It's always a bit of an exaggeration to say that everyone is more or less mentally ill, especially when we're talking about mental illness with a "flying over the madhouse" scene that comes to mind. But in real life, many people are indeed entangled by some emotions and feelings, and even show unusual behaviors, some obvious, some difficult to detect. The reason why the drama "It's Okay, It's Okay" is so refreshing is that it combines these imperceptible emotions, unconscious inner conflicts, and certain characters between characters through a fairy tale narration full of fantasy and well-made animations. These subtle relationships are presented one by one like a thread.
The catharsis of negative emotions and the relief of psychological problems are never easy. Using fairy tales as an intermediary, the protagonists in the play—mental nurse Moon Gang-tae (played by Kim Soo-hyun), autistic patient Moon Sang-tae (played by Oh Jung-seong), and popular fairy tale writer Go Moon-young (played by Seo Rui-ji)—find a way to express their emotions, Emotional ways and ultimately gain character growth. They are both participants in the story and observers of each other, healing each other in pairs. Even Lee Sang-in (Kim Joo-heon), who is in charge of publishing Go Moon-young's fairy tales, appears to be an ambitious publisher who "pursues high fame and solves everything with money", but he is actually a participant in the whole story from beginning to end. When Wen Ying decided to stop writing fairy tale books, his words pointed out the pivotal role of "fairy tale narrative" in this drama, "Fairy tales are the only window for Wen Ying to communicate with the world, which is equivalent to her Mouth and pores, but she has to seal the pen, which means she has to close herself and put herself to death."
"Psycho But It's Okay" opens with an animated story.
A long, long time ago, in a castle in the deep forest, lived a beautiful girl. A girl who has always been lonely and bored, walked out of the castle one day, looking for a friend to play with. However, no matter how precious the gift she sent, no one was willing to accept her. Only later did the girl know the reason, "the monster dragging the shadow of death", people called the girl that way, she was a monster.
A girl who is angry with the world needs a person to vent her anger. One day, she saves a teenager from death, albeit unintendedly. But miraculously, after that, the black shadow that had been following her disappeared. However, the boy began to follow behind her, no matter the day or night, regardless of the mountains and fields, he always followed behind the girl. One sunny afternoon, the girl asked, "Hey, will you always stay by my side?" "Of course, I will never run away." "Isn't that possible?" the girl said, tearing a butterfly's wings in half. The torn butterfly corpses were piled up beside her, and the boy ran away in fright.
So the girl became a person again, and the shadow of death returned, whispering to her: "You can't have anyone around you. Because, you are a monster. Never forget this fact. Do you know?"
"Okay, Mom," the girl replied.
In this animation story, the girl is the heroine Gao Wenying, and the boy is the hero Wen Gangtai. The director didn't want to hide this at all - the male and female dubbing in the animation are the actors and actresses of the male and female protagonists. The shadow shrouded behind the girl also gave the answer directly at the end of the animation: the girl's mother. The ideas instilled by her mother since childhood revealed Gao Wenying's identity setting: a monster alone. Against such a background of growth, Gao Wenying was arrogant, arrogant and rude, and habitually traded human-to-human relationships as items. Her exaggerated costumes, naive thoughts, and strange behaviors not only echo the setting of "monster", but also seem to be a barrier that separates all the people around her.
The story of the boy originated in "The Boy Who Grow Up Eating Nightmares".
The teenager also woke up from a terrible nightmare today. The painful memories he wanted to forget in the past reappeared in his dreams every night, tormenting the teenager continuously. A boy who was afraid of falling asleep went to the witch one day and begged her bitterly. The boy said, "Witch, please delete all the bad memories in my mind so that I don't have nightmares anymore. I'll give you everything you want."
As time passed, the grown-up boy no longer had nightmares, but for some reason, he did not become happier at all. On a night when the blood moon rises, the witch finally reappears in front of the boy for the price of her wish. The boy shouted at the witch in dissatisfaction, and the boy said, "All my bad memories have been deleted, but why... why can't I be happy?" The witch took his soul as agreed. The witch told him: "Painful and painful memories, deeply regretful memories, memories of hurting others and being hurt, and memories of being abandoned, only those who live and bury these memories in the depths of their hearts can become stronger. , more enthusiastic, more resilient, and only such people can be happy.”
So don't forget, don't forget and get over the past. If you can't get over it, you're just a child with a young soul.
