#ok i think i did a good job! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rinbylin · 11 months

Text

li xiangyi, yin, and femininity

we all know that li xiangyi is a character of fractured identities. and li lianhua is an unreliable narrator to his own story. these make him not the most straightforward character to study. but I've believed in treating li lianhua as a part of li xiangyi, rather than separates. and there must be a common thread that ties all of him together. thus, I offer what I have found to be the most useful lens to use to view him as a cohesive whole, regardless as li xiangyi, li lianhua, or any other identity he may reinvent into: his 阴 yin qualities. (yin of yinyang)

this framework suggested by the drama's text itself has helped clarify to me his strengths, weaknesses, motivations, and struggles. by identifying this constant, too, makes it so much easier talking about what has changed in him.

[to the, hopefully growing, boli lhl hivemind @markiafc @ananeiah]

there are some notes on the concept of yinyang and chinese conceptualisation of gender I have to preface with.

[disclaimer: of course, I'm not even trying to cover a tip of what experts have extensively studied and debated in a depth it deserves. all I'm doing is try to parse the broad, fundamental ideas that are needed to explain my blorbos through my own spotty brain filter. so there bound to be nuances I've overlooked or some degree of my own interpretation. pretentious but needs to be done.]

阴 yin and 阳 yang are concepts characterised by passiveness, darkness, gentleness, femininity etc, and proactivity, light, toughness, masculinity etc respectively. a very key and handy concept to have in mind is their relationship to each other - which I'll not attempt at explaining better than literal scholars have:

Yin and yang exist only in relation to one another internally as the way warmth-coldness only exist relative to one another. Furthermore, when using yin-yang as an organizational schema, achieving balancing harmony is always the goal, not domination nor subordination of one to the other. [x]

while yin and yang can be symbols of femininity and masculinity, it doesn't mean all female are yin and all male are yang. it's certainly not a strict 1-to-1 equation. the concept of gender in chinese context is more social than biological. this suggests room for fluidity, and shaping of identities, often through social rituals as one journeys through life. it also means that there can be femininity in the masculine, and vice versa - in fact, that's only healthy because you need a good balance of the two worlds. no one part is better than the other. if you think of the two components as relative to each other, they are always interacting and affecting each other, rather than being strict and inert binaries. simply put, it needs to be kept in mind that there are greater nuances in applying yin and yang to the definitions of gender, and to avoid at all cost a simplification of this framework into a binary.

sure, the show has implied that lxy's powers and energy are yin-coded. but femininity is only one of the multiple attributes of yin. so how are we extending lxy's yin to femininity specifically? it's in the text that substantiates and qualifies lxy as feminine. dead women being used as proxies to his character. being literally dressed as a woman in order to put himself into their shoes and feel what they've felt. adopting a name that happens to be very, very feminine - 莲花 lianhua (lit. lotus flower) (it must be caveated that chinese names are NOT gendered. but there are just some names that are more feminine than others.) him coming to lead a life revolving around traditionally feminine, domestic things as li lianhua. him having interactions with the women around him like he's in his own element - no pressure and tension at all, unlike with all the other men.

as such, I'm more willing to use yin and femininity interchangeably in discussing lxy (while it's not necessarily applicable to every point that will be mentioned albeit there being some degree of implied association). and it's for the sake of elucidating what I feel is an intention or very plausible reading of the canon text in parsing feminine experiences in lxy's character. and thus, his queerness.

one last note is that taoism is going be mentioned quite a bit as well because of how much it as a philosophy honours the yin quality. its key tenets include valuing passiveness and inaction as a form of action, and submitting to the nature of things. and we will see how those come up in lxy's life too. (though I'm not gonna attempt to deep dive into it here beyond broad strokes of it.)

a huge part of li xiangyi's yin actually manifests in him being a passive person. this applies not just to li lianhua, but also li xiangyi. I know. ok wait hear me out. the idea of yinyang is after all components that can change and are relational to each other: thus, there were points in li xiangyi's life when he was less passive than other points, but they ultimately don't match up to the degree of aggression displayed by other men around him. so relative to their display of proactivity and aggression, he can be considered as passive. the best example is that of shan gudao proposing to launch an offensive on jinyuan alliance, while lxy - as much as he was arrogant about it - was standing his ground on not taking action in favour of peace.

it has already showed up in his childhood as well. he wasn't a particularly competitive child: 从来都没有谁要和你争 nobody has ever thought of competing with you over anything, he told sgd as he recalled of their times growing up. it was in fact sgd who was desperate to control and override lxy's presence. baby lxy did not hesitate at all over giving up on winning in favour of protecting his only rare few close relationships left in the world (given how hard-earned relationships are when they're non-familial !!!!). as much as I resent the one-dimensional writing of sgd, he has served as a very strong marker to highlight on lxy's yin.

I've harped on it several times before but this is the time I finally get to explain it proper: my own theory is that li xiangyi became an unparalleled swordsmaster because of his yin/feminine quality, not in spite of it. an interesting point that had been out in the open unclaimed until it was brought up in our friend group is that, li xiangyi does not actually fit anybody's conventional image of a 武林盟主 wulin mengzhu (ie. ruler of wulin). it would most likely have been some burly, muscular, ultra-masculine dude. even if they don't look like the demonic monk, it should be someone more like di feisheng. but. it's li xiangyi, the boyish, delicate-looking kid, who came to the top. (no wonder people - mostly men - love or love to bully hate him like weak men hate powerful women??)

