Yalı Çapkını's roots: The ‘Üç Maymun'

Yali Capkini changes focus from the protagonist plots to the foils in quite a commendable manner. While the viewer dedicates to Seyran and Ferit at most, it is almost hard to ignore the background plots contributing to the story. Episode 30 brought out Seyran and Ferit’s personal struggles with love, 31 brings us back to the story’s roots. The ‘Üç Maymun’.

Each episode, one way or another, the story has spoken for where it started from. A caged pride, a caged prejudice, a suffocating cage, and another that’s laced with jewels. Seyran Sanli and Ferit Korhan were always the captives, The Korhans and Sanlis were always the sailors of the ship. This episode, while it has been shown clearly all along, Mehmet Baris concludes the problem, where it lies, in preparation of finally – the solution.

‘Üç Maymun’ The Three Wise:

The proverbial representation is a reference to the Sino-Japanese image of the three monkeys who see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil. The image has been used in several tales and films to put out either a perspective to see them as advice or rather a moral fable about the consequences of their excess and how they can turn out to be 'not so wise'.

Yali Capkini, adapted from a real-life scenario, utilizes the message to show how families bear price of the evasion, corruption, and suppression that these three decisions bring.

Kikazaru: Hear no evil.

Halis Korhan and Kazim Sanli; the delusional sailors of their kin. The two characters need not any explanation for what they are. While Halis' decisions in the past are only vaguely revealed, it is obvious to interpret that his current persona was produced by cowardice. As for Kazim Sanli; the character is a boy who made up his own image of an Aga (head of the family). Stripped of his father at a mere young age, Kazim has never known the correct example of neither a father nor a man. In the delusion of his self-acclaimed authority, he tortures his young. Not listening to anyone or anything other than themselves and only seldom that that doesn't hurt their ego, these two are the sailors that captivate their young. Semiotic reference - Episode 32 - they represent Kikazaru: the monkey that refuses to hear.

Mizaru: See no evil.

It is the eyes of the one watching the injustice that bear the price and not only the one doing it.

Hattice, Esme, Suna, Gulgun, Asuman, Fuat, Ifakat, Orhan. All of these people's blindness to what's being done to Seyran and Ferit (no matter what intention they have) is what fuels their captivity. Suna. Gulgun and Asuman realize what's happening but still choose to be blind in fear. Orhan and Fuat see only their own good in not seeing. Ifakat and Hattice have prejudiced morals. Some choose to and some are forced to. They watch the ringmasters cage the captives and the crowd applauding, but choose to hide in the crowd, not risking their own freedom.

Ivazaru: Speak no evil.

The couple's lacker has always been communication and it stays that still. Whether it's speaking to each other or speaking up for themselves; they lack in both. Both weaknesses, due to fear of letting go. Where their tormentors refuse hearing or seeing, Seyran and Ferit too participate in the injustice themselves by deciding not to speak up. The development has been showing itself both ways, with Ferit threatening Ifakat multiple times and testing Pelin's self-worth. He constantly holds up a mirror to the Korhans as well as has started looking Halis in the eyes. However, still lacks the bravery to pull the rug at once. Seyran on the other hand does the same. Threatening Ifakat at the designer's, holding up a mirror to Gulgun and Hattice too. She too has started looking Kazim in equal height. However still lacks the bravery to decide for entirely herself, as is forced by her sister and mother's fate. Both find this courage from the love and pain they have for and from each other but they still choose to stay silent from within.

Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake - Mehmet Baris Gunger's brilliant tribute

Baris is an allusive writer. These references are like exploring the subtle but potentially dense backdrops of an intricate painting, without which the foregrounded material would not be as rich and impactful. We've seen the Trojan War, the great mythologies, periodic tales as well as modern old-day tragedies. After several other epics, now he introduces Tchaikivsky's in Yali Capkini.

