Something the anime didn't include in his memories after the old lady hit him was when he saw Maomao as a child for the first time, he was able to see her face like Fengxian (Maomao's mom)
Lankan portrayed himself as a villain when telling Jinshi the story. This is because he views himself as the villain of the story. He blames himself for what happened, but still wants to be close to his daughter.
@09:15 He chooses go instead of chess ... remember? In an earlier episode he told Jinshi that he never won against her in go but mostly won the chess games. So he deliberatly chose go knowing Fengxian will likely win and have her wish.
Yes, that is what the "a terrible thought crossed my mind" refers to. Because he thinks about picking chess first where he knew he would win and could "force himself on her".
It's so interesting because for most of the show Maomao's adoptive father, and Maomao by extension, keep repeating to not jump to conclusions. And yet everyone watching the show does just that (me included, I'm not pretending to be better than anyone). Yes, the show heavily suggests it the entire time, using themes and tropes we are used to, but it's never outright stated nor do we ever get any concrete evidence for it. Lakan is first and foremost just really awkward, and not being able to see peoples faces would almost certainly stunt someone socially. It would be much harder to pick up on social cues and so he probably never learned a lot of the things other people learn about getting along with others. And even beyond that it would probably be fair to call him a pompous asshole. It's so easy to dislike him but he's clearly not the genuinely vile and evil person he was painted out to be.
him being a bit pompous is however justified. he is the 7th most powerfull person within the palace and the 3rd most powerfull in the empire. (after the Emperor and Jinshi)
Luomen constantly reminds Maomao to not come to conclusions based solely on conjecture. The story feeds you tidbits about Lakan, and we as viewers come to a conclusion of who he is based solely on conjecture. The story tells you not to do it, multiple times, but gives you just enough rope to hang yourself. It’s brilliant writing.
"Her defiant eyes, like a balsam flower that would burst if touched" FengXian = Balsam. "Woodsorrel, also know as Cat's foot[...]like balsam, touching a ripe fruit causes the seeds to burst." Woodsorrel = Cat foot; Cat foot = Maomao. Episode title: "Balsam and Woodsorrel" a.k.a. "FengXian and Maomao"
Courtesans have ways to not get pregnant, Fengxian choose to get preg because she knew the buy out would be canceled and her price would fall so Lakan whould be able to buy her, but because of his father sending him away and not letting the letters be send to him, her plan failed and she felt hopeless. I think its a sweet special detail when he said he had a bad thought because he mentioned that he always loose in Go with Fengxian but wins in chess, so he could just choose chess and get his wish but decided to let her wish be the priority and choose Go knowing she would win. They painted Lakan as a villain this hole arc so we can be easy fooled about it when the truth comes out, Lakan is just a smart fox who likes to see people trying to solve problems he already solve (like in them moment when jinshi almost died, he figured it out but wanted maomao to do so he gave her a small tip sending her to solve the three brothers problem). I like to think Maomao have part of all her parents in her: she is analytical person that dont go just jump to conclusions like Luomen, she have love and pride for money like the granny, she treats everyone the same and only cares about what she want like Fengxian, and for the least she also is most likely always right about her conclusions like Lakan (like with the thing about the sleepwalking concubine, the incident that almost kill jinshi and Ah-duo changing babies)
@14:00 well the only thing indicating that he assaulted her was because he said to Jinshi he lowered her value. The viewer jumps to that conclusion. But i think Lakan feels guilt for not getting the hint and in a way he wants to be seen as the villan here.
Well he mentioned earlier that he "even though about forcing himself on her" or something to that effect that people also latched onto, despite the fact that it rather clearly implies he didn't actually do that because you don't say "I thought about going and getting a milkshake" if you actually did go get a milkshake.
@15:12 The tragic thing is Lakan never got the many letters Fengxian sent him. His family never sent these letters to him or informed him. So Fengxian never got an answer in these three years from him, so she thought he abandoned her. That is why she cut her own finger and Maomaos little finger (remember the nightmare Maomao had with her as a baby and a woman above her with a knife? Maomao even says that it was not a dream but a memory) to curse Lakan.
