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artemissarrows · 3 years

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I stan a literary cartoon!! (wrong season, I know, but this post is too comprehensive not to save)

Wirt's Inferno/Dante's Unknown: Allusions to the Divine Comedy in Over the Garden Wall

Introduction

I must stress that the parallels I draw between Over the Garden Wall and Dante’s Inferno are rather broad as they study the overall themes of the latter in comparison to the occurrences in the former. In my defense, the work that chartered what many consider to be the definitive version of Hell, while undoubtedly a monumental and well-constructed masterpiece of literature, contains several understandable prejudices of the author that are not reflected in the cartoon proper. The primordial spirit of the circles however, the fundamental vices that make the Divine Comedy resonate even centuries later, are incorporated into the narrative as are the broad strokes of Dante’s strange journey through the afterlife.

The Travelers

Wirt

Wirt, like Dante, is a poet and shares several traits with the Italian soldier and occasional politician. One of the most obvious of these besides his enjoyment of prose is his infatuation with a girl he finds to be truly exceptional, Sara. Like Dante, he seems content to appreciate her from afar and like Dante’s Beatrice, Sara inspires Wirt to create art in his poetry and clarinet mixtape. However, this distance he places between him and her is shown to be a source of great unhappiness, and while he does go on a fantastic adventure in the vein of “courtly love” (a concept Dante lionized) that inexplicably gives him an opportunity to tell her his feelings, it’s made clear that just talking with her would’ve saved him a lot of trouble.

Pride is another quality that Wirt and Dante share. Despite his lack of self-esteem, Wirt tries to, with mixed success, lord over the one person he is confident and cruel enough to impose upon: Greg, who he believes to be an immature imbecile. I must call to your attention that a surefire way to be sent to the Inferno is to be in denial of your own wrongdoings. Wirt is the principle reason that he and Greg wound up in the Unknown, but his insistence that he is guiltless and that Greg is at fault is strongly implied to be the major obstacle preventing them from leaving it.

Then there are the realms themselves. Though one of the most popular visions of the Judeo-Christian underworld, Dante’s Inferno was a very personal invention and reflected a multitude of the author’s own interests and beliefs. Similarly, it’s heavily implied in the ninth chapter that the Unknown was constructed out of Wirt’s (and some of Greg’s) experiences and hobbies. Both poets likewise find themselves frequently bemused in their quests, despite the strange lands they are stranded in containing a multitude of things they are familiar with.

On a bittersweet note, Wirt has one immense difference that sets him apart from Dante: Wirt actually succeeded in returning home while Dante spent his later years exiled from his beloved Florence, lamenting his separation from his birthplace.

Beatrice

While the creative talents behind the program have confirmed that Beatrice was named after Dante’s muse and guide in Paradiso, the Beatrice of Over the Garden Wall spends most of the story being the antithesis of her namesake; discouraging what she considers to be frivolous flights of fancy and spending half of the miniseries leading the brothers to ruination rather than salvation. After undergoing a personal journey of her own, her behavior becomes more in line with Dante’s lost love, saving Wirt and even accompanying him during the last part of his eerie pilgrimage.

Greg

Wirt’s Virgil. While more spontaneous and prone to distraction, Greg is something of a poet himself, composing several uplifting songs over the course of the chapters in contrast to his brother’s defeatist lamentations. These improvised tunes being beloved by others and Wirt’s eloquent moanings being ignored (by Greg) or mocked (by Wirt himself) allude to how Virgil and Dante’s poems were regarded during the Divine Comedy respectively. Greg may not have a working knowledge of the Unknown, but his courage and curiosity place him in a better position to engage and resolve the trials the pair face, making him an unorthodox guide to his older and craven sibling. As it was with Virgil, Greg is incapacitated during the final leg of the journey, and Wirt must solve the mystery of the Unknown without him.

The Entrance: Abandon all hope, ye who enter here

Dante’s quest begins in a forest. In Wirt and Greg’s case, that’s true in more ways than one. As our Narrator kindly reminds us, the Unknown can be entered by those “who travel through the wood”. This applies to the part of the Unknown they find themselves in initially and the near death experience they shared after almost drowning in a wooded area.

Echoing Dante’s opening plight, Wirt and Greg are pursued by a savage monster. Though Greg’s quick thinking saves their lives, mirroring Virgil’s rescue of Dante from the three beasts chasing him, the altercation destroys the safe haven of the mill, forcing the two of them to travel deeper into the Unknown. Before they go, the Woodsman warns them that the surrounding woods are the home of the Beast, “the death of hope”. However, defying the famous epithet that marks the entrance to the Inferno, he later clarifies that losing hope is about the last thing you want to do in the Unknown as it puts you squarely in the Beast’s clutches.

The First Level: Limbo

Pottsfield is not Limbo itself as the Unknown fits that description better, but it embodies the dilemma that is usually presented to characters that realize they are in Limbo: stay here and be at peace or struggle further in the hopes that you will return home. The passive Wirt is momentarily seduced to choose the first option by how simple and quiet “life” there is and him changing his mind is done more out of being disturbed by the town’s macabre disposition than any real strength of will on his part. Fittingly, as is the fate of those that move past this relatively idyllic portion of hades for deeper zones, this arguably puts him in even greater danger.

Note: The town gets its namesake from a “Potter’s Field”, a type of gravesite for unknown corpses. Conversely, the denizens of Pottsfield all seem to have names, perhaps having regained the identities “lost” during their burial.

The Second Level: Lust

Miss Langtree’s fixation over Jimmy Brown’s supposed infidelity renders her unable to teach. This subsequently renders the sacrifices of her father to keep the school open moot, who in turn accuses Jimmy Brown of “gallivanting”. The two of them are not necessarily bad people, but much like Wirt, they’re too busy moaning about their troubles to fix them. This is made more evident by how Jimmy wasn’t up to any sort of debauchery and was merely working hard to consummate his love for Miss Langtree in the proper fashion. Therefore lust in practice is not the debilitating force here, but the obsession over it.

The Third Level: Gluttony

The patrons and staff of the tavern are people of purpose. Each has their role, their profession, and thus an identity to call their own. All are welcome, even thieves and killers. There is however, one major exception: The Beast. Despite having a “job” of his own and a great singing voice, he is feared and reviled all the same. The innkeeper implies that this is due in part to how the beast lies to get what he wants, in contrast to an “honest” scoundrel like the Highwayman.

There is also the fact that, unbeknownst to those who fear him, the Beast doesn’t actually ��work with his hands” and instead tricks people into acting as his proxies. The metamorphosis into an Edelwood tree, might not even be his own doing. It could just be something that happens to those that fall to despair in the Unknown, a quirk of the land that he exploits so he can keep his lantern fed and even that might be a cruel indulgence. He is not a tradesman, foul or not, he is a parasite. To summarize, the Beast and his lantern are entities of excess as they do not truly earn what they so gratuitously consume.

Note: Something else worth mentioning is how Greg keeps bringing food to his and Wirt’s table to satiate his hunger, but no one, not even his Frog, is ever shown eating any of it.

