Random thoughts on Vice Versa ep 12

Ha! I knew straight away when Talay woke up that the preview had been playing us and that it would end up being that Puen was going to bullshit Talay. I do wish we could have gotten a proper repeat of the scenario Puen described in ep 9 but this subversion kind of works too… It's nice that they're comfortable with each other to be able to joke around. But I don't get the shying away from kisses. Yes, morning breath and whatever...but Talay pulls away too much. Surely they're at the stage where they want to jump each other's bones not be shy about kissing. Anyway, the kisses over the breakfast prep were cute.

I loved the writing on the palm - another callback to their thing of communicating in different ways. It was cute.

But I'm CACKLING!!! Talay's boss is a traveller too and there's an association in their universe (I mean, there had to be but still...) and I loved how that actor played the 16-year-old within him - especially the Phi/Nong thing. (I've seen some people commenting on how it must suck for him to wake up in a 40-year-old's body...but I also think about the 40-year-old waking up as a 16 year old - having to do exams again, study at uni, find a job, finish puberty...I WOULD NOT want to go through that again 😂).

I was disappointed that we never really got confirmation that both Talay and Puen dreamed - that they were actually each other's portkeys...and I wish we had.

Before ep 11, I had wanted a scene in a cafe with Talay eating a pink dessert...well it was a restaurant and a pink drink, so close enough! And, damn! Puen made the folder!! How did he get the exact same design? He obviously has a good memory. But it's all the merch from the gmmtv shop, isn't it...

Now then, the live-streamed interview with O was uncomfortable and Jimmy played that so well in his micro-expressions - I wonder how close to home it is for these actors. And Gyo saying it as it should be: "Whoever Puen is seeing is his personal business". Yes! But it felt like too much drama for the last ep…I was definitely nervous by this point how it was going to be dealt with.

OMG I wanted to punch Puen's manager - he shouldn't have that kind of power. Puen is NOT a child. How dare he just confiscate his phone. I appreciate that actors are bound by contracts but this is taking it too far. He couldn't be more unsupportive of Puen if he tried. So, Puen is supposed to be an unhappy loner so long as he has a career that the industry can leech off him? smh. Now I know why this picture was there - it represents how we all feel about this jackass:

Anyway, I really liked Talay's worry for Puen - "Will he be okay?" - rather than what has been overdone so often before, the 'oh noes he must have stopped loving me' self-depreciation when the other person goes awol, even if it's due to outside forces (which this show did last ep but at least they've redeemed themselves here).

And I was so glad I was right with Tup and Tou being different versions of Up and Aou. I was CACKLING AGAIN! And I liked how they reversed the characters' energies a bit with Tup being the quiet one and Tou the loud one. It also gave us a third character from Neo. This man. istg.

YAS to supportive female friends!!! That's it, that's all. I love Gyo.

I find it so odd in bls when couples cook and then only have one place setting. But OMFG Jimmy in glasses!! I didn't know how much I needed it until I got it...and I now I need it again in the future.

Okay, no, yeah, I love the hourglass symbolism and parallel. I buy it. It's wonderful, I love how Puen made one where the sand stays because he wants time to stop. It's FABULOUS but I just wish they could have introduced the idea earlier in the series. The same for the moon reference - I don't really remember them 'looking at the moon and thinking of the other person'. The show could have made this moment even more poignant had they strengthen this.

And I mean the kiss is great and all at the end there but I needed to know what happened to Tun and Tess…a lot more than just in the dream sequence. This was definitely disappointing and I hope we'll get some kind of special episode - even if it's all different actors playing out Tun and Tess' life as though they had written the screenplay for it from their life-story. I'm salty.

I'll give the show points for giving us Aou and Fuse crumbs, though, as well as Phuwadol - although I don't see why Talay wouldn't have asked that person if they were the Dol he knew from the alternate universe. smh. BUT Fuse's first t-shirt was spot on again, "Believe in Yourself" when he's in acting classes, and I just wish I could find out what's on his second t-shirt 😭

The ending was sweet, lovely to see what the future can hold for them. And what a location!...to find that house with that huge pink trumpet tree…but maybe they're really common in Thailand… It's such a shame we didn't get to see it in bloom though...how amazing would this have been in Talay's garden?!

