[SHL] Xie'er's full name

[shadaras]

I love hanging around on single-fandom discord servers sometimes, because people post some really neat meta. Last night, a member of a SHL/TYK-focused discord server shared a link to this meta about what yifu and yizi mean and what the meaning of such a relationship is (and why ZJ/Xie'er and similar relationships aren't incestuous) (the meta is also on ao3, as another server member later found).

Despite all the interesting cultural information (which is cool to read!), I think the most surprising part is that it references Xie-wang/Xie'er having a full name: Xiejieliubo (蝎揭留波)

Apparently this name is used once during the show (in ep27) (tumblr post showing a screencap of that use), but I'm pretty sure this wasn't translated/transliterated in youtube (or netflix) subs at all (which is why a lot of english-based fandom might not know it). Someone did mention that the proper translation/transliteration was probably in Viki's subs, though!

(This full name also points to Xie'er originally being from an ethnic/cultural minority. Which isn't surprising, but is nice to see more deliberate canonical reference to.)

Comments

[trobadora]

Thank you for sharing that yifu meta, I hadn't seen that before!

About Xie-er, heh. I can't remember now what the subs say in that scene because I'm pretty sure I saw someone mentioning his full name before I'd even seen the relevant episode. *g*

(I checked just now, they only say "Scorpion". *sighs* My kingdom for better subs!)

It's funny to me that you didn't know his name, because I think of you as Xie-er Fan Extraordinaire™. :p

[shadaras]

the ways in which I do not interact with wider fandom are sometimes fascinating xD; I get the idea that cfandom and people who follow actor-related media are much more likely to have known this, but that tends not to be a slice of fandom I actively engage with.

And in efandom, nobody uses his full name! Everyone calls him Xie'er or Xie-wang! (if they don't call him Scorpion King.) I definitely didn't see the name subtitled! How was I to know?

(I just love him a lot; that doesn't mean I know everything about him... xD <3)

[trobadora]

Yes, I continue to be fascinated by how differently we do fandom! :D

(I guess I assumed it would have come up on discord before. Discord is basically a magical mystery box for me; all sorts of things happen there that I have no idea about, and when people talk about it they always sound way more plugged in than I am. *g*)

It's a good question why people don't use his name. Is it because they don't know, or is there another reason? (I mean, the name being mentioned just in that one episode is probably a good enough reason. But.)

[wolffyluna]

I didn't realise he had a canon full name! That's really interesting.

...I could have sword he was canonically from Nanjiang, though now I think about it, I can't remember if that was ever explicitly said.

[trobadora]

Zhao Jing calls him "little southern barbarian" multiple times, at least. ("小南蛮" is what he says.) The subs just translate it as "little barbarian".

[wolffyluna]

Aha, that would explain where I got that impression! Thank you.