Kusuriya no Hitorigoto Episode 23 Discussion

What did you think of this episode?

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Apr 15, 2:22 AM

#201

Unkrowned

Offline

Jul 2015

9999

Feeling bad for Lakan and quite messed up of the tragic Fengxian for cutting Maomao's finger (as message to Lakan), but I feel like the true evil besides the miscommunication between the former two is the old shitty hag for forcing Fengxian to do dirty customers since she lost her 'value' resulting in syphilis and even afterwards keeps her hidden from Lakan and shoes him away.

May 3, 3:16 PM

#202

MircroEscape

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Jun 2020

damn.. that was sad

May 6, 11:51 PM

#203

Garrett_Dark

Offline

Aug 2023

441

I completely fail to see how Lakan is at fault for anything. I'm not making excuses for the guy, minimizing, nor anything like that, it seems like a fact that he did nothing wrong.

Fengxian seemed to have initiated the sex, and as others said that it was likely Fengxian's plan to get herself pregnant to drop her value. Lakan alluding to how to drop the value of a courtesan was way after all this happened, and he was likely ignorant of that at the time. There's parallels to the attendant who didn't know the white powder was a poison, and the other attendant who didn't know honey could kill a baby, they both didn't know at the time, but knew afterwards.

If anything it seems some fault lay with Fengxian for not telling Lakan she was pregnant sooner before he got sent away. And actually the biggest fault seemed to lay with the granny, she was the one who would never sell Fengxian to Lakan because he never had enough money back then. She's also the one who forced Fengxian to prostitute with common people after all that went down, she could have just made Fengxian a servant, trainer, or something. That was some pretty massive blame shifting when she was smacking the crap out of Lakan with a broom. There was also the comments Maomao made about her brothel house being really bad at filtering out the diseased and bad people about a decade ago when all this went down, which again is the granny to be blamed for that. The granny was probably the one who turned Maomao against Lakan, probably worked it into her head that he's to be blamed for everything.

Again, I'm not trying to defend the guy, the show actually tricked me into thinking he was some horrible guy. But the facts seem to say he did nothing wrong, and the granny's to be blamed for much. Maybe that's why granny's been taking care of Fengxian all these years, she know deep down she's really at fault, and it's out of guilt.

Lakan's "crime" was he could never afford Fengxian? I don't think his fault at all. There's parallels with that other guy trying to buy the courtesan for 10,000 silver pieces, is he somehow to be blamed for not being able to afford that yet? That amount was 10 years worth of his military officer wages.

May 13, 6:12 AM

#204

TheOtherJN

Offline

Apr 2008

227

Holy f* that backstory is so tragic. It wasn't the saddest thing to happen in this series yet, but that hit hard being blindsided like that, and by the series of unfortunate events. The show was being misleading on his history.

May 24, 12:53 PM

#205

capyvaraw

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Jul 2020

my heart is completely broken

Jun 24, 1:39 PM

#206

lasodamos

Offline

Mar 2013

347

okay i wasn't expecting Lakan to hate himself even more than Mao Mao, it explain so much about why he talk like a vilain about his past, really great story

Jun 29, 8:17 AM

#207

nickehhhhhh

Offline

Mar 2015

6866

We get much needed backstory for Lakan, seeing all that he went through and how Fengxian got to be in the situation she is now.

I'm Bruneian and I like anime. And Manchester United. And fat cats.