Aaaaand I'll only mention the Lays add since we came full-circle from ep 1 with the marriage reference - with Thailand, GMMTV, and Lays (bless them) flexing their 'we want marriage equality' muscles. 👏🏼

Saturday evening post!! “The Merciless Ones” review by Namina Forna

Hello, Tumblrians! As you all might know, I read The Gilded Ones back in January, and really enjoyed it! Namina Forna pulled me into the story with the brutality outlined in the first half, as well as the strong friendships that powered Deka’s journey throughout, and all of the possibilities for exploring the series’ world. Unfortunately though, the ending was clunky to say the least, and it..created a bunch of flaws in the narrative that’d been set up until then. Overall I wasn't jiving with it. But! Seeing as it was still a solid novel, and it displayed Forna’s potential as a writer (it was her debut novel I’m pretty sure? I’ve unintentionally read a lot of those, goodness), I immediately put The Merciless Ones on by TBR! To which it was ordered by a librarian, and it arrived around the last week of the month :).

I have incredibly mixed feelings about this book, though. Of course, when reading a book that expands on an ending that I disliked (the same thing happened with Six Crimson Cranes to some degree?), it’s logical to assume that I as a reader wouldn’t really enjoy it as much, although I was hoping it would show some promise. It did, in some part! Firstly, I was waiting to see some of the political aftermath of the ending, and we saw that with the Alaki’s treatment, and a bit of inclusion on how the blood ceremony was handled after that (it was basically no longer practiced, spoiler). It integrated more of that brutality present in TGO, especially with the beginning starting off with a bang, as the first sentences are literally about two corpses Deka finds.

Overall though, it had the same issues as its predecessor but intensified: Plot twists felt predictable(except for one?), and the foreshadowing was very obvious because of that. Around the 1/3rd mark I just started making fun of Deka’s “guesses” being proven right again.

SPOILER SECTION!! If you want to read ahead, sure.

Firstly, Melanis got to be cartoonishly evil in the ending. I actually giggled when Deka (foolishly and half-hazardly) tried to convince Melanis into joining her side because The Gilded Ones were lying the entire time (..shocker), to which Melanis just prided them on their sexist cruelty lmao💀 like okay “that just makes me love them even more!” jdkwnfkensof 

Actually, everyone gets to be cartoonishly evil by the end?? Goodness.

Speaking of the gods and their sexism, I..don’t know how to feel about how it was handled here. It felt like there was too much “both sides-ism” in the narrative now, even if Deka’s internal monologue says multiple times that the male monarchs/authorities went totally overboard and shouldn’t have created the misogynistic society that literally tortured Deka (and literal millions) in this series!! But now we have a reason for that oppression(kinda), and it feels weird. Why does there need to be a logical reason for it? Fine, I guess it’s for plot reasons because of how the Merciless and Gilded Ones are counterparts of each other (the former essentially being a genderbent version of the latter), and eventually turned against each other, yada yada yada…

It felt like Forna wanted to make the gods complex or interestingly evil but..I don’t know, execution wasn’t really that great. 

Deka is also ridiculously overpowered?? I completely forgot she was said to be wholly immortal in TGO, and for most of the book it just makes her feel detached from the other characters and a chunk of the stakes of the narrative. Especially with how she literally is for most of the time?! I might not be original for stating this (shoutout to a helpful Goodreads reviewer, I wish I remembered your user, bless), but what made the first book really stick was that even with the fantastical elements it still felt human. Britta and Deka’s unconditional friendship, how the Alaki supported each other, their very human emotions and struggles despite what you’d expect from the premise carried it. For TMO, we got a false(?) McGuffin, along with Deka being very different from her friends..being truly immortal, the only one who can communicate with the gods, kind of being a god herself. It’s..huh. AND NOW SHE CAN GIVE OTHER PEOPLE ABILITIES?! NOT JUST ABILITIES BUT IMMORTALITY?!?! SLOW DOWN😭 (At least we establish she has some limits though, because her physical body is taking physical damage by the end. How the hell does she even work though?! Is she a soul? Something incomprehensible to the human mind, vast and cosmic?? But then how was that formed, is she just..separate from the body she was born/created with? That raises so many questions!!?)

