#and also can stone monkey being able to sic bees on people be like. talked about.

[cave-monkey]

Monkey King 2009 Episode 9

The one where Stone Monkey blows up a mountain I guess.

TIME SKIP

TIME SKIP

Old Monkey King is BACK BABY. And Stone Monkey immediately mellows out! Fancy that! Literally all Old Monkey King has to do is go, "He's not that bad, actually." at the four generals complaining and Stone Monkey is immediately chill, full of love and benevolence for the world. All the tension he's carrying just drops, basically (or at least resets him to late Episode 5/very early Episode 6 levels of frustration, basically the same thing compared to where he's been at recently), and you can practically see the relief when he realizes someone with actual weight is in his corner again. He's so happy he's even calmly accepting a pretty harsh punishment for something that was, uh...only sort of peripherally his fault at best? And even defending his deserving of it to Ginseng Fruit.

Amazing how well offering a kid just a little bit of security works, amirite. Almost like he no longer feels like every vaguely confrontational interaction is the death knell on his right to exist or something.

At least until those people go behind Old Monkey King's back to harass the kid to the point he finally gives up and leaves and they don't even try to stop him. Old Monkey King is so done with their shit, too. Between him flat-out telling them that if anything happens to Stone Monkey it's on them (and himself too, and the entire troop to a lesser extent, but the message was for them) and earlier in the episode when they came up to him and he immediately went from 😄 to "...What do you want? 😒" it's a wonder these guys even have the confidence to pull this shit. They're on such thin ice. I have the distinct impression they've been skating here since Episode 4 too, so like, there's thin ice and then there's the vaguely frosty condensation layer these guys are tapdancing on.

Six Ears's entrance was super cute, though. Him sliding in determined to cheer Stone Monkey up and the way Stone Monkey lit up at seeing him. The half-hearted "You should go rest" but knowing Six Ears won't leave him, and Six Ears laughing at him about it, and how easy they were while working together later. Six Ears appears and Stone Monkey's day is immediately 500% better. The sun has risen. It is a new dawn. They are so cute.

...Even though I am chock-full of questions about where, exactly, Six Ears was. He came "back"? So late at night? Like, come on, but this just keeps happening. He's often off somewhere by himself and this time it wasn't him taking himself off on a mission to track Stone Monkey down since Stone Monkey was actually sticking close to the troop for once. All the four generals were asleep, so who was keeping track of him? What was he out there doing?

They're not sending him out on his own, right? Because I feel like we all know why that's been proven to be a very bad idea. Not that I expect the four generals to make solid decisions there, exactly. Heck, maybe they think he's good bait (they had better not think he's good bait). Maybe they don't care as long as it keeps him and Stone Monkey separated. Maybe the timeskip means Six Ears and Stone Monkey are actually getting something approximating real responsibilities now instead of ones they just sorta give themselves, and the wonky schedules are just...actually maybe also an attempt to keep them separated. I think the likeliest possibility is he was tagging along with a patrol or something, but. Hm.

Anyway. Tangent over.

Him desperately throwing himself between Stone Monkey and the four generals trying to defend him was just...really sad, though? Who in the writer's room okay-ed this? He's trying so hard to protect Stone Monkey and his voice actor did a really good job getting across the desperation and nerves, a kid trying to talk down grown adults, and it's just. Ugh. Ow.

And Stone Monkey watching him beg for him and watching it get him nowhere, knowing that the four generals don't want to change their minds, and just. Losing it. Finally. My heart was in my boots during this scene. Stone Monkey taking off, and Six Ears turning back to the four generals and now he's nearly screaming, "You can't do this, it's not safe, what's going to happen to him?" but it still doesn't touch them at all, and Six Ears turns back around, the anxiety and fear, going in circles, but Stone Monkey's already gone. And then that sad little wave and it's all straight to the heart for me. Ugh. UGH.

*drags hands down face*

UGH.

I don't blame Ginseng Fruit for losing their temper, even if the results were like this. It was not a good way to handle it, but they beat themselves up for it so much throughout the episode already it's pointless to condemn them. They're young, and angry that their friend is being mistreated, and they lashed out. It was maybe inevitable.

Ginseng Fruit and Stone Monkey's relationship was really nice this episode, actually. The timeskip has helped them smooth out some of the rougher edges of their relationship, and they're apparently together all the time these days, for reasons sort of touched on in the episode? They exist in very similar states of loneliness, and that similarity pushes them together even if they aren't naturally very compatible. They still clash, they still fumble and don't quite succeed when trying to give each other the support they want to give, but they choose to make it work anyway, even if it's not especially smooth all the time. It's a good relationship.

I should talk more about Old White Deer, but I'll admit my entire reaction to the Stranger Danger PSA that was the latter half of the episode was primarily:

CHILDREN. CHILDREN NO. CHILDREN PLEASE.

And, honestly, I feel like that sums it up. There was not a single point past encountering Old White Deer where I wasn't screaming some variation of the above in my head. Creepy man.

Like. The tea. The fucking tea. Stone Monkey, please.

In Stone Monkey's defense, the last time he was approached by a random person in the middle of the forest and they asked him to follow them home, he met his best friend and it worked out sort of okay for him. He's also predisposed to a fondness for trickster mentors after Old Monkey King. He's learned all the wrong lessons for this encounter, okay. Some very alarming wires got crossed somewhere in his head and it did not do him any favors here.

But it's okay though, because he blows up the mountain.

!

!!!

Just! Sets that big hunk of rock on fire! He did not have to do that, but I can't blame him for feeling a little pyro-y, I suppose. He can have a bit of arson. As a treat. Make the creepy-crawlies from being drugged and left tied up on the floor of a creepy old man go away, maybe.

...This episode was so viscerally uncomfortable, though. Good job, writers. I hate it.

I hope Old Monkey King on the horizon is looking at this giant flaming mountain in the distance like, "...Well at least I know where he is."