lhan zhans RBF

separate blog for containing my untamed obsession

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

This is mostly for personal use. Trying to be organized with this blog, so listing the rules for myself.

I originally intended this to be for my untamed obsession, but am expanding it into xianxia / danmei / etc.

Listing all fandoms, will use the following tagging system for all, just replacing "the untamed" with the name in brackets:

Scum Villain's Self Saving System (svss)

The husky and his white cat shizun (2ha)

Heaven official's blessing (tgcf)

Mistakenly saving the villain (tbd- trying to figure out if there is a shorthand for this)

Category Tags:

The untamed art

The untamed humor

The untamed commentary

The untamed screencaps

Character shorthand

It seems like fandom has decided on the following format when tagging characters which is:

First initial of the family name, first initial of the courtesy name, second initial of the courtesy name.

Example:

Wei WuXian is WWX

Jiang WanYin (more commonly called Jiang Cheng) is JWY

Lan WangJi is LWJ

So I will use the shirt hand when tagging characters

The untamed as I understand it ( a constantly evolving guide):

The Untamed (Chinese live action drama): This does not have an English dub, but the subs are quite good. A few times I've questioned the translation choices, and they tend to show only the full name, not the honorific or diminutives actually being used, but overall I did not have trouble following the story with these.

This one is my favorite piece of media of all the adaptations I've seen so far, and I would recommend using it as a starting point. My biggest complaint would be there is not much info given about the magic system, but it's still easy to follow.

When starting watching, I found this guide useful: https://docs.google.com/document/u/0/d/1UDfxjqkGpsqvqMaBC77LLnuUE2ihjE-UWcwA0ZLjKwE/mobilebasic

Mo Dao Zu Shi (Donghua - Chinese animation): only recently started watching it, so I can't say much at this point, but I will say that due to the extensive cast and the animation style, I am finding it hard to keep track of who is who.

The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation/ The Founder of Diabolism (light novel): this is the source material everything else is adapted from. It's technically called Mo Dao Zu Shi as well, but I chose to use the two most common translations to distinguish from the Donghua. I read this after watching the c-drama, and it did answer or elaborate on some questions I had from the show. I personally am not as much of a fan of this, mostly because it skirts the line of what I find to be acceptable consent - others experiences may differ. On the other hand, this does have an explicitly gay romance (explicit as in it is clearly a gay romance and it does have explicit content), so it does better at representation.

Other media: I believe there is also a radio drama and a mobile game, but I want list these until I have listened/played them

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

Language learning with media tips and recs for Mandarin

Once you've started to approach conversational level (or before then if you can't wait) a great way to build familiarity is watching shows in the language you are learning. But if you are still fairly new to the language there can still be a big gaps here, so I am sharing what's worked for me.

General tips

If you haven't already, I highly recommend adding two plugins to your browser: a speed controller and a dual subtitle plugin.

A speed controller is great for slowing it down when they are speaking too fast to process.

And while it's not great (for language learning purposes) to rely on native language subtitles, it's one way to enjoy watching a target language show and not have to engage so much of your brain (work and life can be draining) while still getting some benefit via exposure to culture, the sounds and (with a dual sub plugin) the words.

I use Chrome (yuck, I know) and the plugins DualSub and Video Speed Controller . There may be better ones out there, but I enjoy these. Dual Sub also has a " Chinese learning" option, which adds the pinyin as well, but I find it's not super reliable, not sure what I am doing wrong.

Also, side note: use Netflix in the browser for dual sub, if they have the subtitles you want.

Mandarin targeted tips

Watching shows produced in your target language is great practice but it can be hard to find sometimes, or expensive. The two best free options are YouTube and Viki, which come with their own pros and cons.

Youtube

Pros

If you search any show you want with "English subtitles" you are likely to find it

Accessible to anyone, I don't think anyone is unfamiliar with youtube

Cons

Grainy crunchy quality as expected

Subtitles are often in the video instead of as a subtitle file, so they are often also poor quality

You may or may not find a video with Chinese (simplified or traditional) subs as well

Rakuten Viki

Pros

Extensive collection of shows in mandarin

Chat function

Cons

Don't always have Chinese subtitles

With free version, ad breaks can sometimes be a lot

Chat function

Honestly I like the Viki chat, which is timed comments that you can toggle on or off, but as with any chat functionality, the comments vary wildly and can get a little unhinged (whether that's a pro or con is in the eye of the beholder).

