#QXT: YEAH?? HOW DO YOU KNOW

[acoraxia]

Red Son is actually such a cool character when you separate him from shipping.

He’s not angry and hot-tempered, actually, he’s just very dramatic and has a constant flare for making things more.. extravagant than they need to be. He’s actually more dramatic than Macaque is with the way he presents his inventions and his own person.

He rarely gets mad. Mostly annoyed but never down right mad at either Xiaotian or Xiaojiao.

He also seems to lack social interaction and doesn’t understand a lot of social cues? At least, from what I can remember he’s thrown off by how friendly Xiaojiao and Xiaotian are and almost seemed overwhelmed by it.

Cannot really tell if he enjoys hanging out with them in small doses or if he would prefer spending time alone. Because when he does “hang out” with them it’s not up to him — they’re always saving the world from a bone spirit or healing people from spider poison. And he wasn’t even there for the final Azure fight so he wasn’t really needed for that. He just happened to show up at the beach ending scenes but he seems the happiest when he’s with his parents or alone? It’s weird

He’s not as social as the other two and frankly sometimes it just feels like he’s watching over them to make sure they don’t die or something

But he is so cool

[fluffypotatey]

Hello hello, S5 ep 9 let's-a-go! Warning, this one is BRUTAL. QXT: Macaque, what are you doing! M: Xiaotian, stop! You don’t need to do this. QXT: I do need to do this! M: I did tell you before to make your own choices, but this isn’t the way Xiaotian! QXT: You don’t understand. If I don’t do this, everyone will be done for! Everything will be destroyed! M: It doesn’t always have to be you! There’s always another way! QXT: But this is the only way! M: That’s not true. You don’t get it! Nines: Who says…*interrupts/traps* ...he doesn’t get it? Not bad. Who taught you that trick? Who did you make a deal with? M: What deal? Nines: Well, that’s not important. Everything’s ending soon anyways. The Harbinger of Chaos knows his mission. Only by sacrificing himself will you all be able to live. Nines is a real piece of work, making it seem like MK has a choice. That he doesn't care what he does, okay bud. Says that he's tired of being controlled by others LOL. Oh, the irony is enough to make this EP taste metallic. Tired of humans locking themselves in cages, ignoring chaos and destiny, etc. The quiet, seething way Macky asks "what deal?" almost seems guarded. Haha, perhaps he knows. MK saying "not this time" feels like a parallel to another episode, but I can't put my finger on it. Maybe something Wukong said? Yeah, that sounds right. "Sorry bud. Not this time." Yeah, S3 no? Wasn't there something like that?SWK: Xiaotian, no! Macky, watching this: *sighs* Even if this doesn’t work, I still gotta give it a shot. HELLO SIR YOU TOTALLY KNOW WHAT IS UP WITH YOUR WEIRD POWERS HUH? I'm skipping some parts, mostly the gang and Nine bc this ep is loaded, but note the way Mac's shadows infiltrate and surround the midsection where the power core usually is. SWK: Huh? What? My boi just turned himself into a shadowy nuclear bomb. I don’t like his prospects for the next season. Nines: You- what did you do? Why have I been separated from the chaos? I- I can’t feel it anymore! What did you do?! *screams lungs out as Macky gasps for breath on the ground.* HELLO MACKY IS MY POWER STEALING HC TRUE???? AYOOOOO Nine's is really flipping here, voice going all glitchy, robotic and echo-y. SWK: Macaque, you good? M: What are you waiting for? Stop Xiaotian! It's all about the tentative way Wukong steps forward and asks and Macky is clearly unwell...Is it worse or better than he was down for longer after fighting possessed!Wukong so we couldn't see his half-lidded eyes/struggle for air. He got himself up in the background of the SunBurst hug in a way that could be memed, but this? Nope. I brought it up bc I wanted to see if possessed!Wukong was holding back bc someone said he was re: laser eyes, maybe they meant him not using it until that fight, or the slow way(?) it charged up bc some part of him didn't want to kill Macky, idk. SWK: I won’t let you sacrifice yourself! QXT: Don’t stand in my way, Monkey King. Please. SWK: Not a chance, Xiaotian. You never abandoned me, and I won’t ever abandon you. QXT: Don’t force my hand, Monkey King. EVILLLLLL. JUST LIKE WUKONG SAID TO MACAQUE- don’t make me do this, Liu’er! SWK: No, Xiaotian. Don’t force mine. DOUBLE EVIL OH MY GOSH HE SAID THE THING AND HIS EYES WENT BRIGHT GOLD HE MEANS BUSINESS. They gave us serious scary Wukong FR.

I’m starting to see how things so easily went wrong for Macky. Wukong does NOT play around, even if you’re MK. Seeing him use the same spell LBD used to trap Macky on top of all this is making me LOSE IT.

