Xiu Jiekai pleads guilty in court, asks for probation over military-service evasion

Taiwanese actor Xiu Jiekai showed up in court this week and pleaded guilty to evading military service, formally asking the judge for probation. The news shot straight up the Weibo trending charts, and the reaction online was pretty much the same everywhere: wait, it actually got this far?

According to reports, Xiu was cooperative throughout the hearing and asked his friend Huang Kun-da to help pass along his request for leniency. His side told the court the lapse was driven by family considerations, not a deliberate attempt to dodge the draft.

The ruling has yet to come down, so whether he walks away with probation is still up to the bench. For fans, the bigger question may not be the verdict itself, but how someone once known as the nation's favorite on-screen dad rebuilds that image from here.