#to account for lmk sun wukong's personality also being different

[angstandhappiness]

LMAO FUNNY

more content for Qi Xiaotian meeting his 大师兄

[sketching-shark]

Free my man zhu bajie. He doesn’t deserve lmk fandom maltreatment (this doesn’t include zhu da chu. I can make another post about him but this is specifically for zhu bajie from the hit classic:journey to the west.

I dont vibe w the switched up the lmk fandom has to zhu bajie bc of s4. Like oh yall hated bc “he was lazy and make mess” but one good interaction w tang and now fandom is like “tang new bf!!” The audacity to reduce him like that

Being a zhu bajie stan is rough out here. Most dont gets him right in the western fandom esp the lmk fandom.

If you’re going to argue with me about Zhu Bajie aka Zhu Wuneng aka marshal Tianpeng of the heavenly reeds’ character, you better have actual sounds reason and evidence or else im discounting your arguments. Do not make baseless assumptions and make it a whole reason why this character suck. Dont be like this.

Be better. Zhu bajie did not work hard to be renounced like this. Be a zhu bajie fan. BE LIKE ZHU BAJIE. HE KNOWS WHAT ITS LIKE TO BE OVERWORKED AND WANTING BREAKS. The journey would be too serious and short if it weren’t for everyone unapologetic for being him: zhu bajie.

Give this man his flowers.

Monkie Kid spoilers & complaining below so usual drill don't like don't read

Huh tbh anon I wasn't actually aware of the Monkie Kid fandom saying anything particularly bad about Zhu Bajie mainly because he seemed to be one of those characters that's mostly ignored on account of being A) almost entirely absent in the cartoon itself and B) all but confirmed dead asfgerrwf. Also in all honestly it actually can be pretty easy to develop a negative opinion about the og pilgrims when you're dealing with simplified portrayals of who they are and why they act the way they do; as is it takes them +1400 pages to reach enlightenment in the og classic, and a LOT of that is dedicated to exploring different sides of them and presenting their backstories, and given that Monkie Kid's episodes are like 10 minutes each and largely concerned with other characters well that's just not something it's had time or interest in showing, even with short references to Zhu Bajie working hard to become a better person. That said, I do have some memory of people writing about about Zhu Bajie being bad on account of the times he convinced Tang Sanzang that Sun Wukong was in the wrong and got the monkey a session of headband torture times which so far Monkie Kid hasn't shown but only hinted at happening, buuuuuuut then again given the extent to which Flying Bark has made the Monkey King a destructive bumbling clown even back during his journey & warlord days chances seem good that he actually was in the wrong for whatever thing he did that got him a brain squeeze even if the headband was a vicious overreaction, & given the amount of fanart out there of lego show SWK getting punched and yelled at for justified reasons I've stumbled across while not even looking I have a feeling a good chunk of the fandom implicitly agrees (X_X). But yeah, full agree anon that shit's rough out there in the western jttw-adjacent fandom for the og pilgrims :(

[duckwithablog]

The lurker anon reappears! Thank you for answering my questions, and I’d love to hear the backstory of your macaque theme!

Also, I forgot to label myself. Silly me. Mmm 🤔… perhaps peach🍑 anon if it’s free? Because- unrelated to the cute and cheeky monkey man- I really, really love peaches!

YOO hello again!! And yeah, 🍑 anon is free!! I haven't tried eating peaches but they look so aesthetic,, the only peach flavored thing i tried was a peach drink and i ordered it PURELY bcs of LMK HHAHSHSAH

time for some blog lore..... THIS IS GONNA BE KINDA LONG AND RAMBLY SO BE WARNED-

Before this account was made, I actually had a different tumblr account for personal use (I never log into it anymore though lol) instead of writing. I was in the LMK fandom at the time, so I was reading x reader fics EVERYWHERE I could, from wattpad to tumblr to ao3.

And wouldn't you know it, when I was scrolling through the tags on tumblr I saw someone promoting their newly written fic they made on ao3!! I read it, loved the premise, and left a kudos and a comment (I think I left a comment? I'm not sure, I was a lurker as well when it came to reading HSDHSD).

Not too long after, I was scrolling through their blog and saw a post of them asking for any possible writing friends to interact. I thought 'hey!! i can write!!' and promptly sent them a dm. We chatted over our brainrot of the stinky monkeys and we grew to be pretty close writing buddies!! I even got to come up with a ship name for a pairing in the fic (the pairing was Macaque and Y/n, and Y/n in the fic was a baker, so I proposed the ship name 'Mooncake'. Still super proud of that ngl!! I'm pretty sure I made one for Wukong and Y/n too, but I forgot what it was </33 Mooncake was just so iconic to me).