The Fourth Level: Greed

Quincy Endicott is dead. The tombstone in the Eternal Garden cemetery all but proves that. Thus his and Marguerrite Grey’s fear of one another is simultaneously justified and absurd. Fair enough, but the core theme of this episode doesn’t lie in a Sixth Sense-esque twist, but in the insatiable sinkhole of greed. Quincy is rather frank (while stepping on franks) that his entire life was/has been dedicated to the accumulation of money. He is also quick to tell us that these riches have gone into making his home bigger and in turn, more hollow. Consequently, the tea tycoon is made to feel small and alone in his own house, unable to derive joy from making money as he confesses to despising the beverage he peddles: Indeed, he all but states that he’s done reprehensible things to amass his fortune. He has no one to talk to apart from his peacocks as his estate is devoid of any staff; only opulent furniture keeps him company indoors. The mansion itself is apparently turning on him as well, coming into the possession of new rooms and wings that he can’t recall commissioning that make him feel more lost and confused than ever. There is a glimmer of beauty and hope in this increasingly alien environment when he chances upon a portrait of a beautiful woman, and then things get even worse for him until his “nephews” bail him out.

The punishment of this circle for those who lived their lives with avarice in their hearts is an eternal jousting match where they are put on one of two sides and “joust” with one another using massive weights. This is expressed in how despite living in the same building, Quincy and Marguerrite have spent an undefined amount of time barely missing one another; locked in a frustrated and chaste dance with no end in sight. For as far as the two of them are concerned, to confront one another directly only has two awful outcomes: the ghost is real, making their love unfeasible or there is no ghost, which would mean that the two of them have gone mad. A line shared by the star-crossed aristocrats when they recognize one another’s names proves that this is all an immense allusion to their situation before they died. They had never met, nor knew what the other looked like. What they did know was that the opposite party was their “business competitor”, a reprehensible entity that dared to get in the way of them gaining a monopoly on tea, a scoundrel that hampered the accumulation of personal wealth. How could they have known that the cure for their loneliness lay in the arms of their respective rivals? And so it was that these two nobles would spend their hereafters haunted by the specter of the love and happiness they deprived themselves of during their mortal existences; architects of a gilded mausoleum. Thankfully, Wirt and Greg help overturn this bedlam and a happy conclusion is reached for Endicott and Grey, who manage to put aside the past animosity that kept them apart while they still had pulses.

Fred is also a creature of greed, a literal horse thief who despite his lack of hands has apparently stolen a great many things before meeting our protagonists. Once he is confronted by the possibility that his kleptomania might get him killed, he swears that he will cease his wrongful purloining and get an honest job. True to his word, he elects to stay behind with Quincy and Grey as “an official tea horse.” In a moment that is up for debate and interpretation, the epilogue has a scene where Marguerrite is staring at a portrait of Quincy and Fred. If this was painted before she and Quincy properly met, mirroring how Quincy fell in love with her image in the painting, then Fred might very well have been Endicott’s steed when they were both alive, adding a sense of irony to the horse unwittingly trying to steal from his former master.

The Fifth Level: Anger and Sorrow

While this circle is primarily associated with Anger, the sullen are punished here as well. They are cursed to eternally drown in the waters of the River Styx, where there is no hope of salvation or joy with the frogs sinking into the mud acting as a visual representation of this. Though the brothers begin the episode with much optimism and mirth, the discovery that their entire quest was a farce causes Wirt’s spirits to sink, dragged down by the betrayal of someone he considered to be his friend. Wirt, as we are soon to find out, doesn’t have many friends. Worse, he is without a guide, and he and Greg are rendered more lost than ever before with no clear goal to work towards.

Anger is expressed in the simple, but understated act of Wirt stealing Adelaide’s scissors, despite having no real use for them himself past cutting the strings, in order to punish Beatrice for deceiving him and Greg.

Note: I would be remiss not to mention the various references to the afterlife in the voyage itself that others have noted in the past. The ferry is Charon’s boat of course, and the two cents acting as the two coins that the morbid boatman usually accepts as his fare. The frogs hibernating in the mud could also be called them taking a “dirt nap”, a colloquialism for being dead and buried.

The Sixth Level: Heresy

Witches and evil spirits are the obvious embodiments of the circle’s theme of heresy, but this episode also has the power of doctrine as a central theme. After all, what is a heretical action without a coda to rebel against? The bell’s hold over Lorna and the Evil Spirit represents the power of instruction. Rules and laws have the capacity to oppress and protect, to enslave or liberate. Auntie Whispers feared Lorna leaving her once she was cured and used the bell to forcefully keep her niece at her side by restraining the spirit, but not exorcising it. Greg had the gumption to use the bell against Lorna, but was too callow to understand how to use it properly. Ultimately it is Wirt, the one usually wracked with indecision and uncertainty that realizes what must be done and does what Whispers was too selfish (and Greg too ignorant) to do.

The Beast is shown to use a doctrine of his own to manipulate the Woodsman. Simple rules: keep the lantern lit and your daughter “lives”. When the Woodsman wonders if there is “a better way”, the Beast is adamant that his word is law and his methods absolute. He is lying of course, but by himself, how can the Woodsman hope to see past the only options presented to him?

The Seventh Level: Violence

A small scale war is waged between the People of Cloud City and the frightfully destructive North Wind. The elemental eventually comes into direct conflict with Greg and the climax of the episode is a battle on two fronts as the blustering bruiser attempts to trounce Greg in his sleep and freeze him outside of it. The boy triumphs with his usual mixture of audaciousness and creativity; of course you can beat a raging storm by stuffing it into a bottle!

Prominent features of this level of the Inferno include a treacherous river located in the outer ring (as represented by the one Wirt and Greg travel on during the chapter’s start, and the one Wirt falls into at its end) and a terrible storm in the inner ring (The North Wind). The middle is what’s most interesting to people that are familiar with both the Divine Comedy and Over the Garden Wall as it is filled with grotesque trees made from the bodies of those that committed suicide, individuals that gave up on living and surrendered to self-destruction. Wirt is rescued from this terrible (and self-inflicted) transformation by Greg’s sacrifice, but the connection remains rather poignant as it helps build on the idea that the Unknown is a place between life and death.

The Eighth Level: Fraud

Halloween is a day of the dead and a day of disguise. It is a night of imposters and make-believe. What better time to play out the themes of fraud than this? Paradoxically, it is also where a great many truths are revealed alongside a showcase of the many lies that Wirt has invented to exonerate himself from his own cowardice. Among the things we learn is that Wirt and Greg are two American children from the late 20th century, the Garden Wall that the show’s title alludes to was that of a cemetery (named “Eternal Garden”), and that Jason Funderberker isn’t the stud Wirt whines about him being.

Perhaps the greatest display of this episode’s themes lies in Greg and Wirt’s apparel. Greg explains that he wears a tea kettle on his head because he’s pretending to be an elephant. It’s a simple and abstract costume, but one with purpose. Then there’s Wirt’s more elaborate ensemble. When asked what he’s dressed as, Wirt can’t answer the question. He has no idea. The montage of him assembling its components might’ve given him a burst of confidence, but it is ousted as having been utterly nonsensical. That is not to say that Wirt is not masquerading as something. It’s just that he’s disguised as someone who’s wearing a costume: a charlatan’s charlatan.

