A deeper insight into the Chinese meme-lore surrounding Twistzz

The BLAST.tv Austin 2025 Major has given us dominant 3-0s from teams that were backed to go 0-3, colossal upsets, massive underdog runs, toppled Pick'Ems- everything one could ask for. While players on stream are fighting for survival at the Major, the chat has a whole different ball-game going with chat spams commonly referred to as "copy-pasta"- an endlessly nonchalant copy-paste of a pre-written lengthy text, often a shitpost.

During Liquid's game against Lynn Vision, the Chinese side were defying all odds one round at a time. Liquid at world #10 featured some of NA Counter-Strike's iconic figures like Twistzz and NAF alongside siuhy, NertZ and ultimate with no shortage of firepower. Lynn Vision, a Chinese side who were popular 0-3 picks in the first and second stages of the Austin Major, were yet again backed to go 0-3 in the third stage.

However, Lynn Vision outplayed Liquid on the pug-ish Dust2, putting up a dominant 13-5 win. While Lynn Vision were busy taking Chinese Counter-Strike to the next level, the chat kept spamming "宫监手！准备放监!". While people had an idea this was directed at Twistzz, the context was still unclear with google roughly translating the copy-pasta to "Palace guards! Prepare to release the prisoner!".

The fine folks at Dust2.us took a deep dive down the rabbit hole, decoding the copy-pasta and bringing out the context behind these Twistzz-centric chat spams and the lore behind other Chinese memes around Twistzz.

Sit back and enjoy the ride as Chinese journalist and Liquipedia editor EndPoem takes us on a safari outlooking the lore behind the Chinese meme culture targeting Twistzz. Here on out is a one to one interpretation of the conversation between Dust2.us and EndPoem.

Part 1: Why Twistzz is called "总监" (Director, Zong Jian in Pinyin):

Twistzz is called "Director" because he pays attention to his hairstyle in every game and his diverse hairstyles leave a deep impression on the audience. This reminds fans of the "hair director" (senior hairdresser) in a barber shop. We call it "发型总监" in Chinese which is shortened to "总监".

This is the base for this meme.

Part 2: "宫监手" (Gong Jian Shou in Pinyin)

"宫监手" contains multiple homophones:
"弓箭手" (archer, the same Pinyin with "宫监手").
"监" (it has two meanings, the first one is "Director", which means Twistzz himself, the second one is "Eunuch", which is related to the homophone in “宫”).
"宫" (short term of "宫斗", which means drama/gossip/tea/dirt within a palace in ancient China, or means the drama action when it is considered a verb).

Liquid brought in cadiaN for a while, but the stint didn't work out for the North American organization and the roster was soon disbanded and swapped out for the one that's running in the current iteration. Many believed that this change stemmed out from Twistzz's take on the roster where went on record criticizing the "work ethic" of the team under cadiaN. The next part of the meme is based on this narrative.

Part 3: "开宫没有回头监" & "宫监手，准备放监"

"开宫没有回头监" is the homophone of the Chinese proverb "开弓没有回头箭"; it means that once something has been done, it must be continued.
"宫监手，准备放监" is the homophone of "弓箭手，准备放箭" (Archer, ready to shoot).
These are often seen when Twistzz lost the game, and people are shitposting to roast him, also wondering if he'll start new drama to rebuild the roster again.