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Ready to see Tai and Lomfon unfuck it!

La Pluie and the Aftermath 

There’s something so satisfying about a story that pays off every beat it has set up, isn’t there? I am going to have comparably less to say about this episode than the last one, and it’s not because it’s any less masterful. It’s because I already said it last week, because this show’s writing is so damn consistent that after watching that episode I knew exactly what needed to happen to continue the characters’ emotional arcs. 

Shoutout to @wen-kexing-apologist, @neuroticbookworm, @bengiyo, and @fadelikeclouds, all of whom wrote relevant essays I’ve linked to here. 

So in this episode, we continue the arcs for our core four as expected:

Tien is sad, delivering truths Tai needs, and generally continuing to be an emotional rock even as he nurses his own broken heart

Lomfon has realized that he kissed the wrong brother, and is beginning to clean up his mess with a much needed apology to Tai

Patts is going through it (and lord does Pee continue to kill it in this final arc) and still upset with Tai, but because he’s Patts he still tries to compromise and reach out one more time (which the show smartly blocks with a well-timed misunderstanding) before he decides to pack up and try a change of scenery to nurse his broken heart

Tai stubbornly continues to passively wait for Patts to be the one to make amends, forgives Lomfon easily (because that boy never mattered to him enough to bother holding a grudge), and then goes and pitches a fit at his mother’s wedding because he continues to be entirely self-absorbed 

The grace Tai received from his family is perhaps more than he deserved given his extremely childish behavior in the context of those scenes, but we know how much he needed to finally understand what happened with his parents so that he could begin to heal and get his shit together about Patts. I really loved the direction the show took with this. As it usually does (episode 10's big explosion excepted), the show steered away from high drama and revealed that their breakup was entirely mundane - they realized their romantic relationship wasn’t working, and decided to split up even though they still love each other.

@sliceduplife and @neuroticbookworm pointed out to me that this episode is the first time we actually learn Tai’s parents names - Yadfah and Warun - and I think it’s because this is the first time we are seeing them as actual people instead of stand-ins for Tai’s hang-ups. And as we learned, contra to Tai's long held belief, it was Tai’s dad who ultimately decided to release them from this obligatory soulmate marriage, giving them the freedom they needed to live happier lives while keeping their platonic connection intact and sticking together through the rain. 

That’s fucking beautiful, and you could see how moved and shaken Tai was as he realized he’d gotten it all wrong. And his dad did us one better by making the point explicit: Tai done fucked up by dumping Patts, and needed a reminder that when you find a good love, you have to take care of it.

Tai needed to hear that so desperately. He did so much damage to his relationships, and for no damn good reason. Tien already made sure he knew that it was his lying that caused all the drama, and now he can see from the way his parents treat each other that his approach to his relationship with Patts has been wrong-headed from the start. And so we head into the finale where we’ll get to see him finally be the one to reach out to Patts, to use his words, and to make amends for the things he got wrong.

I want to end by just mentioning how incredible it is that this show managed to wind up to such a high drama emotional climax and then pivot immediately to such a quiet, calm release of tension while keeping everything emotionally consistent. This is only possible when the writing, acting, directing, and editing all come together perfectly. I have every confidence that La Pluie will stick the landing.

Fishposting again

He’s very fun.

I love the red/turquoise pallet and I think it works really nice on him