Counterfeiters and hypocrites rate high (or low, depending on how you look at it) on this plane, and Wirt’s a little bit of both. He wants someone to lead the way and be brave for him, but resents Greg’s aid. His carelessness is what loses him the tape in the first place, which he blames Greg for. Wirt also mistakes his brother’s initiative for recklessness and kneecaps whatever progress Greg’s actions might’ve netted him. Finally, he creates an obtuse narrative that frames Greg and his stepfather as saboteurs due to their insistence that he join marching band. Had he listened, the act might’ve brought him closer to Sara, who he considers lost to him now due to the imagined sabotage. Through reflection, Wirt realizes this and against his usual cowardice, heads out into a brutal blizzard in hopes of saving the brother he disowned and practically drowned.

The Ninth Level: Treachery

As with any circle, this one closes where it began. It is a chapter of resolution, but also of return. The final act of the production is set in the woods surrounding the Old Grist Mill, the primary location of the first chapter’s happenings now repaired. It is winter, and even those who only have a broad knowledge of Dante’s Inferno know that while the upper levels of that dismal pit may be rife with fire and brimstone, the very bottom is deathly cold.

The Beast is decked out in satanic narrative and visual trappings from across the centuries: the horns, the name, the association with darkness and witchcraft, the predilection for making deals with the desperate and the gullible, and a monstrous reputation that’s justified by the evil he masterminds and commits. He fools his victims into committing worthless and futile acts that serve no higher purpose outside of his personal benefit. Above all else, he is treacherous, a trait that is made distinct from fraud by how it is a betrayal of a more intimate sort. In insincere defiance of his fearsome reputation, he tries to pass himself off as helpful and altruistic; telling the Woodsman, Greg, and Wirt that he’ll help them out if they perform some simple, but essentially idiotic tasks for an indefinite (read: forever) amount of time. Fittingly, it’s Wirt, whose character arc has him learning to stop being a pushover and take responsibility for himself, who sees through the passive-aggressive charade and puts the villain into a corner.

We are given a brief flash of the Beast’s actual appearance, a horrific mass of flesh made up of dozens of anguished faces. His many mouths were a conscious design choice by the creative team to incite feelings of trypophobia (a fear of holes) in viewers with that brief glance, but they’re also symbolic of the circular nature of the Beast. A shadow cannot exist without light; his existence depends on keeping the lantern lit, but he can’t carry it around himself because doing so would reveal to all those he approached that the infamous Beast is nothing more than an abomination built from weakness, a wretch. The Devil of Dante’s Inferno was a fiend with multiple mouths that was comparatively imprisoned by his own wickedness. Over the Garden Wall is rife with characters that are trapped or feel they are trapped (Wirt, Greg, Jimmy Brown, the Langtrees, Quincy, Lorna, etc.), so it’s only fitting that the show’s antagonist is in an inescapable predicament of his own.

The ending of the first part of the Divine Comedy has Dante and Virgil escape Hell by climbing deeper into the earth using Satan’s body. In time, they pass right through the center of the planet and come out the other end. By going down, they eventually came right back up elsewhere. Such is the case with our protagonists as the Beast’s vanquishing facilitates a great many escapes and returns. Wirt returns to consciousness in the water and saves both himself and Greg from drowning; Beatrice, after unintentionally proving her nobility to Wirt, returns to her family with the scissors that will cure them all; the Woodsman reluctantly returns home and to his joy, discovers he was grossly deceived; we get an epilogue of sorts that shows us the secondary characters in states mirroring the ones they were in during the prologue, but mostly altered for the better; and the program ends as it began with the piano playing frog, who reveals (as hinted in the sixth chapter) that he was the narrator all along and might’ve made the whole thing up.

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artemissarrows · 3 years

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Guardian Body Language Highlights - 1000+ gifs over 40 Episodes

There are a lot of things I love about Guardian, and Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan, but at the top of the list has to be their incredible chemistry and their body language with each other. From the way they look at each other and flirt, to the way their bodies are simply attuned to each other’s movements.

Extra: Themed Compilations:

[ Domesticity Compilation ] [ Smiling Compilation ] [ Synchronized Walking Compilation ] [ Lollipop Compilation ] [ Necklace of Pining Compilation ]

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artemissarrows · 4 years

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Helpful!

Heyy sorry to bother you, im new in the fandom and i was wondering if there's some posts i could read about the band and everything? Just asking for some directions lol, i dont know if you guys have like masterposts about them or something? (Im from other fandoms and we have those for the newbies :) )

i've been watching lots of fanmade youtube videos and stuff tho

Okayyy thanks and sorry for the crappy english, is not my first language

LINKS/GUIDE FOR BABY ARMYs

There is this AMAZING site. bangtanfor.life that is an unofficial fan-made digital archive of BTS’ journey from their pre-debut up to present in the form of a timeline (from 2010 to now with what happened on each day) HERE and even more. Like a timeline for the albums too HERE

Where to follow BTS HERE (I advise you to follow BTS at least on Twitter as new things get shared all the time as for important updates and what is generally happening, I share them on this blog)

List of BTS’ videography HERE (You can find most of it on ok.ru as we hide things there or send me a non-anon ask if you need links to anything in particular)

SOME RECENT REALITY SHOWS TO KNOW BTS BETTER: Bon Voyage 1 to 4 (2016 to 2019) HERE - In The Soop (2020) HERE (I advice you to also watch Bangtan Bombs & Episodes as they are free on Youtube. Another good things is to watch BTS memories of each year. BTS 2019 Memories is like 10 hours long (HERE or download it HERE) You will totally catch up easily and fall even more for BTS as they all have interesting, funny and great personalities)

Festa 2014 to 2020 HERE (Each year BTS celebrate their debut date with ARMYs but it doesn’t last just ONE day. Celebrations start weeks prior and the boys drop loads of free content as gifts for us)

Paid content (* BTS Vlive CH+ (2017-2019) * 2020 RUN BTS! [Behind Cut] * BV 3 Behind * In The SOOP) HERE (cr)

Archive of photos on different social media platforms, videos and so on HERE

BTS profiles HERE

HYYH, THE NOTES & THE BU INFO & LINKS HERE (BTS have a whole alternative universe and the story has been going on since 2015)

BTS SCHEDULE IN YOUR TIME ZONE. Find it HERE or find the main calendar HERE (The schedule might look scary but it just contains the official dates. Most of the time, MORE things happen each day and things drop all of a sudden. If there is no content for like 3 days, the fandom get scared, and we know something is coming for real)

‘BE’ BTS’ NEXT COMEBACK GOALS HERE (As a fandom we are VERY organized. So, we decide on the goals of each comeback beforehand and do our best together to reach them. We also do research, analyze and find ways to come together to make the impossible possible for our 7 boys)

Hi dear, welcome to the fandom and your English is great. I am running this blog in ENGLISH and massacring the language elegantly & confidently one typo at a time on a daily hahaha. Let’s enjoy our time together stanning BTS and make great memories ^^

BTW what I gave you above is just the tip of the iceberg. One thing for sure, in this fandom you will never starve.

