Old Nine Gates 老九门 - Episode 25 (Recap)

kakashi: Really, boys? All this "tension" and suffering ... and then you just blow it up?! I was happy to see the tattoo again though.
SakiVI: Didn't they blow up the last time they went down? Or maybe they were too much in a hurry to leave at that time.
Well, too much blowing, that's for sure

Episode 25 - Blowing up the Mine Entrance

Yin Xinyue thinks she's meeting with her daddy who has come to reprimand her, but no! It's her hot uncle. Or "an" uncle. Now I'm not unhappy about that, but why did her father not even bother coming in person? He is weird. Uncle also lectures her, but he clearly feels very affectionate towards her.
Boss Yin seems a strange person. I hope we see him eventually as Xin Yue's only parent.
To cut a long and not very important conversation a little short, Uncle (and her father) try to get her back to Bei Ping - Peng is off the table. Our Miss however has eyes for only one man, Zhang Qi Shan. And it seems the the Xie men expect that answer, because Uncle brings clothes and other things for her. They also approve of Fo Ye, overall.
Glad that's decided. What clothes has she been wearing all this time, though?
Uncle parts with a warning: A jade buddha statue has been stolen from them. They found the thief in Changsha - but he killed himself before they could get more information.
People kill themselves too easily in Asian dramas.  
Miss goes straight to Xie Jiu / Jiu Ye, who at first does not see the value of this information for the Nine Gate affairs. You should trust the Miss, 9. She's smart. She also has pictures of the statue with her. Xie Jiu is lost in thought when he plays Go with his lady a bit later. And then, Chen Pi barges in!
Is she his wife or his girlfriend? Either way, I would've expected him to have partnered up with someone a bit perkier.  
Oh, DUMMY! He brings Xie Jiu the Buddha statue. He says it's a fake and because that's totally against the rules, Chen Pi declares that Xin Yue hotel's reputation is forever damaged now. He threatens to spread this news, in the process also trampling on Miss Yin's dignity. But here is the rub: Xie Jiu also has a jade Buddha. The real one. He got it directly from someone at the Xin Xue hotel.
The Nose is annoyed.
Okay.
Okay.

Well, Chen Pi thinks he lost this round (it makes it look like he was cheated when he bought the statue, which he of course has not bought at all but stolen) and when he storms out, he smashes the Buddha. The "fake" one. Which was not fake but real ...  it was Chen Pi who made it look fake. But I guess Xie Jiu is right: stopping Chen Pi is worth ten expensive Buddhas if not more.
I got really lost which Buddha is which in this scene. Were either of them from the hotel?
Yes, Chen Pi's "fake" one! 
If you're not confused enough, here is more! all of this was never really targeted at our Miss, but was just a (Hendry) plan to test Xie Jiu and his importance in this whole scheme. okay! Sure thing! This couple always gets mirror shots, look:
They look good together.

