#pattssaengtai

[ilyarozanovtappinghisface4ochki]

Finally starting last week’s La Pluie which I couldn’t watch bc I connect way too much with Patts & knew I couldn’t handle the wait but also every please pray for me.

[sunshinechay]

La Pluie and The Kind One

So I finally caught up on the show after missing last weeks episode and I have to say I really enjoyed both episodes. I love that Patts and Tai have decided to be together, not because they’re soulmates but because they love each other and genuinely want to be together. This weeks episodes starts those tentative steps, allowing them and Nara to make peace with each other and allow Patts and Nara to grieve their relationship so they can truly move on. The ending of relationships are sad and no matter how it ends, it is okay to be sad about it ending and I thought that was really nice of the show to include.

The thing that really struck me with this weeks episode, is the introduction of the fact that Tai and Patt’s grandmother (and by extension, Patts himself) used to be neighbours. That during the time when Tai’s parents were getting divorced, that Tai had someone anonymously on his side, and that that someone was Patts. It might strike as a little odd to include, given that the show has spent so much time deconstructing the idea of the soulmate. To suddenly introduce the idea that, apparently, destiny has been trying to bring them together for years, though it didn’t work out when Patts was just “the Kind One”.

These small interactions give Patts and Tai insight on each other that they might not have ever been able to know about each other otherwise. That ultimately, Patts understands Tai’s feelings better than Tai thinks he does. Patts has watched it unfold. Even though he didn’t know it was Tai or his family, he has been the persona attempting to help someone through the separation of their parents and so he is able to try and help Tai in some small way. Knowing who the other party in these interactions, does recontextulize a lot for them, but in the end, for the better, not for the worse. Just one more thing for the two to love about each other. That they would each in term attempt to help a perfect stranger through a difficult time in their lives in any way that they can.

I get where the show is coming from though and I think narratively speaking, it actually makes a lot of sense and ultimately feeds back to what I think is one of the shows central themes: soulmates are not born, they are made. The idea that it takes work and honesty and communication, the same way any relationship does. That a relationship needs a solid foundation in order to thrive, and so does a soulmate relationship.

To introduce now that destiny has been at work the whole time might seem like a cop out or render the work the show has done to deconstruction the soulmate trope useless, but I don’t think that it does. For one very important reason. The timing at which it was introduced. If the show was really trying to say that Patts and Tai are really destined for one another, this would have come up much earlier in the narrative. Perhaps not for Patts and Tai, but for the audience certainly. We would have been told, like very near the beginning, that these two were at one point, each others secret pen pals and were helping each other go through these events. But we weren’t. Instead it was introduced in episode 9 of a 12 episode drama. Perhaps if it was going to be the sole focus from here on one, it would that worse thing, that cop out and regression in the show’s message, but we as the audience already now that the end game conflict is going to revolve more around Lomfon (and likely Tein, as opposed to Tai and Patts, but I am even less articulate about those thoughts than I am about these so you know ¯\_(ツ)_/¯).

Instead I posit that it is trying to build on the established narrative. These events happened and yes it could be destiny trying to pull them together. I (surprisingly) don’t disagree with that idea. It’s established that Patts and Tai already have their rain connection when this happens, so perhaps it is destiny trying to put them in each other’s paths, however, like with the rain connection, it is only trying to do that. It is not saying that they have to be together, like the common belief that the soulmate connection has. It is only placing Patts and Tai in front of each other and what they chose to do after that is up to them. See again about soulmates being made. Destiny can do all it likes, but that still doesn’t mean Patts and Tai would end up together. They still need to put in the work that helps their relationship to be successfully.

This is in contrast with the destiny keychain. The apparent deus ex machina of Lomfon’s story. Unlike the Kind One, it was introduced much earlier in the story and whether the narrative choose to focus on it in that moment or not, has much more significance to the story than Patts and Tai being pen pals. Why? Because while this show wants to break down certain tropes and story beats, it does play in other ones. While we might not know who Lomfon’s saviour was, we know that it’s likely to be one of the three candidates (Tai, Tein or Patts. For my money, I think it’s either Tein or both Tai and Tein, but that’s another post for another time). And because we know Lomfon is about to become the central figure of the story, it’s about to become a LOT more important to the narrative. The pen pal subplot, not so much. It’s going to end here, maybe become a funny story that the two tell at family get togethers but nothing more.

