There's Something Especially Heartbreaking About The "chasing Milestones, Wishing Upon Stars For A Dream

There's something especially heartbreaking about the "chasing milestones, wishing upon stars for a dream and purpose" x "built a life on the graveyard of broken dreams" trope for seokryu x seunghyo

Never allowing yourself to have a setback vs not wanting to come back from rock bottom. To have a crisis when the fuel finally runs out vs the knowledge that you can always get back on your feet. Anxiety vs depression. To know how to reach for the stars vs to know how to keep your feet on the ground. They've had their own personal downfalls that complete the other

there's this line by richard siken that i can't help but think of whenever i witness seunghyo's feelings for seokryu: "sometimes you get so close to someone you end up on the other side of them."

it's so true. seunghyo is the loneliest cartographer of care in the world — mapping the memories built between him and seokryu. analyzing every look, every word, every touch. labeling the continents of distance between the two of them with his longing — studying the seas of silence stretching them past friendship and into something infinitely more fragile.

bae seokryu; his best friend. his worst wish.

someone whose breaths he has counted like coins from a foreign land — someone whose every move has been canvassed in his dreams. someone who is still so fundamentally out of reach, so unknowable — someone who has been hiding a secret so huge that it swallows him whole.

this episode truly broke me. the ache in seunghyo's eyes as he watches seokryu pull away from him — the helpless haunting he makes of his face when he finds seokryu in his bed. the pure sincerity of his smile as he watches seokryu light up as she eats.

there is wearing your heart on your sleeve — and then there is seunghyo: letting love wear you as decoration.

Bae SeokRyu ❤️

Love Next Door 엄마 친구 아들 (2024) Dir. Yoo Je Won – Ep. 10

DRAMAS in2022:

Once Upon a Small Town (kakao, 2022) — dir. kwon seok jang

Some people are hating on Li Rong after episode 12, saying she is a vicious and vile woman who deserves to be used by Su Rongqing…and that she doesn’t deserve Pei Wenxuan.

I strongly disagree. In fact, I like her character. She has flaws, many flaws and sometimes I have shouted “girl no” at the screen because she does jump to the wrong conclusions a lot. Her personality has been moulded by the palace environment. She is proud, privileged, a hardcore skeptic and keeps her emotions reserved. Imagine a princess (mind you, she’s an eldest daughter) growing up in a palace where almost every person she’s interacted with is power hungry, even her mother and father. The treachery and bloodshed she must have witnessed. All over power. In her past life, she bent to all that. She would do what the powerful people wanted. She would convince her brother, the crown prince, to do what those people wanted.

She desperately wanted to find a trusted companion in Pei Wenxuan because she thought he is not from the palace and won’t go after power. She thought he will choose her and love her for her, Li Rong and not The Princess Royal. But in comes the trust issues when she sees him with Zhenzhen in his arms. She had taken one step forward in trusting him but then she took three steps back. Because trusting and communicating isn’t her forte. Those who have dared to trust in the palace have met with disappointment leading to death. Did her trust issues come in the way of Pei Wenxuan loving her? Yes. Do I hate her for it? No.

She does not become vicious or vile because she is unable to trust people. It is very tempting and easy it is to follow your fears and overthink shit all the time. She spent 40 years living this way so it will take some time for her to rewire her brain and resist and reject the urges to doubt.

I get that people are mad because Pei Wenxuan has put his heart out to her and she is still doubting him. But, that’s why I like her character. Because when she slams open the doors to herself and lets him in, that would be character development moment.

I don’t know what choice she will make in episode 13 but despite whatever choice she makes, I just want to put it out there that her trust issues come from complex, dark emotions and memories and not because the writer wrote a stupid and cruel female lead. Let’s not let the love for the male lead blind us to the point of hating the female lead because she doesn’t reciprocate his trust and feelings.