Maomao - Blog Posts

the rear palace's cat is #Back

They are like father and daughter

Maomao: Jinshi-sama, can you please move, you are blocking the view.

Jinshi: I am the view.

Maomao:

Jinshi: would you love me if I were a bug, Maomao?🥺🥺🥺

Maomao: ugh. You are already a bug. No you are LESS than a bug, I love bugs.

Jinshi: so you love me a little less than a bug 🫶🏻🫶🏻🫶🏻

Gaoshun: Master Jinshi, stop embarrassing yourself 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

Jinshi: cuz you are pretty and you're smart and you are ignoring me---so you're obviously my type.

Maomao: I am sorry what were you saying?

Jinshi, with heart eyes: Perfect👌

I just started watching "Apothecary diaries" and I absolutely love it.

The fact the story, a seinen, is able to have a female protagonist and not make her "Not like other girls", cool, smart but not a perfect genius, strong but not a fighter and scary....like actually SCARY without making her look down on or trying to put down other women.......AHHHHHH

Jinshi is amazing as a male lead, I haven't seen a "pathetic jealous pretty boy" since Tamaki in Ouran highschool host club.

All the side characters are well written and have their own time to shine.

And the way the story is not afraid of talking about the darker themes of the time, or sugarcoating them is really admirable.

Honestly, it has become one of my favourite shows ever.

I'm so glad someone else brought attention to this! Firstly, I think you're referencing the Still Face Experiment by Tronick. As far as psychological experiments have gone, I will say this one isn't as bad as others are, especially because there was a point afterwards to ensure the babies in the experiment were comforted by their parents to work on reversing the affects there. (as far as I remember, at least, I'm working on my master's in counseling so my brain's sometimes fried)

Anyways! So to me, this experiment did a lot to help show that neglect is, in fact, a form of abuse that ends with psychological and emotional issues in the person/child.

A big thing I think they do well (intentional or not) is showing how Maomao is in her relationships. She loves and cares for the people in her life, but she shows it in what we end up seeing as a "Maomao way". I think, however, she has an avoidant attachment style. Many adults who have this style tend to come from neglect, emotional or mental abuse. There's also two subtypes of this; dismissive and fearful. I don't see Maomao falling into the fearful category, so let's look at dismissive.

Signs in adults tend to be higher levels of self-sufficiency, and independence. They also tend to be far more mature faster because they have had to rely on themselves. Vulnerability isn't easy to come by, in any type of relationship. There's a lot of need for space and alone time.

Now I think a lot of that can be seen in Maomao, but not overly so. Why? Because people can have more than one type of attachment style, and because she also had Loumen, I believe she also has some level of secure attachment style in her.

That looks like: feeling comfortable trusting those one's close with (we see several strong friendships she has and maintains, even if she appears semi-closed off in them, with her internal monologue she trusts these people, cares for them, and enjoys being around them), strong emotional regulation (she slips a few times throughout the show (I'm guilty of s1ep4 when she slaps the one lady in waiting in the crystal pavilion) but overall she has a great level of control over her emotions), feeling comfortable with their independence as well as in their relationships.

Overall Maomao is a very well written character, and I could go in further detail psychologically picking her apart (I've done it with other characters lol) and the way she is as we see her is a mixture of her struggling with her biological parents, with her sisters from the verdigris house, and her adopted father, Loumen.

Not sure if any of my word vomit made sense, but if it did and you've never looked into the things I mentioned before, I say do so! It's also rather interesting, and considering I've dedicated my entire college career to psychology, I'm not biased at all!

Still Face Experiment Video

Interesting Reddit thread for SFE

Attachment Style Test

Man, sometimes i wish i hadn't taken Psychology in high-school-

TW//mentions of unethical psychological experiment involving babies-

So, we learn something new about MaoMao's childhood.

And that is, by the time she was a toddler, she was left alone till the cortizans where done with work. And that could take, a while...

Because of this our MaoMao learned from a young age crying wouldn't do her any good. Thus causing her to have trouble telling if people are interested in her, in almost any context.

And there is like, a psychological reason for this outside of 'character with a sad backstory'

So there was this 'Forbidden Experiment' performed on young children, babies to be exact, a long time ago, where the caretakers where only allowed to tend to their physical needs, and not the emotional.

It was a psychological study of sorts for emotional deprivation

I won't get into the heavy details, it's honestly a disturbing case all things considered.

But the reason why I bring it up is that those babies shut down. They stopped crying to have any of their needs met. And nearly half passed away simply from emotional neglect. Those who survived were left with lasting truama that still impacted them for as long as they lived.

And honestly?

I can't help but feel MaoMao is feeling those same effects the kids that survived did.

Obviously, her situation wasn't as bad,

But it left lasting scars on her psychologically.

And we see it in the way she handles affection from those who do care about her.

She responds to it, gives affection herself when prompted, or has a reason(like getting rare medicine ingredients), but when it comes to getting it herself, MaoMao is apathetic.

She is not ungrateful but keeps a respectful distance.

This is also probably what caused MaoMao to be as independent as she is now. Or at least contribute to it.

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All in all, I love the show and its commentary. It doesn't truly sugarcoat things and doesn't blatantly spell stuff out for the viewer or reader. It's trusting us to be smart, make connections and figure the mysteries out ourselves, and determine how these bits of information influence the characters and their choices.

God, why did I take psychology-

I haven’t read the manga or light novels yet so maybe I haven’t seen/learned something yet but

in The Apothecary Diaries can the consorts not interact with each other on their own?

cause I personally feel like… Lady Lihua and Lady Gyokuyou would be an unstoppable duo??? I can only imagine the gossip between them in regards to Maomao and Jinshi

plus in general they both love Maomao, and Lady Lihua’s respect for her always makes me emotional and happy

I feel like the emperor, Lihua, and Gyokuyou would be just… so fun to see interact all together

I get it probably won’t happen cause the ingrained rivalry and all that jazz but

episode 4 of apothecary diaries— the threat— i think is and always will be my favorite

maomao smacking the shit out of the stupid ladies in waiting??? music to my ears

rewatching the apothecary diaries and it's one of the best series i've ever watched. maomao is so captivating as a main character. her knowledge and skills allow her to help people, even though she says time and time again she wants to lay low. she doesn't want to get involved, yet puts herself in harm's way to solve the problem. jinshi is so interesting as a character. he puts on a persona and hides his true nature so he doesn't have to get involved with the palace politics, yet he has moments where the TRUE jinshi is shown. he has so much at stake, so much responsibility, yet with maomao he's able to forget all of it and be himself. the mysteries, the writing, the tension, the secrets, all of these things make the series so amazing. the plot is so incredible, jinshi and maomao are amazing characters, and their relationship is so beautifully written. every aspect of the apothecary diaries is incredible.

i love this scene so much!! jinshi jealous because maomao didn’t ask him for a favor is so adorable and sweet. by now, maomao has worked almost a year at the rear palace alongside jinshi. he sees how talented she is & cares deeply for her. so, when maomao relies on lihaku and even jokes about spending the night with him, it BREAKS jinshi. he’s so dramatic and silly but it’s a reminder that he’s a young man who’s experiencing a crush for the first time. she doesn’t realize how much of a hold she has on jinshi & it makes their interactions that much better. i love jinmao so much!

what i love about the apothecary diaries is that maomao simply loves the work she does and jinshi pops out of the corner simply admiring her. it’s so beautiful to see how maomao worked hard to get to the point where she’s highly respected by noblemen while jinshi finds her so breathtaking. he’s so captivated by her every move and isn’t afraid to show his feelings i just love their dynamic so very much!!

happy maomao friday!!