Apothecary Diaries 2x7 | Full Length Reaction

Maomao was speculating about the swap, but she didn’t actually put Jinshi into that speculation, that was us viewers that did, bacause obviously Ah Duo and Jinshi look like twins. Maomao is not even trying to get to the bottom of who Jinshi is - for her he is just a eunuch. But her speculations and internal dialogue put the seeds into the viewers minds of Jinshi’s identity. But this is the episode in which we are actually told directly that Jinshi is the emperor’s brother, or at least that’s what Jinshi and most people believe to be true. The speculation that he is the son is still in the air as just crumbs from Maomao’s internal dialogue. It is confusing but over time it will be cleared. You both are doing a fantastic job!

If you believe the switch took place then Jinshi is the Emporer's son his brother and Jinshi is Ah-Duo's son. They can never admit this ,so true or not he will always be recognized as the Emperor's son. People here now just think he is a high ranking eunuch most people don't know that Jinshi is even royalty and this Emporer knows the actual truth in my mind

The thing with Maomao, if you notice, when she has certain trains of thought, she immediately cuts it off out of self preservation, preferring to be ignorant instead. So while Maomao could probably figure it out, she doesn't want to. Also, who Jinshi is the son of was never confirmed, just strongly hinted at it.

Small clarification because this confuses peolpe. The show presents facts from the perspective of knowledge of the characters, Not universal facts for the viewers. Like in AoT and how we are presented "facts" about season 1 and 2 before we know anything about seasons 3 and 4. So to clarify something. jinshi thinking he's the emperor's brother is from HIS perspective of knowledge, not counting what maomao speculates separately in regards to the AhDuo situation (if any of that is true vs crazy speculations, we don't know yet) It's like someone looking at a jar of sugar and a jar of salt, putting one of the contents in his tea, and then saying "ah yes, Jar #1 has ALWAYS been sugar because i taste sweet tea", but for all they know, someone behind the scenes switched the contents of jar 1 and jar 2, and it was originally jar #2 that has the sugar, but from the perspective of the person making the tea, they're going to assume that Jar 1 ALWAYS had sugar, instead of thinking "hey, jar 1 might have sugar now based on my knowledge, but god knows how many times someone swapped those jars before". It's actually a known fallacy in discrete math, and before someone comes to a conclusion in the premise -> problem -> conclusion, one can only assume that the premises are true before they can make an accurate conclusion... because if the premises are wrong, your conclusion might be ACCURATE, but not FACTUAL based on the unknowns that are not brough to your attention :)

To help make things clear, even just from the information you've had to this point. The current Emperor was the biological son of the previous Emperor and the Empress Dowagar. Jinshi is the biological child of the current Emperor and the Ah-Duo, but being born at the same time as the previous Emperor's second son and then swapped. So while biologically the current Emperor's son, he was raised as his brother by the Empress dowager. At some point this swap was found out which was why Luomen was punished and banished from the palace. It's not stated exactly who found out and how many know, but we can presume the Emperor himself understands his little brother is actually his son, as well as the likes of Gaoshun and Suiran likely know. But everyone also knows they must keep up the pretence that he is the Emperor's younger brother for the sake of political stability in the nation.

Not 100% and just going off what's been said up to this point, but im pretty sure its implied that jinshi is the son of the emperor and ah-duo, but was switched at birth with the emperors brother. So he was raised as the emperors brother but is gentically the emperors son. They later figured out after he looks exactly like ah-duo (and that is part of why maomaos adoptive father who looked after their births was punished and exiled out of the rear palace) but continued to raise him as the emperor's brother to avoid scandal. The way they reveal this info has been pretty convoluted tho. With jinshi saying literally the opposite in this episode, but i think that is what he was told growing up. Idk, im pretty sure thats it but others can correct me lol

My understanding is that if you compare them to jigsaw puzzles, Attack on Titan is more like two large puzzles: Paradis and Marley. The first three seasons are mainly about putting together the Paradis puzzle, while Season 4 starts putting together the Marley puzzle. In the end, those two puzzles come together to form one complete picture. The Apothecary Diaries, on the other hand, feels more like lots of small puzzle pieces that first form individual puzzles, and then those smaller puzzles come together to create a much bigger one. Some of those pieces don't just belong to one small puzzle, they also connect to other small puzzles, or even the larger picture. It's more like a detective story, similar to Sherlock Holmes: an incident happens, clues are observed and gathered, deductions are made, and then the answer is verified. The two series tell their stories very differently, but they both rely heavily on foreshadowing and small details. When you go back and rewatch them, you realize the authors had already laid the groundwork from the beginning. In Attack on Titan, the truth is gradually revealed as the story progresses, and the answers are usually given fairly directly. The Apothecary Diaries, however, often only gives you the surface answer, or part of the answer. The rest is left for you to connect the clues yourself and think through. For example, the baby swap was actually mentioned back in 1X12, but at that point it was only Maomao's theory and wasn't actually confirmed. On top of that, Maomao doesn't want to get involved in matters concerning the people at the top, so she sometimes deliberately ignores certain clues to avoid following them all the way to the answer.

I don't think Jinshi being the brother of the Emperor was ever confirmed before, but it has been very strongly hinted at. Off the top of my head, there was the stuff with Ah-Duo in Season 1. Jinshi and Gaoshun have also mentioned that they are chemically, not physically, castrated in an earlier episode where they are shown talking about taking medicine so they can stay in the rear palace. There's also a couple instances where the emperor's brother is meant to be somewhere (the garden party comes to mind) but he's absent and then jinshi appears, iirc