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artemissarrows · 4 years

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i've been watching lots of fanmade youtube videos and stuff tho

Okayyy thanks and sorry for the crappy english, is not my first language

LINKS/GUIDE FOR BABY ARMYs

Where to follow BTS HERE (I advise you to follow BTS at least on Twitter as new things get shared all the time as for important updates and what is generally happening, I share them on this blog)

List of BTS’ videography HERE (You can find most of it on ok.ru as we hide things there or send me a non-anon ask if you need links to anything in particular)

Paid content (* BTS Vlive CH+ (2017-2019) * 2020 RUN BTS! [Behind Cut] * BV 3 Behind * In The SOOP) HERE (cr)

Archive of photos on different social media platforms, videos and so on HERE

BTS profiles HERE

HYYH, THE NOTES & THE BU INFO & LINKS HERE (BTS have a whole alternative universe and the story has been going on since 2015)

BTW what I gave you above is just the tip of the iceberg. One thing for sure, in this fandom you will never starve.

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artemissarrows · 4 years

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THIS IS EVERYTHING

Trapped Appreciation Week ➡ Day 6 | Favourite Quote Shao Fei just owning it.

(insp)

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artemissarrows · 4 years

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Just finished History3: Trapped and am lowkey obsessed with Jake Hsu. Can we see him in everything please??? He seems like an awesome person in addition to being a very, very good actor.

#we stan an intellectual (x)

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artemissarrows · 4 years

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Happy birthday Yuuri!!!! ❤️💜💙

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artemissarrows · 5 years

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镇魂 Guardian Screaming II: Some Illustrative HOMO-ments

Some stuff in this show was just Too Much Not To Share, and certainly not a comprehensive list, just a few moments I like!

In which Zhao Yunlan is a shameless flirt and wonders aloud why Shen Wei wears a mask when he’s so hot (ep 34)

(right after ZYL snatches SW’s mask off)

Comments from the peanut gallery, Lin Jing Edition (ep 25)

Comments from the peanut gallery, Da Ching Edition: Da Ching asks if Black Cloak Envoy is hiding as a human on earth...Zhao is missing something veeeery important (ep 11)

Comments from the peanut gallery, Da Qing & Lin Jing edition: Leave me out of it & get a room! (ep 12)

(this was a complete non-sequitur but tbh I love it)

Big Dick Energy from Zhao Yunlan, and Shen Wei knows that ZYL knows that he’s looking

(ep 1, although this shot was missing from the Youtube version of the show, was that more censorship??)

Cute sitting on a bench exactly the same pose (ep 31)

#镇魂 guardian #zhao yunlan #shen wei #weilan

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artemissarrows · 5 years

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Cue the 镇魂 Guardian Screaming

Whelp, this happened. A little over 2 weeks ago, the lovely Mx. Arrows said, “hey, someone on Dreamwidth recommended this Chinese drama Guardian. Sounded like it might be your kind of thing, want to check it out?”

I then proceeded to be that asshat who watches a TV show without their partner even though I said I wouldn’t, and spent the ENTIRE 3-day weekend I was sick finishing up the show. When it ended, I UGLY-CRIED FOR 10 MINUTES STRAIGHT, I hated the ending. 😠

Uh, so I have some reacts. I also started reading the translated novel on Wattpad too, so definitely planning to make some memes from funny parts of the novel that weren’t in the show, so more there too! If you haven’t seen the show yet, there’s a wonderful snarky summary I just reblogged from @lazulisong. Lots to say, here’s the cut.

Many folx have pointed this out before, but certainly this show has A TON OF problems. The CG is terrible (although I find that adorable/unintentionally funny in a lot of cases). Macguffins are a stupid plot device (although I guess I should blame the book for that one). Especially toward the end, the show really loses the thread of the plot, like what is even happening. Their extras budget is also comically low, do only 10 people live in Dragon City?? (I’ve since learned that they lost a lot of their funding part-way through filming, which is why the OST is amazing and the CG is soooo bad.) And Ze Yun The Evil Twin(k)™ is not the most compelling villain I’ve ever encountered.

But I literally do not care because Bai Yu and Zhu Yilong’s acting is so phenomenal and you can just feel the care and love that they have for one another so strongly coming through, all other limitations--CENSORSHIP--aside. It’s just a really beautiful love story about two people who would literally do anything to keep one another safe.

Avenue X did several really amazing explainer videos about Guardian, and having read the novel, she said the following, which sums it up nicely. Their relationship’s not really in the words of the script, with a few glaring exceptions I’ll screenshot and share. But there’s SO MUCH PINING and care that it’s really impossible to read it as anything other than a romantic relationship.

She says: “After reading the book and then going back and watching the drama, I so clearly see that the two actors are actually acting the relationship, the emotional connection, the feelings that the two characters have for each other as the book describes, not as the script has described it.”

Even the Chinese government thinks it’s gay (I think it’s back up now on Youku in China). Which gets me to the elephant in the room: censorship. I really know very little about this, but a friend told me that a lot of censorship happened originally because of some listicles that Mao Zedong originally created. Hence some very strange discrepancies between the book and the show that don’t make a lot of sense otherwise.

Ghosts. The entire web novel revolves around ghosts, the supernatural foes are all ghosts/zombies, and indeed Shen Wei is the Ghost King. But apparently ghosts are a major no-no for the censors. So instead we have the Dixingren/”undergrounders” who came on a spaceship (lol) and then got supermatural powers. Uh, sure?

Religion. In the book, Lin Jing is a “fake monk” who says “Amitabha, forgive me” a lot and then eats some fried chicken. So they turned him into a computer nerd instead, I believe to limit offending anyone’s religious sensibilities. TBH, I like it, TV Lin Jing is such a classic nerd and it’s great.

Lastly but most importantly, the gay. It seems that censorship of LGBTQ media, whether social, film, or otherwise, has gotten much worse of late; there was recently an outcry when Weibo (Chinese Twitter) tried to censor a lesbian hashtag/topic. It’s still there for now, but I guess we’ll see. Uuuuugh.

This means that in the show, there’s no outward showing of Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan’s relationship; it’s all in the PINING GLANCES and things like an awkward-lean almost-kiss, and some comments that Shitty Cat Da Ching and Techno-Nerd Lin Jing make at various points. (More on those later.)

HERE’S SOME ILLUSTRATIVE GLANCING

SOME DEFINITELY TOTALLY BFF PATCHING UP

AND SITTING WITH YOUR BEST BRO ON A VERY SMALL BENCH

AND A VERY SAD & HAUNTED SHEN WEI WHEN ZHAO ACCIDENTALLY REFERENCES SOMETHING FROM WAY BACK IN THE PAST

I also have to say that there’s a period between episodes 11-14 or something like that, where Zhao Yunlan is all “is he or isn’t he??” about Shen Wei being the Black Cloak Envoy or not (including a dork-tastic drawing of them both.) It’s all very Clark Kent, including the huge glasses...I love it. Anyway, I very much read this as “IS HE OR ISN’T HE GAY,” in significant part because several times when Zhao Yunlan confronted Shen Wei about it, the sexual frustration was radiating off of him in waves. Yessssssss.