"why didn't they cast someone who looks more like a wulin mengzhu (read: traditionally manly)?" no, no that's precisely the point. nobody said wulin mengzhu have to look manly. and also who is to define the manliness required to be in a place of authority? (or in my other meta, we would ask, who is to define anybody gets to have the authority over anyone else at all?)

by taoist ideal, gentleness is the most refined form of strength. li xiangyi has been haunting and distracting me in my chinese calligraphy practices lately because I'm thinking about how this must be the closest to what it felt like lxy becoming the best swordsman in jianghu. (so pretentiously brainrotten of me, I know, BUT IT'S REAL and I'm suffering.) mastering a chinese art is essentially about mastering a delicate balance between force and gentleness; being able to draw force from softness 柔中带刚 and an ability to maintain this balance. a beginner will instinctively hold a brush for the first time with brute, unrefined force. some fairly reputable contemporary calligraphers, according to my teacher, can be seen as being either too soft or too forceful - but are still able to pass off as good enough. it's then, the master of masters who will have the sophistication of a firm yet flexible control of the brush with the appropriate use of gentleness/laxness that produces a harmony of strokes. this idea extends to any other sort of chinese craft or practice including traditional chinese medicine, and I believe, swordsmanship too. I'm taking a fucking leap of faith here to say this because I practise NO sort of (chinese) martial arts, I must caveat. (someone who does may want to say something...) but theoretically that should be how it works.

it is not for no rhyme or reason, or *handwaves* that lxy emerged to the top AND is almost undefeatable. among a competitive, forceful (ie. yang) wulin, li xiangyi stood out with a power and energy defined by yin (ie. gentleness and stability) that led him to create his signature 扬州慢 yangzhouman. it is characterised by 慢 slowness (my calligraphy teacher says to us all the time to take it slow), and also described by dfs as 中正绵长 - which I would best describe by painting a picture of a steady and stable stream. these precisely speak of the essence of a mastery of gentleness as strength to me.

conversely, dfs's way in mastering power is very largely premised on taking action because he literally had no other choice in the environment he grew up in. both of them develop in opposite ways. it was the case of gentleness for lxy clearly because he grew up in a safe, nurturing environment that had allowed him to be slow and steady at his own pace, drawing on his natural gifts.

now top of the wulin world at 17, li xiangyi founds sigu sect. li xiangyi, the boy before becoming menzhu and li xiangyi the leader of sigu sect are not the same.

how then did a (relatively) passive boy like lxy end up founding sigu sect. this lxy is the one who was fostered into competition - though not in an abusive, twisted way. in fact he was raised in a rather taoist way by his shifu: to be honest with yourself and respect your opponent. so he honoured whatever powers he had been bestowed with by nature. he gives into it. even so, at another level, I just have a sense that shifu and shiniang's competitive marital spat had an insidious effect on the boys...though the detrimental effect was more on sgd than lxy. baby lxy feels like a sweet-natured kid who was just in his own zone, you know - some (aka sgd) would say, too much of him even, to have not realised what was wrong at all with his shixiong for years.

that's not all of course. I've always gotten the vibes that his attitude behind forming sigu sect felt more like, this is what all the good men of jianghu do and I will have to do it now especially that I'm the best. it didn't feel particularly personal to me, but rather what would have been expected of him by the social climate of wulin jianghu (eg. lxy saying to 光耀师门 bring honour to his teacher). it's definitely not an expectation from his shifu, who explicitly told him that he was never expected to become a noble figure of any sort, but just to be alive and contented. as concluded by the man himself as li lianhua: "有些人入了江湖是为了立心，而有的人入江湖为的是立命。我却不知道自己真正想要的是什么。some people enter jianghu for the cultivation of the mind, others for a cultivation of a meaningful life. but I never knew what I truly wanted." he was ultimately, unwittingly a passive player in his own story of becoming the great sigu sect leader.

(at this point, as a side note, I do wonder if there were any other similar sects or alliances that function the same as sigu sect that came before it. because I'm damn well sure there must be something, as likely as there must have been generations of wulin legends who came before lxy. but of course, this is not what the story is concerned with at all and I'm ok with that.)

it's crucial to point out that, even despite this being the phase of his yang in the display of taking action and enacting firmness, lxy had still done sigu sect with the sole purpose and manner of upkeeping peace and order (in the way of the pro-universal love, anti-aggression mohist 侠 xia leader of the people). he's still very characterised by yin in my books, especially when vis-à-vis to sgd.

a li xiangyi full of himself and made himself too useful to the people was only bound for a great asteroidal fall, in the concept of 物极必反 - or in taoist lexicon 反者道之动 (ie. anything that has reached its limit will only start developing in the opposite direction). if you think you're above all, you can only go down.

this manifests during the next time he took action - and it was one so forceful that it overpowered even his opponent, dfs who ended up being the passive, receiving party in this case - was in initiating the battle at donghai 10 years ago... and gee oh boy. it didn't end well - for both of them, but even more so for lxy. (dfs was like 'tis but a scratch (shrugs)' as compared to him being ripped off his tendons by jiao liqiao like nezha did to the dragon prince. truth is he had to go into a 10-year healing retreat served by his entourage. :p) ok, I digress.

xiao zijin was quick to attribute sigu sect's fall to lxy's arrogance - in turn setting the stage for lxy's 10 years of self-hatred and the framing of lxy as a villain? irresponsible figure? by jianghu. (god forbid girls do anything! ok for legal reasons, this a joke.) lxy lost his mind in ways I believe he never had in his life there and then upon seeing his shixiong dead. so, you could say he led the jianghu world to ruins out of love (using this term loosely). but it feels inaccurate to say it's due to arrogance. he did not do that out of self-importance or ego, especially when the revenge for sgd was a collective decision made by sigu sect as we know from the flashback. so when llh pinned all fault on himself for being arrogant in the past, it is with caution to take his words because that's the unreliable narrator in him speaking.

anyway, it's precisely li xiangyi that is capable of bouncing back from such a fatal crisis, equipped with his yin and a mastery that gave him the power of flexibility.