Gao Wenying is my brother Wen Shangtai's favorite writer, so it is easy to associate the "teenager who grew up eating nightmares" with his brother's childhood experiences: when my brother was a child, he witnessed the whole process of his mother's murder with his own eyes. The logo is a butterfly brooch, and the butterfly has become a nightmare for his brother. Compared with his elder brother's nightmares and emotional instability, his younger brother Wen Gangtai's memory seems to be insignificant. Although he often moved because of taking care of his elder brother, he had no fixed place and no fixed job, but as a mentally ill nurse, he seemed to be at ease, calm and calm. However, the next story opened up the unknown pain in his heart.
In a small village, a little boy was born. The child had pale skin and very large eyes. As the little boy grew up, the mother naturally knew that this child had absolutely no emotions and was a zombie with only appetite.
So the mother avoided the eyes and ears of all the villagers, locked the child in the basement, stole other people's livestock to feed him every night, and raised him secretly. Sometimes chickens, sometimes pigs. Several years passed in this way. One day, a plague raged in the village. All the remaining livestock died, and many people died. Even the living people left the village.
The mother couldn't leave the zombie son to leave, so she cut off one of her legs to feed the crying and hungry son, then cut off an arm, and gave the child all the limbs. In the end, only the torso was left, and she finally crawled into the child's arms by herself and gave him the rest of the body.
Looking at the mother with only the torso left, the child stretched out his arms and hugged her tightly. When he spoke for the first time, the child said, "Mom...it's so...warm..."
Peeing shoulders the mission of taking care of and protecting his brother. What Wen Gangtai desires most is the care and affirmation (warmth) of his mother. Because of the special situation of my brother, my mother may have inadvertently ignored Gangtai's feelings (locked in the basement), or maybe she was at a loss because of her brother, and she didn't know how to get along with Gangtai (only fed food). The story of "Zombie Child" aroused his memories of his mother. What he needed most was her mother's embrace! Since then, Gangtai's stable and strong appearance has been gradually disintegrated, and the melancholy side of his heart has gradually emerged - his resentment towards his mother for neglecting him, and his resentment towards his elder brother for taking away his mother's love. This kind of self-isolation and excessive depression, he is more like a "teenager who grew up eating nightmares" than his brother, eroded by pain and responsibility little by little, his self disappeared.
The story of "Zombie Child" also alludes to the different mother-child (daughter) relationships presented by different forms of maternal love, and does the child need food or mother's warmth? We cannot simply judge. For example, for spiritual care worker Nam Joo-ri (Park Gui-young) and mother Ms. Kang (Kim Mi-kyung), food is a very important way of expressing love, and food is warmth. (Several people in the play get warmth from Ms. Kang's food, whom Moon Sang-tae calls a "fake real mother.") What this story really wants to convey is that many times there is a lack of unity between mothers and children. Opinion and necessary communication, and understanding and communication, are the beginning of love.
In this way, the real life of the protagonist is metaphorically used in the way of dark fairy tales, and there are many other places in the play. For example, the red dancing shoes, which dance involuntarily as long as you put on your feet, allude to Gao Wenying's crazy pursuit of Wen Gangtai - even if his feet are cut off, his feet continue to dance non-stop. In order to get him, Wenying went to the "It's Okay Mental Hospital" without hesitation, even though the person she least wanted to see lived there - the father who tried to strangle her to death. The moral of the story of "Red Shoes" also implies that Wenying will pay the price for this relationship.
In "The Sleeping Witch in the Woods", the princess who was stabbed by a rose thorn and fell asleep, alluded to her mother's imprisonment and control of Wenying, which was a perverted curse. Therefore, she is also the teenage girl in "The Cursed Castle Rapunzel", trapped in a prison-like castle by her mother, praying day after day to the handsome prince who came to rescue her. After her father fell ill and her mother disappeared, Wenying has actually gained freedom of movement. The "cursed castle" here refers to the inner prison where Wenying cannot integrate into the outside world. The first story vaguely reveals that the mother's curse cannot be violated. In the second story, the mother directly said that she would kill the prince who lifted the curse. On the one hand, it responds to the reason why the girl drives away the boy by tearing the butterfly apart in the opening story.
The previous fairy tales were either read aloud from picture books or dialogue monologues, but in episode 6, the protagonists directly moved the story of "Blue Beard" to the screen. The play is interspersed with the adaptation of The Hunchback of the Clock Tower, which emphasizes the meaning of "weird" and "control". The story can be interpreted in different ways, Bluebeard's secret looks like that of Wenying's father - he killed his wife, dragged her into the basement, and tried to kill his daughter who witnessed it all. But in fact, whether it is a father or a mother, the basement that cannot be entered always represents the shackles of taboos. It is control, and disobedience is betrayal, and it is to be punished. In the story of "Father of the Rose and the Red Lotus", we also know that Wen Ying's inner shackles come from her mother's abuse on the one hand, and her father's indifference on the other. The creation of the story of "The Dog of Spring" expresses the heart of trying to break free from the shackles and liberate from the past - "Just because I have been tied for too long, I forgot how to get rid of the collar."