It’s narrative importance lies with what it tells us about Patts and Tai and not about what the show has to say about the soulmate trope and it’s subversion of it. I think it’s ultimately meant to functions as an understanding moment, for the audience, for the characters, about why their relationship works when they put in the effort to maintain it. Each was willing to put in the work for a perfect stranger and expect nothing in return and their relationship can be even better when they know and understand each other.

[sunshinechay]

This is something that I (and the rest of the audience at large) have been wondering for a while. Exactly what is La Pluie trying to say about soul mates. My take away from the show so far is that, soul mates, at least romantically, are not born, they’re made. The soul mate connect experienced in the show is often believed by society to mean an instant and everlasting romantic relationship, but isn’t always necessarily the case. Tai and Tein’s parents are a really good example of this. They tried a romantic relationship, for a really long time, had beautiful sons together but in the end, their marriage and romantic relationship did not work and they split up. In contrast to them, Patts and Tai’s relationship IS romantic and has the potential to be something that lasts for the rest of their lives, if they can work through their issues together, if they communicate and remain open and honest with each other.

I can’t remember exactly who said it, but I do recall someone mentioning in a post that Tai and Patts’s relationship does not work because of their soul mate connect, but in spite of it. They each have their own issues (one of the biggest ones being Tai’s hangs ups about the connection because of his parent’s split).

Each side is presented. Tein and Bow seemingly both in the camp of believing soul mates are meant to be romantic, with Patts also falling somewhere into this category (although where exactly is a little more murky) and Lomfon being the opposite. He doesn’t believe in the soul mate connection is romantic. Lastly, Tai being somewhere in the middle of the two beliefs.

The latest episode had me wondering though, if the rest of the world falling more or less in the middle. That thought came with the idea that “soul mates as meant to be romances” could very well be a largely recent ideal. Likely something that came up in the second half of the 20th century (mostly likely along side and perhaps influencing the idea that engagement rings need to be a thing™️ a man gave a woman when they got engaged and that it had to be a diamond. Or when weddings became to grow into the large commercial industry it is today).

Building on that, there has to be people for whom the hearing loss connection is inherently platonic with no way of it becoming anything else. Other than the fact that many people believe the soul mates are meant to be a romantic connection, very little else has been explained about how and why people are connected. What happens if the two people who are connect have no way of being in a romantic relationship with each other. A good example is what happens if the two connected are opposite genders, but are only attracted to those of the same gender as they are, ie a lesbian and a gay man are connected. Or when both parties are attracted to the same gender, ie a lesbian and a straight man, or a gay man and a straight women. And even this is a very simplified version of the ways in which a soul mate connection would have to be platonic.

I’ve seen some people say that they think Tai’s father is gay and if so, it does help to explain why his parents connection could not work as a romantic relationship. They got married years ago, in a social conservative country. It wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility that Tai’s father repressed that side of himself or didn’t realize it until later in life. But what happens to those in todays world, for whom it’s entirely possible that they have figured out their sexuality or gender prior to hearing their soul mate for the first time, or them meeting in person.

I have so many questions and no way of answering any of them. Half of them don’t even make sense or have probably been answered by piece of the show I’m forgotten but god damn do I have questions that I’m probably never going to get answers too.

[tess-from-neverland]

Nobody:

Saengtai: Me emborracharé, me emborracharé

Por tu culpa, por tu culpa

Me emborracharé, me emborracharé

Es mi culpa, es mi culpa

[tess-from-neverland]

I know that some may not like the fact that Patts didn't tell Saengtai that they kissed but imagine this.

You've spent the last two years trying to talk to your soulmate, not because you love him, but because you think he might be just like you, just as lonely. then you fall in love with someone cute, and you find out that they're the same person.

and you share this amazing kiss, but they don't remember it.

I know by experience that it hurts when someone that you love and care about does something while drunk, something that you think is important, and then they don't even remember it. and yes, you could tell them what they did or didn't do, but it hurts to be the only one remembering.

[tess-from-neverland]

Saengtai after kissing Patts: My job here is done, goodnight everybody

[tess-from-neverland]

Saengtai: Playboy

Patts, internally : I only talk to you and the version of you inside my head

[tess-from-neverland]

I love the fact that both Saengtai and Patts took one look at each other, fell in love and decided to flirt with the other.