You probably already know this from the patreon but it is heavily implied that the servant girl's sister ended up taking her own life after being cancelled out by that guy. And he had done that to multiple women at that point. So very much an understandable reaction imo
ya, from what we know from future ep's spoiler... losing purity is kind of a death sentence, as she and the others would then be less valuable and might have to take on and bed clients as she would be seen as "cheap/easy" the sister couldn't live with the shame maybe he gave her something as his family's wealthy they didn't want it known
@@petthequeenofmaddness8592 Well, it’s not like she was an elite courtesan - just from this brothel’s visual design, we can tell it’s not as high-end as Verdigris.
I feel ya Carson. This show is great. The mysterys are fun and interesting. It's like watching murder she wrote and a Chinese soap opera wrapped in one.
I didn't realize for the longest time that this incident didn't take place in the Verdigris house. This is one of the dozen other brothels that might have not big of a standart.
The douchebag canceling on the courtesan’s miyuke isn’t just hurting their feelings, but lowering their price. By extension they have to work more, possibly risking their career/life in the worst case, when they have to take anybody.
I don’t know that the anime says it directly, but the serving girl that tried to kill the man with the knife, they said that her sister was sweet talked and dumped by him. What I don’t remember if it says clearly in the anime (or maybe if it’s edited out in your reaction), but her older sister committed suicide from it. Which is why she wanted to kill even even more than if her sister had just been dumped
I thought it was obvious that the girl's sis unalived herself. And she's not the only victim who unalive.. they cannot turn him away due to the fact that courtesans were sold in the brothel which is basically same as slaves just have the option to buy themselve out if they have wealthy costumer
If you like the mystery aspect of the show I feel like you might like Hyouka, the mysteries there are less dramatic and more about small every day oddities, but the way the characters approach those mysteries is pretty similar. Although, Hyouka also has a lot of slice of life and a bit of high school romance, which isn't everybody's cup of tea.
i don't know why but whenever i see this shoujo anime, it always reminds me of 2 old popular shoujo animes: Yona of the Dawn /Akatsuki no Yona (manga 2009 & anime 2014) & Fushigi Yûgi /Mysterious Game (manga 1991 & anime 1995)... they have similar vibe with chinese storyline
I gushed a _lot_ about this episode in the comments for another reaction video, back when S1 was still airing. In fact, I feel like copying and pasting that whole comment here, with minimal edits: ~~~ …You know, looking back, there is a LOT of great stuff in this episode. The classic Jinshi coda, of course, with the rest of the Jade Pavilion crew in top form. Lihaku being a big goof. The anime-original Meimei scene, with equal parts daaaaamn girl, d’aww, and setting up for later plot. The parallels between the pleasure district and the harem. The courtesan’s scheme, which is not only clever in its own right but feels very much like how TAD likes to do things - the conflicts ultimately come from the country being a patriarchal society that values women mostly for their beauty and fertility, but _men_ tend not to be the main players. This dirtbag and his father were the root of the problem, but that’s just a motive. The people who actually ACT in this episode’s plot are Maomao, the courtesan with the tobacco leaves, the little kamuro girl, the madam - you get the idea. Like how in previous episodes the players were Fuyou, or Lihua or Lishu’s ladies-in-waiting, etc. (Yeah, Lishu’s problems _ultimately_ stem from the last emperor, but he’s five years dead.) I think it was on the ANN forums I said this story’s brand of feminism is more Mean Girls than Thelma and Louise. And that’s on top of getting to see Maomao act for once in a place where everyone knows to do what she says in a medical emergency. No prickly Crystal Pavilion types here - these girls work for a living like she does, they know her and her dad, and they know if she says to get charcoal, you get charcoal. And speaking of her dad, we see three important layers of _that_ relationship. One, while she defers to the likes of Jinshi or the emperor because she has to, she _respects_ her father, maybe more than anyone - his expertise, his ability to observe and deduce. Two, the way she looks after him and gets frustrated with him being too selfless. And three, the way she clearly learned her sense of discretion from him. Don’t speak based on conjecture. Think about whether it’ll actually do any good to reveal what you’ve figured out. We’ve seen that in Maomao before - the cautious, anonymous notes about the face powder; keeping her Fuyou theory to herself until Fuyou was already leaving; talking to Lishu’s food taster and being all “I’m sure this was an innocent mistake but you _really_ have to be careful”. Maomao has never cared about showing off how clever she is. (And of course, in the rear palace, there’s the extra layer that stepping out of line could cost her her head.) Just an all-around banger of an episode, really. Don’t know if I’d put it on par with episode 4, but it’s close. ~~~ Back to January 2025 here, and I’ll add that the whole “curiosity killed the cat” tension is one of the most interesting parts of Maomao’s character - wanting to know, but at the same time realizing how little she can really be sure of, and recognizing that sometimes, knowing won’t do any good. (She never learns if all her speculations here are right, or even goes back to this brothel before her trip ends. No catharsis. Maomao doesn’t do “Hannin wa… omae da!” moments.) Even if she does know, like she said in episode 1, feigning ignorance makes everything easier.