Anyhow. It really set in that I kind of excused how rushed Kaita and Deka’s romance was? They started out with a rivalry or “hating each other”, had one conversation and suddenly they got googly eyes for each other. I’m thinking of this because their “development” was mentioned somewhere in the book, as a way of signaling to the readers how far they’ve come. But it?? Sure doesn’t feel like it in retrospect haha. He also doesn’t do a ton in the book, except for when they legitimately tried to redeem Deka’s father because he’d “realized his mistakes” or some bullshit and he talked some sense into her (BC HER FATHER LITERALLY TORTURED HER?? WILLINGLY!! SHE LITERALLY CHANGED HER APPEARANCE TO NO LONGER HAVE HIS CHARACTERISTICS BECAUSE SHE WAS TRAUMATIZED BRO🧍). I like that Kaita did that actually because I was like “TALK YOUR SHITTTTT” like Deka wdym “I hated my father all this time😔and for what reason😢” Kaita literally was like HE BEHEADED YOU!! Such a stupid part of the book like girlie I get having parental issues but I was gonna lose my shit fr if Forna used his death as a means of redeeming him chkwncosnfoenforn.

That rant aside though, again, Kaita was mostly useless.

I also just found a lot of stuff to be unintentionally funny this time around because the plot got to be nonsensical after a while. There was one part I did find genuinely funny though less so because of the bad writing and more so just the way events played out?? One of the highlights of this book in my opinion was when the Merciless Ones(the male gods) were trying to mess with Deka’s memories and she knew and was just so fed up of being manipulated by gods she just walked out of their chamber lmfao.

One last complaint! Not digging the sudden introduction of romantic relationships for this book. The first one was so based around platonic ones, and found family even, that it kinda took away from that :(.

Ok! Complaints aside! I’m a little intrigued by what they established with White Hands — will she get to explore her own gender and identity outside of what the Gilded Ones pushed onto her in the next book? (Does that mean they could be non-binary like Thandiwe?) Are they technically intersex, therefore making their story also kind of work as an allegory for forced intersex surgeries? I’m kind of intrigued, as a non-binary reader.

Last things I feel like discussing for this section!! I was pretty stoked that Karmoko Thandiwe was revealed to be non-binary! They were my favorite of the Karmokos in the last book, probably one of my favorite characters overall, their introduction just stuck with me and was so metal. (The “I’ll cut your tongue off and put it in a jar to keep me company” thing caught me so off-guard lmao but it was also kinda badass.) I do feel like the confirmation of it was a little awkwardly worded, though (as are most instances of NB rep unfortunately because it’s often expected that the audience won’t automatically catch on, so we gotta have their gender and pronouns be explicitly stated). Karmoko Huon being trans surprised me though! I’m not gonna lie, maybe there were some hints I could’ve been missing out on because Deka was like “oh yea! I guess I picked it up from the specific way she was shut out from society and ostracized” and I just? Couldn’t remember any of that really standing out?? Or maybe it’s like the Kaita relationship thing where not as much really happened? Anyhow. The influx of queer representation was unexpected but good, although I feel like they only got surface-level on how queer people are oppressed in a multitude of ways in this world, specifically in the case of alaki/women? I guess I get why that was the case though, because Deka is our POV and she’s not queer in any way. Point is though I just wish there was a bit more time spent on that, not because I want to see people suffering on the pages even more(heaven knows there’s enough of that for this series), but so there could be a little more care put into discussing it? 

I think that’s all the spoiler-y stuff I have to discuss!

End of spoiler section!! You may proceed :)

Like the first book though, I liked the action scenes! Even if the plot they were part of was kinda clunky the way the fights played out were solid in my opinion. (And there were a couple times where some batshitery popped up mid-battle and I was like “OH FUCK!” and nibbled on my imaginary popcorn.)

Overall, it feels too harsh a descriptor to call this “worse” than TGO, but I just wasn’t vibing with it as much. All the gripes I had with book one were more prominent here; it felt like the feeling I had reading the ending was extended to approximately 300 more pages. (I’m aware the book is longer than that. The number is there for a reason because it wasn’t that the entire time.) Deka’s backstory stuff just gets increasingly convoluted.

But, with all that’s said and done, I’ll still be seeing how this series ends, because I enjoy most of it and am too far along this journey with these characters to just abandon them. Consider TGO a complicated favorite, if you will.

Book rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars.

Paz, signing off!

(Book trigger/content warnings: Torture, gore, PTSD, grief(death of a parent), references to homophobic and queerphobic abuse.)

