Estetika Dunia

anything pretty.

[estetika-dunia]

When people try to tell you who you are, don’t believe them. You are the only custodian of your own integrity, and the assumptions made by those that misunderstand who you are and what you stand for reveal a great deal about them and absolutely nothing about you.

— Maria Popova

[estetika-dunia]

The most annoying (and devastating) part of her storyline is that she could have multiple versions of happy ending, if only her father wasn't such a jerk.

1. She could have married Moo Yeon normally (being both nobles) had her father didn’t kill his family.

2. She could have married and lived happily with Moo Yeon in the wilds had his father let her escape the palace.

3. She could have married the Second Prince (ML's younger brother) and maybe lived pleasantly as he'd definitely treat her well and both of them had no interest in the throne. (Assuming the Crown Prince doesn't kill her for revenge, but seeing that he has let her be for the most part, I think it's safe to say her happiness/misery isn't of his concern.)

But no. We had none of these potential happy endings because her father had to be this evil man whose sole ambition's basically the reason this tragic storyline exist in the first place.

I guess that's how karma works.

[theseulgis]

[cnladies]

meng ziyi 孟子义 for jiang men du hou 将门独后 — drama photoshoot

[cyberglittter]

bella taiwan

[fashionsfromhistory]

Evening Dress

La Petite (Melbourne)

c.1958

National Gallery of Victoria

[chinese-harem]

2022

[chinese-harem]

[cyberglittter]

nifemilarj

[365filmsbyauroranocte]

In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar-Wai, 2000)

[jstor]

Victorian drag portraits, anyone?

These photos (1, 2, 3) from the James Gardiner Collection are open access and available to view on JSTOR courtesy of the Wellcome Collection.

Dating from the 1850s to 1890s, the hand-colored portraits come from a Victorian album of 35 cartes de visite showing private and theatrical female impersonation. While many of these performances were intended as entertainment, the images also gesture toward gender nonconformity and queer expression.

See more from the album.

[yama-bato]

A stunning three panel Chinese silk embroidered folding screen believed to be created during the late Qing Dynasty (1644-1912).

[estetika-dunia]

Watched this with my youngest sister when she was recovering from a long fever. I didn’t expect much, but I ended up enjoying the show quite a bit. Nothing remarkable about the plot or the character designs, but it gave me positive feelings after watching it.

JeKaTe is a trio of superheroes whose job is to protect Indonesia’s current capital, Jakarta. They deal with villains who want to create havocs in the citizens’ daily life. From cutting off energy supply, disturbing traffics, and even manipulating the flow of time, the villains do whatever they can to bring ruins to Jakarta’s everyday living.

The series itself is pretty short. We watched it one-go and I don’t think it was more than an hour in total. Maybe around 10-15 minutes per episode (I could be wrong, so do check the series on Catchplay+ or Jakarta Tourism’s YouTube channel to make sure). The plot is also pretty straightforward—we have heroes and villains fighting each other, with the good prevails over the bad at the end of each episode. An easy watch for a sick kid as it doesn’t require much thinking. I also love how they incorporated modern Indonesian slangs in the conversations—which is why I think elementary school students will enjoy the show and feel excited whenever a slang they recognize get mentioned by one of the characters.

If there was a Season 2, I think I’d want to watch it. I want the story to be more complex though. Make it a thirty-minute episode, for example, and don’t let the heroes win too easily! Make them put in more effort since in real life, you gotta work hard to win against evil things.

[okayto]

bed.

[estetika-dunia]

The execution is boring. Or maybe I have too short of attention span. Even by the end of the show, I can’t remember any of the character’s name—not even the main character. Though I at least remember one of her nicknames: Potatochips-hime.

So, this Potatochips-hime is a TV show producer. She inherited a production company after her father’s disappearance. In an attempt to revive the company and its legendary reality show (Discovering Miracles), our MC decided to find “strange phenomenon” in her town. She went around and interviewed a bunch of people, trying to scope a worthy topic to dig into.

She did find it. A strange chain of events was happening around the town. The weird thing was all these strange events seemed to have one link: people were disappearing—just like her father. No message, no motive. Just “poof” to the land unknown.

After digging around and connecting with several unusual individuals, our MC discovered the reason behind the disappearances. It was an organization called Black Swan, spearheaded by a mysterious individual called Hades. This organization kidnapped people with supernatural abilities and wanted to accelerate the “evolution” rate of humans on Earth. Basically, they want to change normal people to evolved people—not caring that a major part who can’t evolve will have to die in the process.

With the help of several “evolved people” she got to know during her investigation, our MC tried to stop Black Swan’s dangerous human experiments.

I think I will probably enjoy the plot if it’s more developed. There were lots of things going on, so of course it would be hard to fit in a 13-episode anime. The MC had some kind of amnesia, which made comprehending the world-building a bit of a headache too because just like her, we know absolutely nothing. She was basically a toy in the story—a favourite doll of the antagonists—getting thrown this way and that way non-stop. And, we, the audience, just followed her footsteps and hoped whatever information we could scrap by through her incomplete understanding can make sense. It’s like sitting in a class you haven’t attended for weeks which you don’t particularly care about—you hear the teacher drones on and on but nothing gets through your skull. You just sit there, wishing the bell will sound soon and you can head home immediately.

However, I did find a favourite character in the show. Bai Qi, the MC’s former upperclassman, was a detective. His unit specialized in protecting supernatural people and intercepting Black Swan’s operations. Through his straightforward personality and his willingness to share information, I managed to understand and appreciate the story more. I wish he and the MC had more scenes together, but alas… there were at least three other male characters who demand more of her time 😿

On the upside, I love the music and the voice actors. Their voices are really soothing and nice to listen to. I read some reviews about the game (which the anime was based on) and they said the soundtracks there were amazing as well. I haven’t researched whether the game is in English or Chinese or Japanese (FYI, I watched the anime in Japanese), but if there is Japanese audio option, I think I want to give the game a try.

[EDIT: Just found out they already terminated the game in March 😭 Guess I won't try the game after all.]

[artfulfashion]

Column dress by Gianfranco Ferré for Christian Dior, 1992

[chineseactressandactoronly]