it's extremely vital to re-establish that literally the only thing that was keeping li xiangyi alive, physically, as li lianhua is yangzhouman. (monk wuliao literally said that to lxy even though he did facilitate in saving him.) it's the yangzhouman that was drawn from lxy's mastery of yin. without yangzhouman, li xiangyi would not even have the chance to become li lianhua and undergo any needed process of transformation. without li xiangyi, there would have been no yangzhouman. no li xiangyi, no li lianhua, get it?

the point is not to deny the change li xiangyi wants to make and has made. but to acknowledge that change isn't about complete erasure and destruction. something from you survives. something in you had kept you alive to have you come so far, regardless of all the bad bits that you want to denounce of. you've always been worth it.

bringing back the thing about his new name: the distinction must be made that he did not pick it because it was feminine but it just so happened a feminine name had resonated with him. (read: he didn't necessarily identify as a woman but identified with femininity. at least within the parameters of canon text.)

he also made an interesting choice to retain his surname for someone who was desperate to sever ties from his past. hmm. or maybe he wasn't that desperate? when li lianhua says li xiangyi is dead, I believe it meant that li xiangyi the sigumen menzhu is dead rather than li xiangyi as an entirety. li lianhua is a returning to the path lxy could have gone if he did not establish sigu sect, the path that shifu wanted him to take. when he walked to the doors of sigu sect in the aftermath, nothing was actually stopping him from going back (people were still around and alive, instead of all dead people, you know)... except for himself. taking that action would have been too much for him. so he went with the flow of life giving him a chance at rebirth and walked away. there, inaction as a form of action.

zhan yunfei and qiao wanmian have said to li lianhua, oh that doesn't sound like li xiangyi at all. but has it been considered that, maybe it was sigu sect's lxy who wasn't the real lxy? sigu sect lxy was one big performance of the values of masculinity and heteronormativity that llh had came to an awareness of, and eventually struggle with again and resist against in the final year of his life. there had only been some glimpses of his true nature allowed (validated by fang duobing talking about lxy at his altar).

imho, most flashbacks of lxy during that period felt impersonal and more like a template of a hero expected to marry his girl at 18. going through all the motions and steps of a normative life even before he was old enough to grasp and explore his own identity and what it meant in the world. no wonder he denounced so much of what he had done as lxy including liking girls. walking away then also meant a walk away from those duties and expectations. li lianhua is li xiangyi liberated from masculine duties and heteronormative performance.

in doing that, he had the opportunity for the first time in his life to explore what he truly wanted, at least within the parameters of what he could afford to do at that point. he could go on to build a domestic, feminine life within the space of jianghu (as I've established here). it's a kind of feminine lifestyle that doesn't quite exist in mainstream society - being a woman there meant to stay put in a domestic space without much room to move socially. nor did it exist in wulin jianghu because even the women there like shi-guniang and jlq were expected to be masculine, aggressive, competitive. so building a mobile home in the space of jianghu is his way of defining the life he wants and can have. li lianhua is the extension of femininity in li xiangyi - and one that can be free.

it's also worth talking about in my opinion what is one of the most important and a favourite dihua moment: when dfs said to lxy that his greatest weakness was to like being a hero. and a swordsman should be without weaknesses. I'm forever wrapped up in how many layers this can be read in. was he mad at lxy for liking to be a hero or having weaknesses, or both? if the former, it was dfs criticising, based on lxy's public reputation, lxy's oversized illusions about being a hero - a figure of masculinity with an unrealistic sense to uphold noble goals eg. saving the world etc. that is actually perfectly logical coming from dfs, the straightforward, no-nonsense, morally neutral guy with no illusions about heroism (in this case, he feels more like a yin). but at the same time, we should understand that lxy's motivations behind the donghai battle are more personal than noble. if any, it was actually the opposite of noble - it was like he was acting out of the role of a caretaker of his family, and at a cost of the peace and order of jianghu he was set on guarding(!!) dfs also knew that lxy was there just for his shixiong. and so, dfs, who happens to be the epitome of yang, can be read as a symbol of masculinity disapproving of lxy for being sentimental and emotional; for having the "feminine" desires to simply want to defend his family (not saying those are exclusively feminine traits but they have been conventionally associated as feminine). I think both layers of reading are correct and should work together to contribute to the complexity of their characters. (we can see how it contributes to lxy and dfs being the perfect yinyang halves to each other, which I will come back to briefly touch on later.)

for 10 years he lived a life of seclusion and staying-in-his-own-lane a taoist would be proud of. he knew he was dying and has always been ok with dying, as he claimed. but did he want to die? to think of it, it was the opposite. because in those 10 years when he could have 100% just taken action to take his own life, he didn't. in fact, he lived on and took care of himself in the way shifu wanted him to. he had simply preferred letting nature run its course. if bicha didn't take him, he wasn't gonna do anything. but if he died one day very soon, he would be ok with it too. sure, he was maybe banking on a lead to sgd's whereabouts to appear during his last years alive but that clearly wasn't the only thing on his mind for NINE years because he didn't actively go out seeking for that either. this is basically him telling dfs that he would just lie in the sun and wait for the sweet release of death, if dfs were to force him to fight. not even the mortal threat from dfs was enough to move him into action of fighting back or killing himself.

time and again, lxy as llh was dragged into fdb's cases but not only that, he also maintained an impersonal distance with them. it's starkly different from the usual (wuxia) hero archetypes (for eg. fdb) who would be more impassioned and personally invested in the plight of the victims- or unlike most seemingly aloof protagonists who would somehow grow emotionally invested over time. one of the many things I love about llh is that he never tries a second time to persuade people out of their decisions he finds unwise (eg. him just wanting to move on in response to the girls in 女宅 insisting on staying behind with their slave master at first.) he will not interfere in other people's choices made in their own lives. it's not his business. he didn't even want to be there, to be honest.