QXT: No! No! SWK: There is still a lot I haven't taught you yet. QXT: Monkey King, please! This is my destiny! This is the only way! Let me just say I HATE the expressions Wukong has been making this entire episode. They're ruining me. This one too. SWK: Yes. You're right. It seems like this really is the only way to save everyone. QXT: Then- Then let me go! SWK: Nuwa, or destiny. No matter how you look at it, as long as we came from the same stone... QXT: What? SWK: You don't have to bear this destiny. Let me bear it. QXT: No! Monkey King! SWK: This world needs you, Xiaotian. Thanks...for everything. QXT: Monkey King! Stop, please! THE DRAMA FLUFFY THE DRAMA-! AND WUKONG IS CRYING AS HE FLIES AWAY- and then MK USES THE FREAKING SPELL. I swear everybody is trying to hurt each other and squabbling for the right of who gets to sacrifice themselves first and I'm FLIPPING. WHAT IS THIS?!?!?! This is what happens when you put two sacrificial morons with personal issues in a room together. SWK: No! Xiaotian! No! No! Stop Xiaotian! QXT: I'm sorry. I will be the one to bear my destiny. SWK: Stop! Don't Xiaotian! So anyways, Fluffs. We had all this angsty audio about Wukong crying/yelling if MK got hurt taken from Goku...and now we have to HEAR IT FOR REAL. And like, his VA is seriously good and I think I'll be crying for months if I heard that. I'm going to be crying to YOU about it and that is a threat. We'll cry together. I can kind of see Buddhist influence here since the cycle of reincarnation, while normal here for the characters, is actually the goal to "escape from." So to MK, it's not a good thing. Asides from how much angst Wukong gets from it. You would think it'd be like "oh I get to meet my friends in the next life" but nada, MK here is shook by it. Tho maybe it's because it's not natural, letting them live out to the end, but forcing it early?

OH MY GOD EPISODE 9

I TOOK ALL THE SUNBURST DUO SCREENSHOTS THAT MADE ME FERAL

like…..HELLO?????? 911?????? THERE’S BEEN A MURDER

AND THE FUCKING EXPRESSION BEFORE THE FIGHT🫠🫠🫠🫠 I AM SOBBING

[forgive me for the bad quality 🤧]

AND SWK SO READY TO TAKE MK’S OLAXE BECAUSE “hey, we’re from the same stone, so this destiny of yours should also be tied to me” AND WHAT IF I DIED???? WHAT IF THIS DIALOGUE STABBED ME???? LMK ANSWER FOR YOUR CRIMES

and the way Macky mourned Wukong privately while everyone else cried for MK (bc they assumed the Pillar repairing itsel meant swk failed) since he knew the Monkey King would try to take MK’s place i— 🫠

also Pigsy trying to change MK’s mind and when that didn’t work:

SOMEBODY SEDATE ME 😭

THATS HIS SON!!!! THATS HIS LITTLE BOY WHO LOVES NOODLES AND SUCKS AT DELIVERING THEM AND SPENDS MOST IF HIS WORK HOURS LISTENING TI TABG’S STORIES BUT PIGSY WOULDNT HAVE IT ANY OTHER WAY

🫠

also i think @/lunarwandering mentioned this in a post of theirs but Nines is so confusing lmaooooo like bro 🤨 do you or do you not want MK to sacrifice himself???? “i am giving you the choice he free!!! but i will also make sure to stop your friends from stopping me and you from operation Commit Die!”

the way he snaps at being called a monster 👀 Nines please share in a way that isn’t the Allegory of the Cave (like sir, that is Greek Philosophy come on) (tho interesting that the borders of the “cave” from ep8 looked like Nuwa 👀

ans Nines clearly has some beef with Nuwa 👀 so. what’s up with that)

i have so many questions about Nines

[davids-cartoon-corkboard]

Episode 2 thoughts!

Ok yeah narrative just casually remind the audience that Sun Wukong’s companions are significantly squishier than he is. That’s fine and probably not foreshadowing anything. If anyone were to get seriously injured and possibly thought dead, I’d probably guess Qi Xiaotian (not used to being Brought Down To Normal, high-priority target) or Tang Shifu (probably has latent Golden Cicada powers but who knows if that would actually make him any sturdier than your average human). Or maybe Sha Dali tbh, it would be scary if some threat took out the team’s Tank.

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I like how both Zhu Dachu and QXT acknowledge SWK’s past bastardousness here. Zhu Dachu’s coming at it from an “I don’t like that he’s dragged my kid employee into all this mystic monkey business so I’m going to be hard on him also there’s a desire to butt heads with him emanating from my very soul” angle, and QXT’s whole hero worship thing is gradually wearing down over time as he spends more time with SWK and is able to see him in a more realistic light.

