#whereas you really don't see many western representations that emphasize the cunning & ruthless & ultraviolent aspects
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Starting Journey to the West assuming its the story about a silly goofy monkey going on monster-of-the-week adventures with his friends:
Reading about Sun "was-definitely-a-warlord" Wukong smashing the upteenth person's head into a meat patty but a few chapters in:
#come for the silliness stay for the gore lol#journey to the west#jttw#xiyouji#sun wukong#monkey king#asdfaaew SO OBVIOUSLY this is a very rich text with a LOT going on#hence why any footnotes provided are critical for understanding a lot of the cultural historical and even environmental context#but coming at it from a western perspective#it IS kind of wild just how much the silly goofy side of swk's character has come to dominate understandings about this monkey#whereas you really don't see many western representations that emphasize the cunning & ruthless & ultraviolent aspects#anyway I'm not surprised that there's numerous people who've been left shocked at just how violent og classic JTTW is#looking at the story from popular retellings gives you a VERY different impression of what the og is like
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