however as the story progresses, more and more people - especially men, his past, and the leads to the truth came back to demand and taunt him into doing something. they vary from well-meaning people without any harm intended such as fdb intruding upon his private space completely uninvited and qwm wanting him back; to dfs merely seeking him as a mean to an end initially (eg. I only need him to live long enough to have one last fight); and finally, on the other end of the spectrum, outright aggressive and hostile people like sgd and xzj who wanted him to die. under all this pressure, he tried his best to deflect, but he does waver especially when it comes to matters concerning the people he cares about aka his obsession wish of 10 years of looking for sgd's remains that had lied low until fdb entered his life, and then later on taking revenge for his shifu.

looking for sgd became his final bid at taking action. he was operating on a slim chance of getting some emotional closure from finding out his shixiong is dead for real, yes. what a good plan. but objectively unnecessary. or surprise! uhhh...finding out his beloved shixiong is actually alive and would strangle him for one corn chip? AND OH NO IT GOT WORSE- uncovering a devastating truth about his shifu's death that he could have totally gone on with life fine without knowing if he had continued not caring.

but it is sometimes just impossible not to care - it is only human to care. and he is human, not an icon in the image of a hero. so he took a chance, once more, and it killed him in unprecedented ways. it's donghai all over again. things in life don't go as planned. you fuck around and it fucks you back. finding out the truth behind his shifu's death and his family background from the past did nothing for him as li lianhua living in the present.

it's no wonder that this lxy decisively relinquishes the desire to take action in the end. he goes back to letting nature run its course. and this time, stands firmly to it despite everyone begging him otherwise. wangchuan flower could only give him a recovery (or survival?) rate of 30%. there's a 70% chance of failure and even in the 30% he was not sure what he was to become. in comparison, dfs took a 10% chance game of survival in a heartbeat, and it pushed him to new heights. that's how they differ: he thrives by taking risks and action while lxy the other way round. so, something like that has happened before and he wants none of it again.

he leaves lotus tower, only taking his horse and a sack - relinquishing almost every other material belonging he had - and sets off on a journey. before xzj interrupted...where to was he going?? I wonder. we don't know for sure, I think? and are we allowed to know? that makes the scene he had with xzj an understated inflection point in the very last part of his journey. yes, he was already on his way to...maybe die? but not necessarily. you don't have to travel distances with your belongings for that, right? or speak to dfs personally about not wanting to fight? (borrowing one of @ananeiah's takes.) regardless, he was definitely leaving behind jianghu - not only wulin jianghu (he already did that 10 years ago), but also the jianghu space he had carved out in the last 10 years.

what sparked the decision to jump off the cliff in him was dfs's words from the night of their wedding 10th donghai anniversary: 横扫天下容易，断相夷太剑不易 conquering the world is easy, breaking xiangyi sword is not. in the original context, dfs was talking about defeating lxy being harder than conquering the world. but when it came to this scene, it was to lxy about forsaking the very last worldly possessions he had after already giving up on lotus tower and hulijing (including releasing his horse), especially his only connection left to swordsman lxy.

perhaps it had dawned on him that, wanting things at all was bad for him. in the last 10 years, he lived a life of seclusion, wanting very little. but he had still wanted things. there were still things he couldn't let go of that had led him to this state. despite having lived on an identity inspired by a buddhist teaching for 10 years, maybe it was only at this point that he was finally the closest to reaching an understanding of it. (I wish I was knowledgeable enough right now to dive into the possible buddhist reading here but alas. I'll leave it to our resident expert @markiafc)

it doesn't quite matter in the end where he was going after all. what mattered was that he literally went where the water took him and we're not supposed to know where it ends. I'm not seeing this in a bad and pessimistic way though. I think the relief in all this is that he had tried his best to within his abilities. also it's a form of enlightenment in relinquishing a desire, an obsession, a need to take any more action in order to live well. thus his ending felt to me relatively tender, empowering, and kind - albeit bittersweet and heartaching - than other possible kinds of ending, in a story where it was very possible for him to have died under the knives of his opponents or bicha at any moment, outside of his control.

if you've come so far in this post, congratulations! but also a reveal is that... you're not immune to the dihua propaganda threaded throughout this post. :P

as mentioned, other men like sgd and xzj in lxy's life were incredibly hostile to him. their yang nature overwhelmingly powers his yin. but dfs is different. dfs is the yang counterpart that fits perfectly to his yin.

dfs's yang is one that contains yin, that mirrors lxy's balance of yang in yin. it was suggested in text they are yinyang-coded meant to complement each other, given that whenever wangchuan flower's yin vs yang properties were discussed, the two men were always spoken about in the same breath. more importantly, as with the above few analyses of dfs's words playing a big role in shaping of lxy's choices with multiple meanings - as well as their day-to-day interactions - we can see that they constantly play off each other.

dfs's yang energy has been used to help lxy prolong his life (though not saving him entirely), while lxy has used his yin energy to save dfs and subsequently helped him attain his breakthrough. dfs has also helped lxy in his breakthrough of yin but not in the same way as dfs's cultivation of his combative powers, and rather, it's for lxy an understanding of his own path to take in life - a cultivation of the mind (both times 10 years before and after). given how significant dfs is in the shaping of lxy's realisation of the yin path - alike his shifu has, it's no wonder that they were the only two people lxy had imagined in his last sword dance of a farewell to jianghu.

with each of them coming together to form the perfect yin-yang model, they're a harmony of yin and yang representing the cosmos. what I also love is that they didn't start out as a perfect fit, but only towards the end of the story was the harmonisation completed, which makes sense for two components that are always in a flux influencing each other. the fact that they were number 1 and 2 of wulin, and being the only ones capable of understanding each other in a level nobody else could... it all reinforces the cosmic sense of their relationship. they're the halves to a whole, fitting in a specific way nobody else can.