What are your thoughts on Ibrahim? For me it went from indifference and dislike in season 1 to liking in season 2 and becoming my favorite male character in season 3 tbh. Actually the only good male character by season 3 (season 4 has many other options too). He is probably the most complex and well written character and I really sympathise with him. His arrogance was his downfall but if Suleyman wasn't such a bitch it wouldn't have been lol. He wasn't wrong in that imo. He was a slave, a fisherman's son but his intelligence and skill took him farther than anyone else and it's not wrong to be proud of such a feat. He deserved the pride more than just about anyone, even Suleyman. What I dislike the most about him is his treatment of Nigar after their relationship ended. She's my favorite character and although their relationship itself was my favorite in the whole show (other than Nurbanu and Selim) it ended really badly

Ibrahim is one of my most conflicting characters on the series: one time I feel like I don't get the appeal, especially not the stans in one Bulgarian forum, he doesn't elicit such a strong emotional reaction in me as he does in others, but then once he hits an incredibly strong arc and I begin to analyze his character and all its dimensions, I come to love him for what he is and realize how much effort has gone in conceiving and developing him. He's certainly the most well-written male character that isn't a sultan or a prince in the entire franchise. (the sultans aren't the brightest, but the bar is so high when it comes to their writing. There isn't any of them that is badly written. The princes are also well developed, but now that I think about it, Ibrahim surpasses some of them as well!) He's delightfully fleshed out with every detail; his actions, while morally ambiguous at times, are very understandable and you can clearly see the deeper, nuanced reasons why he does what he does. His arc was a sight to see from beginning to end and watching it reach its inevitable tragic conclusion was heartwrenching. At a point he became so important to the narrative, whether it was intentional or not, that the show (or actually, S03B in particular, because S04 was absolutely fantastic!) began to lowkey miss something without him. He had such a strong presence that couldn't be matched by anyone else after him.

[To be brutally honest though, I find his dynamic with Hürrem in terms of screentime to be kinda overrated. Not that it's bad or anything, quite the contrary - their chemistry was great, they were consistent and fun to watch, they had quite a few great scenes that were definetly more than Hürrem and Mahidevran's, I dare even say this is one of the most solid antagonistic dynamics of Hürrem's writing-wise, but I just find it sometimes gets way too much credit? It's weird, I know.]

The most interesting thing about him is, without a doubt, his fatal flaw that I... actually don't think is arrogance. It's not up for argument that Ibrahim can definetly come off as arrogant, but the arrogance is rather a manifestation of his fatal flaw, not his fatal flaw itself. I believe that it's precisely his inferiority complex that is the root of his vulnerabilities: as you said, he's been only a fisherman in Parga, and his background is both a source of memories where he can recall his more "innocent" days with his family and a tough spot for him where he is consistently reminded of something that is already in the past after all he has achieved. He did want to return to Parga, to see who he used to be one more time, but after that it's as if he never gets a chance to forget, to put it behind him. He pretends he has forgotten, but that consistent reminder of how he has started seems to be constantly haunting him to the point he begins to remind himself of it. It's not only people like Figani, Iskender Çelebi or the other members of the divan in early S01 that don't let him forget, it's as if he himself doesn't want to forget. It's undeniable that he had climbed up to heights he wouldn't dream of and the role of a grand vezier needed getting used to and to be dealt with with care. On one hand, we could argue that he reminds himself of Parga as a way to preserve his moral compass, in a way, to realize when and how he has screwed up or remind himself of the limitations of how far can he go, for Süleiman is his friend and companion who he wouldn't want to disappoint. But on the other hand, the more he rose in the hierarchy, the stronger became a wish for him to exceed these limitations placed upon him by everyone around. Süleiman is able to give him everything if he wishes, so why not let it happen? Then he's going to prove to everyone, prove to his inner demons, this sense of inferiority that he, in fact, can not only become the most politically adept grand vezier there is, but a person who has his own country within the country and can rule it with ease. The political arena ultimately becomes a target of his inner conflict where he projects more power than anyone else, is most influential and does the best in order to gain the goal, not only to gain SS's approval, but show that, yeah, he can do his best for the role he's put in, fixating on the Ottoman country he claims to be a ruler of and his apparently endless rights. It turns into a coping mechanism where he can escape his past and background and he gets so sucked in it that his self awareness becomes less and less. That's where his arrogance comes from and I feel that if he didn't possess that complex of his, he would've managed things way better and had more self control, as a result. He was a very good politician in the show, setting in motion many good strategies (his strategy gave them the Mohacs victory after all), having a strong, pragmatic mind and many innovative ideas and if he didn't try his hardest to convince himself he's worth something that isn't just the story of the fisherman in Parga, Hürrem wouldn't stand a chance against him.

