Guardians of the Dafeng: Rewatch Discussions - Episodes 39&40
Rewatch Party Discussion Logistics:
✎ᝰ Past Discussions:
Index of All Discussions | Episodes 1&2 | Episodes 3&4 | Episodes 5&6 | Episodes 7&8 | Episodes 9&10 | Episodes 11&12 | Episodes 13&14 | Episodes 15&16 | Episodes 17&18 | Episodes 19&20 | Episodes 21&22 | Episodes 23&24 | Episodes 25&26 | Episodes 27 & 28 | Episodes 29&30 | Episodes 31-32 | Episodes 33-34 | Episodes 35&36 | Episodes 37&38
🔗Helpful Links: Flashcards | Subtitle Interchangeable Terminology
🚨SPOILERS: If possible please spoiler tag theories that delve into what you think will happen in S2. On the chance that your theory is correct and because not everyone loves to read theories so please spoiler tag abundantly! 🙂. Comprehensive directions on how to create spoilers.
Gifs made by me. Let’s continue!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Episode 39
Summary Recap:
Mr. Zheng is taken to the Dafeng jail where he is murdered by “The Protector of Dafeng” and Cao. XQA loses all his restraints, sets out to capture those two absolute assholes and brings them to a public square to do lord knows what.
Yang Yan .. as if we need any more reasons to love you more!
Yang Yan and the rest of the Guardian Gang are here to protect Zheng Xinghuai against the Emperor and his cronies. Mr. Zheng is grateful for our gang but decides to be taken into custody. Everyone knows what that means right? Mr. Zheng is not returning. The moment XQA hears Mr. Zheng is taken into custody .. he instantly realises, like we did, what is going on. During my first watch I commented “Did Cao get into his full war gear to arrest one man?” - Eyepatch douche and Cao are the worst are my words now!
What follows next literally made me feel unwell during both watches. Mr. Zheng is being brutally tortured and killed by those two beasts who dare to laugh while they are doing these horrible things. But not before framing him for the slaughter they were a part of. We see him walk through “his” city and pass all the people he loved. My heart!
XQA and CaiWei hurry back but they are too late. He sees what they did to a defenseless old man! He is done with it all. The corruption, the bad guys pretending to be good. That little twerp trying to arrest him for breaking into the jail when they did not even mention Mr. Zheng being brutally murdered. Can we possibly hate the Emperor even more? He is in the list of WORST Emperor’s ever! (For me he might even be #1 .. and all of us have seen some bad Emperors I am sure)
Poor XQA is going through it. The way he catches Mr. Zheng has me all emotional.
All his colleagues are very worried about this behaviour of XQA. Together with family Xu and the phone gang. Everyone is out searching for our guy. We see him playing at the ring toss stand, hitting everything but feeling miserable. What a stark contrast to him playing the game with his family! XQA has figured it all out. XQA is pretending that everything is okay, he gave #4 the last two sentences of his poem, has one last meal with his family.
The moment the Xu family can’t see him his face changes. Like he could not pretend a second longer.
XQA has said goodbye and my heart hurts again!
The visible divide between him and the rest of the family, he is telling our Xu family to leave.
Turns out … we CAN hate Emperor more. What an absolute diaper load of a man! Acting all shocked that Mr. Zheng “took his own life”. Ugh .. I have words! Cao can hardly contain his smirk. They all deserve slaps to the face. Multiple of them! All the ministers know what is up too if the looks are anything to go on. Nobody dares to open their mouth against this Emperor and his horrible sidekicks. Mr. Eyepatch Douche even has the absolute nerve to laugh. Not for long … not. for. LONG!
Man is all about justice and he will hand deliver it to the court. What an entrance too!
The guards are letting him through. I am not sure if it is because of Lord Wei or because they respected Mr. Zheng and by extension XQA for standing up for what is right.
They walked on the same path but with different goals. They reached a fork in the road.
Everyone abandons those two garbage humans and their tones change so quickly. We see XQA doing to them what they did to Mr. Zheng hit for hit and then drag them through the streets. GOOD! Our phone gang helps XQA move around undisrupted and we get to hear the finished poem! One of the people I watched this show with when it was my first watch said “LMAO! That sword of #2 turned out to be so slim” and they are RIGHT. Why does that man need that huge sword holder xD. STOP!
#2 on her way to protect her biggest frenemy!
I got a short chuckle when Cao ratted out Eyepatch Douche so fast because he knows… XQA is crazy.. They pissed off the wrong person. The words “If you do this you won’t have a place in Dafeng anymore” are uttered and all I could think was: stop making the sale man. XQA is on board with that development. He doesn’t want to hang in a place where the Emperor is the biggest Douche Canoo in the world .. who protects his horrible murderous little brother and who has people like Cao and Eyepatch Douche clean up his messes in the most horrible way ever. Man is on his way out one way or another. Best do it with a shiny spine.