(I mean. technically this is going into the space of extrapolation based on a tangential interpretation of canon text, so do take it with a pinch of salt. but of course this pinch of salt can do wonders for a shipper's feast... :P and this certainly could have been a meta of its own expanding on dfs's side of the analysis, but this is it for now in this context.)

to think of it, li xiangyi has actually died more than that one time that turned him into li lianhua. first was a death of him as a nanyin royalty - I resent having to bring up nanyin like it should hold any weight to the narrative as far as I'm concerned, but the point being that he had a completely different (familial-based) life before that still stands. then he had a rebirth as li xiangyi, disciple and swordsman to his shifu and shiniang, and later died again when li xiangyi the sigu sect leader took over. lxy the sigu sect leader died at sea in the battle 10 years ago and came back as li lianhua. (just like nezha, died after battling at east sea and rebirthed from the lotus) li lianhua then dies by the end of the drama.

there can be a myriad of interpretations as to what exactly happened to him, including the possibility that he's still alive. regardless, we can agree that li lianhua as an identity has ran its course, and he had to evolve again. but into what form?

in the line of thought of yin and femininity, and how his transformation has been in an increasing degree of presentation of femininity - even way back when I was watching the show, I had the idea of him living socially as a woman post-li lianhua. I don't know what he would be realistically doing or what could be practical for him in such an identity. but conceptually it was sensible and compelling to me before diving deeper into the details. (I have more elaboration to do on this that I won't be talking about here publicly but it is in the same strain of idea as this other comparative meta I wrote.)

I think the next possible identity lxy can assume - alive in the material realm or not - is one that will be beyond a material being. a nameless entity. once you've gone through the phases of life - from not knowing to knowing, and perfecting knowledge, then to the surpassing of knowledge - you surpass all worldly existence, and become one with the cosmos.

I end this off with an excerpt from Tao Te Ching's Chapter 41 (I'm not pretending to have read the whole book ok but I couldn't resist including this):

明道若昧，进道若退，夷道若纇 [...] 道隐无名 The bright path seems dim; Going forward seems like retreat; The easy way seems hard [...] The Tao is hidden and without name. (x)

the character translated into "easy" is the same 夷 yi of li xiangyi's name. somehow this seems to encapsulate the journey of his life: one that seems blessed and smooth-sailing but ending up to be rocky and turbulent. but at the end of the day, after all that he had been through, he will become hidden and without name.

#莲花楼 #mysterious lotus casebook #lhl #lhlmeta #my posts #a big win for the inaction fandom. lxy would have been patron saint #this inevitably turned into a 'lhl is a taoist and buddhist story if not a very chinese story' meta hbhjbjhbhjjb #the last thing i do before going to sleep is write this meta. the first thing i do after waking up is write this meta.#i feel so insane writing this. it kept growing like a monster. do you think this is a joke it's like my part-time job now #but it's one of the few times in my life i have confidence in my insanity. so.#crazier thing is. this meta is approaching 6k words yet i still think there must be things i haven't covered.#the last section is so nuts idk how i even wrote it guys i think i was possessed #it's also like the most pretentious way to put that he's dead in this world ok hjbjhbhjbhjbjbh #to be clear iirc the drama didn't say LXY'S POWER/ENERGY IS YIN in the same way it literally said dfs's energy is yang #but it's definitely implied by the explanation of the flower's healing properties for both of them. on top of yangzhouman #also fuck. another reason he didn't choose to save himself was so dfs could have the yang flower which he believed was what dfs wanted #thank u frens mark and ana for indulging my brain in the first time i brought the lxy as woman thing up. for it to have come this far #ofc disclaimer is that a lot of this is my own reading. it doesnt have to be agreed by everyone #i would be very happy though if any part of it resonated with anybody #also a good part of the analysis is based on my memory of the show. though i did revisit parts selectively to verify. sooooo. yeah.

167 notes · View notes

brandwhorestarscream · 4 months

Note

Hey! I'm from KOBDSS' ask

It was "KOBDSS, but breakdown is the carrier of jettwins and wildbreak"

Ok I've been sitting on this for awhile and ngl kinda struggling, cuz. I'm not too great at puzzling out three way relationships 😅 but I think I'm finally getting there

First and foremost! Unlike previous iterations, I think the three of them will be triplets here. They come as a huge shock to everyone, and Knockout is the first to know whilst diagnosing his mate's sudden restlessness and inability to keep fuel down. Knockout is stunned to see a grand total of 5 infant sparks orbiting around Breakdown's. Seekers are always born in threes, but one of them split in two so there were 4. Add Wildbreak for a clean 5

They know the chances of Starscream being the sire of at least one is inarguable. They have... a weird relationship with their commander. Knockout and Breakdown have been conjunxed since long before the war, back when Veloctiron was still online and still the hottest, fastest place in the universe. They've always known of Starscream, he's infamous among the decepticons. But they'd never actually met the guy or been under his jurisdiction until earth, snd though their relationship is certainly a bit looser and involved now, there's still... a sort of wall there. Starscream is a massively distrustful and paranoid individual, and it took months of coaxing and careful flirtation to get him to even consider their propositions. Even when their sexual rendezvous' became semi-regular, and friendly(ish) visits even moreso, it's clear he doesn't trust them and is guarding his spark closely. He doesn't love them, doesn't think they love him, and has been beaten down and torn apart too many times to even entertain the idea. KOBD are fully content and emotionally fulfilled between each other, and while they do care for Starscream to a degree, it's more friendly than the deep and romantic love they hold for each other.

