Spontaneous War of Faith mid-show reaction post!

[mumblemumble]

(Concept and title entirely stolen from grayswandir, with love.)

My god, what a show. I've been live-reacting to the episodes in a Discord channel that was specifically created for me to yell about War of Faith, thank you lunarriviera, and also in a few skeets, but now I guess the time has come for a DW post as well.

THIS SHOW.

I'm at episode 23 right now, out of 38, so I've witnessed Shen Tunan jogging up to a bleeding Wei Ruolai, asking him gently if he's okay, barely holding himself back from checking him over for wounds, and then striding towards the deputy chief of whatever to fucking PUNCH HIM IN THE FACE. FOR GETTING HIS BOY HURT.

It was. Very good.

*fans self*

I thought I wasn't going to watch this show, because of The Violence, but then recently I inquired about it again and was promised a happy ending, so here we are. It would be nice to watch it with someone who can tell me when the torture scenes are over, but I'm making do. The gay makes up for a lot.

I've previously said that I'm finding it a bit tricky to 100% get into the ship because Shen Tunan might just be that tiny bit too fatherly and Wei Ruolai is just... very one-note, it has to be said. Their whole relationship is so very unlike the toxic yaoi magic that Wang Yang and Zhu Yilong made happen. But then the show goes and gives me ANGRY DAD and smol hurt baby clutching the precious box he saved for his shifu, and I'm like, well I GUESS I can work with this.

Soooo.

The one thing I find... confusing? frustrating? Interesting? Interestingly frustrating? is figuring out what the show wants me to think about communism, because I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to be in favor, but uh.

Chat transcript, edited for clarity:

mumble:
Oh god help
everything [shen tunan] just said about the prosperous future of the country led chunmiao to believe he's a communist oh my god I can't stop laughing I'm in tears
THAT'S IT THAT'S THE SHOW!!!!!
Well, this was all amazing
But also such a whiplash of swelling violins and hilarity and confusing propaganda, and the more they do this the less I understand the journey we're supposed to be taking here
I know it'll become much clearer towards the end, alas

c:
It really is a whole journey. Though I'm 99% you'll have a good time with the end

mumble:
I was promised a happy ending, and I will hold you to it!
I just read elsewhere the propaganda really ratchets up in the final episodes
Right now I'm like, well your current main example of a communist is this rude rich girl and your main example of a capitalist is this hot dad who keeps trying to alleviate poverty on a national scale, and his main fault is that he believes the government can be trusted with that. But like, I wouldn't trust "the people" with global economic challenges either, so where does that leave us
At war, I guess
Also the rich assholes who're just trying to get even richer have like nothing to do with this ✨ war of faith ✨
They're just assholes
Their personal greed proves nothing

a:
asshole capitalists

mumble:
I GUESS IN A TECHNICAL SENSE
But it's not like they're devoted to the three principles
They just like money
Our capitalist protagonist wants to uplift the damn homeland

a:
shen tunan is not REALLY a capitalist because he puts the country and the people before profit, therefore in this logic he has Always Been a communist, he just doesn't realise it yet

mumble:
Ahhhhh
The way that the three principles have always included communism, like, in spirit
I see I see

a:
exactly. I mean, you can make a lot of money and be a top banker and whatever, but as long as ultimately your aim is to make China great again, all good

mumble:
|-- "Anyway, the real enemy isn't communists or capitalists, but cops"
I stand by this, then

(God, I hate Lin Qiaosong's boss so much)

Okay, just putting some stuff here, in no particular order:

- when Ruolai is about to be released from prison and tells Captain Lin "don't touch Mr Shen" and it's hot
- when they get "I still want to be your assistant" married
- when they get "If this guy is really a communist-- / I'll take responsibility" married
- when they get fountain pen married
- when Shen Tunan sets his own bank on fire to assess job candidates
- and also shoots himself in the arm for tax reform
- Lin Qiaosong
- the sugar daddy scene at the tailor's
- are we not gonna grapple with the fact that Ruolai straight up murdered a dude?
- the jealous secretary, my god, he was fully having a stroke during the shifu scene and I was L I V I N G

TBC

I'm generally very in favor of spoilers and don't like watching tense scenes when I don't know what happens, but the one thing I've remained mostly unspoiled for is how on Earth there could be a happy ending for Shen Tunan and Wei Ruolai, and I'm looking forward to finding out!

Otherwise, if you wanna talk about the show, don't hold yourself back! And feel free to tell me who dies. (I was already spoiled for one particular death by an AO3 tag, lol, and I'm a bit sad about it. Poor guy.)

Comments

[grayswandir]

Maybe he just shows up to auditions and crushes it

This is probably it. XD Impossible not to cast him, but are we really going to rewrite this character's whole backstory now? Nah.

But yeah, all along I sort of had this impression that he was already in his mid thirties when he got back together with Cishu. I guess not!

with four more eps to go

I forgot the last meal scene was that late in the show, but yeah, things do get kind of rushed at the end! And agreed, I thought everybody did really nice work in that scene. Propaganda notwithstanding.

"stuffing your cheeks while having a mental breakdown", is that just a genre thing or did Wang Yang steal that from Lin Nansheng

Sadly he did not steal it from Lin Nansheng! It's actually really common in Chinese movies and dramas. And I feel like every time I've seen it, it's been really well done, too. The first movie where I saw a scene like that, I was like "wow, this is such an unusual choice, what a brilliant piece of directing and what an amazing performance." Second time I saw it, it was the same actor, so I thought the scene was maybe copying or riffing off of the other film (but if anything the scene was even better, so I couldn't complain). Third time it was another film with the same actor in it, but his character had died and the surviving pregnant girlfriend was doing the stuffing-your-face-while-crying scene, and I still wondered "is this a reference to those other two movies... or is this just a Cdrama thing??" And then I ran across the same kind of scene in other unrelated movies/shows, in both mainland China and Hong Kong and in various genres. (It even kind of happens in Guardian, in episode 2 with Li Qian at the hospital crying while eating, after her grandmother dies. And she does an amazing job with it too.)

[mumblemumble]

Belated, but wow, I didn't know! I mean, I thought maybe it was a genre of scene, but good to see it confirmed! I always find these hard to watch, but they definitely convey a lot of emotion. Such as Wang Yang being about to die. ._.