Yet more Untamed meta: control the space
Mar. 28th, 2020 02:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
branchandrootSo, I keep hitting references to ep 22 (and sometimes to 20), and to Nie Huaisang bursting into the room to see Wei-xiong back again, and Wei Wuxian flinching away from him.
And I keep tripping, because that's not how I read Wei Wuxian's movement there at all, and how I do read it really shapes my interpretation of his actions after that point.
I do think it's the same response in 22 (to NHS) and in 20 (to LWJ), but in both cases, that movement, while quick, is also very smooth. Very controlled. When he steps back from LWJ's half-lunge towards him, he keeps /precisely/ the same amount of space between them. When NHS reaches out, WWX simply turns his body on his center; that's a move that would have sent NHS's hand (or whole body if he didn't stop) past WWX and put WWX inside his guard without the tiniest bit of wasted movement. In neither case does he bring his hands or arms up at all.
Those are not the hallmarks of a flinch, a startle, an involuntary reaction. Those are the hallmarks of very deliberately controlling the space around him.
This is not to say he wasn't traumatized by three months on the Burial Mounds, because his other emotional responses show he was--his much faster-to-break temper, his occasional zone-out, his clear discomfort whenever he's dealing with a surge of malice/resentment nearby. And the way he prevents contact is certainly born of what he had to do to survive the Burial Mounds.
But if we recall his original thesis, that the strategically superior response is to re-direct the energy of resentment rather than directly oppose and suppress it, then it follows that what he was doing for three months was taking every attack on him by the violent spirits of the Mounds and, instead of blocking the attack, controlling the space in which the attack happens (spiritual, energetic, emotional, physical space) to turn each movement to his advantage.
Which is exactly, painfully, what he does to LWJ in ep 20, once he finally decides to make his move.
That he responds, by reflex, with the same kind of control to Nie Huaisang, who has never given him the tiniest cause to expect a threat, is absolutely a reflection of trauma. But I think it's very significant that WWX's trauma response is to deliberately and successfully exert control.
Because, if he still has control, then in his own mind he has no excuse to /not/ create the Tiger Seal, no excuse to /not/ use Wen Ruohan's own methods against him, no excuse to /not/ keep following this path. So he does.
Unflinchingly.
And I keep tripping, because that's not how I read Wei Wuxian's movement there at all, and how I do read it really shapes my interpretation of his actions after that point.
I do think it's the same response in 22 (to NHS) and in 20 (to LWJ), but in both cases, that movement, while quick, is also very smooth. Very controlled. When he steps back from LWJ's half-lunge towards him, he keeps /precisely/ the same amount of space between them. When NHS reaches out, WWX simply turns his body on his center; that's a move that would have sent NHS's hand (or whole body if he didn't stop) past WWX and put WWX inside his guard without the tiniest bit of wasted movement. In neither case does he bring his hands or arms up at all.
Those are not the hallmarks of a flinch, a startle, an involuntary reaction. Those are the hallmarks of very deliberately controlling the space around him.
This is not to say he wasn't traumatized by three months on the Burial Mounds, because his other emotional responses show he was--his much faster-to-break temper, his occasional zone-out, his clear discomfort whenever he's dealing with a surge of malice/resentment nearby. And the way he prevents contact is certainly born of what he had to do to survive the Burial Mounds.
But if we recall his original thesis, that the strategically superior response is to re-direct the energy of resentment rather than directly oppose and suppress it, then it follows that what he was doing for three months was taking every attack on him by the violent spirits of the Mounds and, instead of blocking the attack, controlling the space in which the attack happens (spiritual, energetic, emotional, physical space) to turn each movement to his advantage.
Which is exactly, painfully, what he does to LWJ in ep 20, once he finally decides to make his move.
That he responds, by reflex, with the same kind of control to Nie Huaisang, who has never given him the tiniest cause to expect a threat, is absolutely a reflection of trauma. But I think it's very significant that WWX's trauma response is to deliberately and successfully exert control.
Because, if he still has control, then in his own mind he has no excuse to /not/ create the Tiger Seal, no excuse to /not/ use Wen Ruohan's own methods against him, no excuse to /not/ keep following this path. So he does.
Unflinchingly.
no subject
Date: 2020-03-29 12:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-03-29 02:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-03-29 03:40 am (UTC)Yes. I think only half the people talking about his reaction to NHS point out that his angle of approach was a big part of the issue.
Hmmmm.... Every time I think about writing this, my biggest stumbling block (for which I have one idea, but it's not great) is why he hears LWJ call his name
no subject
Date: 2020-03-30 05:52 am (UTC)But damned if I'm not having the time of my fandom life trying! Thanks for this. I'm coming up on episode 20 here again pretty soon, and I'll watch for that response to LWJ.
no subject
Date: 2020-03-30 02:49 pm (UTC)