17:00 - He views Jinshi buying out Maomao as him stealing his daughter away. He is angry at him and threatens him and manipulates him and acts as a villain, because he wants Maomao.
Every time I watch Maomao shuffling those cups for the chess match I think "What you do not smell is called Iocane powder. It is odorless, tasteless, dissolves instantly in liquid, and is among the more deadly poisons known to man."
For me the point where it became sort of clear cut that Lakan wasn't a particularly bad guy was the conversation between Maomao and Meimei after Meimei's meeting with Lakan. Where she relates that Maomao was getting "that offer again" and that she didn't see the downside. Meimei dotes on Maomao like a little sister and she was the one who regularly entertained Lakan when he came. So her having an opinion that the offer didn't have a downside with regard to her beloved little sister gave a feeling of an endorsement of his character.
It was mentionned in passing a few episodes prior, but Fenxian always won at the game of Go, and Lakan always won at Shogi. When she asked him to pick a game whetere the winner gets to take whatever he or she wanted, she was asking him to pick who would win, and he chose Go in order to let her take whatever she wanted from him, even though he's wanted to play chess that day.
The thing with the fingers has to do with the superstition about the red string of fate. A red string is tied to your little finger and the little finger of your destined love. The reason why her mom cut both their little fingers off was because she didn't want either of them to suffer the pains of love because she believed they had been betrayed.
Yes Meimei was super young when this went down since it was a year before Maomao was born. Maomao is 17 I think so this would have been 18 years before the present day and Meimei is in her 30's now so she was probably like 12-14. She was Maomao's mother's apprentice which is likely why she's especially close to Maomao.
Still blown away by the overall writing quality of the season and how it takes the viewer on such a ride with twists and turns and changes in perception of characters as you learn more. Love it. And very much enjoyed your reactions and conversation.
Lakan’s whole thing is putting pieces in places to make things turn out the way he wants them to. The whole time he was behind the scenes doing that. Pointing maomao in the correct places to save jinshi, etc. all to make things happen without getting his hands dirty, as he’s not the type of guy to step up and do things himself.
It's been a while since I've read the light novel but if my memory serves me right. It was actually Fengxian plan to get pregnant with Lakan that's why she asked him when he will coming back. She planned to get pregnant to lower her price for Lakan to buy her out. Fengxian doesn't want to be buy out by other men but only with Lakan. But her plan back fired at her because of what happened to Lakan's uncle (aka Maomao's adopted father). The thing is, Lakan's father used Maomao's stepdad situation to exile Lakan so he could put his bastard son to be the next head of the family instead of Lakan.That's why it took Lakan 3 years to get back instead of 6 months only. His father delayed his return from 6 months to 3 years to put his bastard son to be next head. And also, didn't gave Fengxian's letter to him so he wouldn't insist on coming back.
Ommgg yay im so happy you are finally seeing this i just took a break from studying so the timing is PERFECT and btw you both are so cute have a great day
The kind and loving Meimei is in love with Lakan, but also her older very proudful older sister Fengxian. Hopefully, she can eventually have a happy ending.
She actually calculated getting pregnant. She was in love with Lakan and knew that he was unable to afford her so she intentionally planned his last visit with her ovulation and seduced him to create a child and lower her price I to a range he could afford. Lakan was sent away before he could receive the letter informing him of her pregnancy, although this could have been accepted by her because the original assumption was that he would be gone for only 6 months which would have made it so that he would be able to buy her out before the birth. Sadly with him being gone for 3 whole years she was forced to take on customers after Maomao was born and due to her now bad reputation she was limited to the bad and unhealthy customers she took this as Lakan abandoning her and thus cursed him with the finger severing. Additionally the manga shows it more but the deformation she suffered from the diseases are actually much worse than are shown in the anime.
One thing the show failed to explicitly state, was maomao's mom was the blood daughter of granny. Granny wanted more for her daughter, and trained her to become a high class courtesan, so she would command a high buyout, and end up in a rich home, living a good life. Maomao's mom sabotaged the plan to lower her value so lakan could afford her, but never knew why he disappeared for 3 years. When word got out the verdigris house was trying to sell off a courtesan that was already pregnant it nearly bankrupted the business, and maomao's mom had to take customers like a streetwalker to make enough money for food for maomao and herself. That is when she caught syphilis. Lakan being an awkward person creeped young maomao out, and so she denied all of his attempts to buy out her debt from the verdigris house. All in all a tragedy story.