The one complaint I have about this show (besides the terrible CG, lose-the-thread plot, etc.) is that it’s also kind of sexist, particularly the characterization of Zhu Hong, one of two female members of SID. For one, she has a mad crush on Zhao Yunlan who is extremely not interested (uh, taken??) and her attempts to express her feelings are portrayed as childish/immature. It’s really not a good look for Zhao or the show. Even though Hong’s a demi-human and half-snake with powers, she’s honestly shown as kind of useless most of the time which is deeply annoying too. Like, let her do something badass ocasionally? And generally, there’s just a lot of men in the show and while I am all for the homosocial stuff, there’s a distinct undercurrent of “this is all men’s work” and the most powerful woman is evil (a demi-human crow).

#镇魂 guardian #shen wei #zhao yunlan #weilan

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artemissarrows · 5 years

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Wow, this is ridiculously accurate...Shen Wei’s actual life goal is to be Zhao Yunlan’s sugar daddy / service dom (!) props department is 3 unpaid interns and their pet monkey (!) 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

help I’ve fallen down the Guardian rabbit-hole and probably won’t emerge for quite awhile. oh well.

What IS this show?

TRASH GARBAGE but also MY FAVORITE TYPE OF TRASH GARBAGE so when Pru (our favorite cdrama disease vector) started watching it and liveblogging on twitter we all ended up following along because she said it was trash garbage and she was gonna write porn about it.

So I’m gonna give you several warnings first and then you can decide if you just want to block the tag or watch me spiral in agony or actually watch it or whatever.

1. The writing and pacing is terrible. The special effects are uhhhhhhhhhhhh well I guess they sort of tried. The lead characters do all the work and they’re amazing. Apparently they completely lose the plot in the last third of the series because –

2. It’s based on a BL webnovel but it was made in Mainland China so I understand the ending is uhhhhhhhhh not so good. The webnovel author and the actors fully understand your agony however, and Zhao Yunlan’s actor read out bits of the novel for the fans and the author straight up wrote an epilogue fixing the TV ending. I have a faint idea both the webnovel and the epilogue are being translated but I haven’t gone to look for it and it’s definitely a Lot of Work (I’m not sure where to find it yet but I have a vague impression there’s one on Ao3. if you know of one for sure please let me know!)

3. in conclusion, to quote chinese sellers selling doujinshi, if this is what you’re looking for, it’s exactly what you’re looking for. if it’s not, maybe don’t try it.

So having said all that! Do you like eternal pining? Do you like identity porn? Do you like EXTREMELY COMPETENT PEOPLE with three piece suits / bad boy taste in leather jackets? Do you like special team shenanigans? Do you like wuxia?

HAVE I GOT A PIECE OF TRASH GARBAGE FOR YOU.

Guardian is set in Dragon City, I’m not sure what province of China but I’m genuinely hoping not the same one as Dr Qin was set in, hilarious as that crossover would be. In the world there are three types of sentient beings: humans, and two types of aliens who arrived 20,000 years ago and settled in. One became fused with plants and animals. One migrated underground and became a whole separate society that occasionally shows up and either tries to live peacefully or rampage. They’re technically called Dixingren, the underground people,but after about three seconds I gave up and started calling them drow and their land the Underdark. About ten thousand years ago they tried to invade the upper world and four Holy Tools – a writing brush, a sundial, an awl, and it hasn’t actually appeared yet but it looks like a lamp? – were created from a meterorite to stop them. They lost and were forced back into the Underdark, and an agreement was made to keep them there.

So much for background. Present day, you have the Special Investigation Department, whose job is to keep the Dixingren from rampaging angrily, and their liason to the Underdark, Black Coat Envoy (nobody can agree how to translate this in the subs by the way but he is a Senior Official and you do not piss him off because he will kick your ass). The SID consists of seven or eight people who are mostly demi-human or Dixingren but a few humans.

Zhao Yunlan - the boss, human, I suspect in my heart he speaks very rough and manly. Zhu Hong says he acts outgoing and friendly but has a cold heart. The only one he really opens up to is Shen Wei, for reasons which become obvious in a hurry. Zhao Yunlan is very competent but he loves being spoiled by Shen Wei.

Zhu Hong - a member of the snake tribe and the department’s admin. I think she might be half human? She’s estranged from her tribe because she hasn’t fully come into her powers yet. Has a crush on Zhao Yunlan.

Lin Jing - resident science nerd, loves online shit and explosions, has a great wardrobe, is rightfully terrified of Hong-jie.

Da Qing - shapeshifting cat, hundreds if not thousands of years old. His nickname is Shitty Cat or Dead Cat. His hobbies are eating fish, being the voice of reason, and cuddling up on people. Since they chose a dude who looks like he’s doing this as a promotion for his boy band, this is extremely entertaining. I think people actually -ge or lao him because he’s old but I’m not sure because the accent everybody has is unfamiliar to me. (by the way in some shots they actually use a cat for him but I’m not sure what breed it is. It looks a bit like a Scottish Fold but every time it’s the actual cat it just looks resigned to it’s fate.)

Guo Changcheng - the Newbie. a normal human taken in by the department because his uncle is somehow involved in their funding, as far as I can gather. Terrified at everything, tries his best, very kind. Honestly I have a feeling he’s already marked for death, but I’m a pessimist who has watched too many of these series. He calls everybody -jie and -ge. He mostly works with –

Chu Shuzhi - a Dixingren who is somehow connected to / owes a favor / respects? wants to fuck? the Black Coat Envoy (possibly he served under him?) and controls energy puppet strings. Usually he gets “lao” instead of “ge”, I think. He’s very big and gruff and mean and obviously he and Guo are the secondary ship for the series. They’re very cute.

Last but not least are Wang Zheng and San Zan, who are actually “energy beings” (ghosts) created by the Holy Awl but that’s like an entire episode and a half so I won’t bother explaining it. They are the Token Straights. Wang Zheng is the secretary and San Zan is the ‘librarian’ (he can’t read or write and he’s got a speech disability for reasons). They’re very cute.

Their main contact with the Underdark is with

The Black Coat Envoy – he’s very mysterious. He wears a mask that I think I actually could buy at the art store in my neighborhood. He wears hooded gothy robes. He is also

Shen Wei – a mildmannered professor who looks a bit like Eriol Hiwagizawa and teaches bio-engineering at Dragon City University. He wears very formal clothes and my Chinese is … not existent …. but I suspect he speaks very formally and kind of old fashioned. (Whereas Black Coat Envoy speaks old fashioned but uhhhhhh okay like it’s very obvious that he says tu to them and they say vous to him, except for Zhao Yunlan who has never heard of ‘vous’ in his life unless you kick his ankle.) He won’t or can’t use computers or cell phones and it’s my personal belief that the poor guy stepped out of the upper world for like three fucking seconds and the Cultural Revolution happened, so he still acts like he’s from just before then. He’s the idol of the school, and for obvious reasons Zhao Yunlan is like WHY ARE YOU ALWAYS GETTING MIXED UP WITH OUR WEIRD SHIT and Shen Wei is hastily shoving his glasses back on like Clark Kent and trying to look like normal human beings just kind of land awkwardly in the bushes and survive falling a 20 ft drop.

