branchandroot

On the fourth re-watch (round Wallowing In It), and I am struck once again by just what a tightrope Shen Wei is walking for the first quarter of the show. I suppose I should cut this, since we're still enticing people in.

Shen Wei meets Yunlan, and has a decision to make. What's he going to do? By the time he comes to pick up Li Qian (second meeting or so?) he's hitting the mark that he will for the next dozen eps: not innocent but not a threat; keeping sensitive information quiet but in earnest about helping; almost certainly Dixingren but definitely not the Envoy.

And that's the thing I notice most. He doesn't want Yunlan to know exactly who he is, or the extent of his power. He doesn't want Yunlan to get deeper into the Envoy's job than he already is. But he sure as hell does want Yunlan to notice him, to be curious about him. He's practically pulling Yunlan's pig-tails. It's only the specifics of his ability that he tries to conceal, presumably because those point straight to who he really is.

Which is why I'm amused by the running joke about what a bad liar he is. He's actually a very good liar, if you watch him lying to anyone else. Thing is, he's not trying to make Yunlan believe the actual things he's saying--he's signaling that he can't talk about it beyond a certain point. It's the same essential conversational maneuver you see once Yunlan has figured it out and they're in Shen Wei's apartment with the tea--Yunlan suggests joining SID (again) and Shen Wei doesn't answer. He takes another sip of his tea instead. And, you notice, Yunlan knows that this actually means "no".

The thing is, Yunlan is totally not stopping there.

That's the other thing. Yunlan is not doing what would be the polite thing, and accepting that Shen Wei won't talk about this. He's pushing. He's pushing like either a) they're already friends or b) he really does suspect Shen Wei of being behind all the shenanigans. I love that nuance, especially in that Shen Wei also forces the issue very early on, during their conversation in the hospital, by making Yunlan articulate it (rather than leave it politely unspoken). They both do the pushing-the-issue thing, right off the bat, which is not something strangers would normally do.

So I tend to read Shen Wei's increasing discomfort over his social-lie boundary markers as him being increasingly torn over whether he wants to tell Yunlan or not. This matches the snippet of interior dialog we get, and also marches with the increasing thinness of the lies. He's maybe kind of wanting Yunlan to push, but maybe not. And, of course, we can similarly track Yunlan's increasing trust by the way he shows his frustration more and more openly, but also backs further and further off from directly challenging or calling out the lies. It's all body language, by that time, allowing Shen Wei the choice of whether to take notice.

Not that anyone could help but notice, because Yunlan is seriously over the top about being straightforward with those he trusts, but that gets us into his issues with dear old dad, and that's another post.