We bounced off ideas from each other, and I sent them posts about Wukong (they were a Wukong Apologist and honestly, slay), and one of them actually managed to influence their characterization for him in a later chapter!! I was even writing my own LMK x reader fic at the time, and while I gave up on it after a while, they were the first person to ever read the first few paragraphs and gave me their thoughts.

Eventually, I had an urge to make a whole blog dedicated to x reader writings because I was inspired by them to make one, and when I told them they told me to go for it!!

Here's where the important bit comes in: This person's blog was themed around Sun Wukong. They're a Monkey King lover, they fucking love that stupid smelly monkey man!! So I told them "hey wouldnt it be funny if my blog was Macaque themed so we could match?" and they went "DUDE"

And boom!! That's the reason why my blog is Macaque themed!! I went through a LOT of custom tumblr themes (you know where you open someones blog and instead of being the regular tumblr blog layout its a totally new one that they customized themselves? Yeah that was me), meanwhile my friend just stuck to a simple 'Wukong pfp + header and orange background'. I think that matched our character themes really well HAHSAHSAH

Unfortunately, I'm sure that my friend is not working/active anymore. Their last post on tumblr was them apologizing for the lack of updates because of art school, and that was it. I don't know how long it's been since I checked up on the fic, but when I did, I found that their ao3 account was orphaned. So it's probably safe to assume that theyre not coming back to their tumblr acc either.

But still... I kept my Macaque theme. Even when my LMK interest started to fade and other media took over my brain, I refused to change it. Idk why, sentimentality I guess? It just felt wrong.

I have no idea where they are now, honestly. I just hope theyre doing okay. They were a super cool person, and I loved their fic and I loved talking to them and I loved being their friend!! Even if they probably wont see this post, I just want them to know how much of an impact they had on me. It was because of them I made this account, and got into writing requests and fics. And even if that didn't work out, they got me back to writing in general! They were an awesome person and they deserve everything good in life!!

Augugh this got sentimental... My bad!! Ngl, I've been secretly waiting for someone to ask me why my blog was Macaque themed, but the chance of that happening was really slim so I held the Blog Lore™ in. BUT NOW I CAN FINALLY SAY WHAT IVE BEEN HOLDING IN FOR YEARS RAHHH

Thanks for asking this, btw 🍑 anon!! Sorry if this was so rambly and long, my mind do be like that (incomprehensible to decipher sometimes). I'd love to see you pop in some more, if youd like!!

Oh!! And since ur a Wukong lover as well, you should read their fic!! It's unfinished, but I think you should give it a shot. The chapters are long, the writing style and interactions between characters are great, and the development and pining is well done!!

I realize that this sounds biased, but ermm..... IDC GO READ THEIR FIC!!! (/nf) Kudos and comment bcs they deserve it!! Even if they dont get to see it, I'd like to at least cheer them up on the off chance that they do.

Here's the fic!! And their tumblr acc too, because they make some pretty banging drawings for their writing!!

@butternut-zippersqaush

[sketching-shark]

I think on some narrative levels in LMK, Qi Xiaotian represents Sun Wukong's best traits (like his love for his family and friends, his potential to grow as a person, and so on). Just like Liu-er Mihou represents Sun Wukong's worst.

(And I have so many thoughts that the two monkies are reflections of Qi Xiaotian in turn.)

Because Qi Xiaotian is a person and has his own flaws and insecurities, and he's genuinely kind, it's inspiring and loving rather than overwhelming.

I wish I had more coherent words. Just. The power that Qi Xiaotian and Sun Wukong as their own characters care so much about each other. It's choosing to be kind, to believe in each other. It's what saves Sun Wukong in the season 3 special.

Also, Qi Xiaotian demands better, of Macaque included.

And on a narrative level, it's being kind to yourself. To look at yourself and decide to love the whole of you, which also demands of you to improve as a person when you can and hold yourself accountable.

OOOOOOOOOOOUGH anon the idea that Qi Xiaotian embodies/represents the Monkey King's very best traits while the Six Eared Macaque embodies/represents the very worst traits is SO genuinely big brained on so many levels.