Episode 40
Summary Recap:
XQA sentences Cao and “State Protector of Dafeng” to death and quickly handles the execution himself. He feels conflicted but relieved and right after he quits his beloved job. When Emperor shows up to squash “ant” XQA the MiB casts Mystify and everyone forgets XQA. Afterwards Mr. Zhou takes XQA to the MiB who tells him the Fortune of the Dafeng belongs to him and XQA. Right after XQA is back to being Yang Ling in the real world and is told that the gamehost will tell them what those words mean during the next session!
All our favourites rally behind XQA. Yang Yan is 2 for 2 with heroic saves in the first 5 minutes of these 2 episodes. Like we need a reason to cheer him on!
Our two Bronze Guardians hopping through the screen in the most extra way. I love this bunch!
Yang Yan and our other favourite Guardians are here to remind everyone of the Guardian Creed. Also .. did Lord Wei tell them to go or are they on a personal mission?!
SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK!
XQA is touched by all his friends showing up. At the same time I am sure he is also very worried. He didn’t want to drag his friends and loved ones into this little revenge / suicide mission and now they are all here. Our friends from the Bureau are also here including Mr. Petals with his back to everyone. Lin’An is present too .. although she is there because she is worried sick about her boo. Which turns out to be legit because … XQA beheads Cao without any remorse and while he preps Eyepatch Douche for the guillotine he tells him in a lot of words to not expect any mercy from him after what he did. Now he starts apologizing and pleading but XQA stopped giving a hoot about 35 minutes ago.
Just like that both those wet blankets of men are no more. It turns out EVERYONE came to watch the event. As we can clearly see Grand Princess HuaiQing and Lord Wei have found their way to the “event” as well. Wondering if HuaiQing and the Bureau people were sent by the leader of the Bureau or if they all found their way themselves?
The acting here .. right after the executions reminds me so much of that one scene in Love Like the Galaxy episode 48 or 49 from the top of my head(if you know you know, if you mention this scene in your comment please do not forget to spoiler tag it!). The mix of emotions, not precisely knowing how to feel but both sadness and a sort of joy/relief taking over. Chills, and it once more cemented for me that WHD is a really good actor. He has grown a lot!
There it is. XQA officially quits the Guardians.
Lord Wei is having a bad time hearing XQA quit while Lin’An looks proud (that is how I interpreted it). Finally people understand XQA’s poem! The man lived by his words! Everyone is standing there, not sure how to respond, when they see XQA having a bit of a breakdown as he says goodbye to Mr. Zheng.
Not for long though because Emperor Douche Canoe is on his way. I noticed the “evil” music is now played when Emperor entered on his horse. Confirming what we already knew. He is a Dumpster Fire of a man! During my first watch I theorycrafted that meant that Emperor was the baddie and that XQA was supposed to be the Emperor now xD. We finally get a glimpse of how powerful that jerk really is when he summons that freaky ghost dragon and our whole gang needs to do their absolute best to subdue it.
Also I just realised when revising my post. But is it not weird that the man has power over a SHADOW dragon? His power seems really sus and more like a power a villain would have. It feels a lot like the demon arm!
What is it with this family calling people ants? They all suck!
This is the time the MIB together with sidekick Zhou has been waiting for! He activates Mystify .. a second rank sorcerer’s spell. What is happening? Very mysterious! It has me mystified.. *badum tsss*. He has clearly been preparing this for a long time because it all centers around the name of Xu Qi’An. After the spell hits .. XQA’s name is erased and everyone is left wondering who killed those two guys on the platform?!
Finally the Emperor is being questioned about what he has been doing. After his little temper tantrum more people join the plea for the Emperor to Introspect for a long while, until finally everyone joins in. Cue the most DELULU words that were ever delulu’d. Is that man high? But I did enjoy seeing that man .. turning grey in an instant.
Excuse the messiness of the next paragraph. I could not clean it up any better not even after two revising tries! My emotions ran rampant and my heart cried!
Excuse you …. LORD WEI DIED?!! Ugh I hate this! Also did you notice that he had his wring the right side out this time?! For just a moment we are led to believe that XQA is the promising young man the Xu family is talking about. But it is XinNian! He is now a capable official with a lot of responsibility working for CP! Good for him! Someone bought Little Pot TangHulu.. we know who it is before we see him. XQA could NEVER not give food to his favourite little glutton. My heart cries for him when he realises they do not remember him! For a second it felt like home! We are shown the impact XQA had on the world around him while none of them remember him. CaiWei doing her stretches and the eye massage and Song telling her to not forget about reproductive isolation!
CAIWEI STOP!! She totally would munch on a rabbit head the size of a cow head!
For a moment we are again led to believe that someone will remember him. His two guardian besties are now Silver Gongs and act like XQA would while arresting someone. The phone gang sitting around and eating. Everyone has that nagging feeling they forget something .. well someone …. but they have no idea who. Every time we see XQA looking at his loved ones he smiles because he knows they are alive and happy and my heart is broken into a million pieces! It is all that matters to him even when he is left out on his own. The closest one to remembering is Lin’An who has no idea why she keeps going to the summer palace and why she is always depressed when leaving.
