1

I've often seen MK's speech when Mei was burning alive associated with whatever happened surrounding Macaque's death, and it makes sense.

Wukong looks over his shoulder with a dejected expression at what MK says. Then, instead of looking relieved when MK throwing his life to save Mei results with both of them safe and sound, he looks horrified. It makes perfect sense to associate all that with guilt, and I kind of do too.

The headscratcher is that it's more straightfowardly a parallel to the fight against the Jade Emperor, in which it was Macaque that "abandoned [Wukong] when he needed him," not the other way around. I wonder if the writers wrote themselves into a corner.

2

I like thinking of LBD in terms of black-pill ideologies. She worked her whole life to build a better world, as she saw it, until she decided the dream that embodied her insurmountable, unaddressed misanthropy was actually a premonition, and veered to manifest it as "destiny".

3

It's kind of interesting MK's "retcon" of LBD's "that pursuit only leads to one thing: to pain." C'mon now, kid. She wasn't talking about how she was bound to cause pain to her friends and her world. She was talking about herself. Everything she did was for the good of everyone around her, as she saw it, but it made her a walking rotten wound. She thinks that if MK keeps hoping to make things better, like she did, he'll end up miserable like her.

4

Nine headed demon unintentional anarchy

5

The brotherhood as a polity is kind of interesting. They act like they are in agreement but they're kind of split into three different factions (Peng n DBK, Azure n Yellow Tusk, Wukong n Macaque) with one common goal (dethrone the Jade emperor).

Peng (done squabbling for scraps) n DBK (the realm is long overdue for new leadership) want more power. Azure n Tusk (they have lorded long enough with no regard for those they rule) want to break Heaven's monopoly. Wukong n Macaque want to maintain the mountain's status quo.

Macaque and Wukong obviously have an asterisk here. They agree on wanting to keep the mountain safe, but Macaque thinks they already have what they need to achieve that, while Wukong is worried about hypothetical threats. For a reason of your pick, though, Macaque acquiesces to Wukong's methods.

6

It's VERY interesting to me that MK didn't really sacrifice himself for "the world" or "humanity" - he sacrificed himself for his friends, specifically. When it was clear that his friends as he knew them wouldn't make it, he bailed the fuck out. This show really said fuck Samsara

7

"Mei was right; I need to stop dragging you into my fights." brother did not hear what Mei fucking said

Things Mei criticized him for: leading them without a real plan; putting MK in danger while leaving him to figure out everything on his own; how his avoidance was hurting them.

And listen, I hate to do this when Mei is given almost nothing in this show, but it's not shipping goggles, it's just standard reading glasses:

What he heard her say was "He's gotta drag everyone else into his mess!". Right? That's kind of word for word what he answered to.

8

Wukong's favorite pastime with Macaque canonically is "not-complimenting" him.

The last one can get a little sad if you do some extrapolation. Wkng said that after alluding to his defeat against the Jade Emperor and Mac ditching him ("Classic: I get all the punishment and you get to mope!"). Back then, Mac failed him in his eyes when he didn't want, like Wukong did, to risk being trapped in the mountain with him.

9

Not anywhere near enough fanfiction writers make use of Wukong having canonically called Macaque a peach.

10

Understandably Macaque is often portrayed as one-sidedly attached to Wukong ◉

◉ Considering 1) Macaque expresses wanting to fucking kill Wukong, 2) his only stated motivation for anything until S3 is "hates Wukong", 3) S2-7 has him mainly complain that he was "forgotten" by Wukong, that "the second [Wukong] got real power, he couldn't care less about his friends", 4) Wukong treats him as basically a persistent gnat until S3-9, 5) S4 shows Macaque in the past folding to Wukong's whims consistently

11

I was thinking of how fanfics often portray Macaque staying/being left behind when Wukong goes off in an adventure.

12

Most things that are Macaque's is fanon. 'Dojo', six-ears, theater.

13

[Macaque] "Not the Great Sage - he doesn't listen to anyone!"

then

[Pigsy] "Don't bother. I've been telling him that for years, but he literally never listens."
[Monkey King] "Yep, that's how we roll."
(Macaque arrives.)

I wonder if it's the text intentionally communicating something.

14

Past Wukong was a doom prepper.

15

The whole thing of how Wukong was holding back and such was making me mald. I don't like it because 1) it assumes the show has consistent power scaling when it doesn't (s3-1 sees Macaque defeated by throwing him off a flying ship. He can fly) and 2) reading Wukong as holding back in S1-9 but not in S3-10 is bewildering because a) why would he hold back beyond what Macaque claims [^2] he is since he wants to protect MK, b) why would he ask MK for a hand instead of sending him away and c) it makes Wukong's character one that will hold back on Macaque (when S1-9's fight was away from MK) because of, presumably, some remnant of nostalgia, but will NOT hold back when he wants some heat-of-the-moment revenge.

And I don't think it's a stretch to say that Macaque was at his lowest there, having half his brain just unfrozen. My best corroboration is in the kneeling and, less so, in the portal. When Wukong lets him go, he stays in the ground for a good while - through Mei's rant and Wukong's explanations. And this one is a stretch, but since it's plausible i'll insist on mentioning it: Macaque uses a portal to escape. This is only interesting because when they fought in S1, Macaque didn't use portals at any moment.

16

"Wukong knew the risks. It's what he would do if he had to. That's the hard part of being a hero." I love her to bits, and because of that I don't believe for a fucking second that it was "hard" coming to the decision of burning Wukong to a crisp

17

Is it subtext when your bro tells you to eat your peach and you answer that he's a peach? Is it subtext when Wukong calls Macaque a peach then not 3 minutes later says he really wanted that peach as Macaque leaves? Come on

18

Nuwa and Xiangliu made similar mistakes.

19

It's actually pretty verisimilar that MK is a superfan of Wukong while having very dubious knowledge about him.

20

People b saying things so definitely. 'They're both equally wrong' 'It's a complicated situation' 'Wukong did nothing wrong' 'Macaque did nothing w' man I think it depends. On what actually happened. People understandably want to form an opinion on what happened because it's been 5 seasons of blueballing but you HAVE to resign yourself to the fact that it's currently IMPOSSIBLE to opinionate. It's inconclusive. Whatever happens in S6 will reframe everything before it. The horror is in the fact that not necessarily the reframing will be well done, and it will just retroactively make it 5 seasons of disappointing setup.

21

S1-S - {92} - S1 - {195} - S2 + S2-S - {288} - S3-t - {11} - S3 - {131} - S3-S - {234} - S4 - {133} - S4-S - {344} - S5-t - {49} - S5 7 junho 2025 beats previous no news record.