We're really getting to elements of Apothecary Diaries' writing that elevate it above so many other stories. It's *never* afraid to address the social, economic, and gender inequalities in its setting, and not from a 'oh GIRL POWER' element. It's a fact of life that every character must navigate. Maomao's observation is very accurate - the Red Light District and the Imperial Harem are far more similar than people want to admit. They are both locations that reduce sexuality to something transactional or, in many cases, violent. Gyokuyou knows there is not genuine, emotional love from the Emperor. She has his favor because she's pretty and a good entertainer, in addition to being politically minded. Traits shared by Mei Mei. One is a courtesan working in a business often maligned then and now, the other is the mother of a princess. The difference between them is birth - Mei Mei was born to peasants, Gyokuyou is a noblewoman. It's why Gyokuyou looked at Fuyou and said, "I envy her." It's why Lihua was so scared about not being desirable anymore. It's why Lishu being a consort in the first place is horrifying, and the show explicitly states she's a political prisoner rather than actually "working" like Lihua or Gyokuyou. Women were, and are, forced to find places to gain power and influence within that ecosystem. Some manage to succeed, become big names, but many are devoured by a socioeconomic system designed to reduce them to being some form of entertainment for men. Maomao grew up with this. It's so engrained into her from a young age that she can't help but notice these problems because she is an outsider. She's not conventionally attractive, she's short, she clearly has some kind of issue with her parents given the absence of her mother...her stroke of luck was the presence of her father teaching her medicine. She doesn't know how to fix this social system, nor does she give thought to it. It just is. She's a random peasant. All she can do is keep her head down and avoid trouble...but her curiosity, impulses as a doctor, and desire to study medications pull her into the games of the Imperial Harem.
there are different levels of the brothal, not all women/girls take "customers", women that do are like the 3 princess and have a very high cost for their time and services. Since they are such good money makers their BUY OUT price is really high. Other girls who are still pure are for entertaining the guests. They CAN take a customer BUT at a high cost to them and the brothal. Their BUY OUT price drops dramatically after they do. So in this story, the little girls older sister allowed herself to be conn'd by the asshole giving up her virtue, for the promise of buying her out. He then was done with her, she became "used good" at that point and depression took over from there.
Maomao and Jinshi = Gyokuyou's personal soap opera.
Just a mom who loves her soaps - Gyokuyo is an icon❤
You probably already know this from the patreon but it is heavily implied that the servant girl's sister ended up taking her own life after being cancelled out by that guy. And he had done that to multiple women at that point. So very much an understandable reaction imo
ya, from what we know from future ep's spoiler...
losing purity is kind of a death sentence, as she and the others would then be less valuable and might have to take on and bed clients as she would be seen as "cheap/easy" the sister couldn't live with the shame maybe he gave her something as his family's wealthy they didn't want it known
@@petthequeenofmaddness8592 That only applies to high ranked courtesans. Mid & low ranked courtesans do normal brothel services with contraceptive.
@@petthequeenofmaddness8592 Well, it’s not like she was an elite courtesan - just from this brothel’s visual design, we can tell it’s not as high-end as Verdigris.
I feel ya Carson. This show is great. The mysterys are fun and interesting. It's like watching murder she wrote and a Chinese soap opera wrapped in one.
I didn't realize for the longest time that this incident didn't take place in the Verdigris house. This is one of the dozen other brothels that might have not big of a standart.
The douchebag canceling on the courtesan’s miyuke isn’t just hurting their feelings, but lowering their price. By extension they have to work more, possibly risking their career/life in the worst case, when they have to take anybody.
I don’t know that the anime says it directly, but the serving girl that tried to kill the man with the knife, they said that her sister was sweet talked and dumped by him. What I don’t remember if it says clearly in the anime (or maybe if it’s edited out in your reaction), but her older sister committed suicide from it. Which is why she wanted to kill even even more than if her sister had just been dumped
Poor jinshi 😂
I thought it was obvious that the girl's sis unalived herself. And she's not the only victim who unalive.. they cannot turn him away due to the fact that courtesans were sold in the brothel which is basically same as slaves just have the option to buy themselve out if they have wealthy costumer
The more I watch episodes of Apothecary diaries, the more it reminds me of Detective Conan
If you like the mystery aspect of the show I feel like you might like Hyouka, the mysteries there are less dramatic and more about small every day oddities, but the way the characters approach those mysteries is pretty similar. Although, Hyouka also has a lot of slice of life and a bit of high school romance, which isn't everybody's cup of tea.
13:31 personally kept that chibi face as my sticker, it's too funny 🤣
i don't know why but whenever i see this shoujo anime, it always reminds me of 2 old popular shoujo animes: Yona of the Dawn /Akatsuki no Yona (manga 2009 & anime 2014) & Fushigi Yûgi /Mysterious Game (manga 1991 & anime 1995)... they have similar vibe with chinese storyline
I gushed a _lot_ about this episode in the comments for another reaction video, back when S1 was still airing. In fact, I feel like copying and pasting that whole comment here, with minimal edits:
~~~
…You know, looking back, there is a LOT of great stuff in this episode.
