How to sell Zhao Yunlan

[sakana17]

My good friend thevetia asked me to show her Guardian, I very happily complied, we've watched through episode 13 (♥ 13! ♥) and she mentioned that she... doesn't like Zhao Yunlan much. ;__; But she wants to keep watching, so there's hope.

1.) Shen Wei is a quietly dazzling package of awesome, and I totally understand her devoting more attention and thoughts to Shen Wei because, yes.

2.) On first watch I didn't immediately love Zhao Yunlan, either, but he quickly interested me, and by this point (ep 13) I was sold. Now I love him so much I don't actually remember how I got here. :)

Through episode 13, what are Zhao Yunlan's best qualities? How would you describe his good points to someone who didn't notice them? I made an attempt, but... was not rational about it.

I don't need her to love Zhao Yunlan, of course (if she wants to watch the rest just for Shen Wei, I ain't gonna say no), but...!

Advice? Suggestions?

Comments

[sakana17]

Yes, Zhao Yunlan hits my competence kink so very much! (Well, they both do! I call them the Competence Couple.) And it's true that she may have missed some of his demonstrated smarts so far, just because a lot is going on at any given moment. She's sort of reading his strategizing as manipulating Shen Wei, though, which hmmmmm.

by the time you get to the mind-control episode, I deeply love all his attempts to make ROOM for Shen Wei to tell him the truth, which he has already figured out for himself. That little scene just after the wedding where he gets intensely unhappily quietly frustrated that Shen Wei still won't tell him, but still doesn't push him to the brink, mannnnn I feel for him so much. And then the super badass "use the gun" moment, MY HEART. They are so in tune there.

YES, all of this! How I love episode 13! She liked the episode but reacted differently to Zhao Yunlan. She felt that since he was smart enough to know that Shen Wei must have a good reason for keeping his secret, Zhao Yunlan shouldn't have let Shen Wei think he was mind-controlled in order to force him to reveal himself. I pointed out that Shen Wei keeping secrets led to a death at the wedding, but it didn't go very far. IDK. I'm hoping that now that the identity reveal is over, it'll help? It does shift Zhao Yunlan out of stalkery mode and there's good Competence Couple stuff coming up. But there are also more Zhao Yunlan Can't Keep His Mitts Off The Holy Tools moments, and someone predisposed to think less of Zhao Yunlan is unlikely to cut him any slack there.