The same is Alptekin, who decorates Baris' characters with fourth-wall-breaking shots every now and then when the characters break the viewer's illusion with their helpless calls. The nudity of the pen is not in the obvious about 'Swan Lake's' impact on the viewer but in the way how it introduces the legend as both a foil and nonlinear plotline for three characters. How Suna Sanli possesses both Odile and Odette in her own story, Seyran Sanli takes the both into her's and Ferit Korhan lives Seigrid as his fate.

The scenes in the dressing room might just have been Gunger and Alptekin’s best exhibition this episode. A series of shots that depict brutally, more than one plot, pushing the eye to almost the brink of complexity. The Sanli sisters both one after another shown to try on feathery dresses for a forceful audience, nerve-wracking confrontations with the viewer, Seyran’s swift laying on the ground, the sisters’ devastating battles within themselves. There’s no frame that doesn’t narrate a familiar classic. One would put Odile immediately onto Pelin or Suna and cast Odette and Seigrid on the protagonists. Though where he makes his ligatures is where Mehmet Baris pays his tribute to the story brilliantly. Baris references complexity and identity in these characters. Mostly doesn't connect to the story but the characters personally. As if the central characters draw from the plot but the story is explored in a far more indirect way. In this one he even goes to the extent of writing through different variations of the same tale:

Seyran Sanli: The Swan Queen

Odette is a traditional character that can easily be seen possessing Seyran. The curse that doesn't let her show herself as she is - The fear of exposing her true form - ‘the curse can only be broken by true love’. Yet she’s also a monarch; everything falls beneath, down to her rise in heroism.

It is even visible how Seyran reigns as the swan queen when the corps de ballet of swan maidens (the Sanli and Korhan women) forms a passionate accompaniment. Implied that their fates are bound up with Odette, even that they are supplicants. Hope and fear are wonderfully shared by both heroine and monarchists as Seyran protects and leads the women of Yali Capkini to liberty.

Where Baris makes a ligature is the heroine's duality within herself. It is her alter ego – Odile, that has been written as a variation of the same personality. Odette and Odile exist as the black and white to each other. ‘We all contain within us the black swan and the white swan, an Odette and an Odile.’

Episode 26 – Seyran started showing signs of her superego dominating her gradual demurral. Odile overshadowing Odette. Rhombus inserted skillfully through her choice of earrings that episode, we understood how balance was the eventual destination for the character (The geometric symbol (two triangles up and down) appears so a significant change is installed within the consciousness; one that supersedes the limited ego-self of the human personality and that acts for benefit of what is important). Cut to – episode 31, she wears the same jewelry while confronting Ferit (again) – depicting (again) a need for balance within the self.

Odette and Odile are like the two triangles on this rhombus. Yin to Yang, Black to white Seyran struggles to defeat Odile. Last few episodes we even start seeing her fear the consequences of her actions, as she sacrifices her love for Ferit for her pride and continues hurting him. Conclusion? Odile is Seyran's demurral in disguise. Call it love, call it pride, it is what she struggles to leave behind.'Why doesn’t anyone understand me. I was dragged and locked in a room. I broke down in there and no one even opened their mouth. Even Ferit didn’t come and apologize. He didn’t even come and apologize Abla. He could’ve lent his hand. Only if he had told me to run away, to hold his hand there, I would’ve torn those papers' Seyran is the Odette who ran away at the prince's sight. The swan who hid beneath her wings when love approached her. The Odette who even after realizing the Prince's love for her, still is unable to leave the cursed swan in her behind.

Swan imagery in “Swan Lake” works several ways. Odette’s swan condition is what she hopes to leave behind forever like Seyran does her pride and demurral— but can she ever shake it off? And does she really want to? For swan, form is also the known zone to which she continually retreats for comfort. She’s the most profoundly diffident of heroines. 'Beautiful, anguished, remote, Swan Lake's Odette became one of the great Romantic symbols of the longing for redemption.' As has Seyran. 'Though she’s human, she’s haunted by swan form. Her arms often move with the powerful shapes of swan wings; her feet flutter like wingtips; now and then, her head and neck preen, swannishly. She opens out into big swan contours, trying to take wing.' Until Ferit doesn't justify what she's borne, she will continue to haunt herself.

