#i'm on level 45.

[stabbyfoxandrew]

im sorry to hear that :( you’ve been kinda quiet lately so i was hoping that wasn’t the case. i hope you take care of yourself and things get better soon <3

oh have i? i'm sorry.

i've just basically been existing the last week or so? the depression is Getting me real good. literally like i eat and sleep and play fortnite with jess.

that's all i've felt like doing lately. i haven't even been reading fics really? the state of Everything has got me feeling like shit my dude. ty for checkin on me <333

[starmocha]

This man loves with his whole heart, body, and soul, and that is the only kind of love I will accept from now on. 🥹💕

[thenugking]

that was just--we started off from a point of "going insane over an actor's name for the past several weeks," and I've been swinging back and forth between "it's just her name, she's a real person, it doesn't mean anything" and "rtd absolutely knows what he's doing here though" but look as much as I wanted Susan I didn't want to get my hopes up too high. I thought we might be getting the Trickster, possibly the Guardians, but more likely a new generic villain I had no reason to care about.

And then they IMMEDIATELY have the character be called Susan too?? And bring up the annagram of TARDIS?? And I'm sitting here going "Susan named the TARDIS, is this a reference, are they actually doing a reference????" and then they straight up NAMEDROPPED HER and brought up the possibility themselves and I had my mouth hanging open through the titles.

And look I got that it probably wasn't actually Susan! And I was vaguely worried that if it was, they'd make things I didn't want Decisively Canon. And then the doctor's talking about how Susan was his granddaughter but that didn't mean he'd had her parent which??? Are we making Lungbarrow TV canon here??? And I know showrunners love to disagree, but the Doctor metioned being a dad in russell's first run, in both Fear Her and the Doctor's Daughter, so.... was that about Miranda?? Is Miranda also TV canon??

And THEN we get to the end and the TARDIS has something evil going on with it--is it Zagreus? Is it anti-time?? Why is this theme music so similar to the Master's Sound of Drums theme, it can't be the Master, can it?? I'd almost decided it was the trickster (I was getting Vibes from ruby's bio mum) but then he gets namedropped, and then the Mara gets namedropped and then?? The Other gets namedropped????

I got it at Set. Literally went "is this Sutekh??" outloud. Spent the final few minutes laughing. Did anyone call this??? "What if it's Susan/the Rani/the Master/the Trickster/the Toymaker/River/Tecteun/Rogue/Roger ap Gwilliam/Iris/Omega/the fucking Carnival Queen?" Nope it's fucking Sutekh apparently. He's back now.

I hope Ruby's bio mum turns out to be the person crouched behind his throne and holding it steady. what the fuck.

[rinbylin]

galaxy-brained mlc take of the day: mlc is wuxia, yes and maybeee not exactly? it very much is a wuxia aesthetically, but it's actually - conceptually - xianxia story in the core. (this is different from suggesting that it is a xianxia show.) however xianxia can (or should) be considered a subgenre of wuxia, not its own separate distinct genre despite the idea of 仙 xian being fundamentally at odds with the idea of 侠 xia, because they both stem from the same belief. (as seen in mlc, it works with the conventions of traditional wuxia aka li xiangyi the sigu sect leader, to get to the real bits of xianxia concept aka li lianhua's story.) so, mlc is wuxia through and through, inside out. send tweet 🫡👍

-

ok wait I can explain

so, this must be premised on the understanding that any discussion of "仙 xian/deities" in this context is only as its abstract idea of living a life distanced, detached from worldly, human woes instead of the possibility of immortality existing in mlcverse. (if you think about the deities in xianxia stories being basically human beings who have cultivated themselves into immortality.)

this is the explanation of xianxia as a wuxia subgenre (古仙武侠) in the baidu article of wuxia genre:

武侠中的侠，是脱胎于墨家“以天下为己任���的使命感；而仙侠的侠，通常是传达着“能力越大，责任也就越大”的朴素精神。侠乃入世，仙为出世，道教阴阳的无情大道（无情指寻求自我的不断体悟，以达精神的成仙，非没有感情之意）与武侠江湖的有情众生，即是矛盾也是循环，象征着太极之道，这也就是为何古仙武侠也属于正统仙侠流派的原因。

rough tl:

the xia of wuxia is born from the mohist ideal of bearing a sense of responsibility for the world

while the xia in xianxia focuses on the idea of "with great power comes great responsibility"

the idea of 侠 xia is secular. the idea of 仙 xian is beyond the secular - it is to pursue a life of suppressing/taming your own emotions (it does not mean to be completely removed of the ability to feel. it's a pursuit of self-realisation that makes one attain the status of a "deity" spiritually.) 仙 xian is then inherently at odds with wuxia jianghu's deep empathy and connection with the secular world, but it's also connected back to it. this is why 古仙武侠 is considered to be a part of the wuxia genre.

the relationship between xian and xia is conflicting because the former is all about distancing yourself from worldly issues while the latter necessitates an active effort to do something about them.