In the source material Lakan leaving is alot more one sided. It wasnt his father that sent him away it was the emperor himself he literally had no choice but to go.
I think the biggest flaw in this show was that they made Lakan seem so terrible at the very beginning with the suggestion of rape. it doesnt give you even an opportunity for considering that its a misunderstanding until now and its really unfairly manipulating the reader.
It's intentional, the story keeps telling us to not jump to conclusions, it's one of the main tropes of the story, and yet we do. Based on nothing substantial whatsoever. Rather than being angry at the story for it, see it as a lesson in how easy it is to manipulate people and their perceptions of the world around them, and a lesson to always be critical of even your own beliefs and assumptions. I think this all makes the story MORE compelling.
Something the anime didn't include in his memories after the old lady hit him was when he saw Maomao as a child for the first time, he was able to see her face like Fengxian (Maomao's mom)
well they did show that he saw her face in his thought bubble
@@Eisen_Jaeger yea but itd hit isanely hard seen how theyd animated the scene
they dont show it but maomao pretty much talks about it next episode
It's in the next ep.
Lankan portrayed himself as a villain when telling Jinshi the story. This is because he views himself as the villain of the story. He blames himself for what happened, but still wants to be close to his daughter.
Yes it is MaoMao's finger. remember in the thrid episode, MaoMao mentioned that fingers can partially grow back.
That's mentioned in the next episode not the 3rd lol. Up till the 24th episode she just looks at her pinky at moments.
@09:15 He chooses go instead of chess ... remember? In an earlier episode he told Jinshi that he never won against her in go but mostly won the chess games. So he deliberatly chose go knowing Fengxian will likely win and have her wish.
Yes, that is what the "a terrible thought crossed my mind" refers to. Because he thinks about picking chess first where he knew he would win and could "force himself on her".
@@christianleitner7868 indeed ... i thought the same thing.
Lakan’s father didn’t send him the letters Fangxian wrote, that’s why he didn’t know, and he was only able to read them when he came back
It's so interesting because for most of the show Maomao's adoptive father, and Maomao by extension, keep repeating to not jump to conclusions. And yet everyone watching the show does just that (me included, I'm not pretending to be better than anyone). Yes, the show heavily suggests it the entire time, using themes and tropes we are used to, but it's never outright stated nor do we ever get any concrete evidence for it.
Lakan is first and foremost just really awkward, and not being able to see peoples faces would almost certainly stunt someone socially. It would be much harder to pick up on social cues and so he probably never learned a lot of the things other people learn about getting along with others. And even beyond that it would probably be fair to call him a pompous asshole. It's so easy to dislike him but he's clearly not the genuinely vile and evil person he was painted out to be.
him being a bit pompous is however justified. he is the 7th most powerfull person within the palace and the 3rd most powerfull in the empire. (after the Emperor and Jinshi)
Luomen constantly reminds Maomao to not come to conclusions based solely on conjecture. The story feeds you tidbits about Lakan, and we as viewers come to a conclusion of who he is based solely on conjecture. The story tells you not to do it, multiple times, but gives you just enough rope to hang yourself. It’s brilliant writing.
"Her defiant eyes, like a balsam flower that would burst if touched" FengXian = Balsam.
"Woodsorrel, also know as Cat's foot[...]like balsam, touching a ripe fruit causes the seeds to burst." Woodsorrel = Cat foot; Cat foot = Maomao.
Episode title: "Balsam and Woodsorrel"
a.k.a. "FengXian and Maomao"
congratulation. now go back to every previous episode and find the flower reference. All of them have them.