Seyran in the longer run depicts identity: ‘finding out who you truly are, and where you belong; a story of growing into your own skin or discarding one that no longer serves you. What are the events that have shaped us, how do we integrate the different parts of ourselves, how do we learn to tell our own stories? Baris as I said draws from the plot but his character is explored in a far more indirect way. He digs into the overarching themes and archetypal characters; shape-shifting, love, betrayal, identity, sacrifice, and belonging. Drawing on tales of transformation and shape-shifting like Odette's war within herself with Odile.

Ferit Korhan: The Lonely Prince

Prince Siegfried too is an obvious casting, but Gunger again, explores identity. Although Ferit this episode was mostly only seen mourning and longing the swan queen, it is only fair to see his journey in the mold of the character he's been referenced to.

'From the very beginning of Swan Lake, we see the Prince. He is isolated in a busy palace and we follow his lonely journey through his public duties with his mother the Queen. In Ferit's case of course - The Korhans.

The Prince tries his very best to perform his duties but always falls short of his mother’s (Halis') expectations. He is constantly distracted by his internal thoughts and rarely gets anything right.

The Prince’s interests grow beyond the parameters of his current life. The rising levels of disappointment in him and subsequent exasperation that we witness in the Queen (Halis) make it apparent that tensions between family and son are rising. One of the biggest sources of unhappiness for the Prince appears to be the significant lack of maternal warmth, interest, and affection he receives from them. Throughout Act One we see the gulf in their relationship – both physically and emotionally – fracture to the point of breaking. With an enthusiastic but desperately unsuitable girlfriend and a broken relationship with his family, the Prince is tormented by the realities of his life as the son of a monarch. When he meets the Swan in Act Two this unexpected encounter signifies the beginning of change'. Strong, beautiful the Swan queen entrances the Prince and introduces him to a new world of possibility. The Prince begins to feel depths of emotions that his life as a member of the Royal family has been devoid of and it intoxicates him'. As for this episode and where it places Siegfried: Ferit is bearing the consequences of abandoning the Swan queen (Seyran). While he questions the queen's hiding and rejection, he still longs for her.

This is the rise up in the plot where love has started to not only change him but to hold him accountable until he doesn't realize his past. Why it doesn't need further addressing is because this is a static period in the character's storyline. He keeps changing, but the longing and suffering won't change until he ends it himself. 'The captive that sees a light running away' was discussed last week for him. It applies still.

The Episodic 30s are the Prince's longing and suffering at most, while he prepares for realization in a dream soon. This longing and suffering, however, Mert Ramazan Demir serves best.

Ferit tries to go back to his old ways. He knows he'll forget his pains by using this side as he had always done. But this time he fails miserably. He tries everything. Drinking, partying, escorting. Even tries to provoke Halis and the family by bringing one home. But nothing works. He serenades his broken heart to unconsciousness in Seyran’s memory, as did the prince in the lake of tears.

Seigfried uses dance to mourn his beloved. Ferit. uses Demir's euphonious voice...

"Çaresiz derdimin sebebi belli

Dermanı yaramda arama doktor

Şifa bulmaz gönlüm senin elinde Boşuna benimle uğraşma doktor Bedenimde değil, kalbimde derdim Tek alışkanlığım, bir zalim sevdim Sen çekil yanımdan sevgilim gelsn Boşuna zamanını harcama doktor Aşk yarasıdır bu; ilaç kapatmaz Verdiğin teselli beni avutmaz Dermanı yardadır sende bulunmaz Boşuna benimle uğraşma doktor Dokunma benim gönül yarama, dokunma doctor"

His doctor being the Yali Capkini himself. The one who makes him forget all his darkness. Ferit breaks into conversation with his darkness. No light if not for Seyran, he tells his shadow there's no cure for it. Not even his mask can cover his wound now.

