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mumblemumble) wrote2025-01-03 10:07 pm
mumblemumble) wrote2025-01-03 10:07 pm
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The Way Home (2024) // part 2
Siiiiiigh.
I had such high hopes for this show. And then Youku went and removed a bunch of scenes, and the whole ending was very disappointing, and here we are!
*sad jazz hands*
I opened the MDL page and saw a comment about how the creepy shippers ruined everything by practically FORCING Youku to delete everything from the show that could be remotely construed as gay, even though there was nothing gay about this touching, platonic, NORMAL relationship between brothers we got to witness in the first few episodes. Before, you know, Youku deleted all the scenes.
So then I closed the MDL page again.
I'm not gonna list all the ways in which the show very heavily leans into BL tropes and visual cues to assure us that, if you wanted to, you could read something a little non-platonic into this relationship. I trust you to believe me that it did. It also did a lot of things to assure us that this was a show for kids and these were definitely a sweet, innocent teenager and his supportive big bro. But I mean. We all contain multitudes.
Anyway, I still want to talk about this show, just for closure, so here's my final review, with spoilers for the ending. Again, this entire drama is an 8-hour commitment, you're not going to be on tenterhooks between episodes. (I still want someone other than me to watch it. 😩 Please!)
Okay, so first of all. Here's what we know about Zhang Kangle's character (He Jiashu) about ten minutes into the fourth episode:
He and his dreamy, sensitive baby cousin (He Jiahao) grew up as brothers; he was kind of a jock but also sweet and smart, and they spent a lot of time together. Then Jiashu's already sick father learned that Jiashu wasn't his biological son and had such a reaction to the news that he died shortly after.
Jiashu's uncle blamed him for the death and cast him out of the family, since they weren't related by blood after all (and his mother was a harlot). He was forcibly thrown out by his uncle when he tried to attend his father's funeral and everyone just watched it happen.
He was maybe 15 or 16 at the time; we're never given an age so I'm just going by what the flashback actor looked like to me. Xiao Hao was 8 or 9 and was completely heartbroken about it. Shattered. For reasons that don't need exploring at this juncture, he also blamed himself for it all. His father was very strict, if not downright physically abusive, and nobody in the family was allowed to talk about Jiashu at all.
And now it's eight years later and Jiashu is back in town. Slow reconciliation ensues. At some point they move in together. You can read things into it, if you like.
There's a scene somewhere in the middle where Xiao Hao has run away from home and people are looking for him. And by "a scene" I mean there's like five of these and this is one of them. It neatly encapsulates several key aspects of the drama:
Maybe that last one's just me.
My beef isn't so much with the fact that it's a show made for children (although I'm telling you, some of these "let's make paper lanterns together! ☺️" scenes are rough), but that it ends with Jiashu's uncle NEVER APOLOGIZING TO HIM, NOT EVEN ONCE, and that we're still presented with a happy ending in which the whole family is together again and everything's good, and Xiao Hao isn't depressed or unhealthily obsessed with Jiashu anymore, since he's got friends now! And his father is maybe nicer to him? Inconclusive.
There are scenes that appear in the trailer and the actual INTRO! OF THE SHOW! that have been removed by Youku, turning the final episodes into a choppy, childish mess. I hadn't expected, like, a gay little happy ending, but I really wanted the drama to reckon with all the evil shit that had been done to Jiashu, and it never really did. It just turned into a show for five-year-olds.
Still gonna write porn about it.
I'll leave you with this amazing GEge~~ line delivery by Zhang Kangle, because I still get a kick out of it.
I had such high hopes for this show. And then Youku went and removed a bunch of scenes, and the whole ending was very disappointing, and here we are!
*sad jazz hands*
I opened the MDL page and saw a comment about how the creepy shippers ruined everything by practically FORCING Youku to delete everything from the show that could be remotely construed as gay, even though there was nothing gay about this touching, platonic, NORMAL relationship between brothers we got to witness in the first few episodes. Before, you know, Youku deleted all the scenes.
So then I closed the MDL page again.
I'm not gonna list all the ways in which the show very heavily leans into BL tropes and visual cues to assure us that, if you wanted to, you could read something a little non-platonic into this relationship. I trust you to believe me that it did. It also did a lot of things to assure us that this was a show for kids and these were definitely a sweet, innocent teenager and his supportive big bro. But I mean. We all contain multitudes.