Courtesans have ways to not get pregnant, Fengxian choose to get preg because she knew the buy out would be canceled and her price would fall so Lakan whould be able to buy her, but because of his father sending him away and not letting the letters be send to him, her plan failed and she felt hopeless. I think its a sweet special detail when he said he had a bad thought because he mentioned that he always loose in Go with Fengxian but wins in chess, so he could just choose chess and get his wish but decided to let her wish be the priority and choose Go knowing she would win. They painted Lakan as a villain this hole arc so we can be easy fooled about it when the truth comes out, Lakan is just a smart fox who likes to see people trying to solve problems he already solve (like in them moment when jinshi almost died, he figured it out but wanted maomao to do so he gave her a small tip sending her to solve the three brothers problem). I like to think Maomao have part of all her parents in her: she is analytical person that dont go just jump to conclusions like Luomen, she have love and pride for money like the granny, she treats everyone the same and only cares about what she want like Fengxian, and for the least she also is most likely always right about her conclusions like Lakan (like with the thing about the sleepwalking concubine, the incident that almost kill jinshi and Ah-duo changing babies)
@14:00 well the only thing indicating that he assaulted her was because he said to Jinshi he lowered her value. The viewer jumps to that conclusion. But i think Lakan feels guilt for not getting the hint and in a way he wants to be seen as the villan here.
Well he mentioned earlier that he "even though about forcing himself on her" or something to that effect that people also latched onto, despite the fact that it rather clearly implies he didn't actually do that because you don't say "I thought about going and getting a milkshake" if you actually did go get a milkshake.
This was the “I was wrong about Lakan” episode lol
@15:12 The tragic thing is Lakan never got the many letters Fengxian sent him. His family never sent these letters to him or informed him. So Fengxian never got an answer in these three years from him, so she thought he abandoned her. That is why she cut her own finger and Maomaos little finger (remember the nightmare Maomao had with her as a baby and a woman above her with a knife? Maomao even says that it was not a dream but a memory) to curse Lakan.
Not gonna lie, they got us good with the plot twist.
17:00 - He views Jinshi buying out Maomao as him stealing his daughter away. He is angry at him and threatens him and manipulates him and acts as a villain, because he wants Maomao.
Every time I watch Maomao shuffling those cups for the chess match I think "What you do not smell is called Iocane powder. It is odorless, tasteless, dissolves instantly in liquid, and is among the more deadly poisons known to man."
For me the point where it became sort of clear cut that Lakan wasn't a particularly bad guy was the conversation between Maomao and Meimei after Meimei's meeting with Lakan. Where she relates that Maomao was getting "that offer again" and that she didn't see the downside. Meimei dotes on Maomao like a little sister and she was the one who regularly entertained Lakan when he came. So her having an opinion that the offer didn't have a downside with regard to her beloved little sister gave a feeling of an endorsement of his character.
It was mentionned in passing a few episodes prior, but Fenxian always won at the game of Go, and Lakan always won at Shogi. When she asked him to pick a game whetere the winner gets to take whatever he or she wanted, she was asking him to pick who would win, and he chose Go in order to let her take whatever she wanted from him, even though he's wanted to play chess that day.
You two are my comfort reaction channel- always quality commentary. Thanks for your content 😁
The thing with the fingers has to do with the superstition about the red string of fate. A red string is tied to your little finger and the little finger of your destined love. The reason why her mom cut both their little fingers off was because she didn't want either of them to suffer the pains of love because she believed they had been betrayed.
Yes Meimei was super young when this went down since it was a year before Maomao was born. Maomao is 17 I think so this would have been 18 years before the present day and Meimei is in her 30's now so she was probably like 12-14. She was Maomao's mother's apprentice which is likely why she's especially close to Maomao.
Still blown away by the overall writing quality of the season and how it takes the viewer on such a ride with twists and turns and changes in perception of characters as you learn more. Love it. And very much enjoyed your reactions and conversation.
Lakan’s whole thing is putting pieces in places to make things turn out the way he wants them to. The whole time he was behind the scenes doing that. Pointing maomao in the correct places to save jinshi, etc. all to make things happen without getting his hands dirty, as he’s not the type of guy to step up and do things himself.
