#me realising he's in like less than 40 eps: oh god everyone is so weird latching onto such a minor npc it's only bc they like caleb surely

[ravelqueen]

Love how the one friend i got into critical role is now suffering the same fate that i did: hearing/seeing this Essek fellow around all the time and realising that he only shows up from ep 60+

[merinnan]

DMBJ Explore with the Note Ep 5

Okay, now that my workshop is finished, time for DMBJ Explore with the Note ep 5! Otherwise I will spend the entire afternoon just fucking around in WoW instead (one day I will show you screenshots of my Iron Triangle-as-WoW-toons).

We start ep 5 with the usual counts 

Season 2 Xiaoge Rescue Count: 2 for Wu Xie, 2 for protagonists, 3 for everyone 

Season 2 Wu Xie Swoon Count: 0 

Season 2 Evil Hair Count: 3

Cumulative Xiaoge Rescue Count: 12 for Wu Xie, 17 for protagonists, 18 for everyone 

Cumulative Wu Xie Swoon Count: 6

- It's been a few eps since we had updates to the rescue or swoon counts, so here's hoping for Ep 5 

- Ah, yes, the baby archaeologists just discovered the heavenly palace 

- At least this girl is marginally less annoying than she was in the novel 

- ...okay, I take it back

- Sweetie, it's a fucking tomb, why are you upset that there's a corpse in there? 

- Those are some impressive fingernails 

- lol, and they were all so distracted by the girl that no-one noticed 'Xiao Zhang' going all Zhang Qiling to get up there to check out what freaked her out

- I am disappoint that they didn't keep the present time crew in form-fitting wetsuits for the whole underwater tomb investigation like they did with the flashback crew 

- OMG the look on Wenjin's face, I love it 

- I think she's starting to realise that he knows what he's doing

-Very good questions, Wenjin 

- Oh, so that wasn't just better set lighting, the tomb was actually fully lit somehow? The better question in this case is not 'why is it suddenly so dark' but 'how the fuck was this underwater tomb so well lit?'

- THEN you can follow it up with 'why has the mysterious lighting suddenly gone out?' 

- WHY would you bring such a group of easily scared kids on an archaeological expedition to EXPLORE THROUGH TOMBS? 

- That seems like a bad idea even if you didn't think anything weird would go on

- ISTG, Sanxing, Wenjin, and Xiaoge are the only level-headed ones of the bunch 

- A mural. They were in hysterics over a mural. 

- I mean, yeah, there's a lot of high mountains, so not surprising you can't tell which one it is

- I was gonna say she's super judgey for an archaeologist but...nah, yeah, that tracks for academia, speaking from experience XD

 - This episode has been taunting me with potential rescues that never quite get there, so it better actually pay off with one of them this episode

- Oooh, bitty shadow 

- Wonder if it's the baby corpse from the jar earlier 

- ...oh, right, Sanshu's still running around in some weird trance

- Awww, the lights go out in the heavenly palace room, and the entire set lighting goes from lovely and well-lit so you can actually see what's on screen, to super dark and shadowy, even outside that room

- Sorry, sanmei, I know I said I’d stop talking about lighting, but...I live in eternal hope of good lighting. The flashbacks here were actually GOOD up until now. So I am sad they've gone back to bad lighting. 

- I'm embarrassed to say that it's taken me the entirety of Guardian, Granting You A Dreamlike Life, DMBJ 1, and now partway through ep 2 of DMBJ 2 before I've realised that I can pause Viki playbacks by hitting my space bar.

- OMFG, how many rooms are there in this tomb with a set of porcelain vases arranged in a particular order?

- Smart, Wenjin, conserving flashlight batteries like that. 

- I know that this Wenjin must be older than the Wenjin in the Chongqi flashbacks, but why couldn't we have had this Wenjin in those flashbacks as well?

- Chongqi Wenjin is ok, but this one's more level-headed and competent. And much better at de-escalating semi-hysterical girls. 

- Then again, I suppose if Chongqi Wenjin had this Wenjin's skills, they wouldn't have been able to have had that dumb ~DRAAMAA~ with the love triangle

- Tunnel floor is suddenly wet again instead of dry. Wish they'd make up their mind 

 - Evil Hair Count: 4 

- This time creeping on random guy at the back of the party 

- Who is mildly disturbed that he's suddenly got water down the back of his neck. Don't blame him

- Judging by the way Xiaoge just clapped a hand over his mouth and nose, I'm guessing that they all just got gassed. 

- And it must be a REALLY FAST acting gas if they all collapsed like 5 seconds after Xiaoge covered his nose and mouth, and he seems to be fine

- Oh, no, spoke to soon, down he goes 

- Okay, Sanshu. A) That's creepy, and b) why aren't you also affected? 