Shen Wei’s actual life goal is to be Zhao Yunlan’s sugar daddy / service dom, a calling that Zhao Yunlan is very happy to help him fulfill. Someone hands Shen Wei a water bottle and his automatic reaction is to open it and hand it to Zhao Yunlan, who drinks it without a word. They’re driving to a site and Yunlan’s like NAP NOW, shoves a pillow on Shen Wei’s shoulder, and Shen Wei’s only reaction is to move the pillow so Zhao Yunlan will be more comfortable / he won’t have his view of Zhao Yunlan blocked. Yeah. Zhao Yunlan gets sick because he can’t take care of himself, and Shen Wei stays up all night watching over him and folding his laundry. He’s not whipped, but he’s frantic to spend all the time that he can with Zhao Yunlan because

Zhao Yunlan is the reincarnation of a dude Shen Wei fell in love with during the war 10,000 years ago!

Meg, eating ice cream, watching raptly: This is the good shit, China. This is the reeeeealll gooooooood shiiiiiit.

He died (I feel like he was a human but don’t quote me, I’ve only seen flashbacks) and Shen Wei was left with memories, an amber pendant, and the promise to find him again. The first time Shen Wei sees him as himself and not as the Black Coat Envoy, he can’t let go of his hand after they shake hands. Zhao Yunlan says something about Shen Wei’s name (I’d have to rewatch but it’s something about standing above people and being mighty) and there is an actual honest to god damn truth flashback to when ZHAO YUNLAN’S PAST SELF GAVE HIM THE NAME.

it’s gay.

Anyway the effects are bad, the plot goes increasingly off the rails because the censors were like “you realize it has to be technically not homosexuals finding each other and living happily ever after or we will make you regret it, right?” and they made weird changes to the plot, and the props department is like three unpaid interns and their pet monkey but if you like supernatural shit, EXTENDED PINING, and team family shit, its definitely something you should look into.

It’s unfortunately not on Viki but there IS a Youtube playlist here:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvpAVnYN4lb2Gfz6Feq3KA1r5trkUxMU-

which might actually be licensed?

ETA: god damn it self spell poor Shen Wei’s name right

#镇魂 guardian #weilan #zhao yunlan #shen wei

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artemissarrows · 5 years

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SOTUS The Series: Patriarchy & Queerness As Redemption

Okay, it’s been a little bit! But I have certainly been consuming a lot of queer content I need to discuss. First up is SOTUS The Series! It’s a Thai boy love (BL) show about an engineeing college that has a super-intense hazing culture. One of the freshman (Kongpob/Kong for short) stands up to the hazers who make them do endless squats and such….and ends up falling in love with the head hazer (Arthrit). It’s a romcom so you probably know where this is going.

I *hope* this goes without saying, but HAZING IS NOT OK and should not be lifted up as a normal part of a university experience. It is abuse, full-stop. One of the yuckiest things about the show for me is how the administration is totally and completely fine with it. People who are invested in the hazing culture (and, frankly, the showrunners) try to make the case that it teaches teamwork and problem-solving and stuff like that. Not really! More importantly, it’s incredibly damaging to participants and there are a lot less harmful ways to teach those lessons, if they’re really so important.

We could just leave it there--on a surface level, it’s honestly pretty enjoyable. The two leads have pretty solid chemistry and are quite believable (at least until the very end, when they’re equally as awkard three years on. But as my partner Mx. Arrows pointed out, they are painfully awkward engineer nerds on top of everything else, so maybe that’s actually realistic. Anyway.) It’s funny. It’s heartwarming. It’s gayyyyy. The supporting friend characters are also kind of fun and I like them.

But there are some other noteworthy things going on here that I’m interested in teasing apart, and which I’m not entirely sure the show intended. Let’s do that! Lots of spoilers after the cut (but again, it’s a romcom, there’s only so many things that can be spoiled). Note that I have only watched Season 1, I know there’s another season.

It’s about the patriarchy.

The more I thought about it, the more it seems reasonable to see the SOTUS (hazing) system as a useful dramatization of the patriarchy. When I say “the patriarchy,” I mean a system of dominance that gives men power over women; SOTUS also privileges older people over younger, straight people over queer people, etc.etc.. Here are some of the ways that we can see this system of dominance playing out in the structure of the hazing system:

The SOTUS system is run by men, exclusively. There are 6 or 7 head hazers, and they are all men

They belittle, berate, and punish their younger charges for doing things like looking the wrong way, singing slightly out of tune, or questioning their authority to mete out dubious punishments for nothing at all

It’s quasi-military, with uniforms for both the hazers and the freshman, and endless drills and the blind loyalty and authority that comes with military order

Women who are not freshman are present in the second tier of hazers, beyond the men. They are ancillary to the men, and their helpers. In particular they are the medics: they ensure that the hazers can assign their punishments etc. while also ensuring that it doesn’t get too out of hand and that no one gets hurt too badly. Without their assistance, the men could not do what they do, and could not enforce this system.

The head hazer, Arthrit, also uses sexism and homophobia as weapons to enforce control and order. Of course, he’s aware that the structure of SOTUS is headed by men. But he also taunts the freshmen in these ways too. At the beginning of the year, the hazers demand that the freshmen fill books with upperclass students’ signatures. In exchange for his signature, Arthrit demands that May, a female student who asks him, give him her number and take her picture. She’s clearly uncomfortable with the interaction; it happens in the lunchroom and she’s one woman who’s the object of the male gaze of 6 or 7 seniors. In that same scene, Arthrit also harasses Kong in a homophobic way. Again to get his siguature, he forces Kong to shout “I like guys!” three times loudly, and then to ask something like 10 male students if they’ll be his boyfriend. (He then doesn’t give his signature.) Mind you, this is something like day 2 or 3 of school in the show.

Arthrit is one repressed dude. More on that later.

It’s Also About Cycles Of Abuse

We’ve established that the SOTUS is all about dominance and control based on gender and other heirarchies--but that’s just the system in one particular point. What happens to this system over time? That’s where we get into cycles of abuse, and how SOTUS harms not just the freshmen who are on the receiving end of the abuse, but also harms the hazers themselves. Let’s look at Arthrit, the head hazer/one-half of the lead couple.

He’s an extremely homophobic and self-hating gay, at least to start with. Per above, he actively promulgates homophobia. He’s also deeply uncomfortable with expressing affection toward men, and Kongpob in partiuclar--though apparently fine with grabbing Kongpob’s shirt when Kongpob stands up to him during a hazing session. When they share their first kiss after Arthrit finally confesses his feelings, Kong tries to hold his arm and hand and he keeps shoving him off. Then they go on another date, where they meet a fellow student at the movies and Arthrit lies and says it’s not a date. (This is not the first not-not date they’ve been on together...this is not at all relatable. Not at all ^_^) Anyway, it takes him and painful time to do that.