Show Recs

Ok now the real reason for this post: an excuse to gush about my favorite shows lol.

The Untamed

Probably needs no introduction, but as my first cdrama it will always hold a special space in my heart.

Sales pitch: a very fun cast of characters with acting I really enjoyed (but sometimes on the cheesy side) and motivations I could understand, even if I disagreed with them. I don't think I truly hate any character in this show, even the annoying ones I enjoy mocking at least.

Vibes: epic historical fantasy drama with humor and angst and tragedy

Disclaimers: not everyone enjoys the acting as much as I did, many people dislike the deviations from the source material (including the censorship), regular drama pitfalls (pacing, cheesiness, etc)

Where to watch: Available on US Netflix or on Viki (although low quality unless you have a paid subscription)

My Uncanny Destiny

My favorite drama to date.

Sales pitch: an extremely funny satirical take on cdrama tropes, I laughed through pretty much all of it. Has very progressive themes for the setting and handles them well (but humorously). The main couple's dynamic was fantastic.

Vibes: comedic historical drama with depth

Disclaimers: I personally think it is a lot funnier if you are at least passingly familiar with cdrama tropes as the premise of the show relies on flipping these (esp gendered ones), a fair amount of potty/gross out humor (but not all of it), the writing does drop off a little towards the end

Where to watch: viki

God Troubles Me

For the animation fans

Sales pitch: an animated show that is also really great for learning more about modern Chinese culture, I love the light hearted humor and ridiculous characters in this. While there is a loose overarching plot dealing with gods and monsters, it's actually very much a slice of life show

Vibes: cozy fun comedy

Disclaimers: while it's a great way to learn about Chinese culture, that can also be one of the biggest hurdles to engaging with it, especially if you are not very knowledgeable yet (like me!). Because it assumes the audience is already familiar, some jokes/details/plots may be confusing.

Where to watch: US Netflix.

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

Took me four hours but I was able to convert and format a Mandarin epub to include pinyin notation above the text:

Technical details below for anyone interested

I was trying to do this on my personal laptop, which is, unfortunately, Windows. I found two GitHub projects that looked promising: pinyin2epub and epub-with-pinyin and spent most of my time trying to get python to work. I wasn't able to get the second project to work, but I was eventually able to get some output with the pinyin2epub project.

The output was super messy though, with each word appearing on a different line. The script output the new ePub where all the tags that encapsulated every word and pinyin were on a new line, as well as having a ton of extra spacing.

I downloaded Calibre and edited the epub. With the help of regex search and replace I was able to adjust the formatting to what is shown in the picture above.

All in all, I'm fairly happy with it although it does fail to load correctly in any mobile ePub reader I've tried so far ( I have an Android). I think it's the <ruby> tags are either unsupported or cause a processing error entirely depending on the app.

Once I have motivation again I'd love to try to combine the original text epub with a translated epub. My idea here is that there would be a line of the original text above followed by a line of the translate text so on and so forth. I'd probably need to script something for this, maybe it could look for paragraph tags and alternate from two input files. I'd have to think about it a bit more though.

Unfortunately my Mandarin isn't yet strong enough to read the novels I'm interested in entirely in the original language, but I'd love to be able to quickly reference the original text to see what word or character they used, or how a phrase is composed

Feel free to ask if you want to try to do this and need any clarification. The crappy screenshot and lack of links because I'm on my phone and lazy.

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

Ok with the success of a second run through, this time with SVSSS I'm feeling more comfortable with the process. This one was actually nicer as it didn't have the formatting issue the previous one did - I was wrong to blame the git project lol. It must have been a stylesheet issue but I am not sure what - still very new to this.