Anyway, I still want to talk about this show, just for closure, so here's my final review, with spoilers for the ending. Again, this entire drama is an 8-hour commitment, you're not going to be on tenterhooks between episodes. (I still want someone other than me to watch it. 😩 Please!)
Okay, so first of all. Here's what we know about Zhang Kangle's character (He Jiashu) about ten minutes into the fourth episode:
He and his dreamy, sensitive baby cousin (He Jiahao) grew up as brothers; he was kind of a jock but also sweet and smart, and they spent a lot of time together. Then Jiashu's already sick father learned that Jiashu wasn't his biological son and had such a reaction to the news that he died shortly after.
Jiashu's uncle blamed him for the death and cast him out of the family, since they weren't related by blood after all (and his mother was a harlot). He was forcibly thrown out by his uncle when he tried to attend his father's funeral and everyone just watched it happen.
He was maybe 15 or 16 at the time; we're never given an age so I'm just going by what the flashback actor looked like to me. Xiao Hao was 8 or 9 and was completely heartbroken about it. Shattered. For reasons that don't need exploring at this juncture, he also blamed himself for it all. His father was very strict, if not downright physically abusive, and nobody in the family was allowed to talk about Jiashu at all.
And now it's eight years later and Jiashu is back in town. Slow reconciliation ensues. At some point they move in together. You can read things into it, if you like.
There's a scene somewhere in the middle where Xiao Hao has run away from home and people are looking for him. And by "a scene" I mean there's like five of these and this is one of them. It neatly encapsulates several key aspects of the drama:
1) Large parts of it seem like they were written by an actual child. We never learn what the adults do for a living; they just go to or return from work. Parents put unreasonable pressure on their children and spend most of their time bickering with each other, mostly about their children. When someone goes missing, the best way to look for them is to just walk around outside and shout their name, like if your puppy runs away.
2) If you're a sad, stressed, maybe queer teenager and you run away from home, people will be very worried about you! They'll feel bad about how they treated you, and they'll talk about your mental health struggles, of which they're actually aware! This is nice to see, isn't it. <3 Maybe you, too, could confide in someone in your life and get some support?
3) The "village" (it looks like part of a small town or suburb to me, but the subtitles insist on village) seems to be extremely deserted, even for late at night. Like it's just this one family running around the town square and making noise. There's also very deserted hospital hallways during the hospital scenes. It all seems weirdly fake and just serves to highlight the high school production quality to both the dialogue and the blocking.
4) Jiashu, who had been purposefully distant and cold when Xiao Hao saw him off at the train station, comes back aaaaall the way from where he was heading just to join the search party. He's frantic and worried and he actually loves his didi very much. See #2.
4a) Jiashu runs into his aunts during their search, because of course he does. Every single scene in this drama follows the time-saving formula of "thing happens - character we need to know about the thing shows up just in time/is already there to overhear/is immediately informed about the thing." RIDICULOUS. How is everyone, always, without fail, in the right place at the right time just to move the plot forward? I assume this is some kind of genre convention? For soap operas? But oh my god.
4b) For a minute or two, some nuanced acting is allowed to happen, where you can see all the grief and longing in Jiashu's eyes, for the life that was ripped away from him when he was even younger than Xiao Hao is now. The awkward reactions from his aunts (who clearly still consider him family) feel inadequate, but we have to remember that adults are largely useless in this world. The important part is, Zhang Kangle is allowed to do some acting, and we take what we can get.
5) Zhang Kangle is the most beautiful human being you've ever seen and the best part about any given scene he's in.
Maybe that last one's just me.
My beef isn't so much with the fact that it's a show made for children (although I'm telling you, some of these "let's make paper lanterns together! ☺️" scenes are rough), but that it ends with Jiashu's uncle NEVER APOLOGIZING TO HIM, NOT EVEN ONCE, and that we're still presented with a happy ending in which the whole family is together again and everything's good, and Xiao Hao isn't depressed or unhealthily obsessed with Jiashu anymore, since he's got friends now! And his father is maybe nicer to him? Inconclusive.
There are scenes that appear in the trailer and the actual INTRO! OF THE SHOW! that have been removed by Youku, turning the final episodes into a choppy, childish mess. I hadn't expected, like, a gay little happy ending, but I really wanted the drama to reckon with all the evil shit that had been done to Jiashu, and it never really did. It just turned into a show for five-year-olds.
Still gonna write porn about it.
I'll leave you with this amazing GEge~~ line delivery by Zhang Kangle, because I still get a kick out of it.
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Oof. That sucks so much!
All the hugs.
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