Which... somehow, makes it more awkward. If they were all a big happy united threeway sparkbond, it would be easy to tell him. They'd better be able to gage how he might react. But with him holding them at arms length and vice versa, and the seeker being so volatile, they can't even begin to guess what he'll do. What he'll think.

Knockout knows they ought to disclose it as soon as possible. After all, it's an important medical condition. But... he's worried. They both are. Breakdown has made it clear, right from the moment he found out about them, he can't stand the idea of a termination. He knows they should. They both do. An active battlefield is no place for a bitty let alone several, and they're not in a position to guarantee their safety and shelter from the war's ever evolving fallout. But the idea of snuffing them is too cruel, even for the two of them. But if they tell the wrong person or things escalate negatively, there's the risk Lord Megatron or Starscream might order their termination anyway. And while the two of them have already resolved to fight for their litter if they have to... they both know it's a fight they'll lose.

Soundwave is the next one privy to their situation. He's the calmest and most reasonable commanding force on the ship, and realistically, if anyone could get them greenlit for parenthood while also not being ejected from the warship, it's probably Soundwave. They're hoping he'll smooth things over with their big boss, because everyone knows Soundwave can do no wrong in Megatron's eyes. Of the news comes from him it'll seem less bad, right?

Right!

...except Soundwave does little more than acknowledge their situation and quietly file it away into the logs. Informs them to act at their discretion: if they want maternity leave or to be excused from battle, that is Lord Megatron's will alone.

These two idiots take the "act at your discretion" and run with it. They're just....... waiting for the right time to tell Starscream. Maybe once hes recovered from his last beatdown from Megatron a bit, or comes to loitering around the medbay when he's in a particular good mood and looking to gossip. Yeah, they'll spring it on him then, and gently ease it in with a cup of some hot energon and some embarrassing story plucked from one of the hapless vehicons. They're bracing for impact and trying to dodge the inevitable. The idiots

Their stupidity unfortunately does eventually lend itself to tragedy. Thankfully they've avoided any altercations with the autobots recently, and Breakdown has been listening to Knockout about not exerting himself. The carrying cycle is progressing nicely and Soundwave has been approving thejr extra energon intake without question. Everything is great.

And then everything goes to shit because of MECH

Everything plays out just as it does in canon. A clash with Bulkhead, taking hits and plunging it head first like he really shouldn't, dragged away by the humans and put under the knife. Having his optic ripped out of his head, having pieces of him removed and cut away. It's a traumatic, horrifying experience, and by the time Bulkhead arrives to free him he's bleeding from a very inconvenient place. Breakdown doesn't know if his greatest rival truly didn't notice or if he was refusing to acknowledge it, but he's glad for it either way. Starscream shows up to get him back, and Breakdown manages to hold himself together until he gets to the medbay

Knockout is waiting for him, and already knows the grim reality: Breakdown had never experienced such a spark-deep, lacerating pain than when one of their sparklings reabsorbed into him, premature bond shattering and leaving him a howling, roaring mess strapped to that concrete slab. Even now it persist, as his internals constrict and twist trying purge what would have been one of their bodies.

He looks like a mess stumbling into Knockout's arms, face still torn open, a gaping hole of wires and energon where his eye once was, chassis soaked in blood from their experiments and thighs just as wet, leaking a trail of blood behind him. The second the door whooshes shut behind them Breakdown collapses, crumbling to his knees and starting to scream even as his bondmate rushes throw his arms around him. It's so much, it's too much, everything is visceral pain, everywhere, from the farest reaches of his limbs to the cold void growing in his spark. It's agony, pure agony, as he desperately clings onto Knockout hard enough to dent and scratch and scrape, bawling and screaming in ire so loudly it surely echoes out into the halls. It's all just too much.

And then, to make matters worse, Starscream arrives. Bulkhead may not have noticed but he did. He can think of several reasons a mech might be voiding internal energon from his interface array, and none of them are positive. One look at the two of them immediately confirms his suspicions, and the only thing he can ask is, "Why didn't you tell me?"

Why, indeed. Breakdown immediately starts hysterically rambling, that he's sorry he knows they should've said something sooner but he's sorry this is all his fault and he's so sorry-

Explanations can wait, evidently. They need to get him taken care of, first.

Thankfully, a quick look with the mirror and a medical scan reveal that three of them are still there. Obviously stressed, vibrating at a higher rhan usual frequency, but still anchored safely to him. Not immediately in danger of reabsorption, and it's a huge, bittersweet relief. Three of them survived, might still survive all the way to emergence. The happiness is of course overshadowed by the loss, but this discovery feels like a glimmer of hope nonetheless. Knockout gets to work patching him up as seamlessly as he can, precise, loving hands eradicating wound by microscopic wound. Breakdown gets a tiny but of carrier-safe sedative, to relax his body enough to safely operate while keeping him semi-coherent. They talk the whole time, all three of them. About... what to do next, about what the future may look like with three sparklings soon to be born. Starscream agrees that, if any of them have wings, he'll willingly care for them and be their parent. If they're all grounders, then... he'll of course be civil and be more forgiving about time off for the two of them, but he won't be involved. It's a fair arrangement they can all agree on.

Of course, that all goes out the window when the three of them are born. Starscream himself didn't even realize how excited he was for their birth until Knockout announces the first one is a grounder, and his spark leaps because he doesn't care. He doesn't care if they're a grounder or a flyer, his spark lurches in a joyful way it hasn't done since before Vos fell, and all at once he realizes that he wants to be involved in these bitties' lives whether they're actually his or not. They'll need all the help, all the love they can get, and he wants to be there with them regardless of what frame they are.