The classic Jinshi coda, of course, with the rest of the Jade Pavilion crew in top form. Lihaku being a big goof. The anime-original Meimei scene, with equal parts daaaaamn girl, d’aww, and setting up for later plot. The parallels between the pleasure district and the harem. The courtesan’s scheme, which is not only clever in its own right but feels very much like how TAD likes to do things - the conflicts ultimately come from the country being a patriarchal society that values women mostly for their beauty and fertility, but _men_ tend not to be the main players. This dirtbag and his father were the root of the problem, but that’s just a motive. The people who actually ACT in this episode’s plot are Maomao, the courtesan with the tobacco leaves, the little kamuro girl, the madam - you get the idea. Like how in previous episodes the players were Fuyou, or Lihua or Lishu’s ladies-in-waiting, etc. (Yeah, Lishu’s problems _ultimately_ stem from the last emperor, but he’s five years dead.) I think it was on the ANN forums I said this story’s brand of feminism is more Mean Girls than Thelma and Louise.
And that’s on top of getting to see Maomao act for once in a place where everyone knows to do what she says in a medical emergency. No prickly Crystal Pavilion types here - these girls work for a living like she does, they know her and her dad, and they know if she says to get charcoal, you get charcoal. And speaking of her dad, we see three important layers of _that_ relationship. One, while she defers to the likes of Jinshi or the emperor because she has to, she _respects_ her father, maybe more than anyone - his expertise, his ability to observe and deduce. Two, the way she looks after him and gets frustrated with him being too selfless. And three, the way she clearly learned her sense of discretion from him. Don’t speak based on conjecture. Think about whether it’ll actually do any good to reveal what you’ve figured out. We’ve seen that in Maomao before - the cautious, anonymous notes about the face powder; keeping her Fuyou theory to herself until Fuyou was already leaving; talking to Lishu’s food taster and being all “I’m sure this was an innocent mistake but you _really_ have to be careful”. Maomao has never cared about showing off how clever she is. (And of course, in the rear palace, there’s the extra layer that stepping out of line could cost her her head.)
Just an all-around banger of an episode, really. Don’t know if I’d put it on par with episode 4, but it’s close.
~~~
Back to January 2025 here, and I’ll add that the whole “curiosity killed the cat” tension is one of the most interesting parts of Maomao’s character - wanting to know, but at the same time realizing how little she can really be sure of, and recognizing that sometimes, knowing won’t do any good. (She never learns if all her speculations here are right, or even goes back to this brothel before her trip ends. No catharsis. Maomao doesn’t do “Hannin wa… omae da!” moments.) Even if she does know, like she said in episode 1, feigning ignorance makes everything easier.
The little girl crying after being stopped by Maomao hits me hard. The voice actor got real.
We're really getting to elements of Apothecary Diaries' writing that elevate it above so many other stories. It's *never* afraid to address the social, economic, and gender inequalities in its setting, and not from a 'oh GIRL POWER' element. It's a fact of life that every character must navigate.
Maomao's observation is very accurate - the Red Light District and the Imperial Harem are far more similar than people want to admit. They are both locations that reduce sexuality to something transactional or, in many cases, violent. Gyokuyou knows there is not genuine, emotional love from the Emperor. She has his favor because she's pretty and a good entertainer, in addition to being politically minded. Traits shared by Mei Mei. One is a courtesan working in a business often maligned then and now, the other is the mother of a princess. The difference between them is birth - Mei Mei was born to peasants, Gyokuyou is a noblewoman. It's why Gyokuyou looked at Fuyou and said, "I envy her." It's why Lihua was so scared about not being desirable anymore. It's why Lishu being a consort in the first place is horrifying, and the show explicitly states she's a political prisoner rather than actually "working" like Lihua or Gyokuyou.
Women were, and are, forced to find places to gain power and influence within that ecosystem. Some manage to succeed, become big names, but many are devoured by a socioeconomic system designed to reduce them to being some form of entertainment for men.
Maomao grew up with this. It's so engrained into her from a young age that she can't help but notice these problems because she is an outsider. She's not conventionally attractive, she's short, she clearly has some kind of issue with her parents given the absence of her mother...her stroke of luck was the presence of her father teaching her medicine. She doesn't know how to fix this social system, nor does she give thought to it. It just is. She's a random peasant. All she can do is keep her head down and avoid trouble...but her curiosity, impulses as a doctor, and desire to study medications pull her into the games of the Imperial Harem.
One of the most unique episodes.
there are different levels of the brothal, not all women/girls take "customers", women that do are like the 3 princess and have a very high cost for their time and services. Since they are such good money makers their BUY OUT price is really high. Other girls who are still pure are for entertaining the guests. They CAN take a customer BUT at a high cost to them and the brothal. Their BUY OUT price drops dramatically after they do.
So in this story, the little girls older sister allowed herself to be conn'd by the asshole giving up her virtue, for the promise of buying her out. He then was done with her, she became "used good" at that point and depression took over from there.
By the way, that's why them drinking straws.
Meimei is always fine