Andy x Quynh and Andy x Booker thoughts.
Honestly, after reading it, I’m really torn about the screenplay’s portrayal of Andy and Quynh’s relationship. From what I could tell, the writing in the screenplay suggests that maybe Quynh and Lykon were together while Lykon was alive rather than Andy and Quynh?
I mean, I know them calling each other “love” doesn’t automatically indicate that they were romantically involved but the scene in which Andy gives her “I’ll never leave you” speech that everyone is losing their minds over (rightfully so, it’s the perfect parallel to Joe’s all and more speech to Nicky) Quynh has been (I think) trying to kill herself over and over with Andy tailing her as a direct response to Lykon’s death and Quynh says, “He was supposed to stay with me. Lykon was supposed to live forever,” which again, reads very romantic to me - both these words and her response to his death. Again, it isn’t indisputably romantic and of course people can and do platonically love each other with this kind of passion, but if it’s in a work of fiction I generally assume the writer’s intention is to imply romance.
And as awesome as Andy x Quynh x Lykon would be, I don’t think there’s anything in the screenplay that suggests that was the case so at best...if my interpretation of this text’s intentions is accurate...Andy and Quynh began a romance after Lykon’s death - so starting at earliest 1200 years ago and being disrupted no later than 500 years ago, 700 years or so together, less than Joe and Nicky have been together - which granted, wouldn’t make Andy x Quynh any less canon or their love any less profound.
But, I pictured Quynh being the first immortal Andy met and for them to begin a romance together shortly after, and spending millennia together, perhaps even before Lykon came along...and I just...prefer that, I guess. Them being each other’s one and only just like Joe and Nicky are for each other. I would have preferred Andy find Quynh for the first time trying to just repeatedly kill herself and that conversation and that speech being their first genuine interaction together and the catalyst of their romance and the moment Quynh decided to stop trying to kill herself.
Also, though I think there were details in the final movie that hinted at some past Andy x Booker/unrequited Booker in love with Andy...it was more overt in the original screenplay. Personally, I’ve always shipped Andy x Booker secondary to Andy x Quynh. I picture Booker having just lost his wife and Andy having spent the last 200-300 odd years sleeping around and forming zero genuine connections with those people she slept around with and here’s Booker grieving his wife and wanting to cope with it the same way Andy’s chosen to...and them both just giving in. Only, Booker actually falls in love with her and Andy has to break it off because she can’t love him like that while Quynh’s still alive...Angsty, but good shit. Seeing it in the screenplay just made it too sad though.
When they reunite he asks her, “Meet anyone special?” and it says, “Andy is both truthful and kind in response.” Like how else am I supposed to interpret that other than Booker’s gone a year without seeing her and is already worried she’s found someone who could do what he couldn’t - make her get over Quynh - and Andy knows this and so she has to be kind because she feels sorry for him and then at the end? He’s exiled for a thousand years and he says, “I won’t see you again,” to her, because he knows she’ll die before then...And then you take into consideration that he didn’t just betray them so that he could possibly kill himself, he says to Andy, “We could be mortal, have real lives. That’s what you wanted,” enunciating yet again that he did this as much for her as he did for himself, but also enlightening the audience to the fact that if they could end the immortality, he still wouldn’t choose to end his life immediately. He would live out a normal mortal life...with Andy. And her response is, “Have a little faith,” because the truth would just rub salt in his wounds so this time she lies to be kind instead.
And now he believes he’s never going to see her again. She got what he wanted more than anything else and she’s going to live her remaining years without him and he’s going to spend millennia without her all the while wishing to die.
Makes that ending hurt a little more, I’ll tell you what.