Then the next two come out as jets and he's somehow even happier, because this means he'll have someone to teach about the sky and all it's wonders, and it's somehow an even greater happiness. The three of them are beautiful sparklings, each somehow with Knockout's unnaturally pretty, elegant face. The little grounder looks just like his carrier as far as his colors go, mimicking him near perfectly, but his alt mode is achingly different but so familiar. "He's just like Wildrider..." Breakdown murmurs, optics faraway as he remembers his family from so long ago. They name the eldest Wildbreak, at Knockout's insisting that Breakdown being included too. The split spark twins inherit names from the sky, from long dead relatives they'll never meet: Jetfire and Jetstorm. Neither Knockout nor Breakdown has any complaints, so their names are settled on swiftly. With that out of the way their exhausted parents can all settle in on and around the bed, bonding with their newborns and whispering back and forth to each other about just how wonderful their precious sparklings are 💖

#ask game #hi anon sorry its been months 😭#i really wanted to do a good job with this cuz i love the idea but. i think i finally did ok!#please enjoy 💖#also feel free to throw rocks and boo i really do deserve it lmfao #KOBDSS #knockout #Breakdown #Starscream #cw miscarriage

23 notes · View notes

thelovelybitten · 9 months

Text

random loonatics unleashed hcs bc I like childhood comfort show binging

only elites watched loonatics unleashed—so for the ATOM SIZED community who still gaf abt this gem here’s some random hcs I thought of

ACE BUNNY

[+] confident, determined, loving

[-] stubborn, cynical, impulsive

since he’s like. the most heroic MF known to acmetropolis, overconfidence is his thing. sometimes it goes too far and people have to smack some sense into him (lexi & tech, most likely) and y’all thought duck was cocky… ace is cocky and smart vs duck is cocky and dumb.

i imagine he has some sort of cooling eye drops he puts in after battles or over usage of his laser vision.

may wear glasses if needed.

he defo has underlying anxiety about his leader position since he’s basically in charge of the universe and his teammates he considers his family. (he confides in lexi with this eventually)

on a similar note, since he feels the pressure of being the leader, he suppresses his emotions all the time until lexi finds out and they teach each other to heal :’)))))

as much as he and duck annoy the fuck out of each other, they complement each other in the sense that ace needs comedic relief and duck supplies it (bratty ass little brother things)

anime STANNNN. anything that’s got good lore—He and Tech love sword art online. they hook in rev and slam in the second season. he and slam like attack on titan FOR SURE.

duck gives ace social media tips (because ace loves the attention but doesn’t know SHIT ABT creating a following)

japanese culture fascinates him, so he implements traditions and holidays into the loonatics' activities.

stubborn as fuck, it’s his way or the highway. since zadavia has always put him in charge, it's hard for him not to boss people around when he's unable to help. (as seen in s1 ep6)

since in the show it’s hinted all the loonatics are in university, I have ace being the second oldest child. he’s a natural-born leader, but still can’t take certain things seriously. tech is a good influence on him.

LEXI BUNNY

[+] sweet, empathetic, fiesty

[-] emotional, hot-headed, judgemental

she wears noise-cancelling headphones all the time if not needed by others. the absolute peace and quiet she needs to stay sane, tbh

the amount of radio traffic and minds around her causes headaches and migraines—but also some paranoia and slight insanity since she can’t take all of these mind voices all at once. she receives medicine after years of putting it off/testing due to her super powered dna

^^ tech is the one who finds her crying and screaming and he takes care of her until she tells everyone else.

also to touch on that, tech creates wrist bands that lexi can put on. they are supposed to cancel any brain waves or mind reading for a certain amount of time (but not forever, as she is super powered and it’s still a wip for him). (she also needs her powers to protect planet blanc)

actually hates carrots of any sort (minus carrot cake, she would die w/o it) ace thinks she’s crazy.

“can you read this person’s mind” is her biggest gripe and she hates when anyone asks her to do so

due to her upbringing, she hates mean girls and anyone who isn’t a girls girl gets to have a not so nice convo with her.

she’s very social savvy and is always in the newest trends, she hates how self conscious she is but funnily enough she and duck relate to one another and do have shopping sprees and Amazon hauls for therapy 😭

she’d like tiktok but rarely post lol, and when she does her social media pops off

feminist. "oh girls can't be heroes" "girls shouldn't be doing a man's job" SHUT UR TRAP. she will prove u wrong in 1000 different ways.

most popular of the loonatics—she’s the only female.

her age hc I have is she’s third oldest. which kinda leans into my duck/lexi hcs but that’s in another post

TECH E COYOTE

[+] intelligent, punctual, organized

[-] uptight, perfectionist, egotistical

perfectionist syndrome we LOVE HER

he’s so father type (big brother to all of the loonatics, everyone relies on him imo) Ace is the leader, but Tech is the dad 🤪

since he and mallory (mastermind’s) huge falling out, he has a people pleasing complex. this is because he feels guilty about putting her in jail as she is his protégée but knowing what he did was for the best makes him uneasy. so not only does everything have to be perfect, he has a hard time saying no to prevent conflict.

that being said, when it comes to danger and safety he’s gonna put his foot down.

he absolutely loves tinkering with rev. the two of them share one braincell, though. call them thing one and thing two. they’re smart. but not together 😅

while tech likes…well…technology, I feel like he’d also like forensics too. And watching crime shows with Ace and Rev.

he also has a bit of an ego. mostly bc he’s the creator and manager of all the technology in blanc. (And the universe, maybe. at least blanc and acmetropolis.)

has some sort of side gig going on for sponsorships. i hc that he loves to help create new technology, but he'd also like to provide said ideas to companies, kingdoms, etc. usually has the loonatics branding on it.

when his powers upgraded, he had a bit of trouble controlling it to the point where their new HQ had electrical issues for a month. yay metal but also oopsies I can create electrical currents and it’s a lot

the idea of him being immortal due to his regeneration abilities scares him because his friends will eventually die off and he will remain on his own :( (if i had to think about this, so do u.)

very protective of his stuff, and his family. this is not debatable.

he tries to hide itttt but he loves kids. he likes to surprise them with things he makes and teaches them how to build objects (with lego, of course. ain't no way is he letting any cheeto-dusted fingers come in contact with his shit.)

he’s the oldest loonatic NO QUESTION.