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"Mix with unkind people and you will surely encounter disaster!” Did Tang Shifu get shoved into lockers a lot as a kid, to parallel how yaoguai and bandits and so on would cause trouble for Tripitaka? Like Tripitaka, was he too trusting? I wonder how his mom feels about him being friends with Zhu Dachu and Sha Dali, they’re hardly Proper Scholarly Gentlemen.

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I’m not even sure what to call this comment. Racist? Species-ist? I know mixed race people irl will often get comments like “you don’t look like you’re [race]” or “you’re only half, you’re not really [race]”. Long Xiaojiao’s uncle’s attendant dragged her around, yelled at her, called her indecent, demanded she give up her sword, and was apparently ready to physically attack her if she didn’t listen. What the fuck.

Idk how much this Fun Wacky Adventure Cartoon For Kids is going to delve into all that on, like, a socio-political level, but they might explore more about how being mixed species affects LXJ personally. Can she become more draconic? Neither of her parents have draconic traits, so they probably wouldn’t appear naturally as part of a second puberty. Her parents don’t seem to be fighters, so maybe draconic traits could appear as she becomes more powerful, like how the Demon Bull King becomes larger the more power he absorbs? Is such a change safe for her mostly-human body?

Also, what’s the deal with this other Dragon Blade in the treasure room? Do the North and South Dragon families also have Dragon Blades? Could LXJ sprout an extra set of arms to wield all four at once?

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Ao Guang and LXJ saw a vision of the Samadhi fire, and of someone consumed by it. Ao Guang, frightened, jumped back and said “this is impossible!” What is impossible?

And what the hell is this reaction from LXJ? The shadowed eyes, the wind kicked up in the room...

...it’s her standard “my family is in danger and I’m about to go Fucking Apeshit to rectify that” response, which is ostensibly manifesting to communicate to Ao Guang that she’ll kick his ass if she has to.

The person in the vision has a similar hairstyle to LXJ, but it’s not quite clear enough to say for sure that it is LXJ. Maybe it’s not quite LXJ. Maybe it’s a vision of the past. Of Ao Lie.

Maybe LXJ got so upset because she remembered, just for a moment, the feeling of burning to death.

Is that why Ao Lie has never been outright mentioned yet, neither by Sun Wukong nor by the dragon families? Is it simply too painful to speak of? Was the end of his story left unwritten, such that neither Tang Shifu nor QXT know of it?

Is it worth it for LXJ to delve deeper into her dragon heritage, if she risks unlocking more of such memories?

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(Screenshots and subtitles courtesy of chrossrank on twitter.)

(Opening) (Ep.1) (Ep. 2: You Are Here) (Ep. 3) (Ep. 4) (Ep. 5)

(Ep. 6) (Ep. 7) (Ep. 8) (Ep. 9) (Ep. 10)

[davids-cartoon-corkboard]

Episode 3: Smartie Kid

(original thoughts here)

Qi Xiaotian: “[Sun Wukong is] in no state to waste his time on mere mortals... especially now I don’t have my powers.”

Zhu Dachu: “Woah, he told you that?”

QXT: “We have a very honest relationship, Pigsy.”

Somehow I doubt SWK literally actually said that, but the rest of the crew already don’t think too highly of SWK so they aren’t questioning it. I think QXT's train of thought is running along the “abandonment” track again: “I’m weak, so why would he stick around?” Can we BLEASE get some backstory for this boy, I want to know where these issues stem from.

Zhu Dachu immediately seeks to reassure him, of course. He loves his boy so much, y’all.

SWK: “You found your strength when you needed it most.”

Like, okay, that’s great pal, but that doesn’t override Zhu Dachu’s valid concern about how deliberately putting your friends in danger is bad. Honestly I want some contrivance to lock the two of them into an enclosed space together and force them to talk shit out so they can understand each others’ perspectives.

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*PUTS HIM IN A PRINGLES CAN AND SHAKES HIM* STINKY. STINKY BASTARD MAN.

“Goldfish Demon” is, uh. A pretty lazy “translation”, ngl. His name in Chinese is “靈感大王”, or Línggǎn dàwáng”. “Dàwáng” means “great king”, and he’s been pretty sorely dethroned since his Journey to the West days, so I can understand omitting that part. “Línggǎn” isn’t easy to translate (”Spiritual Touch”? “Numinous Power”? “Miraculous Power”?), but they could have just. Y’know. Not translated it? “Hey there guys I’m Linggan the Goldfish Demon, do you wanna win this cool engine?” isn’t hard asdklfj;kjklsdf.

Yeah that’s it for this episode tbh ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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(Ep. 1) (Ep. 2) (Ep. 3: You Are Here) (Ep. 4) (Ep. 5)

(Ep. 6) (Ep. 7) (Ep. 8) (Ep. 9) (Ep. 10)