Alptekin gives his mourning a touch of her own mastery when he starts to dream of the Swan Queen. Seeing her in the dress he saw her in at a time that now feels like a dream, Ferit fools himself into breathing his soul next to him again.

Mert Ramazan's brutal display of Ferit, Burcu Alptekin's flow of expressionism, and Guldiyar Tanridagli's heart-piercing melody - The Ocean Dreams of The Sun...

He opens his eyes, the ice crackling on his surface.

Are you here? Asks the frozen ocean to the sunray that peeks from behind the surface.

Is the storm over? He asks her, shivering. Freezing.

Where would I go?’ The sunray looks at the ocean as if surprised.

‘Wherever you are, I am’ She wears a red dress to her lover’s demise.

The ocean breaks its spikes. Tears splash out as if broken ice.

The ocean had started crying in surmise.

‘Why do you cry beloved?’ asks the sun. ‘Do you not see me’ ‘Do you choose to be frozen still?’

Ocean cries to its tragedy still.

‘The night keeps me shivering beloved’ ‘You’re not real’ ‘You fool me with your warmth’ ‘The night keeps me frozen beloved’

‘I miss your smell. I miss your breath. I miss your light. I miss your warmth. I miss your fire. I miss your torment. I miss your voice.

I miss.

Your rise over my darkness every day. I miss your demise into my arms every evening.

Where has this night come from again beloved?

Where have you left me again?

It's dark here it’s cold.

It freezes me to something I’d left quite old.

I’m scared here, I’m bare-ed.

Take me away from here. Shine on me again beloved.

The ocean’s waves now break free. They reach up to the sun as if calling it home to its loving embrace.

The clouds came over me beloved I couldn’t see you anymore. They covered my eyes so that I couldn’t see yours anymore. Don’t torture me with this longing anymore.

The sun looks at her lost lover, lest…

She laughs a little and says ‘as if I ever left’.

His waves smile. His depths reconcile.

He cries when he smiles. He smiles when he cries.

He touches her with frozen waves, the gift that forever saves.

The stars come to wish them lies, but the sun and the sea stay to die.

The sun sets into the ocean, the love spills as if a potion.

She melts the ice, his frozen demise. He cools the constant trice. Her forever compromise.

Morning comes, they stay the same. The ocean mourns. It was all a game.

Suna Sanli: The Black Swan

(contrasting MBG's character to Heinz's)

How Suna Sanli possesses the duality in Yali Capkini is what concludes the scenarist's use of this risky but bold poly-perspectivity. We were informed of the Sanli sisters' separation from the very start, this stays through all the times Suna was quick to judge Seyran. The initial topped description for the character itself mentioned that Suna Sanli is set to get back at her sister for what she thinks is stealing her life.

This is not a pointer towards where Suna stands now but where she will in near future. Just like - while Seyran wears Odette in contrast to Ferit's Prince Seigfried, she also wears Odile as part of her own journey apart from Ferit - Suna too wears the same for her's. Considering Baris' enthusiasm for identity quest narratives, Suna Sanli is much likely to turn into the obsessive creative that Andres Heinz penned for his Black Swan in 2010. It is how she will embrace a little bit of both Odette and Odile but in a way entirely and brutally opposite to her sister.

