed by the one thing that could actually kill him rather than face her as he is. We see the fire literally hurt him in that flashback to the point where he falls after getting nicked by it, and yet he was planning to put that inside him. His hands shake at the mere thought of facing her without it, and sitting there with my siblings all we could as was “how on earth did he beat her the first time?”
then my brother brought up the flashback Sandy had in To Catch A Leaf. And the fact that the Monkie crew is pretty much confirmed to be the reincarnations of the JTTW crew. Either it was a willing reincarnation or… they were killed.
It would take a lot to kill that crew. And we know Sun Wukong could not have defeated the Lady Bone Demon alone, if he could, he would have attempted to do so to begin with.
What if Monkey King is so afraid to fight her because the last time he did he lost everything.
So basically: Theory that the last time Sun Wukong fought LBD, he won, but the JTTW crew, his family, were killed in the process