I guess the good thing in all this extremely boring boringness is that Xie Jiu is now acutely aware of a "devil in the city of Changsha". And we learn from Hendry's extra long exposition about him that Xie Jiu is hot as hell. So smart and so powerful! Hendry has some evil plan to get Xie Jiu a criminal charge. Once he's removed temporarily, he thinks he can topple Zhang Qi Shan. 
He's this mild-mannered No. 9 that turns into a superman when he hears cries for help.
Chen Pi and his new Shifu.
Down in the mines, Visual Zhan makes an appearance. Oh thank god.   
He's so pretty, OMG, OMG, OMG!
Him and his men feel super anxious: Fo Ye at al. are gone for too long. Lt. Zhang sends four of his men in. Canon fodder! Of course, they get lost almost immediately. In the meantime, Fo Ye and Ba Ye wait for Er Ye. Four hours and more have passed and he's not back. After Fo Ye wants to go in after him several times (looking hot)...
Yes, hot.
 ... and is held back by Ba Ye ...
Like Ba Ye could stop Fo Ye.
... Er Ye comes stumbling out! He is gravely hurt!!
With no issues at all (pfft), they find back to the room where Visual Zhang is fretting. Fo Ye screams at everyone to hurry up, they need to leave! Right now! And nobody is allowed to go in anymore! Too dangerous! Fo Ye, care to boss me around too for a bit? Yes?
Care to go into the tomb, magma and hair bacteria and all, with him? 
Well, I'd prefer this game at home, actually. He would have to undress first too.
Ba Ye thinks Er Ye's "muscles and bones" were injured. Not his organs. Okay. Er Ye wakes up temporarily and manages to hand Fo Ye a fragment of something (that Ba Ye calls "rubbish thing", lol). And then, Er Ye tells them to blow everything up.
Muscle and bone injuries must hurt like anything, though.
They do. How many times do you think this has happened already, people blowing up one of the mine entrances? (Many, many times.  And yet the entrances are still there.)  There are explosives ready there too. There are lucky to find some quarry tubs right away as well. Here's Er Ye, after Ba Ye has put him inside one:
So YaTou-ish.
Here's Fo Ye riding it manly:  
Yes!
This makes me sad. Such a beautiful gate.
I know.
Everyone makes it out, Er Ye is still breathing ... actually, even talking! He says: "Fo Ye ... that thing ... keep it well". Oooookay.
Fo Ye is home! Bleeding, but apparently writing up a report. The poor boy is in pain. And exhausted. And.... not well, in general. Of course, he claims "it's nothing".  
But he's bleeding at that same spot on his neck!
He is concerned about the others ... the dead ones (the families will be compensated) and the alive ones and their potentially lose tongues. They can't have anyone tattle about this! Miss Yin comes in and scolds him for being injured again. Preach it, woman! She got her cousin Mo Ce, a doctor, to come.
Why does this feel very fast? Oh right, the uncle actually arrived when these boys went down into the mine, giving Xin Yue some days to call this cousin over.
Mo Ce admits she was very curious to see this man who snatched her cousin away. Xin Yue asks "how he is then", haha, and Mo Ce deliberately misunderstands that. I think Fo Ye is a little embarrassed. He gets up and steps away. Haha. He is also still very concerned about Er Ye and Xin Yue sends her cousin there as well.
New love interest for Er Ye? She looks the quiet type which he likes.
Please make it so! 
Later, Fo Ye is alone in his room ... half naked. Yay! When he wants to take his pants off (!!!) he remembers that thing Er Ye gave him.
He starts to wash carefully (cause no water on the wounds allowed!) and that activates the tattoo. And suddenly, it dawns on him! He stares at the beast on his body...
... and on the "crappy thing" in his hand ... oh foooooooogg! That thing in the tomb, it's a Qilin! (and that means the Zhangs are much more involved in this than we previously knew. They might have built it! I am saying this because I've seen the rest already, hehe).
Nice twist!
And then, we end this episode with Er Ye, who has a horrible nightmare about hair. Well, before that, he dreams of Yatou, who is assailed by hair too. He wakes up ... and there is hair everywhere, tying him to his chair. Not good. Not good at all.
Yes, that has got to suck.

Comments

Too much Hendry bullshit exposition in this but at least no Lu Fucker. 
It's a good idea to skip Hendry's expositions.

I was seriously angry with them suddenly blowing everything up. They've been in there for days if not weeks, where did they even walk to?! And then, they immediately find back to that gate? And wasn't that mine entrance bombed before by the Japanese, so that they had to find a different one? Drama, you make no sense. You're still a lot of fun though, because you're crazy. 
This is where The Lost Tomb did better than this show. That group went in by one entrance, wondered around for a bit, and found a tree to climb to get out of the tomb. It all made sense, surprisingly. Here, they just seem to beam out of the tomb.
Well, to be fair The Lost Tomb might have done the tomb stuff (a bit) better, but it also was a great, glorious mess otherwise.