The scene isn’t actually dedicated entirely to Seyran but to Suna’s future descent. Considering the ligatures Baris has contributed into the story inspired by epic projections and tales, it wouldn’t be too repelling if Suna is fated to possess the Black swan herself. Baris seems obsessed with psyco dualism, it is visible in most of his characters. 'Likewise “Black Swan’s” alter-ego rivalries and divided-ego visions connect intimately to the good-bad, white-black, active-passive Odette-Odile heroines of “Swan Lake.” First Nina (Suna's possible reference) is told she doesn’t have it in her to be both the white swan and the black. Eventually, however, it’s disconcerting how much of the contrasting heroines she does contain. I intend not a diagnosis for the character as the reference character Nina Sayers is clearly shown to possess, but only a mere contrast. Suna may as well see Seyran as her anti-Suna and not herself. Or she might fight herself for both roles like Nina Sayers. Ifakat's role in preparing Suna Sanli for revenge on her sister has been spoiled and introduced enough to let the viewer know it will eventually be Suna's fate. Whether the wedding with Saffet works or not, the plot will find its way into the mansion eventually. With Ifakat's mentorship comes perfectionism. With perfectionism? The Black Swan herself. Black Swan takes great pains to show the mental and physical toll that Nina's single-minded pursuit of ballet perfection takes on her. While perfection can mean different things to different people, Nina's arc — and the film as a whole — shows that the pursuit of perfection doesn't come without consequences. After all, achieving excellence can be gratifying, but chasing it can be deadly.

While Suna Sanli lives for her sister selflessly, it is not long until the mirror convinces her of betrayal (to herself rather than her sister).

Tariq Ihsanli: The Hidden Mephistopheles

While his juggling personality between humor and cruelty contrasts Kazim most and Kazim and Halis will continue playing the role, Von Rothbart who cages Odette and curses her to love possesses Tarik Ihsanli at current best.

Birds, animals, vultures reside at the Ihsanli mansion; The whole set made to depict the sorcerer's eery aboad possesses manner. Kazim and Halis may be behind the Swan queen's captivity, but it is Tarik who provokes and pulls the two at current. Perhaps it is he who took Odette from Seigfried's arms and it is he who creates situations for the two to grow apart.

Tarik's obsession with glassifying and caging humans and animals remains contrast again. Ballet enthusiasts are no stranger to Baron Von Rothbart initially approaching the princess for her hand in an abstract version of the tale. Rejected at which, the half-human - half vulture sorcerer implied that in captivity, she would cooperate and so cursed the youth to a limited presence in her world.

Seyran and Ferit - Fast, Purify, Revive.

Episode 31 continues drawing the same circles around the two protagonists. Same lack of communication, same demurrals, same prides masking hopeless love. Channeling Ceylan's 2008 award winner 'Uc Maymun', these characters are crowded for room. There’s no place to escape to in their lives. They’re always running up against one another’s motives, needs, problems. Things spiral more and more into an abyss until everything has to be at least acknowledged. Though as I said before, Mehmet Baris pointed out the problem visibly this episode to move forward to -finally- the solution.

Seyran and Ferit's marriage, that too forced is clearly the A-plot for most of Yali Capkini's episodes. It is an anchor Baris always returns to after exploring other sectors of the story. Now after completing a 30-episode hooking phase, he returns to linear parallels to prepare for the finale. Coffee being spilled, dates being set, it is the Pilot all over again.

Seyran Sanli and Ferit Korhan were never bound to love each other. Their marriage was never about them, their dreams, or their desires. It was a business deal between the greed for status and dominion that benefited only Kazim Sanli and Halis Korhan. Both punished each other for what their families had done to them all their life, both punished themselves when realized they'd started to love each other. Even though it was he who initiated the brutality (and is to redeem for it) they both kept serving hits at each other's prides and consciences until completely broken.

It was and still stays a game that never stops. Burcu Alptekin skillfully depicted which in a tradition that they'd formed between them:

There’s a seldom-used idiom in the design industry. Mr. Breitling said. “You’re investing time and money in playing Ping-Pong with the designer because they have a vision.”

The table tennis (Ping-Pong) game being parallelized to Seyran and Ferit’s past ones puts meaning into the game itself. The idiom is an analogy, where the heart of the discussion is a Ping-Pong ball, and the two parties engaged in the debate are like the players (S and F)

The presumption is that the metaphorical volley is an extended one, so the debate is lengthy, and it takes a long time for a consensus to be reached. Seyran and Ferit had played multiple times. Though they never decided on who had won for good. Every time one won, the other would postpone the match to another time (especially Seyran). Pointing to the desire to continue debating until settled.

