Guardian works on AO3 Pop Quiz!

[china_shop]

I started putting this together on a whim this morning, and now I have to post it before the stats change. Oops! Click the little triangle at the bottom for the answers. (Hopefully it doesn't contain any egregious errors; I gave it a quick check, but I haven't had breakfast yet.)

( 16 questions behind the cut. )

Focus On: Da Qing (...and Memory Loss)

[eirenical]

Hello, everyone! I'm excited to be posting here for the first time. ^_^ This week I'm going to talk about Da Qing and his issues with memory loss through the course of the series, because following that meandering thread is just... very confusing to me sometimes and I wanted to take some time to try to iron it out a little. (Also, I've tried to format this with cuts so I don't kill everyone's feeds... hopefully it works. OTZ)

To break it down a bit:

1. First mention of Da Qing's memory loss (ep. 6)
2. Da Qing's past with Zhao Xinci + lost skills (ep. 16)
3. Da Ji (ep. 26)
4. Da Qing remembers Shen Wei (ep. 26)

(Also just so you know up front, this is not going to be 100% comprehensive because there were some scenes I couldn't find and I didn't want to discuss them without rewatching them.)

1. "Didn't you have Alzheimer's a long time ago?" (ep. 6 ~33:00)
( Read more... )

2. "Ex-Chief, I don't know cat language." (ep. 16 ~13:00)

( Read more... )

~five minutes later~

( Read more... )

3. Da Ji (ep. 26 ~20:45)

( Read more... )

4. Da Qing Remembers Shen Wei (ep. 26 ~26:15)

( Read more... )

So. I don't... have an answer here. There's too much of Da Qing's memory loss situation that just doesn't make sense.

But if you'll permit me to step to the side and share a headcanon, then at least I won't leave this post with a big old question mark as its final statement. ^_~

I think Da Qing's amnesia is protective. I don't think it really has anything to do with having been bonked on the head. I think it's his own mind's (...or the Hallows) way of protecting him from the weight of all the years he's lived and the loss that's gone along with it. He may or may not have nine lives, but either way, he's long since outlived the length of 100 of them. He's lost so much, survived so much, and he didn't have the "luxury" of getting to sleep most of it away. So maybe it wasn't the bonk on the head that lost him his memory ten years ago. Maybe it was the loss of Da Ji. And maybe it wasn't the Hallows that lost him his memory 10,000 years ago, but having lost Kunlun and Shen Wei. And maybe as each of them comes back to him, maybe that's what prompts his memory to return, that lets him know it's safe to return.

As Da Ji says in ep. 26, "Smile when happy, scream when sad. That's just how cats are."

And Da Qing has been struggling on some level to stay happy for a very, very long time under a tremendous weight. It's no wonder that sometimes his mind might blank out for a while, just to give him a break so he doesn't break.

Anyway, I'd love to hear everyone else's thoughts on this, because as I said, I definitely don't have an answer here. ^_^