Sorry for another grimy screenshot, I'm lazy. This post got more attention than I thought it would, so I updated the screenshots out of shame

If anyone wants this done but doesn't want to figure out the python etc I am open to doing it on request with the following terms and conditions:

1. I only can do hanzi currently, if you are wanting the romanization of other Asian scripts I can't do that

2. I make no claims to the accuracy of the pinyin notation.

3. I make no claims about epub readers compatibility. The notated epub is readable in Calibre on Windows, because that's what I clean it up in, but can't verify it will work anywhere else.

4. I don't want payment or anything so don't complain if I am slow to respond/complete lol

5. You have to provide the epub. Again, offering to do it for free so I'm not going to purchase it.

This is a side blog but you can reach out privately to request on my main blog @villainyislife

On another note I'm feeling less confident about being able to combine an original language epub with a translated epub. Differences in paragraph markers, stylesheets, metadata etc would seem to force a ton of manual labor. Unless the Mandarin epub and the translated epub came from the same distributer, and had the same formatting etc, and I was able to get my hands on both, I don't think it would be worth the effort

In the meantime I can just have each version a different device and follow along on both.

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

Took me four hours but I was able to convert and format a Mandarin epub to include pinyin notation above the text:

Technical details below for anyone interested

I was trying to do this on my personal laptop, which is, unfortunately, Windows. I found two GitHub projects that looked promising: pinyin2epub and epub-with-pinyin and spent most of my time trying to get python to work. I wasn't able to get the second project to work, but I was eventually able to get some output with the pinyin2epub project.

The output was super messy though, with each word appearing on a different line. The script output the new ePub where all the tags that encapsulated every word and pinyin were on a new line, as well as having a ton of extra spacing.

I downloaded Calibre and edited the epub. With the help of regex search and replace I was able to adjust the formatting to what is shown in the picture above.

All in all, I'm fairly happy with it although it does fail to load correctly in any mobile ePub reader I've tried so far ( I have an Android). I think it's the <ruby> tags are either unsupported or cause a processing error entirely depending on the app.

Once I have motivation again I'd love to try to combine the original text epub with a translated epub. My idea here is that there would be a line of the original text above followed by a line of the translate text so on and so forth. I'd probably need to script something for this, maybe it could look for paragraph tags and alternate from two input files. I'd have to think about it a bit more though.

Unfortunately my Mandarin isn't yet strong enough to read the novels I'm interested in entirely in the original language, but I'd love to be able to quickly reference the original text to see what word or character they used, or how a phrase is composed

Feel free to ask if you want to try to do this and need any clarification. The crappy screenshot and lack of links because I'm on my phone and lazy.

[clearandmuddy]

JWWJ Official Physical Book Covers, Volume 1 & 2

The artist is @竹墨繁漪 on Weibo.

[douqi7s]

Official art for the audio drama and audiobook adaptations of 钟山谣 (The Ballad of Zhongshan) by 吕不伪 (Lü Bu Wei). This xianxia/xuanhan baihe novel features a romance between a bird (specifically a red-tailed shrike) demon and an ancient dragon goddess.

Read the novel here. Listen the the audiobook here. Listen to the audio drama here.

[douqi7s]

New chibi art for the bonus content released on reaching 5k and 10k subscribers.

[friedwizardwhispers]

I'm sorry.

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

May be a hot take but I have grown to dislike the pretty boy art style that characterizes so much of yaoi/danmei/bl. It starts to feel a little repetitive when it all thin/slim/tall/long eyelashes/chapped lips/etc... It's the same character model with a different hairstyle/color and outfit style/color as the only thing to differentiate it. I have similar issue with female characters that get given the same type of treatment in all forms of media.

Personally after reading tgcf I envisioned Hua Cheng as ugly (or at least not conventionally attractive) based on the descriptions. And honestly, that's my favorite idea of him even now! Ugly rights!!! Non-conventionally attractive people deserve partners too.

I've seen the head canon that Xie Lian is buff, and that feels right to me too. He can be pretty and buff! Buff guys also deserve tender heartfelt romances

I get the appeal of the pretty boy style -its very pretty, but I'd love more MCs/MLs depicted in unique ways too.

