Xiyao Meta

[x_los]

A while ago I read a Xiyao fic my partner recommended which was kind of a sequel to a Wangxian we’d both enjoyed. It was really pictorially excellent; the visuals were on-point. The emotional through-line, however, was super shaky in a way I don't think a fic can afford to be, given that this fic, at least, offered full access to the characters’ PoV. Indeed, it relied on that access for the story’s emotional effect. You can’t dodge questions about motivation from point-blank range. 

This Xichen was fairly aware of a relatively unvarnished, though lightly-treated, version of Guangyao’s Greatest Hits, but very ‘oh, murder gremlin, so hot! How I love you—’ about it. I suppose not every fic wants to tread the blood-soaked ground, and for a more comedic treatment, or one with a different focus, this could have worked. But this fic chose to look directly into the barrel of anon and shrug. I didn’t get this Xichen at all: who he was, what he valued in this person. If a fic simply has Xichen cheerfully accepting in-your-face murder plots (as opposed to his arguable passive acceptance of institutional murder, I suppose—though that functions quite differently in both this narrative and the world), then what defines his character? What’s he about? I felt I didn’t know him anymore because there wasn’t really a character to know, beyond a hot dude in robes who was surprisingly chill about some wild wild shit. 

I theorised to Katy that perhaps the difference in my expectations came from my having drifted in from more novel-y fandoms, while many other people in CQL might have come from a mix of large media fandoms (Marvel, SPN et al). Many such writers are absolutely excellent at media effects writing I struggle with, but are not necessarily attentive to the sustained characterisation that makes those effects work, for me personally. I wonder if that's why I don't quite hook into a lot of really well-written stuff in Untamed fandom: because some well-written material is doing affective work I'm not entirely invested in.

I am Interested in Xiyao, theoretically, but this fic slid right around what, for me, is a central pressure point: Xichen is interested in the person Jin Guangyao pretends to be, and perhaps even wants to be, but isn't quite. Perhaps Guangyao situationally can’t afford to be that person, or perhaps that person is a role he performs and simultaneously disdains.

For his part, as I understand it, Guangyao doesn’t really know how to value a Xichen who understands and judges him. In a way, he likes Xichen for his utility to him, his weakness, and/or his ability or willingness to be duped. In general, Guangyao seems to have some contempt for the people he manipulates (which is not necessarily the case for MXTX couples: Binghe is constantly emotionally manipulative, and he and Shen Qingqiu both know it and experience it as a half-earnest game). 

None of this is to say that Guangyao could not value Xichen’s respect, grace, charity, position and capabilities, or indeed partly want to be Xichen. His affection for Xichen does, however, feel like a probably-genuine esteem cut through with these undercurrents of hostility. None of that lends itself to easy summative statements, but it’s the meat of that relationship, isn’t it? I’d expect to see fic for the pairing take a stance on those questions, offer some readings and positions. I'm intrigued enough to have time for some version of the pairing that sells me on its inner workings.

One way to think about it might be looking at villains similar to Guangyao, like Steerpike or Uriah Heep (who also have layers of fake (?) romantic relationships), and asking where the commonalities and differences sit, and where the emphases lie.