This inferiority complex is the reason for his infidelity, too. He loves Hatice dearly and he never expected that she of all people would do the very thing he dreads the most. Her pulling rank on him came as such a shock for him that it seemed he would never forget or forgive. It put infinetly more salt to the wound, deeply hurting his ego and the self-esteem he was just beginning to gain. That's why he let himself in Nigar's hands for so long, for she would only want to please him, for that relationship would have no limitations whatsoever and wouldn't restrict Ibrahim in any way. It was something that was his, something the dynasty would never touch or learn about. I love Nigar and Ibrahim's relationship, too. Principally, I'm not a fan of love triangles at all, but that one is a notable exception for how wonderfully, but crushingly psychological it is. It wasn't added in only for the sake of the drama, it was set up for very long and it was like the characters actually got there through their own actions and they had to truly face that struggle to flesh out and evolve. But there wasn't genuine love there, not in Ibrahim's part. That was his biggest weakness speaking, causing the illusion of love, not the real feeling of it. He wanted to preserve this relationship as the fisherman in Parga, but to me, it felt like he showed something more similar to his own confident assertions of the power of a grand vezier than actual regard for Nigar's feelings. It all was a lie he wanted to believe, because of his ego's denial, and he believed it so much he told Nico that Nigar was the person he truly loved in E51. And when he did get out of the lie (the monologue in E57), see how he reacts differently in front of her now - he turns off every single try of hers to give him affection, he reacted very badly when he learned she was pregnant, it was as if he wanted her to wake up from the dream and move on, too? And due to his inner conflict that perpetuates his arrogance grew even more in S03, he got over Nigar, but not over her child. Esmanur's birth made him return to and enforced his old habits that made him consider that child as another piece of solace, something out of the dynasty, also only his, trying so desperately to have her live with him and Hatice. The infidelity and the way he treated Nigar after he realized the error of his ways are ones of the worst things Ibrahim did, along with Leo (now, I get he wanted to knock Hürrem down a peg, but that was admittedly much for me.) and while I understand why these events and interactions came to fruition, I can't justify him for them.

I agree that had Süleiman not given him as much power, his inferiority complex would be highly downplayed, at the very least. He underestimated the possible consequences of Ibrahim's rise and it really doesn't look like he knows him as much as he thinks he does. Whether he did it to test him (SS's lasting reminders that Ibrahim gets closer to death) or because he loves him dearly and wants to embrace his potential ("I want you to use that mind only for me!") or both, it's like he gave him both too much freedom and too many boundaries at once. I mean, I understand why SS executed Ibrahim: his affirmations, no matter their backstory and how metaphorical they are, pose a definite threat for a padişah and along with his growing paranoia of betrayal, he couldn't be sure how far he was going to go anymore. It's as if Ibrahim crossed every line, openly acting like he controls the padişah and his state in front of the fellow pashas, efendis and ambassadors and that couldn't be controlled anymore. It's as if he had done his best efforts to bring him down to earth, but since none of it was working, he decided to act accordingly. The many "failures" of Ibrahim have been piling up in the narrative in the span of 81 episodes and I get why SS would finally snap for what was the final straw. However, doing so much unprecedented stuff for a grand vezier was bound to bring disasters for the padişah due to the chance in his mind that he would try to question or prevail over him, hence Süleiman should've realized that it was only natural one would want more and more. And that happened with S03 Ibrahim - he fought more and more with his inner demons, hence wanting to have more and more to be validated by the others and by his own ego that perhaps wouldn't feel satisfied regardless.

While his fatal flaw underlines his complexity, it also gets complimented by his many positive qualities: his love for Hatice was very sweet in the beggining and after the Nigar plot, it turned out to be really genuine - their reconciliation was very telling in that aspect; his relationship and loyalty to Süleiman deserves respect, even though his inferiority complex came in the way, he still would never give him up and never once lost hope in his recovery when he was in his deathbed and while that may become up for debate in S03, he would never openly stand against him and would gladly try his best to please him; his bond with Mustafa is amazing, too - I love how he practically raised that kid and gave him sound advice as well as his mother; that said, his relationship with Mahidevran deserves more appreciation and it is one of the most reciprocal and understanding, soft and "carefee" dynamics of the show; I love his dedication to his family and how he loves them as much and remembers them with the same fondness as ever before. In short, when going in depth, this multifaceted character has so much to offer, like, wow!

Okay, when I first watched the show, there was that point where I felt Ibrahim overstayed his welcome and I even wanted for Hürrem to finish him already (heh, those were the days! 😅) but now when I've rewatched and reexamined MC many times, I see that despite of his few negative traits, everything about this character flows so well and so organically and it's one of the characters in the series that have aged really well with time in my eyes. And I respect him so much for that.