but it also means that both wuxia and xianxia acknowledge this weight of human emotions and connection to the world. it's just their respective responses and the outcomes they want that they differ in. what is the ideal person? wuxia says it's to be someone who can propagate and execute the ideal of doing something about this weight of your connection to the world, while xianxia says it's to learn to be at peace with that connection, and it's ok to not do anything about it actually - which might even be harder than trying to do something. (and focusing on your own cultivation can be a good thing for the world, in fact.)

with this, I hope it sounds less absurd that I'm connecting mlc's story to the concept of xianxia. lxy's life was a traditional wuxia archetype. (I've already harped on enough about how he fits into the quintessential mohist model of a xia leader.) what happens after, aka his journey as li lianhua, is the real story of mlc. it's a breakdown of that quintessential wuxia hero. it is a story in which the main conflict faced by the protagonist is to struggle with all the worldly woes including his own past and the cases' victims, in defense of the serenity he has found in the past 9 years. it is a natural battle to fight for someone such as llh because as long as you're still human, you will face the implications of human connections and the innate feeling of compassion and urge to do something about it (part of this, I guess, manifests physically in bicha breaking him down and the resistance to cure).

and relating that to an excerpt from an article discussing xianxia in relation to wuxia:

武侠剧的精神内核也是仙侠剧的精神内核，而“仙”实际上是实现新形式的“侠”的手段，由此扩展了“侠”的深度和其实施的时空范围。武侠之中的侠义精神，可以强调其自在，更强调其是自为的，前者是需要逐渐成长和觉醒的。然而对于高于人的仙而言，作为上位者的“侠”之精神，则应该是内在自觉且自为的。

rough tl:

the spirit of wuxia dramas should also be the spirit of xianxia dramas. xian should in fact be another way to bring out and explore the idea of xia.

the spirit of xia in wuxia can be an emphasis on the spirit of freedom, and even more so, the idea of agency and autonomy. the former is gained through growth and awareness. but for xian aka people who occupy a realm above the people on the ground, the xia spirit they embody should manifest in their inner awakening and agency.

it goes without saying that nobody is a deity in this show, and never will be. only in ep 40.5 it came so close to possessing that otherworldly, surreal edge, but that's all to it. deities do not exist in the mlcverse.

but but. it's interesting to point out in the ep 3 flashback when lxy walked through town in the aftermath of the sigu sect vs jym battle, commoners were heard describing it as 神仙打架 百姓遭殃 when immortals fight, commoners suffer. of course they didn't mean it literally but figuratively, that those people of wulin jianghu are high above, detached from the people on the ground. which is. contradictory to the idea of 侠 xia to begin with. so... it could even be interpreted that li lianhua living the spiritually "immortal" life embodied the xia spirit even more deeply than he did as li xiangyi the sigu sect leader, the "immortal" in the eyes of the commoners. actual immortals do not have any real attachment to the people, but a cultivated "immortal" does and is destined to feel and learn to deal with it over and over like llh did. it all comes back in a circle indeed.

[etdraconis]

( kind of regret running a degree audit today to see what I still need to graduate, bc now I wanna cry lmao )

[two-person-job]

pokemon has such an atrocious hold on me.

[pupmon1]

I think I broke something...

[makenna-made-this]

It was my birthday today! The Spawn Chicken cheat code from last year stacks someone hELp

[nukaposting]

whoever griefed my camp in fallout 76 last night you suck ass at picking targets. if you want to cause REAL devastation you go for the guys who build three story mansions filled wall to wall with dispensers and microtransaction goodies

[youremyonlyhope]

Weird intense sertraline dreams are super real side effect.

[stabbyfoxandrew]

i wasn't lying anon...

[rabbithaver]

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME

[nerdyfangirlingbooks]

Every now and then I remember the times I would mention to my flatmate that I was thinking of buying myself something reasonably expensive (that I had been eyeing up for months and had budgeted for) and she'd tell me that I shouldn't spend that much money on something I didn't need and it would be stupid etc etc while she regularly impulse bought things that cost at least as much and she would use once (while complaining that she was under a lot of financial stress and couldn't afford <$3/week for 2 months for a rental washing machine when ours broke). She is... perhaps not my first call for financial advice

[antennatoheaven]

i let a stranger catch a tapu lele that was bothering me on my beach and as thanks they upgraded all my armour to netherite (i'd been walking around in mismatched iron and diamond armour) and got me a bunch of enchantment books. peace and love on planet earth

[howcanibesadyetalsoacowboy]

I have a pain playthrough and a therapy playthrough of dark souls

[tonyglowheart]

reading thru old meta posts on qian qiu and there's like, some stuff I agree with sure but there's also a lot I don't lol. w like yan wushi especially. there's a lot of. I think too much conventional-mindedness in approaching yws even from the ppl who did like him as a character. saying he's a difficult character, and is meant to be a difficult character, but then still framing him along more conventional moral frameworks. yet another apartment 'complex'? strange, I find it quite simple moments.