He is a seriously repressed and emotionally stunted person, and being the head hazer is a major part of why. As head hazer, he berates the freshman, he enforces order, he snaps at them, he plays games where he makes them humiliate themselves for his attention and benefit. He is comfortable ordering people around. But when it comes to being in touch with his own feelings, he’s hopeless. It takes him forever to realize he has feelings for Kong. He’s deeply confused about it, up to the very second he kisses him. His friend Knott literally has to tell him to talk through difficulties with Kong and not let them stew. He spends most of the show running away from Kong, hiding from Kong, or otherwise finding ways to not open up to him. It would be funny, if it weren’t deeply sad.

Friends, this is classic toxic masculinity. At least his friend Knott has his head on straight and gives some decent advice.

I honestly get the sense that Arthrit is a quiet, introverted, and smart guy, who felt like he was forced by duty to become the head hazer, the one everyone looks up to. Even when he’s with his hazing friends, he seems aloof, apart, and alone. But guess what: he made that choice himself! When he’s sick--because he ran 54 LAPS IN A DAY for a hazing challenge--we see that he’s into comic books, and action figures. We learn that he also gets good grades, so is obviously smart. And even when he talks to his friend--the former head hazer who recruited him--about his feelings for Kong, his friend tells him, “be tough.” (His friend also implies that he hasn’t dated much...no surprise there.) Sigh.

Are we meant to envy Arthrit, feel sorry for him, or both? He’s at the top of the social structure of the school, but he doesn’t seems particularly contented, and in fact seems disconnected. He’s the person who seems to have it all, but has nothing. I’m somewhat curious if others share this reading of him as a discontented bully who longs for human connection.

We can also think about the succession of the head hazers, and how the head hazer before Arthrit chose him, and how Arthrit chose Kong. The one before Arthrit chose him because when he punished Arthrit for speaking out by telling him to greet a banyan tree for three whole hours, Arthrit did it. Then Arthrit chooses Kong because he speaks out and heckles Arthrit. It’s super interesting to me, but I think the thing is to identify people who have strong enough feelings about the system--and care enough--that speak out and therefore demonstrate leadership skills. They then turn those feelings of rebellion back into the system and coopt them. Toward the end of the show Kong starts to feel more invested in the hazing system and I was hoping that he would try to reform it; he doesn’t seem to that much. Kong says that he likes the teamwork and problem-solving aspects of hazing; he could do those things as head hazer and take the abuse out, but he doesn’t. Cooptation.

It’s Also About The Redemptive Power Of Queerness And Queer Love

This says it all.

They’re at a party, and someone asks Arthrit if he and Kong are dating. He says, “so what?” and throws his arm around Kong’s shoulder--and Kong seems pleasantly surprised that he’s able to do this publicly. This is just ugh, so beautiful, and Krist/Arthrit acts it so incredibly well. It’s truly the first time we see Arthrit truly, hugely, bashfully smile, in the whole show. It’s always been a sardonic smile, or a joke at someone else’s expense. But here, he’s just experiencing happiness and joy, even if he’s still quite shy about it and can’t look people in the eye while he hangs his arm over Kong’s shoulder. Queerness as redemption is a trope I wish would become a thing!!

PS, here are some screenshots of Arthrit making fun of Kong’s food habits. Enjoy the fluff <3

#sotus #sotus the series #krist #singto #krist x singto #lgbtq #gay #queer #kongpob #kongpob x arthrit #arthrit

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artemissarrows · 5 years

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ARMY Guide to Dionysus

I am so excited to explain the cult of Dionysus (or Bacchus) and how BTS has used it in their recent song!! I studied ancient Near Eastern religion in undergrad, and read part of The Bacchae in Greek so this is particularly exciting and I’ve never felt so prepared to contribute to this fandom ^_^

I’ll discuss Dionysus himself, his followers, and then the various references to the god in the PERSONA comeback and the titular song.

God of Altered States of Consciousness

Dionysus is often referred to as the god of wine, but that doesn’t reflect the full scope of this powerful and enigmatic deity. It’s more accurate to say that Dionysus is the god of altered states of consciousness. That means that he is the god of:

Wine, obviously, and therefore of intoxication, both in its positive and negative iterations

The agricultural processes of production that create wine, and generally, bountiful nature. As such, he’s a god of fertility who dies in the winter and comes back to life in the spring (sound familiar?? It should!)

Mass hysteria and ritual madness (and ecstacy) – more on his ecstatic female followers, or maenads, shortly

Theater – in which we all decide to imagine—or hallucinate--that what we’re seeing is, in fact not what we’re seeing. He’s the patron of dramatic festivals in ancient Greece.

The crossing of boundaries, particularly between life and death, sanity and madness, civilization and wilderness, and also gender

Alright, let’s jump into it!

Important Things About Him and His Myths

Dionysus is said to come from the East, or at least from a foreign place in most of his origin stories.

Different versions of his myths cite locations like India or Ethiopia. The worship of Dionysus could have come to Greece from somewhere else, quite possibly Asia.

He is Twice-Born.

Basically, we have Badly-Behaving King Zeus who always sleeps around, and Hera, his wife, gets jealous as per usual. (Patriarchy is gross.) Hera visits Semele disguised as an old woman, and tells her that she should ask Zeus to reveal himself to her in his full godly splendor like he appeared to Hera. He tried to dissuade her but no, and he showed himself as a thunder and lightening storm. Semele was burned to a crisp but Dionysus survived because Zeus saved him from the flames and sewed him into his thigh. (Source)

TBH I’m still not 100% sure what this origin myth is about, it’s pretty wacky. In The Bacchae there’s some motifs about doubling, which is kind of related to seeing double when you’re drunk, as well as the doubling of actor and character in the theater, so I thought maybe the symbolism was something along those lines. Wiki suggests that fire/heat and rain is related to the harvesting of grapes and winemaking, which sounds about as plausible as anything. Another possible explanation is that the ancients thought that a plant was born once when its shoots came up, and again when it bore fruit (source).

He is The God That Comes.

He’s a god of epiphany, or a god coming to visit humans. He comes to a place, spreads his joy and madness, and then disappears. He literally walks among humans in the Bacchae, which is not common for these types of plays.

He’s often seen with wild animals and trees, or other emblems of the natural world. He also wears animal skins.

Again, with the nature’s bounty imagery.

His staff is a thyrsus (he’s holding one in the pic above).

It’s a staff made of giant fennel, covered with ivy vines and leaves, and topped with a pine cone, and sometimes had honey in it. It’s a symbol of the god and his hedonism and fruitfulness. From Euripides’ tragedy The Bacchae, we know it was used in dances, and it’s an integral part of the maenads’ ritual garb.

Is it a giant dick? Yeah, probably. Again, fertility god.

He very often has a very androgynous appearance.

Although sometimes depicted as an older man in the earliest images we have from ancient Greece, he’s usually shown as an androgynous young man. This is also related to Dionysus’ boundary-crossing nature, as it also encompasses bending gender. We get a lot of cross-dressing in The Bacchae, as Dionysus dresses up Pentheus (king of Thebes, rejects Dionysus’ power and is punished thoroughly) as a female maenad (ecstatic worshiper). Lest anyone think we moderns invented self-referential humor, we did not! In that dressing scene, Euripides (the playwright) is making a bit of fun about actors getting dressed for a show too.