Aug 7, 4:28 PM

#208

Vaixen

Offline

Jul 2020

The outcome of this episode was pretty obvious from the get-go, it was clear that Maomao was going to win the Go game somehow with her contrived plan and that they were going to play the "ACKSHUALLY he isn't a bad guy" card without putting actual work in his redemption arc; are we supposed to forget all of the shit he has done? Why did he agree to such rules on the Go game when they were clearly biased against him? For such supposedly clever characters the miscommunication is insane btw; all of his life has been purely based on dry, hard logic; seeing others as chess pieces yet he can't put two and two together on anything regarding Fengxian and his relationship with her. Yes, the Go and Chess metaphors aren't subtle and Fengxian clearly was outside his "seeing everyone as pieces" mindspace but you'd think that someone as Lakan would find a way to fit such an irregular unit into his normal thinking scheme. Perhaps making her the queen; the second piece with the upmost importance on the chess game, maybe even making her the King, as she'd be the piece with the upmost importance on his current life situation. This way he'd be able to construct something and get away; but instead he gets driven away by passion? It feels so out of character. Also, moreover in relation to the Go game: NOBODY gets THAT drunk THAT fast lol.

I feel like his backstory could have been constructed and told better in the span of many episodes instead of it all being shoehorned into a single episode of so much exposition; I get that there were some signs, but the amount of information we suddenly receive about him makes it hard for me to digest all of it and feel anything for this guy; maybe his character would have been benefitted from receiving more scenes from his PoV and internal monologues? Moreover, if a soldier and the ghost-like concubine could manage to reunite again, how couldnt two of the most clever characters in the entire kingdom do that too? You'd think they'd find a way, especially considering how both of them are so dry and they don't drive themselves purely into passion; there's always at least sprinkles of cold inference even when they were having sex. Both of them not finding a plan to get away is insane in my honest opinion; not even a semblance of a thought process, yet they are depicted as so clever and cunning.

I believe it is especially contrived that all of it turns this way, as it kind of betrays Lakan's character. I'm also surprised at the lack of consequences or judgement towards the old hag who allowed all of this through pure ineptitude or malice. You'd also think that Lakan and Fengxian would be able to outsmart the granny, but nah. Regardless of whos the "guilty" one in here I think that doesn't matter, both are absolute goofballs and this is the upbringings they have brought upon themselves. I'm sorry if that sounds rough, but it is just unthinkable on how none of them communicated or planned anything in any way whatsoever, later resulting into such a contrived and forced drama regarding Maomao's family and lineage. An insane amount of miscommunication, strange out of character moments and weird interactions plague this episode, which if executed better could have been maybe a more endearing backstory. Also the granny is clearly at fault at least partially, yet she strangely receives little to no consequences. Maybe they could have executed a plan but it ended up badly, turning into even more of a tragedy? I'm not sure, but as it stands now, it's pretty contrived.

2/5

VaixenAug 7, 5:25 PM

Aug 9, 9:02 PM

#209

AguyinaRPG

Offline

May 2015

I shake my head in this thread over the Lakan situation because I really see some selective blindness on both sides of the debate. Just because Lakan has a tragic backstory does not totally redeem him - he clearly put MaoMao in danger pretty knowingly, back then and now. And people saying the situation doesn't make sense are completely missing the narrative communication.

On the point that he should have known that Fengxian was trying to get pregnant: Just because you sleep with a courtesan does not mean they are going to become pregnant. It's pretty clearly communicated by the show that contraception and abortive solutions are used very regularly. Lakan had absolutely no reason to think this was her plan and it was probably not the first time they had sex.

I agree that the change from the original story that he was sent abroad rather than on campaign is a strange one, given how much they talked about him as a military commander. That doesn't at all change the second point: He never received any of those letters waiting for him back home. You can call him an idiot for not realizing what she had done, but it's necessary to accept that he didn't know because that's what the story tells us. The severing of his connection with the family created the circumstances for him to be aware of what was going on, and last he knew - as said in the narration - she was already bought by somebody. For him, that was the end of his courtship with her so he never expected any further correspondence. This was all very clearly communicated.

I don't think the story is trying to tell us Lakan has no moral complications. Not doing anything (that we know of) to help Fengxian and MaoMao whether due to despair or dissociation is something that's hard to forgive. Seeing how the discussion just leaps over the points in the episode is a bit eye-rolling. I think a hint of ambiguity is something this show has done extremely well, yet it seems to have tripped people up on things which aren't remotely ambiguous.

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