In the next few episodes, in addition to insinuating characters, fairy tales also play a role in promoting the plot. In "Beauty and the Beast", is Belle staying because of love or because of emotional kidnapping? Did the boy in "The Wolf Come" lie because he was bored? Why did the ugly duckling run away from home? Romeo and Juliet, is it a doomed fate, or a tragic fate? Whose fault is it for the overly spoiled anglerfish? The emotions of the characters, the real life, are laid out in these stories.
Realities are ever-changing, and so are the interpretations of these stories. Everyone has their own answers in their hearts, and the basis for their choices, and we can also peep a thing or two from the story. As for whose answer is correct and whose answer is incorrect? unimportant. Different growth experiences and different choices have created a unique self. That's exactly what the show wants to explore: be your true self, what if it's different?
In the process of growing up, you and I may both get hurt. We don't need to be vigilant all the time to resist these wounds.
As revealed in "The King With Donkey Ears": all secrets that are deliberately concealed will eventually be revealed in another way. Wen Ying, who is full of scars but pretends to be strong, and Gang Tai, who is full of worries but forbears and restrains, all the hidden resentments, hidden fears, and camouflaged fragility, in the sudden outbreak, the pain and damage caused are far more. Yu learn from the beginning to face and accept.
Therefore, entanglement, vulnerability, sadness, pain, madness...it doesn't matter, try to understand and face your true self. It's Okay to Not Be Okay.
The English title seems to be more relevant to the theme, but the title of "It's Okay, It's Okay" also inspires us to rethink about mental illness: what exactly is mental illness? If different experiences and emotions produce different mental states, how can we easily classify people with different mental states as abnormal or pathological? What's more, in addition to the obvious disease states, there are some pathological behaviors that are difficult to identify and define - "there are more patients in the world who are not wearing medical clothes".
There is such a scene in the play. Wenying fulfilled her promise to accompany her father for a walk in the hospital for Gangtai, but was suddenly pushed to the ground by her father and strangled - her father tried to kill her again. When everyone came, they were all comforting Dad, Wen Ying was lying on the ground helplessly, her eyes were blank, she was smiling, but tears flowed unconsciously. One side is a diagnosed mental patient, and the other side is the deep pain and despair. One is the right medicine, and the other is reluctant to admit his own trauma. It is difficult to say who needs more attention and treatment. (It's even more chilling to see my mother who is standing on the sidelines at this time.)
When Wenying grew up, her parents were always present, but from beginning to end, one person perpetrated violence and one person condoned. The love of the family has always been missing. She grew up in an environment that looked beautiful on the surface, but was actually full of darkness. The most important step in growth is self-awareness and digestion of these dark shadows, which is also the first step in spiritual healing.
Psychiatric treatment is never a simple drug treatment. Choosing metaphors like fairy tale narration to awaken real emotions through symbolism and psychological projection is to pay attention to mental illnesses in a more delicate way, especially those that are not easily detected, difficult to express, not recognized, and unclassified, but Trauma everywhere. Because the line between normal and pathological is already blurred .
"Psycho But It's Okay" begins with a fairy tale and ends with a fairy tale. All the answers about pain, growth, and happiness have always been implicit in the narrative of the story.
The moral of "The Boy Who Grows Up Eating Nightmares" is that we should never forget to overcome the past, otherwise we will just be a child whose soul does not grow up. The Anglerfish alludes to the fact that our parents raised us, but children are not their parents' creations, nor are they a tool to use. "The Dog of Spring" tells us that the process of growing up is to break free from the shackles and become an independent self. To this end, we must take the first step bravely, because only ourselves are our own masters. Everyone has a vulnerable side. For some people, ordinary is even a luxury, but never lose the courage to find happiness. This is what "Finding the Truest Face" teaches us.
When the dark and gorgeous atmosphere turned bright and cheerful at the end, when Wenying didn't care why her mother was still alive, when Gangtai became "unreliable" and actually got drunk before a long trip, when Shangtai decided to be independent and said " Wen Gangtai is Wen Gangtai's master." At that moment, they all finally found themselves.
(Unless otherwise stated, the pictures in the text are screenshots of the show.)
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