Focus on Guo Changcheng: especially ordinary

[china_shop]

Zhao Yunlan: If we weren't a little special, how could we be the Special Investigation Department? Being fit to be recruited here means you're also very special.
Guo Changcheng: No, no, I'm not special at all. I'm especially ordinary.

I love non-powered characters being brave in the face of super-powered situations. Guo Changcheng (24yo, human) is as non-powered as you can get, and from the very start, he gloms onto the SID as an institution/ideal, despite some questionable lollipop action from its chief, the team's going out of their way to Halloween-scare him, and being dangled perilously out of a crime-scene window for no obvious reason.

None of that deters him! In episode 1, after he escorts Li Qian's grandmother home, the shadow man comes looking for the Longevity Dial, and Guo Changcheng, although understandably terrified, hurls an apple at him. At the end of the episode, he questions the procedure for dealing with Dixing detainees in front of the awe-inspiring Black-Cloaked Envoy. And by episode 2, he's doing his utmost to protect Shen Wei and Li Qian at the hospital. Even the bad guy looks bemused and/or moved by his tenacity.





Changcheng's parents were killed in a car accident when he was young. His grandmother raised him, and when she died, his uncle and aunt took him in. Maybe that's why, when Zhao Yunlan says at the start, "From this day onwards, we [the SID] are your family," Changcheng takes that so much to heart. He uses -ge (brother) and -jie (sister) with just about everyone, but (I think?) keeps calling Zhao Yunlan "Chief Zhao" as a mark of respect, when nearly everyone else says "lao-Zhao".











Guo Changcheng embodies huge amount of goodness and compassion. He's respectful to strangers. He has a strong moral compass. He's really kind. (The peptalk he gives Ji Xiaobai in episode 5, when Zhou Weiwei is missing, is both super-dorky and effective.) He doesn't let his anxiety, awkwardness or fear get in the way when it counts. (He stands up to Zhao Xinci!) I adore and find it hilarious that his custom-made weapon is a zapper for turning fear into electricity. I love that he's goofy and innocent. And I love that he keeps a diary and a list of Zhao Yunlan's sayings, and tries to make sense of and learn from everything that happens.

There is so much more I could say about him, but the moment I most want to highlight is in episode 5, after the water kidnapping case when, faced with Butler Wu dying and his son's grief, everyone in the SID stands around feeling helpless. Zhao Yunlan looks to Lin Jing, who shakes his head: there's nothing they can do.

It's Guo Changcheng who goes and fetches the Longevity Dial from its case. He's the one who thinks outside the box and summons the determination to risk and to sacrifice. In that moment, he is more heroic than any of them, and Zhao Yunlan immediately learns from Changcheng and takes over, setting a new course for the SID and paving the way for a closer relationship with the Black-Cloaked Envoy. Guo Changcheng's actions -- and his belief in the SID as a force for good -- are pivotal.



Quotes:

• We... we have the spirit. We don't care if we have to sacrifice ourselves to protect the people around us. Chief Zhao, the Deputy, Chu-ge, Hong-jie... even Sang Zan who joined us recently. They all have this kind of spirit. They are my role models. Although I'm a coward, I still know that even if I hide somewhere, how long can that last? If danger is going to come, someone has to stand in front of everyone else. (ep 13)


• Uncle, you're right, I'm useless, but at the SID everyone looks after me. Although I always need help, they still take the trouble to take me on cases, teach me fighting skills, and when there is danger, they protect me. It's the SID people who give me courage and confidence. It's them who help me find my own value and my future path.(ep 14)

And of course, there's the arc of his relationship with Chu Shuzhi, from being respectively intimidated and annoyed to primary partners/family/lovers.



For me, what I love most about Guo Changcheng is the idea that even if you're inexperienced, scared, klutzy, and prone to motion sickness, you can still be a hero!



A few fanworks:

• Gen
  • So Brave! by teaotter
    Wherein a second Chief Zhao arrives via wormhole just as the team summons Hei Pao Shi, and Guo Changcheng is very confused.
  • Conduits of Meaning by nnozomi
    So the final candidate for interpreter, at the reception for the SID and the Lion City visiting governmental delegation, was Guo Changcheng and his good high school grades.
  
  
• Guo Changcheng/Chu Shuzhi
  • By Any Other Name by trascendenza
    Changcheng meets Chu-ge's brother.
  • a litany of firsts by cosipotente
    More than anyone else, Guo knows his own faults, his shortcomings, and what he is and isn’t worth. It’s taken time, but Guo accepts himself for who he is. Sometimes, though, he reaches for things he knows he shouldn’t; things that aren’t meant for him.
  • That tender moment by maggie33
    They’re alive and Changcheng doesn’t want to wait another second to do what he wanted to do for some time now. (post-canon fixit)
  • maggie33's Chu Shuzhi/Guo Changcheng fic recs post and fanworks recs post

So -- what do you think? Is xiao-Guo admirable, embarrassment-squick pinging, or both? What are your favourite/the most telling xiao-Guo moments or scenes? What do you like best about xiao-Guo and lao-Chu's relationship? How is Changcheng different in the novel?


Please share links to related meta, picspams and fanworks, new and old! Self-recs are whole-heartedly encouraged. :-)

Comments

[china_shop]

During that peptalk scene in episode 5 I was looking at him with the same hearts eyes as Chu Shuzhi. :)

Aww, yes! ♥

And I really love that quote from episode 14 when he explains to his uncle what SID means to him. It’s one of my favorite scene of his. Another one is that time when he was able to resist Ye Zun’s mind control in Dixing.

Yes, he's surprisingly strong-willed, isn't he, given his diffidence? And respectful of authority but still willing to challenge and question -- with Zhu Hong's uncle, with the Envoy, and with Zhao Xinci.

(I love when he tells lao-Chu to support Zhao Yunlan, during Zhao Xinci's test. It takes guts, but he can't not say it! ♥)