[piosplayhouse]

Sometimes I see posts that are like "buff xie lian actually isn't canon because cultivation strength =/= physical strength and also lean and graceful muscle exists" and it's like yeah that's true but also did you guys forget that WITHOUT spiritual power his hobby was SMASHING BOULDERS ON HIS TITS

[wohdaily]

WORD OF HONOR | Episode 27

[pakhnokh]

Hanguang Jun & Yiling Laozu commission

A commission for @neoladyapollonia, thank you so much!

These are to be matching images to be printed on each side of a bag *O* I'm so excited I never had my art printed before (zines not included lol) They are based on the Untamed poster of LWJ and WWX

[idledee]

wohs!

[qourmet]

i drew the poster but then csp crashed on me & didnt recover the poster so i used the lowest quality jpeg i could find

this has plagued my mind for Months, i drank coffee at 1am & havent come down yet

[qourmet]

stop being funnier than me! !! ! !

[qourmet]

i drew the poster but then csp crashed on me & didnt recover the poster so i used the lowest quality jpeg i could find

this has plagued my mind for Months, i drank coffee at 1am & havent come down yet

[qourmet]

stop being funnier than me! !! ! !

[rhysiana]

I asked @thatgothsamurai for the separated out image of my request from their Valentine's extravaganza just so everyone could better admire this fabulous modern Ye Baiyi. (In my heart, he goes with this Xie'er. And probably stepped right out of a @robotmango fic.)

[hawberries]

I have added: yet more ships to the MXTX bookmark catalogue :)

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

Spoilers for word of honor

I'm sure I'll have more thoughts on this after I've had time to process it, but after finishing word of Honor I am feeling frustrated.

What's that comic of two people who keep bending in front of the other one to protect them? That's this show in a nutshell. The two main characters, love interests, keep sacrificing themselves for each other over and over and over again. I think I'm just sort of over this trope in romance anyways. IDK why couples never try living for each other.

I did like the show. Just a little tired by the end of it.

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

Ok after thinking about it a bit more my overall issues with the show and the first problem I mentioned boil down to two things:

1. The show seems to fall in to a genre I like to call tragedy porn. The tragedies exist simply to provoke emotion in the viewers and happen constantly. I like tragedy, but this show is a bit ridiculous with it. And there never seems to be a narrative point other than "look how consistently awful the world is".

All these people die, but what change does it actually drive? It only drives one change, which is the MLs ability to see things from each other's perspectives. But that had happened by the arc when wen kexing fakes his death. Every moment afterward is a build up to happy moment that ends in tragedy, but this doesn't change anything about the characters and their motivations.

The main characters don't have any further realizations/growth the side characters stay static.

Part of this can also be attributed to problem

2. The show feels extremely serial, in a way it shouldn't. I've come to prefer short tv shows as my favorite form of media. Long form, but with a scheduled plan and set number of episodes. This lends really well to in depth character and world exploration, but without the pitfalls of being continually renewed.

Word of Honor started to feel like a tv shows that had been renewed too many times by the end, which doesn't seem right considering there is only 36 episodes. The same plot points and character interactions keep being repeated with only a few cosmetic changes

Wen kexing and zhou zishu keep trying to die for each other. Side characters keep going through the same miniplots with slightly altered circumstances.

Since it was based on a novel (I haven't read yet) this may just be issues that bled over

Or may the show intended to feel like limbo, the same tragedies repeating endlessly. If that's the case it did a great job, but I hated it

[lanzhans-resting-bitchface]

But I don't want to shit on it too much, I did enjoy it most of the way through.

Positives: interesting and fun female characters. Although many do lack agency typical of the genre, they were still really fun to watch. Gu xiang and the other ghost women were very fun to watch interact, especially with each other. I love sisterhoods.

Beautiful costuming, especially for wen kexing. I think he had the most costume changes I've ever seen in a drama, and I appreciated it. Gu xiang also had some pretty outfits.

Similarly, nice visuals throughout the show. Scenery looked very beautiful.

Main characters were engaging and acting was very good. I was very convinced of the care they had for each other.

Dialogue, especially in the beginning was funny and I laughed out loud multiple times.

Worth a watch, but not sure I would rewatch (at least all the way through)