Like yes just to scratch the surface of this idea you are completely right about Qi Xiaotian and the Six Eared Macaque standing as narrative foils to each other perhaps more than even LEMH and SWK themselves specifically because QXT, while still being a major Monkey King fanboy as well as the literal successor to SWK, has a LOT going on in his life outside of his interactions with SWK. He's got a busy job, at least two(2) father figures, a best friend, an uncle figure, a love of art, games, and sports; just a lot of people and things that he really cares about that while they sometimes make him exhausted and distracted do keep him grounded in the here and now. So even while he does mess up and does occasionally act pretty selfish and thoughtless, I feel like his genuine kindness and happiness with living in the present provides a solid foundation for him to truly want to actively work towards forming friendships and connections while striving to do the right thing. Hell, he's even conversely compared to the Lady Bone Demon in that she became so disgusted with reality that she thought the only way to make it better was to burn it all down, kill everyone and everything, & make it start over, whereas QXT recognizes the suffering in the world but sincerely believes that it's worth protecting and saving and trying to make better anyway. Macaque, by direct contrast, is so obsessively enraged with one(1) person that by all appearances he has literally nothing going on in his life except his attempts to get revenge against SWK. Now maybe it is due to his limited screentime free from the Lady Bone Demon's control, but basically every single thing he's done throughout the course of the show right up until the 25th hour was either A) Trying to kill/beat the tar out of SWK and/or QXT or B) Tell everyone who might listen what a terrible person SWK is in an attempt to make them turn against the Monkey King. Aaaaand that's kind of it. That's the grand total of the things that define the Six Eared Macaque's life. From what we've seen he has 0 friends, 0 family, literally nothing that might draw him away from his centuries-long endeavor against the Monkey King. It's like he's STILL playing out his JTTW role of "SWK except worse," except this time instead of trying to replace the Monkey King he wants him disappeared, dead, or completely alone. Either way, he's stuck in one mode of being and seems to have no intention or ability to behave in a different way (at least right up until the very end of season 3, where there's some hints that he MIGHT start acting differently but we'll see).

And then you have the Monkey King himself, which at present seems pretty tenuously suspended between these two positions. Like gosh dern just thinking about it I feel like you really hit the nail on the head in terms of how lego show Sun Wukong seems to keep getting jerked around by two seemingly contradictory parts of his character; his decision to become someone's shifu does indicate that he wants to do good in the world & make things better for others and himself & live in the present with all its potentials, but he does mess that up a lot mainly because he still thinks that when push comes to shove he has to do everything by himself, just like it often was during this time as a yaoguai warlord & during the journey. And then on the other hand there's always this distance between him and his tudi because SWK is still very much living in the past (just like LEMH) & the guilt and regret that it brought. I mean, this monkey literally exiled himself for 500 years after imprisoning the Demon Bull King, and since that he has repeatedly shown that his go-to solution to him messing up and/or for a major threat to manifest is to leave his companions and try to fix everything by himself, again just like he did when he was a yaoguai warlord (he fights against the entire heavenly army by himself) and during the journey (he frequently faces the various yaoguai by himself). These are just a few of the things that indicate lego show SWK genuinely thinks that he can't and perhaps even shouldn't live in the present rather than dwelling on the past, because what the past ‘taught’ him is that if he tries to accomplish anything with anyone else he’ll fail & get everyone killed & he’ll be left alive, alone, and despairing of life. 

QXT’s and SWK’s relationship is really so interesting & so full of potential in a lot of ways, but one of the big ones (for me) is that both the monkey and the young man seem to have a lot of doubts about themselves, but also seem to ultimately believe completely in the goodness and worthiness of the other person in their shifu/tudi relationship. Like I know people get angry at SWK for his “believe in yourself” lines, but his behavior does indicate that he really does believe in QXT, and he does see his tudi score victory after victory even while SWK keeps to the background but will intervene if he thinks he needs to. And the season 3 special showed just how completely QXT believed in SWK in that he had his back deliberately turned on a charging possessed Monkey King because he trusted SWK to be able to shake off the possession before he hurt him. That, of course, is a level of trust and a willing show of vulnerability that we don’t see from SWK, and in a very real way QXT was able to save the day because Qi Xiaotian is NOT Sun Wukong and believes that A) He can fully count on his loved ones to be their best selves and help him and B) He can show “weakness” and still be okay because his loved ones would never truly hurt him. Like dang this dude believes so much in the inherent or at least potential goodness of the people around him that many can’t help but be positively affected by it (notwithstanding QXT’s very obvious willingness to violence if need be). But yes altogether this level of reciprocal care does in a real way indicate that loving yourself and the people around you does mean being willing to acknowledge when you’ve messed up and what you need to improve, but not sinking down so far into the pit of guilt or obsession over past mistakes that you stagnate and come to believe that being better is impossible. Kind of does make me hope that season 4 of Monkie Kid will focus more on the quieter aspects of the relationship between QXT and SWK in a way that lets SWK let down some of his carefree untouchable hero persona to be more genuine with QXT, and for QXT to feel that he can be more honest with SWK about things that he’s uncertain, angry, or upset about. 

Also would be nice if we could get some more background on these two to get some sense of what the nelly contributed into shaping them into the monkey and man that they are aaaaaaaaa.

[antidotefortheawkward-art]

more content for Qi Xiaotian meeting his 大师兄