Neither backed down, neither accepted defeat, ‘abla do you think Ferit will stop if I don’t stop first?’ the game continued until a third pad walked in. Ferit keeps hitting the ball at Pelin as if a wall. There were no hits from her side, indicating inability to keep up with the game and unsuitability to the opposing player. Hitting the ball against the wall denotes disappointment in a dream.

Ferit and Seyran, while stabbing each other constantly, actually were playing the game. Hitting one on another on another. Neither stopped. Kept hitting the ball, kept throwing it to the other’s side. Kept racing it up. Hyping it up. Though there is something different about this time and that is a manifestation of the game to call the last serve. Wearing white stripped sailor uniforms, making clear that soon they'll take steering of the ship, Seyran and Ferit are to soon realize their need to escape. Escape the sailors that captivate them, escape the cages that forbid them, escape a relationship that is -in all - forced. Still fooling not each other but themselves, they challenge each other to the hearing day.

Mabel Matiz's 'Aferin' and Ozcan Deniz's 'Kal de' to Burcu Alptekin's masterful direction and Demir and Saracoglu's piercing art don't deserve words. The musical take-through was magical and euphoric. Seyran and Ferit sacrifice their conscience and love at their rulers' feet again, fearing exposing it. Halis and Kazim saying the exact same things to them while they look at each other in death of hearts marks the brutality again.

The divorce marks apogee rise up for the two. If not ending the thing stopping them from accepting their feelings clearly, nothing else could measure up to an escape from their prides and prejudices. However, this is also the best opportunity to stand up to Halis and Kazim and find strength in their marriage. It is only forced until they reject it to be. Yali Capkini yet again floods the eye with possibilities. What matters however is that this is where it all ends for good. We've fasted, we've purified enough to realize our love, it is time we restart. The episode ends at Seyran's decision this time while it was Ferit's when they were married. Emrullah Hekim creates a unison in their perspective while leaving the viewer hooked until next week.

Seyran and Ferit have slowly been realizing 1: their hopelessness for each other and 2: their families' participation in ruining their lives. Mehmet Baris symbolized the core conflict of the plot with the 'Uc Maymun' depicted clearly in semiotic reference, while Seyran was seen saying things like: 'Let nobody think that I did not see or hear anything, since I was silent for so long.',' Before you, I was locked in that room. You didn’t say anything. You didn’t even see or hear me.', 'But you probably got used to closing your eyes to some things. Plugging your ears.', 'But you think that I too, would turn a blind eye and accept. Right? '

It is hinted not far that Seyran takes to her words and takes stand. The monkeys who refuse to see and hear will remain the same while the one who keeps silent will break it eventually. As for Seyran and Ferit's marriage, a little law talk even; the court can at most order separation until three months. Permanent Divorce can not be initiated until someone doesn't come up with opposing claims.

Halis had prepared a no-fault-contested divorce for Seyran and Ferit to sign. The claims being:

Both parties are mutually exclusive of each other and - There is no expectation of stability and compensation. Kazim after coming back from meeting Ferit of course still doubts Ferit's ability to divorce Seyran. He suspects Ferit will make a scene at court and so finds hope in the possibility that there were no physical relations between them so as to have the option to bring the topic up if something happens. 'It is called either alienation of affection or constructive abandonment, If a spouse is withholding sex, or using it as a weapon, this is immediate grounds for divorce. Marriage, as set forth in legal precedent, implies that there will be sex to withhold this is considered a divorceable offense. If your spouse refuses to sign the divorce papers and give consent (as Kazim expects Ferit to), you must prove the breakdown of the marriage, such as adultery or physical/mental cruelty. Physical cruelty being the alienation of affection in Kazim’s hopes. If you can show evidence of this when the court hears your divorce application, then you may be granted a divorce. Kazim of course (if does) plans to put the claim on Ferit instead of Seyran.

To conclude chapter 31;

Seigfried and Odette when refused to be let a future together, jump into the lake of tears. The lake of tears that then honors their misery by breaking the curse.