- ...something that takes down Xiaoge for long enough that he wakes up in a hospital bed concerns me 

- I do not blame him one bit for looking so perturbed

- OMG, that GRRM roast, that's fantastic 

- I hope Xiaoge is just leaving out all of the unnecessary family stuff that he doesn't think Wu Xie and Pangzi need to do, otherwise he just implied that the Zhangs have just, like, misplaced him for 20 or so years and not looked for him?

- Wu Xie is always so desperate to believe the best of Sanshu, it's really cute 

- Ah, I see we're back to the requisite pingxie staring for the episode. Excellent

- Here's the clearest sign yet that S2 does not follow on from S1 at all, as it completely ignores changes that S1 made to the plot and instead is referencing novel events that did not happen in the drama. 

- I would have been SO FUCKING CONFUSED if I hadn't read the first novel

- lol, Xiaoge. Giving a tiny almost-smile and clapping someone on the shoulder after dropping a bombshell like that on them is NOT how you're supposed to talk to your crush

- And it looks like we're now back to Wu Xie's nightmares from the first ep 

- ...is that last one supposed to be Xiaoge? It's hard to tell with the angle and (yes, sorry, sanmei) the lighting 

- Way to ruin the moment, Pangzi 

- ...omg Pangzi 

- I'm kinda cringing now

-  Hahah, the look on Wu Xie's face. Like, same 

- Those are good points, Pangzi, but wouldn't you still have the problem of being underwater without oxygen tanks? That tomb is pretty far down and mostly buried in the sea bed, after all 

- ...Wu Xie that maths made no sense at all

- Rude. Pangzi has said useful things before now! 

- LOL at all the "don't touch anything" "i mean it" "also" "DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING" 

- Because we all know that Pangzi is gonna touch stuff and try to steal at least one thing 

- Oh, there you are, A-Ning 

- How did you get in there?

- This is an unnecessarily long sequence of Xiaoge running his fingers over the door and Pangzi messing with his hair, set to super annoying BGM. Was it really necessary to have a full 1 minute 40 seconds of that? 

- That should have been done in, like, 30 seconds tops.

- I do like how excited this Wu Xie is to see the cool architectural stuff like the moving doors in here 

- After that first hallway, they all seem so unconcerned about traps 

- Tombs are usually, quiet, Wu Xie. Hence the saying 'quiet as the tomb'

- Xiaoge's tiny smiles at Wu Xie and Pangzi's banter are just adorable

- OMG THEIR FACES

- But guys, you really should have looked for traps first 

- Before the walls started trying to squish you like pancakes 

- "Start climbing", says Xiaoge, as he just fucking leaps up the sides of the walls

- Good thing these walls are conveniently not smooth and straight, with regular hand and footholds 

- Xiaoge Rescue Count: 3 for protagonists

- Not quite the dramatic rescue I was hoping for, but I'll take it since it's been so long 

- The closed walls has now made them a cute little tunnel to crawl through

- Oh, wait, annoying girl was from one of the Nine Gate families? 

- Which one? I'll have to look her up later, I've completely forgotten her name.

- Xie Lianhuan is talking Sanshu into taking him along on the original expedition. Honestly, dude, you dying is all your fault, you weren't even supposed to be there

- Oh, Qiu Dekao was involved in the 20 year ago bullshit as well. Why am I not surprised? 

- And with the tomb from S1, too, also 20 years ago

- Wait, if Wenjin was the leader the whole time, how come she kept deferring to Sanshu? 

- Dramatic bgm! Dramatic reused footage! 

- Oh yeah, the looks on their faces, I know exactly who just popped into mind for Pangzi and Wu Xie at that 

- Because who else could have done it?

- ...okay, except Sanshu, point 

- Oh noooooo, more fucking underwater diving scenes 

- This show is instilling in me a visceral loathing of underwater diving scenes. They're awful

- Like, seriously, after 5 eps they've already shown enough underwater goddamn diving scenes to fill up a full half of an episode 

- An entire quarter of one episode was made up of them 

- Oh my GOD that bgm. That was...something

- Okay, Xie Lianhuan was supposed to have dug this passage? Seriously? 

- He was only missing for a day before they found his body, how the fuck was he supposed to dig a loooooong passage, high enough for a fully grown adult to walk crouched, in less than a day?

- Ah, and that's ep 5. 

 Count updates: 

 Season 2 Xiaoge Rescue Count: 2 for Wu Xie, 3 for protagonists, 4 for everyone 

Season 2 Wu Xie Swoon Count: 0 

Season 2 Evil Hair Count: 4

Cumulative Xiaoge Rescue Count: 12 for Wu Xie, 18 for protagonists, 19 for everyone 

Cumulative Wu Xie Swoon Count: 6 

Season 2 is decidedly lacking in swoons so far. It better up its game.