I would also feel so heartbroken after every visit too.
The saddest scene where she is given a poem book and she sees XQA very blurry! Her running through the streets teary eyed and sure she has forgotten something important! Why doesn’t she see him!
Her hopelessness gets me every time!
As if our hearts weren’t hurting enough we see the Xu family having bought one crab too much and setting an extra plate.
Mr. Zhou takes XQA to see his master in Yuzhou.
XQA for sure knows, poor man has been seeing all his loved ones who can’t remember!
Anyone else confused by MiB saying he brought that man back, it is an equivalent exchange. Who did MiB bring back to life? I thought it was Lord Wei but we also saw the Zheng family living a good life. I am confused. (I picked this gif because I needed SOME positivity for our poor XQA!)
Look at him! Finally something positive!
MiB has opinions on the leader of the Bureau. Spill the tea man! We have been wondering if the leader of the bureau is a good guy? .. well… turns out the answer is a BIG FAT NO…. According to the MiB he is after the Fortune of the Dafeng that is inside of XQA so he can cultivate a higher level. But wasn’t he already level 1? What is higher? Also why is XQA surrounded by powerful douche canoe’s on all sides? Not only that but turns out .. MiB is Papa Xu, the actual one this time and the Fortune of Dafeng belongs to them?
Also did anyone notice that the actor playing Papa Xu (Ho JunTung / Peter Ho) is the same one who plays the muscly scholar in Prisoner of Beauty? I did not until I checked MDL. The man has been in a lot of drama’s!
There is an amazing little after credit scene. Yang Ling is back in the real world. Where we see #4‘s sword. With the poem etched in. But isn’t that something Yang Ling / XQA made up during the session? This is all getting very meta! This also means Yang Ling is without his family again!
So … people .. I love this show. I gave it a 9.5 on MDL… but all of you best know I ranted so HARD after this ending and S2 not being announced at that time. I know watching a show is about the journey but I was so ANGRY. We spend 40 episodes bonding with XQA and all our favourites and by the end hardly any questions are answered. The Emperor has been dealt with mostly off screen. I was looking at my screen wondering why we had to see XQA be forgotten by everyone. Everyone being hardbroken without any idea why. Including the whole audience. I was angry! During the rewatch I can appreciate a lot more since S2 is announced and I already knew what was coming. So I was prepared.
I will share my theories that I have now by reading the musings of others. My theories are 1.>!!.. the MiB/Papa Xu .. stole the Dafeng Fortune 20 years ago (from a bad Emperor) and shoved it into his son XQA. To keep everyone safe he removed his own name until the time he could get XQA back.!<
- >!Papa Xu was the OG Emperor and faked his death during a hostile takeover from the Witcher’s Sect. Everyone forgot him and thus thought the current Emperor is the real one. To be safe he took the fortune with him and shoved it into XQA which he left with Uncle Xu to make him even less noticeable. But I can admit this theory is less likely. Otherwise our Xu family would not be so low on the pecking order.!<
>!The only 2 things I do not understand are the following 1. OG XQA was a bit of a tool. How could they have known Yang Ling would come and elevate XQA to a new version. A 2.0 if you will. 2. We saw in the episodes the removed name of Papa Xu showed he moved up through the ranks slowly. How did the fortune belong to him / the Xu’s if that is the case?!<
I have SO MANY questions and not enough answers!
- So .. what do you all think? Is the MiB really XQA’s dad?
- Is the leader of the bureau good or bad?
- Is XQA Dafeng Royalty?
- First time watchers, What did you think of the ending?
- Second time watchers, did you pick up on more things this rewatch?
- Is Lord Wei resurrected at the Bureau? Did XQA give directions on how?
- What did you think of the Emperor’s shadow dragon?
- Who got our guy XQA into the world of the Dafeng? (
- What do you think the Witcher Sect’s reach has been until now? They were really in the background. I suspect we will see way more of them in S2.
- Do you think we will see all of his people from Dafeng in the real world or we will start in Dafeng immediately?
- How will people remember XQA again? Nobody remembered MiB after decades. Can he even be remembered if he tries?
What are yours? Maybe we can all brainstorm together. What are your predictions for S2 cast wise?!
Counters:
Who Is Here playing in the background: 14
XQA flipping ponytail: 17
XQA finds money: 5
XQA has hay in mouth: 13/40 (+1 in Episode 40) -
32.5% of the episodes contained XQA with hay in his mouth at some point!
The Dafeng News team has been honoured to bring you this Rewatch Discussion! My thanks to my amazing, talented, immensely creative and fun co-hosts u/BasilOrdinary3617, u/Beautiful_Candle1729 and u/Emotional-Vegetable1 for an amazing time and all of you for reading our posts, commenting and sharing your ideas. If all goes according to plan .. the Dafeng News Team will be informing you again of all Dafeng (and Yuzhou people in hiding) developments when S2 hits! Mark your calendars as soon as the date drops!
So I am putting this here - 🗓️Next Post: When Season 2 airs. Date unknown.