It's been a while since I've read the light novel but if my memory serves me right. It was actually Fengxian plan to get pregnant with Lakan that's why she asked him when he will coming back. She planned to get pregnant to lower her price for Lakan to buy her out. Fengxian doesn't want to be buy out by other men but only with Lakan. But her plan back fired at her because of what happened to Lakan's uncle (aka Maomao's adopted father). The thing is, Lakan's father used Maomao's stepdad situation to exile Lakan so he could put his bastard son to be the next head of the family instead of Lakan.That's why it took Lakan 3 years to get back instead of 6 months only. His father delayed his return from 6 months to 3 years to put his bastard son to be next head. And also, didn't gave Fengxian's letter to him so he wouldn't insist on coming back.
Ommgg yay im so happy you are finally seeing this i just took a break from studying so the timing is PERFECT and btw you both are so cute have a great day
The kind and loving Meimei is in love with Lakan, but also her older very proudful older sister Fengxian.
Hopefully, she can eventually have a happy ending.
She actually calculated getting pregnant. She was in love with Lakan and knew that he was unable to afford her so she intentionally planned his last visit with her ovulation and seduced him to create a child and lower her price I to a range he could afford. Lakan was sent away before he could receive the letter informing him of her pregnancy, although this could have been accepted by her because the original assumption was that he would be gone for only 6 months which would have made it so that he would be able to buy her out before the birth. Sadly with him being gone for 3 whole years she was forced to take on customers after Maomao was born and due to her now bad reputation she was limited to the bad and unhealthy customers she took this as Lakan abandoning her and thus cursed him with the finger severing. Additionally the manga shows it more but the deformation she suffered from the diseases are actually much worse than are shown in the anime.
Another thing Lakan can both be a decent person and a creep at the same time. Lakan is a creepy wierdo but at tye same time it dosent make him evil.
15:53 Now after watching this ep and understanding Lakan more, last part of ep 19 hits differently.
What a twist! :D
One thing the show failed to explicitly state, was maomao's mom was the blood daughter of granny. Granny wanted more for her daughter, and trained her to become a high class courtesan, so she would command a high buyout, and end up in a rich home, living a good life. Maomao's mom sabotaged the plan to lower her value so lakan could afford her, but never knew why he disappeared for 3 years. When word got out the verdigris house was trying to sell off a courtesan that was already pregnant it nearly bankrupted the business, and maomao's mom had to take customers like a streetwalker to make enough money for food for maomao and herself. That is when she caught syphilis.
Lakan being an awkward person creeped young maomao out, and so she denied all of his attempts to buy out her debt from the verdigris house.
All in all a tragedy story.
In the source material Lakan leaving is alot more one sided. It wasnt his father that sent him away it was the emperor himself he literally had no choice but to go.
And he was sent off to war, not study. 18:34
Actually poor Lakan he get everything but peace
Love the videos, y’all’s next series should be watching sounds of life. It would be something y’all would love I just know it.
He just never know😂
What?! I never thought of him as a villain 🌚
what do you mean lol? the story set him up that way the whole time, the point is the twist that our preconceptions about him were incorrect
Day 2 asking cara and prez to react to My Love Story!!
P/s Yes it's moamoa finger
Such a tragic story.
You misjudged him. There were plenty of signs the entire time. But at least it was intentional i guess
I think the biggest flaw in this show was that they made Lakan seem so terrible at the very beginning with the suggestion of rape. it doesnt give you even an opportunity for considering that its a misunderstanding until now and its really unfairly manipulating the reader.
It's intentional, the story keeps telling us to not jump to conclusions, it's one of the main tropes of the story, and yet we do. Based on nothing substantial whatsoever. Rather than being angry at the story for it, see it as a lesson in how easy it is to manipulate people and their perceptions of the world around them, and a lesson to always be critical of even your own beliefs and assumptions. I think this all makes the story MORE compelling.
that's literally the point.
It is reversing the trope where the nicest person ends up being a villain.
16:32 not really, you guys were the one that decided he was creepy and stick to that image the whole time
That's very much intentional by the story. You're MEANT to find Lakan reprehensible for the way he talks about other people.
@@Masterfrogg Just goes to show how many of the commenters don't understand actual writing anymore.
all it takes to decide he's creepy is having any literacy, he's purposely displayed that way..