Ancient androgynous Dionysus:

Renaissance androgynous Dionysus, by Caravaggio:

Worshipping Dionysus

People worshipped Dionysus in several different ways, and he had a ton of different cult sites around Greece. Here are some of the most commonly known.

Festivals of Dionysus

This is an area I know less about, but apparently classical Athens had 4 (count ‘em) festivals of Dionysus. Theater was definitely an integral part. These types of festivals spread throughout Greece and Italy.

Maenads (or Bacchants)

Maenads were ecstatic female worshippers of Dionysus. The practice was believed to have begun at Thebes, said to be (one of the) birthplaces of the god. Certainly, The Bacchae is all about Thebes. These women are said to be possessed by the god—remember, the God That Comes—and dance ecstatically in his honor in wild places.

Their dress is very particular. They have loose and flowing hear, they wear deerskin dresses and animal skins, they carry the thyrsus wand or staff, often are shown with a snake crown, and barefoot, to show their connection with the Earth (source)

In ancient Greece women were pretty much restricted to homemaking, so the garb and behavior of maenads is very much the opposite of that. This is again Dionysus crossing boundaries—in this case, that between civilization and wilderness. The women dress in animal skins, run around the woods barefoot almost in packs (and without any men!). They also tear flesh apart with their bare hands (sparagmos) and eating it raw without cooking (omophagia).

Much of our info about maenads’ appearance comes from ancient Greek pottery, and from the religious practice, Euripides’ Bacchae.

The Dionysian Mysteries

Dionysus also had secret mystery cults! Apparently these started a bit later, like the 1st century CE, rather than earlier. We don’t really know what went on here, but we can guess. Dionysus is the God Who Comes, so the mysteries were definitely an invitation. Psychadelics were quite possibly involved. It’s also likely that these types of rituals enacted something along the lines of death and resurrection, connected to Dionysus’ death in the winter and reviving in the spring.

Enough Ancient Stuff, Tell Me About BTS!

First, a brief comment on the Map of the Soul: PERSONA concept. The word “persona” is derived from a Latin word that means either a mask or character in a play. There’ve been lots of masks in BTS concepts recently, particularly live performances of Fake Love and in Singularity; this definitely feels like a continuation and expansion of that. They’re continuing to play with ideas about public representation versus who they are as people, and what it means to project their image so widely. As patron deity of the theater, Dionysus is the king of such dualities.

Now, concept photos. These are from Version 4, Map of the Soul: PERSONA

It might seem obvious that the band is evoking Dionysus here since 5 of 7 members are literally posing with grapes, but there are other deliberate choices too that point toward the reference:

1. Images of flowers and nature – Suga’s sweater

2. Members wearing jewelry with animals associated with the god – J-Hope’s bee bracelet 🐝 🐝 , and V’s snake bracelet 🐍 🐍 (remember, maenads with snake crowns, and the thyrsus sometimes had honey on it!). V’s belt is literally called a Dionysus Belt and Jungkook is wearing a Dionysus velvet mini-bag as a necklace (weird choice but whatever)

3. Androgynous appearance. The members do generally have an androgynous appearance for sure, but for this shoot, V also wore clothing originally sold as women's, and many of the members wore femmier-than-usual jewelry. For the record: the gender binary is trash, everyone can wear whatever the fk they want, thank you 🌈 🌈 🌈

Alright, now we’re onto the song Dionysus! I’ll go through specific lines first, and then some overall thoughts about the song. I’m going to ignore the most obvious lines (partying, drinking a lot, etc.)

Thyrsus (grippin’) Grape (eatin’)… Drink in one hand, Thyrsus on the other

This one made me laugh a bit. As thyrsus-holders, BTS could plausibly either Dionysus himself, or his worshipers, or both. I think they both work. Is it a dick joke? Yeah, probably.

Art is alcohol too, if you can drink it, you'll get drunk fool

So I’m thinking two things here. One, there’s the heady intoxication of creating art, which is also an altered state of consciousness (the idea of flow gets at this, I think). And second, I’m also connecting it to Dionysus being the god of theater and entrancing people. Lots going on here.

From my mic made of ivy and rough wood

Again, we have a thyrsus, this time it’s a mic. Interesting! This is definitely not the first time we hear BTS waxing poetic about their mics (looking at you, Mic Drop).

Sing it, sing it again Drink it, drink it again We’re born again

The Twice-Born God! BTS are talking about being born once as themselves, and then again as performers. It also again seems like a meditation on the intoxicating nature of the process of artistic creation, and of performing said art.

I'm now in front the door to the world The cheers I hear when I get up on stage Can’t you see my stacked Broken thyrsus At last I’m reborn

I like that the idea of stepping onstage is a bit like the epiphany of the god—he’s showing up, throwing a rager, and then leaving on his wandering way. The cheers also connect to the frenzy of the crowd.

Born as a K-pop idol Reborn as an artist Reborn as an artist, reborn as an artist What does it matter if I’m an idol or an artist, cheers Art at this level is over-drinking, over-drinking yeah

Now we get a different duality: artist and idol. First they were idols, now artists. And it’s certainly echoing the song IDOL (can call me artist/can call me idol). And the “what does it matter” piece speaks to the thin line between many of these dualities and the crossing of them—so very Dionysian! And again we have the intoxication of art—in this case, going way overboard and reflecting their extreme fame.

General thoughts about the song and theme:

The sound of the song certainly has a frenzied, dark, and chaotic quality to it that fits the god nicely. It’s definitely a hype song that I will be screaming to when I see them next month (!)

I love the “born twice” imagery. I think it’s a really beautiful metaphor for being reborn as an artist (or idol) and for discussing their public versus private selves.

For me, there’s a big connection between BTS as Dionysus and us ARMYs as maenads, in the way that they inspire such devotion, yes, but also overboard obsession. As with many of these dualities, it is a fine line. This isn’t the first time they’ve warned us off of going too far with it.

And just because they’re literally coming for me, V and J-Hope in front and they’re ALL WEARING CAPE TOGA THINGS:

And RM waving a thyrsus around, I CAN’T EVEN~

In short, this is a piece of art that thoughtfully engages with complex ideas related to Dionysus. We know our boys choose their references carefully, and they absolutely did so here. Well done!!

Other references and recommendations:

Molly Ostertag, incredible artist and author of The Witch Boy, wrote a really fantastic story in which she reimagined these myths in a modern context. Very unfortunately it looks like she’s not selling the pdf anymore on her website, but you can read a few of the pages here and it gives a good sense of the atmosphere

The Bacchae is an incredible play. I highly recommend reading it, or seeing a production if you can. Here’s a free translation, and I’m sure there are others.

A really phenomenal illustration of the Homeric Hymn to Dionysus, illustrated by Glynnis Fawkes, here. It’s both beautiful and accurate! You can check out her other comics as well, they’re great.

#bts #dionysus #map of the soul #map of the soul: persona #thyrsus #twice born #persona welcome party #bangtan #bangtan sonyeondan #bangtan boys #armiesnet

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