aquynh

When the furniture stopped waking up and talking to Tofu, I assumed that it was because Tofu was becoming more "real" and would lose that ability. If one of Nut's furniture in his bedroom starts to sleep then I think the "real boy" theory could be true. But since the furniture revealed Sib's chair never woke up because Sib died, I'm also thinking that Na is coming down with an illness...perhaps a form of dementia since she keeps forgetting.

I don't think the same rules apply to Tofu, though. If you remember in an early episode when Tofu was trying to do laundry (!) Tofu passed out when Tatarn woke up briefly in the hospital. I think the laundry scene in episode 9 was deliberately included to get us to remember what happened the first time, on top of using it to give us some cute Nut/Tofu moments. I think the choices are either: Tatarn wakes up with Tofu's memories (so Tofu disappears permanently), Tatarn dies and Tofu lives with whatever power he's been getting from Tatarn (perhaps he will remember he is Tatarn), or something completely different could happen, I don't know LOL.

is this show saying shitty actions are okay because you have shitty pasts? let’s unpack that.

its constantly pointed out how nut’s actions are shitty, and it’s repeatedly highlighted how no one likes his behavior; gen is the one that keeps yelling at him to get his shit together. gen understands that nut has trauma from his past but does not mollify him. he actively pushes him to do better—gen never says nut’s actions are okay because he’s mentally unstable. there is a difference between showcasing why people do what they do, and using the reasons showcased to romanticize & justify their actions. the show is explaining why nut is acting so aggressive instead of just making him aggressive. and nut for one, realizes his behavior is shitty and needs to be corrected while abusers don’t find anything wrong with their actions and think what they’re doing is normal. by the end of ep 7, nut realizes he cant act like that anymore if he wants to still have anyone left in his life. this is definitely a step towards nut’s character development and healing.

i think the main problem comes down to taohu and how we see everything from his point of view. taohu is a teddy bear turned to life— nut is his entire world and he revolves around nut from the start. he’s innocent, a baby, if you will. he doesn’t understand social conventions and as a result does some weird, creepy behaviors: he shows up out of the blue falling naked out of nut’s balcony and then tells nut’s mom that he’s nut friend. and then when nut comes home and asks his mom who the hell is this random guy, his mom tells him “he was naked in your room and says he knows you” but you’ve never seen this man in your life like what the fuck? how would you react to that? not to mention at another point taohu gets in bed naked with nut without nut’s consent and that’s like. UMMM⁉️⁉️⁉️ and the audience laughs it off cause he’s a teddy bear! these are some unexplainable situations we cant talk about without sounding crazy! but to nut it’s very much “this weird amnesiac guy is being creepy towards me and invading my personal space and butting into my personal traumatic business” so when nut is violent towards taohu in ep 3, its like— you’re a stranger who the fuck are you why are you here and being invasive and creepy. like damn violence is bad but i think it’s understandable but not justifiable—“cool motive still murder”—that nut’s lost his patience by this time because he’s also reached his limit with his mom consistently not taking her meds. but from the audience who knows taohu is a 100% innocent baby that just wants to please nut, this scene comes off soo bad. insanely bad. the way taohu is characterized, intentionally or unintentionally, plays into our perception of nut.

the scene in episode 7 i just hate i have nothing to say to that at this moment as im still digesting it, lol. But no, this show is very much not excusing or justifying nut’s actions. its trying to understand him— why are you like this, nut? how can you stop?

and then, is this show telling people in abusive situations to stay with their abusers?

i think this one is hard to answer. yes and no. No because i don’t think nut and taohu can be characterized as being in a “traditional” abusive relationship given the circumstances that taohu is a literal teddy bear whose very existence is to comfort nut. despite being turned into a human and learning how being human works, he’s not a real person. he doesn’t realize he has intrinsic worth because he’s alive—he associates his worth to how helpful he is to nut (my immense disappointment when those potentially queer neighbors told taohu he's only worthy something because he's helpful....sob). he is characterized as a literal punching bag for nut because loving and comforting nut is his only personality. but also, Yes because when taohu's hurt by nut, he says no, i'm fine i wasn't hurt, which wooow really sucks and definitely tries to excuse/belittle nut's very harmful actions (also sucks that nut didn't mention anything about hurting him physically in his speech in ep 7...like sorry for throwing you out-- ok but what about those punches, man...) if im honest, i dont think they will get a happy ending if taohu doesn't grow into his own person with likes & dislikes, a backbone, etc. both of them need to change, not just nut, for this relationship to work out nicely. but i'm not sure the drama will address that at this point, so i'm just along for the ride hoping this drama somehow works itself out.

I agree with you completely! Hopefully they resolve and address the problems well. And I see the Xiao Zhan resemblance in Job too haha

I'm soo glad someone else thinks Job looks a bit like Xiao Zhan!!! There are certain angles when he looks like him especially and it's been driving me crazy cause I haven't seen anyone mention it LOL

It's not just you, I've been thinking this too! I'd love if they were, we need more queer elders representation <3

Ooh, thanks for pointing that out! Tofu rarely wears jewelry so it just seemed out of place to me, haha

Everyone in the comments section is so serious (which is fair given how Nut's violence is very difficult to sit through) so let me talk about something trivial LOL: I just wanted to point out that during ep 6's carnival/fair scene, Taohu/Tofu was also wearing a silver bracelet similar to Nut's. It looks like a mistake, maybe because they were filming other scenes on the same day and forgot to take it off, since Taohu has never worn it before in previous episodes.. either way it seems like Nut might give Taohu a matching bracelet in a future episode..?

I think it's just common in some asian cultures! I'm vietnamese and we do this too when someone is sick because taking a bath/shower will make you get cold and thus sicker. We usually also put a small damp towel on a person's forehead when they have a fever to try to relieve them from the heat. Honestly I was surprised they didn't do that here haha.

I totally agree with you! I think the existence of Nueng also serves to highlight how much Tofu/Taohu isn't truly a person.. he's a teddy bear solely focused on comforting Nut, but he also a living reminder of someone who's passed.. I absolutely hope the drama will give us Taohu developing his own emotions and ideas outside of Nut and address the *possible* weirdness of Nut liking Taohu because he looks like his first love (I feel like this would serve as a decent moment for Tofu/Taohu to express his feelings) but it does seem like the drama will give us something since there's been a running theme of Taohu realizing being human is complex? idk i'm crossing my fingers lool

youku releases one episode every monday through wednesday on youtube, so 3 eps a week. it'll be done airing by may 5th :o)