REV RUNNER

[+] energetic, comedic, caring

[-] oblivious, childish, sporadic

he’s so baby boy. a child. I love him so.

adhd brain on TOP

fears rejection, but works on it with lexi helping him out

I think he’d also play league with lexi and ace.

he loves running around fast, obviously but he also likes to stop and enjoy views when he can. (Defo uses the wormholes to escape to sunny places.)

definitely has lists to keep himself organized (and slam, which he is blessed for)

likes mechanical machinery and modifications (hates detailing though, fuck that)

recites the entire bee movie script to tech to annoy him

relies on zadavia for advice frequently. she’s a mother to him and she gives him hugs :))))

knows the best spots in the universe for anything ever, (thanks internal gps)

may the lord bless him bc he loves his brother so so so much that he'd do anything for him. rip is always welcome at hq and they play games/invent shit together :)

would pull pranks on all of the loonatics and he’d get away with it (but duck sees right through him—helps him anyways) since it's shown in season 1, episode 6 that ace and rev like to watch sports/attend games, they'd love other ones that are hockey, basketball and football-oriented. (since this is the future and all, the sport they play in this episode is based on soccer anyway) duck is also part of this too.

the metabolism popped off this man can EAT. since he's already burning it off. He's unlike slam though—he eats at a regular speed due to conversation-making.

youngest loonatic.

SLAM TASMANIAN

[+] strong, resilient, comforting

[+] aggressive, uncontrolled, moody

has a hard time with expressing himself due to the language barrier b/w him and the civilians.

good news tho, rev and duck help him to learn english :DDD they get him to read a ton of things (rev with different books while duck just shows him magazines with him as the street model LMFAO, also trends and stuff.)

has an action figure collection that if touched, a tornado will destroy your room. (he had them before the meteor hit, as a coping mechanism from all the fighting he did)

obvi fave food is pizza, specifically meat lovers

gets into origami to control his mind. lexi loves doing this w him :)

tech and slam love to do weapon tests together bc slam is BEEFY and withstands more injury than people think.

ace and slam train together the most. it helps both of them with tiny/large targets.

desperately wants a cat, a kitten, something cat related… but ace says no all the time bc it serves “as a distraction” from their job (ace is delulu ignore him)

a chef. amazing in the kitchen. cooks all the food for the house. a WHOLESOME MAN. watches the food network LMAO

gives the best hugs.

VERY BROTHER BEAR VIBES, he'll tell someone straight up to NOT FUCK W HIS FAMILY. just DON'T.

third youngest loonatic but acts older

DANGER DUCK

[+] loyal, self-aware, amusing

[-] arrogant, overbearing, hypocritical

u know this man is one of the ✨g w o r l s ✨

he attends drag shows with rev and lexi (DID I STUTTER ??? I think not.)

he doesn’t give a FUCK this man will do what he wants, when he wants, for as long as he wants. (until ace or zadavia gives him shit, whoever comes first) attention-seeker, but rightfully so as he is very much overshadowed by all of his teammates, when in reality he is the strongest and most deadly loonatic. i mean think abt it. he has three powers. the most out of all the loonatics. ace has laser vision. lexi has telepathy. tech can manipulate metallic objects and regenerate. rev has super speed and is a human gps. slam can create storms/tornados. DUCK HAS THE POWER TO CREATE HOT LAVA ORBS (EGGS), MANIPULATE WATER, AND TELEPORT. u see the vision???

it also doesn't help when zadavia is always shitting on him for his character. in her defense, he is a superhero and should be a good influence and in a professional manner, when in his defense, he should at least be praised and acknowledged for the work he puts in...js.

TAKES HIS TRAINING SERIOUSLY EVEN IF HE USES IT AS A VIDEO GAME SIM— HE'S ON IT IN SECONDS.

he does get a bit depressed abt the whole overshadowing thing sometimes. but he's so cocky that he hypes himself up and forgets it ever happened.

HIS APPEARANCE IS EVERYTHING TO HIM, which is why he and lexi hang out a lot when lexi is in need of a break. THEY LOVE THE SALON.

he helps the men eventually with tinder profiles so they can get out there and find romance and shit (but not lexi, since she knows she can get whoever she wants) he's pretty successful at it too.

BOARD GAME CHAMPION. BACK-TO-BACK MAY I ADD. Slam hates it bc he almost clutches the win but duck suddenly has a trick up his sleeve then BAAM. winner winner pizza dinner. his favourite board game is monopoly. (for obvious reasons, mans' needs to be able to manage his money for future investments.)

if he could be on a version of america's next top model, he would.

might be a sarcastic asshole, but does deeply care about his family, and other beings for that matter ( I mean, s2 ep12 ANYONE ??) tweetums was his everything that WAS HIS SON.

trolls people on club penguin with rev, don't ask, I just know.

blogger typa beat. is the social media editor and influencer for the team.

second youngest, but acts like the youngest LMAO

aaaaand that's it for now, i will make separate hc posts for pairings (platonic and romantic) and obvs the loonatics in general, so stay tuned. :)

if u read this far u THE GOAT >:D

#faves: lu #loonatics unleashed #loonatics unleashed hcs #viv speaks #i love the loonatics and u will never hear the end of it nope not ever #i thought long and hard about these ok #i think i did a pretty good job !!!#but yeah i love my kids sm so take some brain mush #ace bunny #lexi bunny #slam tasmanian #tech e coyote #danger duck #rev runner #MORE SOON

36 notes · View notes